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Rack   Listen
noun
Rack  n.  A fast amble.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Rack" Quotes from Famous Books



... scrawl the word "captivity" across the desolate landscape. Even the ispravnik's room, with its heavy black furniture and sombre draperies, was suggestive of the Inquisition, and I searched instinctively around me for the rack and thumbscrews. How many a poor wretch had stood in this gloomy apartment waiting patiently, after months of unspeakable suffering, for some filthy hovel wherein to lay his head. It seemed to me that crape and fetters ...
— From Paris to New York by Land • Harry de Windt

... others—where it does not affect your own wages—is your rule, and you know it. What better joke is there than the joke about the union label? How many hats on your rack have union labels in them? How many of you can swear no sweatshop ever saw your clothes? How many of you would apologize for not offering your friend ...
— Editorials from the Hearst Newspapers • Arthur Brisbane

... he went thither again, and the morn was wild and stormy with drift of rain, and low clouds hurrying over the earth, though for the sunrise they lifted a little in the east, and the sun came up over the passes, amidst the red and angry rack of clouds. This morn also gave him no tidings of the token, and he was wroth and perturbed in spirit: but ...
— The Roots of the Mountains • William Morris

... have ears," remarked Aunt Rachel, sententiously, "and perhaps I have not. It's a new thing for a nephew to tell his aunt that she lies. They didn't use to allow such things when I was young.—But the world's going to rack and ruin, and I shouldn't much wonder if the people are right that says it's ...
— Timothy Crump's Ward - A Story of American Life • Horatio Alger

... wretched dwellings now occupied by the working classes—the miserable, uncomfortable, jerry-built "villas" occupied by the lower middle classes and by "business" people, will be left empty and valueless upon the hands of their rack renting landlords, who will very soon voluntarily offer to hand them and the ground they stand upon to the state on the same terms as those accorded to the other property owners, namely—in return for a pension. Some of these people will be content to live in idleness on the income allowed ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell

... convulsions, presenting the image of the same torture, and giving me nearly as much pain; for is it not a painful thing to watch the torture of a man who is busy painting pleasure for my benefit? Draw a curtain to hide the man from me, if he must show me the spectacle of a victim on the rack. In the midst of all these agitations and cries, if there occurred one of those harmonious passages where the bow moves slowly over several of the strings at once, his face put on an air of ecstasy, his voice softened, he listened to himself ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists - Volume II. • John Morley

... may find a way of doing without the question by hunger as we have done without the question by fire. It is equally possible, for the matter of that, that a future society may reestablish legal torture with the whole apparatus of rack and fagot. The most modern of countries, America, has introduced with a vague savor of science, a method which it calls "the third degree." This is simply the extortion of secrets by nervous fatigue; which is surely uncommonly close to their extortion by bodily ...
— What's Wrong With The World • G.K. Chesterton

... secured against the bulkhead, out of the way, thus leaving plenty of air space above me when I should be turned in. At the foot of the bunks there was a nice deep, double chest of drawers, surmounted by an ornamental rack-work arrangement containing a brace of water-bottles, with tumblers to match, together with vacant spaces for the reception of such matters as brushes and combs, razor-cases, and other odds and ends. Then there was a wash-stand, with a toilet-glass above it, and a cupboard beneath ...
— The Castaways • Harry Collingwood

... anybody to question it. Parnasius, who had been a prefect of Egypt, a man of spotless character, was banished for thus illegally seeking a knowledge of the future; and Demetrius Cythras, an aged philosopher, was put to the rack on a charge of having sacrificed to the god, and only released because he persisted through his tortures in asserting that he sacrificed in gratitude and not from a wish thus to learn ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 11 (of 12) • S. Rappoport

... Spenersberg Valley might not be applied. The very pictures hanging on the wall—engraved likenesses of the great masters Mozart and Beethoven—had their frames of well-woven willow twigs; and the rack which held the books and sheets of music was ornamented on each side with raised wreaths of flowers wrought by deft hands from the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 11, - No. 22, January, 1873 • Various

... "No doubt all this water is to drown me in? I hope you don't suppose that a person of my size could swallow it all." The executioner said not a word, but began taking off her cloak and all her other garments, until she was completely naked. He then led her up to the wall and made her sit on the rack of the ordinary question, two feet from the ground. There she was again asked to give the names of her accomplices, the composition of the poison and its antidote; but she made the same reply as to the doctor, only adding, "If you do not believe me, ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... convenient and satisfactory. It is provided with a cover that fits tight. In this cover, as shown, is an opening that may be closed or opened so as to regulate the amount of moisture inside the pan. In the bottom of the pan is a rack upon which the ...
— Woman's Institute Library of Cookery, Vol. 3 - Volume 3: Soup; Meat; Poultry and Game; Fish and Shell Fish • Woman's Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences

... I acted upon this suggestion and went to Madame Fontanieu, whom I found alone. I was forced to talk to her of the suit of Monsieur and Madame de Lauzun, which I pretended was the business I came upon, and cruelly did I rack my brains to say enough to keep up the conversation. When Fontanieu arrived, for he was soon found, fortunately, I was thrown into another embarrassment, for I had all the pains in the world to get away from Madame ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon

... not been long started before he begins to fidget and shuffle, and presently he hauls up a wicker basket beside him, undoes it, and fishes out a very nice dark purple kimono. His top hat goes into the rack. His collar, tie, and stud disappear. His coat comes off and is carefully folded on the seat. We watch the gradual unpeeling with an absorbed interest, wondering how far it will go. Luckily there are no ladies ...
— Round the Wonderful World • G. E. Mitton

... a break. In this case the unity of each piece supplies enough longitudinal resistance to strains. But when a vessel is large, and more especially when she is long, the strains known as hogging and sagging are apt to rack ...
— All Afloat - A Chronicle of Craft and Waterways • William Wood

... carefully sewed this flag with twine, and this part of the canvas I left and made it serve as the blade of my paddle; and so in due time I paddled to the Kansas shore. The river was rapid, and there were in the river heaps of drift-wood, called "rack-heaps," dangerous places into which the water rushed with great violence; but from these I was mercifully saved, and though I could not swim, I landed a few miles below Atchison without harm or accident, and made my way to Port William, ...
— Personal Recollections of Pardee Butler • Pardee Butler

... the rack!" commanded Mrs. Peck. "There's a drop of soup to go in first. And, Columbine, my dear, I don't think it's right of you to go losing your temper that way. Rufus is Adam's son, remember, and you can't refuse to sit at ...
— The Tidal Wave and Other Stories • Ethel May Dell

... lies the Laughing Lass, a little weather-worn, but sound as a dollar, and not a living being aboard of her. Her boats are all there. Everything's in good condition, though none too orderly. Pitcher half full of fresh water in the rack. Sails all O. K. Ashes of the galley fire still warm. I tell you, gentlemen, that ship hasn't been deserted more than a couple of days at ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams

... know. One of the railroad men I guess 'twas; anyhow he was a fresh young guy, with some sort of uniform hat on. He asked me if I didn't want him to put my bag up in the rack. He said you couldn't be too careful of a bag like that. I told him never mind my bag; it was where it belonged and it stayed shut up, which was more'n you could say of some folks in this world. I guess he understood; anyhow he beat it. Lordy!" with ...
— Thankful's Inheritance • Joseph C. Lincoln

... of defeat, first by angry glances, and at last by contemptuous murmurs. Seged likewise shared the anxiety of the day, for considering himself as obliged to distribute with exact justice the prizes which had been so zealously sought, he durst never remit his attention, but passed his time upon the rack of doubt, in balancing different kinds of merit, and adjusting the claims of ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson

... photographs ornamented the mantelpiece and were mixed up, without attempt at classification, with curious odds and ends which Peter had sent home from South Africa during the war time. Some riding-whips hung on a rack on the wall, side by side with a few strange sketches in oil-colours of Jane's favourite hunters, painted by herself. Peter thought the sketches were among the best he had ever seen, and even Jane was rather ...
— Peter and Jane - or The Missing Heir • S. (Sarah) Macnaughtan

... bleak domain, 30 Say, what tidings dost thou bring! Shouts, and the noise of battle! and again The winged wind blew loud a deadly blast; Shouts, and the noise of battle! the long main Seemed with hoarse voice to answer as he passed. The moody South went by, and silence kept; The cloudy rack oft hid his mournful mien, And frequent fell the showers, as if he wept The eternal havoc of this mortal scene. He had heard the yell, and cry, 40 And howling dance of Anarchy, Where the Rhone, with rushing flood, Murmured to the main, through blood:— He seemed to wish he could for ever throw His ...
— The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. 1 • William Lisle Bowles

... pitiable and galling result of a gallant fight. Even the insurance office had got the better of him. It had taken one-third of his savings, and the very next day his trade was gone, and his life in no danger. The "Gosshawk" had plucked him, and the trade had tied his hands. Rack his invention how he would, he could see no way of becoming a master in Hillsborough, except by leaving Hillsborough, and working hard and long in some other town. He felt in his own heart the love and constancy to do this; but his reason told him such constancy would be wasted; for while he ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade

... appeared at the breakfast, table we looked as if we had been on the rack, and Clementine's eyes betrayed her feelings, but our grief was respected. I could not be gay in my usual manner, but no one asked me the reason. I promised to write to them, and come and see them again the following year. ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... said This nonsense, throwing back my head With light complacent laugh, I found Suddenly all the midnight round One fire. The dome of heaven had stood As made up of a multitude Of handbreadth cloudlets, one vast rack Of ripples infinite and black, From sky to sky. Sudden there went, Like horror and astonishment, A fierce vindictive scribble of red Quick flame across, as if one said (The angry scribe of Judgment) 'There— Burn it!' And straight I was aware That ...
— An Introduction to the Study of Browning • Arthur Symons

... the common lot," thought Ayrault. "Earth cannot give that joy for which we sigh. Poor fellows! though you rack my ears and distress my heart, I cannot help ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds - A Romance of the Future • John Jacob Astor

... but in that case the form must be strictly subjunctive, and not indicative. 'If any member absents himself, he shall forfeit a penny for the use of the club'; this ought to be either 'absent,' or 'should absent.' 'If thou neglectest or doest unwillingly what I command thee, I will rack thee with old cramps'; better, 'if thou neglect or do unwillingly,' or 'if thou should neglect.' The indicative would be justified by the speaker's belief that the supposition is sure to turn out to ...
— The Verbalist • Thomas Embly Osmun, (AKA Alfred Ayres)

... from a rack on the table, Fo-Hi held it near a lamp and examined the contents—a few drops of colourless fluid. These he poured into a curious long-necked yellow bottle. He began to speak, ...
— The Golden Scorpion • Sax Rohmer

... gate in the counter, turn within the open doorway on our left, climb a short, narrow flight of stairs, and find ourselves in a small room, ten by fifteen, furnished with a green carpet, a bed lounge, an open book-rack, a high desk, a writing-desk, three arm-chairs, a short-legged table, and a small ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe

... reached to despair when he felt this relation between Warren and himself. Something within him cried out to him to reveal his identity. Warren would kill him; but it was not fear of death that put Cameron on the rack. He had faced death too often to be afraid. It was the thought of adding torture to this long-suffering man. All at once Cameron swore that he would not augment Warren's trouble, or let him stain his hands with blood. He would tell the ...
— Desert Gold • Zane Grey

... and brought before Torquatus, governor of Umbria, then residing at Spoletto, about the year 178. The martyr, paying no regard to his promises or threats, in the first interrogatory was beaten with clubs, and in the second was hung on the rack, but in the height of his torments he cheerfully sang: "Glory be to thee, Lord Jesus!" Three days after, two soldiers were sent by Torquatus, to behead him in the dungeon, unless he would offer ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... Brett was bowling along Knightsbridge in a hansom, having left Hume with a strict injunction to rack his brains for any further undiscovered facts bearing upon the inquiry, and turn up promptly at ...
— The Stowmarket Mystery - Or, A Legacy of Hate • Louis Tracy

... doin' a great deal for the family, and especially for the young lady, sir, out of his own pocket besides. But he still owed his father a couple of hundred pound an' more when this causality happened, while the business, I know, had been a-goin' to rack and ruin for the last three year. To-day I seen the agent of the insurance, and he says to me, "Legge," says he, most private like, "this is a bad job about young Oswald, I'm afeard, worse'n they know for." "Why, sir?" says I. "Well, Legge," says he, "they'll never ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen

... had not been suffered to go with him into hiding, had vanished as it were from the face of the earth. Nay, and we knew for what cause and reason, for Dame Henneleinlein had counselled the King's men to seize him, to the end that he might be put on the rack to give tidings of where his master lay hid. If they had caught him his stout limbs would have fared ill indeed; but the light-hearted varlet was a favorite with the serving men and wenches of the court-folk, jolly at the wine cup and all manner of sport, and thus ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... rope this early in the game, Sarge; you'll only throw yourself. Brace up. We've been in worse holes before." Never a word of what it might mean to him; never even hinted that the high moguls at Fort Walsh were more than likely to put him on the rack for letting any such lawless work be carried out successfully, in his own district. A Mounted Policeman can make no excuses for letting a tough customer slip through his fingers; the only way he can escape censure is to be brought in ...
— Raw Gold - A Novel • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... you to the rack," said he, "they will make you confess you did it yourself, whether you did it or no, and ...
— The Fortunate Mistress (Parts 1 and 2) • Daniel Defoe

... galley. They however that day seized a galliot laden with cotton, and made inquiry of the men concerning the fleet. They protested that they had not seen a ship since they left Gogo, and earnestly implored their mercy; but, instead of treating them with lenity, they put them to the rack, in order to extort farther confession. The day following, a fresh easterly wind blew hard, and rent the galliot's sails; upon this the pirates put her company into a boat, with nothing but a try-sail, no provisions, and only ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms

... bleak interior of the ancient, old-fashioned basilica, with its blackened roof-beams, unadorned walls, Travertine columns of the severest Tuscan pattern, and plain window-lattices, made an austere setting for the trial. I saw nowhere any rack, winches, horse, or any other engine or torture; but, while Dromo was gone, four muscular court-slaves came tramping In, each supporting a pole end. The two long poles were passed through the four ear-handles of a bronze brazier all of five feet square, ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White

... for Rex or Roland or some other kingly name." But my Uncle George protested. "Surely," said he, "you but jested: never yet did youth named Reggie scale the shining height of fame." Thus it was for weeks together, and I often wondered whether other parents ever suffered as I did upon the rack. All my uncles and my cousins and my aunts gave tips by dozens, so I named the babe John Henry, and for short we ...
— Rippling Rhymes • Walt Mason

... was medicinally good; 150 But when they fasten'd on their fester'd sore, Then justice and religion they forswore, Their maiden oaths debauch'd into a whore. Thus men are raised by factions, and decried; And rogue and saint distinguish'd by their side. They rack even Scripture to confess their cause, And plead a call to preach in spite of laws. But that's no news to the poor injured page; It has been used as ill in every age, And is constrain'd with patience all to take: 160 For what defence can Greek and Hebrew make? ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden

... suffered more than Michael," she said. "I have endured certain things in my life, but I could never have endured as you have done the loss of my peace of mind. How have you lived through these two years? What days and nights upon the rack ...
— Prisoners - Fast Bound In Misery And Iron • Mary Cholmondeley

... cordial and hearty; Mr. Hamlin's somewhat restrained. But, at Brown's urgent request, he followed him up the back stairs to a narrow corridor, and thence to a small room looking out upon the stable-yard. It was plainly furnished with a bed, a table, a few chairs, and a rack ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte

... eyes, so that he could see and comprehend its every movement. He became, thenceforth, not a spectator only, but a chief actor, in the poor minister's interior world. He could play upon him as he chose. Would he arouse him with a throb of agony? The victim was forever on the rack; it needed only to know the spring that controlled the engine;—and the physician knew it well! Would he startle him with sudden fear? As at the waving of a magician's wand, uprose a grisly phantom,—uprose a thousand phantoms,—in many shapes, ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... more? And yet I even tremble now," exclaimed Miss Godfrey to her astonished uncle, as he entered the house. "For heaven's sake, my beloved Frances what has thus dreadfully alarmed you?" returned the old gentleman. "Tell me I beseech you! I'm on the rack till I know what could possibly have the power of alarming you to this dreadful degree. Come my sweet girl, compose yourself and relate to me this "soul harrowing" tale; for I'm half inclined (seeing you smile) to suppose it some imaginary evil." It is ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 4, April 1810 • Various

... had depended fled before the action of the 20th, and the result of course made it impossible for them to return. The sultan's light cavalry harassed their communications by land. On the 25th, the general commanding wrote that his "mind was on the rack without a moment's rest since the departure of the fleet, considering the character of M. de Suffren, and the infinite superiority on the part of the French now that we are left to ourselves." From this anxiety he was relieved by the news ...
— The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 • A. T. Mahan

... into the sun? Have you ever come down through Madison Square late at night, when the relic of a moon was rising behind the tower, and the ghostly shaft stood up tremendous against the pale, racing cloud-rack? Have you seen it with the last pink glow of sunset upon it, and upon the western wall of the Flatiron Building, and upon nothing else, all lower buildings being in shadows of obscuring twilight? ...
— Penguin Persons & Peppermints • Walter Prichard Eaton

... and worn; but they looked comfortable, and were evidently in constant use. There was not the least attempt at prettiness anywhere. Pipes and books and old newspapers littered the chairs and tables; when an extra seat was needed Clarence simply tipped a great pile of these on to the floor. A gun-rack hung upon the wall, together with sundry long stock-whips and two or three pairs of spurs, and a smell of tobacco ...
— Clover • Susan Coolidge

... Gardeur!" burst out Colonel Philibert,—his voice could not repress the emotion he felt,—"and God bless Amelie! Think you she would care to see me to-day, Le Gardeur?" Philibert's thoughts flew far and fast, and his desire to know more of Amelie was a rack of suspense to him. She might, indeed, recollect the youth Pierre Philibert, thought he, as she did a sunbeam that gladdened long-past summers; but how could he expect her to regard him—the full-grown man—as the same? ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby

... divided screen that receives the enlarged image of the reticule fixed upon the needle. Upon this reticule are projected the rays (condensed by a powerful lens) that come from a luminous source placed behind the balance. The focusing is done by means of a rack and pinion. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 799, April 25, 1891 • Various

... out his treasures, and enrich Latium with a comprehensive language. The luxuriant he will lop, the too harsh he will soften with a sensible cultivation: those void of expression he will discard: he will exhibit the appearance of one at play; and will be [in his invention] on the rack, like [a dancer on the stage], who one while affects the motions of a satyr, at another of a ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace

... own the genuine thing, an electro-plated toast-rack will be all-sufficient. If you don't, well it's simply no good worrying around the bottom rung of the ladder which he has climbed, and from the top of which he sits making faces of ...
— Leonie of the Jungle • Joan Conquest

... turn'd these years agone; The Captal died in prison; and, over all, Edward the prince lies underneath the ground, Edward the king is dead, at Westminster The carvers smooth the curls of his long beard. Everything goes to rack—eh! and we too. Now, Curzon, listen; if they come, these French, Whom have I got to lean on here, but you? A man can die but once, will you die then, Your brave sword in your hand, thoughts in your heart Of all the deeds we have done here in France— ...
— The Defence of Guenevere and Other Poems • William Morris

... had exhausted the bishop's vitality, and he seemed hardly able to lift his head. The utter prostration of the man would have appealed to anyone save Cargrim, but that astute young parson had an end to gain and was not to be turned from it by any display of mental misery. He put his victim on the rack, and tortured him as delicately and scientifically as any Inquisition of the good old days when Mother Church, anticipating the saying of the French Revolution, said to the backsliders of her flock, 'Be my child, lest I kill thee.' So Cargrim, ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume

... Richards' hospitality and friendship by claiming back the money I had lent him, and for which he no doubt had good use. At the same time, it would have been rather Quixotic to let my own plantation go to rack and ruin for want of the funds by which he was profiting; and moreover, I had given Menou my word to be guided by him; so I put the receipt and my romantics in my pocket, and returned to the house to give my adviser an order for ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 348 • Various

... sensibility of feeling. If his intelligence perceived that there are qualities, individualities which claim exemption from ordinary rules, he had no desire to claim any such exemption for himself. Yet he found himself occupying the position of a man torn on the rack between a jealous wife for whom he has affection and esteem, and a mistress who compels his love. Only here was not alone a struggle but a mystery, and the knot admitted ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods

... the bright Queen who rules the tide Now forward thrown, now bridled back, Smile o'er each answering smile, then hide Her grandeur in the transient rack, And yield her power, and veil her pride, And ...
— Ionica • William Cory (AKA William Johnson)

... her long yarns of how I had spent my time at the Beechams; of the deafening ducts Harold and I had played on the piano; and how he would persist in dancing with me, and he being so tall and broad, and I so small, it was like being stretched on a hay-rack, and very fatiguing. I gave a graphic account of the arguments—tough ones they were too—that Miss Augusta had with the overseer on religion, and many other subjects; of one jackeroo who gabbed never-endingly about his ...
— My Brilliant Career • Miles Franklin

... Cutlets in Mint Jelly.—Roast a piece of what butchers call the rack of lamb, which is really the neck and ribs. Let it get cold; cut from it six cutlets, which trim just as if they were uncooked; that is to say, remove meat and fat from the bone, and scrape it. Mask ...
— Choice Cookery • Catherine Owen

... yet. The Devil and his lovely dam walk with you, Come fortify your self, if they do dy, Which all their ruggedness cannot rack into me, They cannot find an hour more Innocent, Nor more friends to ...
— The Little French Lawyer - A Comedy • Francis Beaumont

... "Great or small they are absolutely unfitted by their natural instincts to be landlords. Shrewdest of traders, most business-like in the matter of bargains, they are unable to take a broad view of the duties of landlord or to see that rack-renting will not pay ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell

... curiously carved pipe-rack hung, with some half dozen pipes of weird design, evidently the collection of years, while just under it a small table held the utensils sacred to ...
— The Sky Pilot in No Man's Land • Ralph Connor

... rack at the back of the wagon, because he wished for quiet in which to write a poem to celebrate the occasion, and the others forgot all about him until they drew under the shade of a grove of trees for the noonday halt, when, to their extreme consternation, it was found that ...
— The Adventurous Seven - Their Hazardous Undertaking • Bessie Marchant

... either in possession or expectance, and that these are its proper and only good, can you forbear thinking they make use of the soul but as a funnel for the body, while they mellow their pleasure by shifting it from one vessel to another, as they rack wine out of an old and leaky vessel into a new one and there let it grow old, and then imagine they have performed some extraordinary and very fine thing? True indeed, a fresh pipe may both keep and recover wine that hath thus been drawn off; but the mind, receiving ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch

... tragedy. Do this, and you will be giving Mr. Grant the greatest possible help. He needs it. Next Wednesday, at the adjourned inquest, he will be put on the rack. Ingerman will fee counsel to be vindictive, merciless. Such men are to be hired. Their reputation is built up on the slaughter of reputations. I want to understand Siddle before Wednesday. By the way, what's his ...
— The Postmaster's Daughter • Louis Tracy

... moved by indignation, dealt the emperor so heavy a blow on the head with his sword-knot as to bring the blood. It does not appear that he was made to suffer for his boldness, but two of the lower ecclesiastics, John of Nepomuk and Puchnik, were put to the rack to make them confess facts learned by them in the confessional. They persistently refused to answer. Wenceslas, infuriated by their obstinacy, himself seized a torch and applied it to their limbs to make them speak. They ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris

... the prison of the unfortunate Caroline Matilda, queen of Christian VII., and in the great vaults of which it is said the Danish Roland, Holger Dansk, still lives, his long white beard grown fast to a stone table. We were soon out of the Sound, plowing our way toward the famous Skager-Rack. The weather had been showery and threatening for some time. It now began to rain ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne

... my hands in my trousers-pockets, by walking instead of ambling or slouching, by wiping the mud from my shoes before entering the house, by a personally conducted tour through the realms of manicuring, and by learning the position and use of the hat-rack. Getting no school credits for such incidental minors in the great scheme of life, I grew careless and indifferent and acquired a reputation that I do not care to dwell upon. If those who had me in charge, or thought they had, had only been wise and given me school ...
— Reveries of a Schoolmaster • Francis B. Pearson

... flag for you," he said to Hamilton, "if I have to put every man, woman and child in this town on the rack. It lies, I think, between Miss Roussillon and the priest, although both insistently deny it. I've thought it over in every way, and I can't see how they can both be ignorant of where it is, or at least who ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson

... eat. Marse Thomas was a rich man and fed 'is Niggers well. Dey cooked in a big open fireplace and biled greens and some of de udder vittals in a great big pot what swung on a rack. Meat, fish and chickens was fried in a griddle iron what was sot on a flat topped trivet wid slits to let de fire thoo. Dey called it a trivet 'cause it sot on three legs and hot coals was raked up under it. Hoe cakes made ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume IV, Georgia Narratives, Part 1 • Works Projects Administration

... big-game animals of the country. "Well," said Father Zahm, "now you've shot them both!" The storm continued heavy until after sunset. Then the rain stopped and the full moon broke through the cloud-rack. Father Zahm and I walked up and down in the moonlight, talking of many things, from Dante, and our own plans for the future, to the deeds and the wanderings of the old-time Spanish conquistadores in their search for the Gilded King, and of the Portuguese ...
— Through the Brazilian Wilderness • Theodore Roosevelt

... water—were wound upon reels, making about two hundred pounds weight of wire to each reel. Two men and one mule were detailed to each reel. The pack-saddle on which this was carried was provided with a rack like a sawbuck placed crosswise of the saddle, and raised above it so that the reel, with its wire, would revolve freely. There was a wagon, supplied with a telegraph operator, battery and telegraph instruments ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... which I experienced on this solemn occasion, I have come to the conclusion that the man who is led to death is not as unhappy as the public imagines him to be. Fifty ideas presented themselves nearly simultaneously to my mind, and I did not rack my brain for any of them; I only recollect the two following, which have remained engraved on my memory. On turning my head to the right, I saw the national flag flying on the bastions of Figueras, and I said to myself, "If I were to move a few hundred metres, ...
— Biographies of Distinguished Scientific Men • Francois Arago

... itself, and needs nothing to help it out. It is always near at hand, and sits upon our lips, and is ready to drop out before we are aware; whereas a lie is troublesome, and sets a man's invention upon the rack; and one trick needs a great many ...
— Many Thoughts of Many Minds - A Treasury of Quotations from the Literature of Every Land and Every Age • Various

... they would no longer be willing to compete with one another so as to injure one another's business: they would out of pure goodwill organise into a "monopoly," and working this monopoly for the exclusive interest of themselves and their employees, rack-rent the consuming public; or if their benevolence extended to all their customers they would socialise their business, conducting it for the greatest good of all society. Such a form of socialised ...
— The Evolution of Modern Capitalism - A Study of Machine Production • John Atkinson Hobson

... rack of bones, limping, weary, sore. But see her foot lift! You can't kill the pride of the Barbary. She falters; her driver lashes her over the head. Trove is running toward her. He climbs a front wheel, and down comes the driver. In a minute Trove has ...
— Darrel of the Blessed Isles • Irving Bacheller

... with Bert as quickly as he could grab his cap off the rack, and the two brothers promptly started for ...
— The Bobbsey Twins at the Seashore • Laura Lee Hope

... am old and grey, My bones are rack'd with pain, And time speeds fast away— But why should I complain? There are joys in life's young morn That dwell not with the old. Like the flowers the wind hath torn, From the strem, ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie

... Poketown, I mean, of course. "It is a lovely place. But it must be confessed that it is a good deal behind the times. It is not as bad as Aunt 'Mira makes it out to be, I guess. Only, the old Day house has pretty well gone to rack and ruin." ...
— Janice Day, The Young Homemaker • Helen Beecher Long

... sorrows and pleasures of the world about them. To make a future heaven and hell take any hold of them at all, the church had to translate its mysteries and sublimities into a very material and crude ceremonial. It brought in penalties of a substantial sort,—penance and excommunication, the rack and the stake. It constantly appealed to fear. And after all, there remained always an enormous amount of stolid and mostly silent indifference and unbelief. The priest said these things were so,—the priests ...
— The Chief End of Man • George S. Merriam

... front door, hung her hat and coat on the rack, and stopped in the parlor to warm her hands at the stove. Then she went out through the diningroom, where the boys were getting their lessons at the long table; through the sitting-room, where Thor was asleep in his cot bed, his dress and stocking hanging on a chair. In the kitchen she stopped ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather

... into a warm and cheerful refuge from the darkness of the lower floor. The purring of the cat, comfortably settled on the telephone-stand, was as cheering as the singing of a kettle on a stove. On the rack near me my garden hat and an old Paisley shawl made a ...
— The Confession • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... he answered. "We were as much surprised as you are. Read that!" pointing to a card tilted against the music rack. ...
— Polly of Lady Gay Cottage • Emma C. Dowd

... made to listen, by means of a special course in tone production, which should go hand in hand with the technical exercises used at the very beginning. Otherwise they imagine they are making music when they place the printed page on the rack, and set ...
— Piano Mastery - Talks with Master Pianists and Teachers • Harriette Brower

... bounding, singing, dancing, ferns and mosses loved its track; Lower in it dipped the willows, as to kiss the cloudland's rack. ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... you see; we boast of our cupboards. The green paint is de rigueur; duck's egg colour; I've got to like it. That door leads into the bedroom. Well, after breakfast, about eleven o'clock that's to say, I light up—look at my pipe-rack—and read newspapers. Then, if it's fine, I walk about the streets, and see what new follies men ...
— In the Year of Jubilee • George Gissing

... ghost: O, let him pass! he hates him That would upon the rack of this tough world ...
— Essays of Robert Louis Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson

... crab-line anchors and floats were stacked along the side of the boat. There were three covered bushel baskets of crabs, and extra baskets stacked in place. One open basket held a dozen jumbo crabs. Orvil's net was in its rack on the engine box, but there was ...
— The Flying Stingaree • Harold Leland Goodwin

... his horse to the rack before the store and entered the crowded place. The fumes of tobacco smoke, vinegar, cheese, and various other commodities gave a distinctive flavor to Caleb Schell's store—and not a pleasant ...
— Hiram The Young Farmer • Burbank L. Todd

... wild-fowl, beat by the storm, were coursing below, on bewildered pinions; and, as I was nearing them, I knew I was descending. A breaking rift now admitted the sun. The rainbows tossed and gleamed; chains of fleecy rack, shining in prismatic rays of gold, and purple, and emerald, "beautiful ...
— Sanders' Union Fourth Reader • Charles W. Sanders

... thankful for the merciful haste of it that she could not, until long after, recall herself to mourn. And she did honestly mourn. The little John was glad of that. So ill and tired had she been for years and yet so bound upon the rack of her husband's Spartan theories for her, that John thought he could not have borne it if she had not adored her righteous tormentor, if she had had to look on him as her master, not her lord by love. It seemed to him he was always mourning over his mother, in those days, always ...
— Old Crow • Alice Brown

... moved back leaving a wide open space. The furnishings were rich, in excellent taste, the carpet a soft, green Wilton; the hanging lamp quite ornate, while a magnificent upright piano was firmly anchored against the butt of the aftermast. It was a yacht-like interior, even to the sheet music on the rack, and a gray striped cat dozing on one of the softly cushioned chairs. Gazing about, I could scarcely realize this was an abode of criminals, or that I was there a captive. It was the sudden grip of my guard which brought the truth ...
— Gordon Craig - Soldier of Fortune • Randall Parrish

... occupied a very low and insignificant position in the service. Then, after his first wife (mother of the younger Pokrovski) had died, the widower bethought him of marrying a second time, and took to himself a tradesman's daughter, who soon assumed the reins over everything, and brought the home to rack and ruin, so that the old man was worse off than before. But to the younger Pokrovski, fate proved kinder, for a landowner named Bwikov, who had formerly known the lad's father and been his benefactor, ...
— Poor Folk • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... hitched to the big lumber wagon. Father and Hobson took the wagon box off and put the wide hay-rack on. ...
— Bobby of Cloverfield Farm • Helen Fuller Orton

... exhibition was a very painful one, putting a heavy strain upon the spectator. For be a fellow creature never so displeasing in nature and in habit, never so cankered by vanity and self-love, it cannot be otherwise than hideous to see him upon the rack. And that de Courcy Smyth was very actually upon the rack—a rack well deserved, may be, and of his own constructing, but which wrenched his every joint to the agony of dislocation nevertheless—there could be no manner of doubt. Coming as conclusion ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet

... to have to go," she said; "for my time is up just in the middle of my busy season, and that's goin' to throw me back dreadfully. He hasn't done right by me, that Mr. Rooper, in lettin' things go to rack and ruin in this way, and me payin' his ...
— A Chosen Few - Short Stories • Frank R. Stockton

... half that I spent in going through the gorges of the Yangtse were the most exhausting part of my whole trip; from the mere strain of seeing and feeling, one's senses were all the time on the rack. Scenes of overpowering savagery and grandeur that held one spellbound, were relieved by beautiful bits of cultivation, little hamlets of brown houses and red temples half concealed in groves of golden bamboo and the glossy green of orange trees; moments when ...
— A Wayfarer in China - Impressions of a trip across West China and Mongolia • Elizabeth Kendall

... in the light-house tower, And trimmed the lamps as the sun went down; And they looked at the squall, and they looked at the shower, And the rack it came rolling up, ragged and brown; But men must work, and women must weep, Though storms be sudden, and waters deep, And the ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry

... potatoes of a uniform size. Parboil for 10 minutes, then put in a dripping-pan with the meat or on a rack in a baking-pan. ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Household Science in Rural Schools • Ministry of Education Ontario

... is—and how convenient!" exclaimed Selma. "I haven't felt this way since the first time I went to the circus." She pointed to a rack from which were suspended thin silk dressing gowns of various rather gay patterns. "What ...
— The Conflict • David Graham Phillips

... adjusted each time it is tuned. The hammers need occasional and careful attention to preserve original tone quality and elasticity. Never allow the piano to be beaten or played hard upon. This is ruinous to both the action and tuning. When not in use the music rack and top should be closed to exclude dust. The keyboard need never be closed, as the ivory needs both light and ventilation and will eventually turn yellow ...
— The Handy Cyclopedia of Things Worth Knowing - A Manual of Ready Reference • Joseph Triemens

... and I think you tend the same way. Please take the trouble to make the two lines I have scored into a paragraph, so that poor devils who are not quite so well up in the subject as yourself may not have to rack their brains for an hour to supply all the links of ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 1 • Leonard Huxley

... mint leaves, remove from stems and rub each leaf gently with the finger dipped in Egg white slightly beaten. Mix 3 tablespoons granulated sugar with 3 drops oil of spearmint, and sift over each side of the mint leaves. Lay close together on a cake rack covered with wax paper and leave in a warm but not a hot place until crisp and dry. Serve in Tea with ...
— For Luncheon and Supper Guests • Alice Bradley

... entered the cabin, still drying his hands on a towel. "Greetings," he said. "Evidently we're fellow passengers for the duration." He hung the towel on a rack, reached out a hand. "Rodriquez," he said. "You can call me Paco, if you want. Did you ever meet an Argentine ...
— Combat • Dallas McCord Reynolds

... very wilderness of agonies. Heaven guard us from them! To crown all, the sufferings of Caliban under the magical touches of Prospero are applied to the wretched dyspeptic, who has "cramps by night, and side-stitches to pen his breath up; old cramps (one attack is not sufficient) shall rack him and fill his bones with aches, making him roar so loud, that beasts shall tremble at his din;" this is the very climax of bodily suffering—long may we all be preserved ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various

... entered, he stopped before the hat-rack, and told me "just to walk into the parlor;—his daughter might be there." I could not rush in impetuously, I had to steady my color. Besides, ought I not to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 6, April, 1858 • Various

... but I found myself at last in a narrow room, surrounded with squalidness, its only light from a high-barred window, and its only furniture the wooden tressel on which I lay, fierce, weary, and feverish, as if I lay on the rack. From this couch of the desperate, I was carried into the presence of a magistrate, to hear that in the melee of the night before, I had in my rage charged my honest-faced acquaintance with palpable cheating; and having made good my charge by shewing the loaded dice in his hand, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 12, Issue 337, October 25, 1828. • Various

... got the Pearl of great price feel that he had given too much for it, even if he had given all that he had? Never! Martyrs and confessors have gloried in the possession of it while they have writhed on the rack and in the flames, and you never heard one solitary testimony that any man or woman of God ever thought that they had paid too highly for it. Never! Do you want to have your prayers answered? That is the way. Walk so that your own heart condemns you not. The obedient ...
— Godliness • Catherine Booth

... fated to be driven from post to post, never daring to proclaim himself openly the foe of the man he dreaded and hated. Cranmer, with his tolerant spirit, he despised. Here was an archbishop who might rack and burn for discipline's sake, and he did nothing.... And all these New Learning men with their powers of language, these dark bearded men with twinkling and sagacious eyes, he detested. He went clean shaved, lean and yellow-faced, with a hooked nose ...
— The Fifth Queen • Ford Madox Ford

... to the great unused upper story, where heaps of household rubbish obscured the dusty half-windows. In a corner, behind Louise's baby chair and an unfashionable hat-rack of the old steering-wheel pattern, they found the little brown-painted tin ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various

... I said, "but my butter-dish was doing itself proud. It had sneaked up to a magnificent toast-rack with stabling accommodation for about eight pieces, given by somebody with a title. And you ought to have seen the fish-slices. The fish-slices wore gorgeous. I expect William will spend a great part of ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, July 29, 1914 • Various

... a gallery we are glad to see every style of excellence, and are ready to amuse ourselves with Teniers and Gerard Dow, so we derive great pleasure from the congenial delineations of Castle Rack-rent and Waverley; and we are well assured that any reader who is qualified to judge of the illustration we have borrowed from a sister art, will not accuse us of undervaluing, by this comparison, either Miss ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson

... not to be balked. He pointed to the coat-rack on the wall in front of them both. "There is Henry de Spain's coat. He hung it there just before he went down to the inn. Under it, if you look, you'll find his belt of cartridges. Don't take ...
— Nan of Music Mountain • Frank H. Spearman

... peacefully winged its way to the bosom of its God, or was hastily driven forth upon the dagger's point, whether some kind friend closed her eyes in death, and decently robed her cold limbs for the grave, or whether torn upon the agonizing rack, whether she is left to moulder away in some dungeon's gloom, or thrown into the quickly consuming fire, we could never know. These, and many other questions that might have been asked, will never be answered until the last great day, when the grave shall give up its dead, and, ...
— Life in the Grey Nunnery at Montreal • Sarah J Richardson

... point in the race or flume, the flow should be protected from leaves and other trash by means of a rack. This rack is best made of 1/4 or 1/2-inch battens from 1-1/2 to 3 inches in width, bolted together on their flat faces and separated a distance equal to the thickness of the battens by means of iron washers. This ...
— Electricity for the farm - Light, heat and power by inexpensive methods from the water - wheel or farm engine • Frederick Irving Anderson

... after another. "Never mind," said the mother, with a still deeper disappointment in her own tone; "perhaps he had to go to see some poor body who is sick." In the hurry of picking up all the parcels, and the sleepy babies, the poor daisies and buttercups were left forgotten in a corner of the rack. I wondered if the mother had not intended this. May I be forgiven for the injustice! A few minutes after I passed the little group, standing still just outside the station, and heard the mother ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various

... he fa'rly wipe up de face er de yeth wid 'im. You better b'leeve dat w'en Mr. Dog got a chance to make hisse'f skase he tuck it, en w'at der wuz lef' un him went skaddlin' thoo de woods like hit wuz shot outen a muskit. En Brer Coon, he sorter lick his cloze inter shape en rack off, en Brer Possum, he lay dar like he wuz dead, twel bimeby he raise up sorter keerful like, en w'en he fine de coas' cle'r he scramble up en scamper off like ...
— Uncle Remus • Joel Chandler Harris

... her discretion, and there was toast on the table. A beam of Spring's morning sunlight illuminated the toast-rack. He sat, and ate, and munched the doubt whether "not till" included the final day, or stopped short of it. By this the state of his brain may be conceived. A longing for beauty, and a dark sense of an incapacity to thoroughly ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... the mathematician with a clear voice. "Come in! The lady has not broken her word, nor by me shall she be petitioned to do so. It is I who will quit this place. You have succeeded, Sir John, in your revenge—you have succeeded, and yet perhaps it is an imperfect success. You shall not rack the heart, though you should starve the body. You think, perhaps, I shall pursue you with objurgation or entreaty. You are mistaken. I leave you to the enjoyment of your triumph, and to the peace which a blunted conscience will, I know, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 360, October 1845 • Various

... his painful pine doth rack this frame of me; * Melts heart and maims my vitals cruel agony; And rail my tears like cloud that rains the largest drops; * And fails my hand to find what seek I fain to see: Thee I conjure, O Yusuf, by Him made thee King * O Sahl-son, Oh our dearest prop, our dignity, This man ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton



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