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Block   /blɑk/   Listen
Block

noun
1.
A solid piece of something (usually having flat rectangular sides).
2.
A rectangular area in a city surrounded by streets and usually containing several buildings.  Synonym: city block.
3.
A three-dimensional shape with six square or rectangular sides.  Synonym: cube.
4.
A number or quantity of related things dealt with as a unit.  "He held a large block of the company's stock"
5.
Housing in a large building that is divided into separate units.
6.
(computer science) a sector or group of sectors that function as the smallest data unit permitted.
7.
An inability to remember or think of something you normally can do; often caused by emotional tension.  Synonym: mental block.
8.
A simple machine consisting of a wheel with a groove in which a rope can run to change the direction or point of application of a force applied to the rope.  Synonyms: pulley, pulley-block, pulley block.
9.
A metal casting containing the cylinders and cooling ducts of an engine.  Synonyms: cylinder block, engine block.
10.
An obstruction in a pipe or tube.  Synonyms: blockage, closure, occlusion, stop, stoppage.
11.
A platform from which an auctioneer sells.  Synonym: auction block.
12.
The act of obstructing or deflecting someone's movements.  Synonym: blocking.



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"Block" Quotes from Famous Books



... 17 B. C., fitted together, make a block three metres high, containing one hundred and sixty-eight minutely inscribed lines. This monument, now exhibited in the Baths of Diocletian, was in the form of a square pillar enclosed by a projecting frame, with base and capital of the Tuscan order, and it measured, when entire, four metres ...
— Pagan and Christian Rome • Rodolfo Lanciani

... gave plenty of trouble to the civil authorities. All this is true of Salvationism to-day; and we have no doubt that the early Church, under the guidance of Peter, was just a counterpart of the Salvation Army under "General" Booth—to the Jews, or men of the world, a stumbling-block, and to the Greeks, or educated ...
— Arrows of Freethought • George W. Foote

... a busy man of affairs in these days, walked up the stairs of the big block of flats in which he had his modest dwelling with a little smile upon his lips and a sense of cheer in his heart. There were many reasons why this broken adventurer, who had arrived in London only a few months before with little more than his magnificent wardrobe, should feel happy. He ...
— The Secret House • Edgar Wallace

... perhaps, but I casually mentioned in the smoking-room one night that some curious fool of a gardener boy had thrown some stones and frightened Strangeways, and that Pearson and I were watching for him, and that if I caught him I was going to knock his block off— bing! He didn't do it again. Darned fool! What does ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... profession, but Colonel Jinks took kindly to the suggestion. It would bring a little real militarism into the family and give a kind of ex post facto justification to his ancient title. "Sam, my boy," said he, "you're a chip of the old block. You'll keep up the family tradition and be a colonel like me. I will write to your Uncle George about it to-morrow. He'll get you an appointment to East Point without any trouble. Sam, I'm proud ...
— Captain Jinks, Hero • Ernest Crosby

... work I ever did seemed to meet with severe opposition from church members. This is a great stumbling-block to some. The church crucified our blessed Christ, that is, it was the hypocrites; for the church is the light and salt, the body of Christ. "If I yet please men, I should not be the servant of Christ." There is no other organization but the church of Christ that persecutes ...
— The Use and Need of the Life of Carry A. Nation • Carry A. Nation

... subject. Formerly they cut little pieces of black-lead out of lumps of the natural black-lead such as you see there; but now-a-days they powder the black-lead, and then compress the very fine powder into a block. There is a block of graphite or black lead, for instance, prepared by simple pressure (Fig. 18 b). The great pressure to which the powder is subjected brings these fine particles very close together, when ...
— The Story of a Tinder-box • Charles Meymott Tidy

... away. There was nothing to make him know that a group of curious alley-dwellers huddled at the mouth of the trap in which he stood, watching with eyes accustomed to the darkness, to see what would happen; to block his escape if escape should ...
— Lo, Michael! • Grace Livingston Hill

... matter," said Cecil simply, as he paused a moment before some delicate little statuettes and carvings—miniature things, carved out of a piece of ivory, or a block of marble the size of a horse's hoof, such as could be picked up in dry river channels or broken off stray boulders; slender crucifixes, wreathes of foliage, branches of wild fig, figures of Arabs and Moors, ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]

... with baskets on their heads, or under their arms, fish-wives, quack-doctors, cutpurses, bonarobas, merchants, lawyers, and serving-men, who came to be hired, and who stationed themselves near an oaken block attached to one of the pillars, and which was denominated, from the use it was put to, the "serving-man's log." Some of the crowd were smoking, some laughing, others gathering round a ballad-singer, who was chanting one of Rochester's own licentious ditties; some ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth

... made of many thick quilts, and the pillow a little block of wood! We should think it very uncomfortable, but the Twins' Mother did not think so. She lay with the wooden pillow under her head in such a way that her hair was not mussed by it— instead, it looked ...
— THE JAPANESE TWINS • Lucy Fitch Perkins

... goddess of works,) in fashioning blocks of stones, for the repair of the heavens, prepared, at the Ta Huang Hills and Wu Ch'i cave, 36,501 blocks of rough stone, each twelve chang in height, and twenty-four chang square. Of these stones, the Empress Wo only used 36,500; so that one single block remained over and above, without being turned to any account. This was cast down the Ch'ing Keng peak. This stone, strange to say, after having undergone a process of refinement, attained a nature of efficiency, and could, by its innate powers, set itself into motion and was ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin

... canvass of the New York delegation showed that nearly one-fourth of its members believed it was extremely doubtful if Seward could obtain a majority at the polls in that State."—H.B. Stanton, Random Recollections, pp. 214-15. "Perhaps the main stumbling block over which he fell in the convention was Thurlow ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander

... weakness as he performed the last duties of mortal life; and kneeling down on the bare boards, he was supported by his servant, while the minister, John Lamotius, delivered a prayer. When prepared for the block, he turned to the spectators and said, with a loud and firm voice, 'My friends, believe not that I am a traitor. I have lived a good patriot, and such I die.' He then, with his own hands, drew his cap over his eyes, and bidding the executioner 'be quick,' ...
— A Wanderer in Holland • E. V. Lucas

... a shipload together and started them off for Russia—the "Red Ark" it was called, and the Red soap-boxers set tip a terrific uproar, and one Red clergyman compared the "Red Ark" to the Mayflower! Also there was some Red official in Washington, who made a fuss and cancelled a whole block of deportation orders, including some of Peter's own cases. This, naturally, was exasperating to Peter and his wife; and on top of it came another incident that ...
— 100%: The Story of a Patriot • Upton Sinclair

... touching of the electric button which, in our day, sets in motion for the first time a vast mechanical system, or fires a simultaneous salute of guns in a hundred cities. King Charles I., who was to lose his anointed head on the block because he tried to crush popular liberty in England, was the immediate human instrument of giving the purest form of such liberty to English exiles beyond ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne

... Waverley, my grandsire,' he said, 'with two hundred horse, whom he levied within his own bounds, discomfited and put to the rout more than five hundred of these Highland reivers, who have been ever LAPIS OFFENSIONIS, ET PETRA SCANDALI, a stumbling-block and a rock of offence to the Lowland vicinage—he discomfited them, I say, when they had the temerity to descend to harry this country, in the time of the civil dissensions, in the year of grace sixteen hundred forty and two. And now, sir, I, his grandson, ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott

... September 1571, and placed on his trial in the following January. He was condemned to death, but as Elizabeth did not wish to take the responsibility of his execution on herself she waited until it had been confirmed by Parliament, after which he was led to the block (2nd June 1572). Parliament also petitioned for the execution of the Queen of Scotland, but for various reasons Elizabeth refused to ...
— History of the Catholic Church from the Renaissance • Rev. James MacCaffrey

... have heard the Hamelin people Ringing the bells till they rocked the steeple. "Go," cried the Mayor, "and get long poles, Poke out the nests and block up the holes! Consult with carpenters and builders, 150 And leave in our town not even a trace Of the rats!"-when suddenly, up the face Of the Piper perked in the market-place, With a, "First, if you please, ...
— Dramatic Romances • Robert Browning

... the serpents stinging at my breast), Gayly, when I in the dumb grave am lying, Pour the warm wish or speed the wanton jest, Or play, perchance, with his new maiden's tresses, Answer the kiss her lip enamored brings, When the dread block the head he cradled presses, And high the blood ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... and having got leave to go home to arrange his affairs beforehand, the former pledged his life for his return, when just as, according to his promise, he presented himself at the place of execution, Pythias turned up and prepared to put his head on the block; this behaviour struck the tyrant with such admiration, that he not only extended pardon to the offender, but took ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... or absence of the habit of barking cannot, then, be regarded as an argument in deciding the question concerning the origin of the dog. This stumbling block consequently disappears, leaving us in the position of agreeing with Darwin, whose final hypothesis was that "it is highly probable that the domestic dogs of the world have descended from two good species of wolf (C. lupus and C. latrans), and from two or three other doubtful ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton

... and no writer was more so than Benjamin, young as he was. This was the real cause of the action of the Assembly. A letter appeared in the Courant, justly rebuking the government for dilatoriness in looking after a piratical craft off Block Island. The letter purported to come from Newport, and represented that the Colony were fitting out two vessels to capture her. ...
— From Boyhood to Manhood • William M. Thayer

... may be noothing beyoond admeeration," observed the Captain of Grenadiers, "a tell ye as a freend, Geerald, a do not like this accoont ye gi' of her coonduct. A wooman who could show no ageetation in sooch a scene, must have either a domn'd coold, or a domn'd block hairt, and there's but leetle claim ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson

... regarded it for a few seconds and raised his eyes mournfully to Mr. Harper himself, as much as to say that he would give the young man a chance to take it back if he could—if the words had not been spoken which would bring the offender to the block in the bloom and enthusiasm of youth. Misguided Mr. Harper had committed ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... conceivable shape and size, with long and tortuous channels intersecting the land in every direction; yet vain men, anxious to put barriers in the way of future navigators, draw large continents, where no one has dared to penetrate to see whether there be such or not, and block up natural outlets ...
— Stray Leaves from an Arctic Journal; • Sherard Osborn

... reinforcements. At first, I had no thought of doing more than breaking down the bridge, and of perhaps checking the advanced cavalry; but when I found that the peasants who came along were quite willing to aid, it seemed to me that by cutting down the trees, so as to block the road and make a shelter for us, we might be able to cause the enemy considerable delay. I hardly hoped to succeed in holding out so long, or in inflicting such loss upon him as we were able to do. It did ...
— No Surrender! - A Tale of the Rising in La Vendee • G. A. Henty

... certain to return new members at a general election. All the elections take place on one day, and if a member—even the leader of a party—loses his seat, he may be cut out for years. This is a misfortune, as experience is a quality of which the House is apt to run short. Block votes frequently prevent elections from being fought on the practical questions of the hour. The contests are inexpensive, and there is very little of the cynical blackmailing of candidates and open subsidising by members ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves

... writer sees an idea which he thinks may illustrate a principle he knows of. The observed fact must illustrate the principle, but he must shape it to that end. A carver takes a block of wood and sets out to make a vase. First he cuts away all the useless parts: The writer should reject all the useless facts connected with his story and reserve only what illustrates his idea. Often, however, ...
— The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language - Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric • Sherwin Cody

... us waste more time talking about it, boys.—Hold it up, Peterkin. There, lay the hind-leg on this block of wood—so;" and he cut it off, with a large portion of the haunch, at a single blow of the axe. "Now the other—that's it." And having thus cut off the two hind-legs, he made several deep gashes in them, thrust a sharp-pointed stick through each, and stuck them up before the blaze ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne

... now called Broadway." A block of houses and another street now lie between that highway and the east front of the manor-house. The building is closely hemmed in by the sordid signs of progress. Ugly houses, in crowded blocks, cover all the great surrounding ...
— The Continental Dragoon - A Love Story of Philipse Manor-House in 1778 • Robert Neilson Stephens

... while the wind whistling through the rigging—ropes slashing about—the seas dashing— the bulkheads creaking—the masts and spars groaning, created a perfectly deafening uproar. Then came a clap like thunder—the foretack had parted, and the block striking a seaman had carried him overboard. To attempt to pick him up was useless—he must have been killed instantaneously. For a moment there was confusion; but the voice of the captain, heard above all other sounds, quickly restored order. While the topmen were clearing ...
— The Three Lieutenants • W.H.G. Kingston

... had struck before I got into the air, that was scented, not disagreeably, by the chips and shavings of the long-shore boat-builders, and mast, oar, and block makers. All that water-side region of the upper and lower Pool below Bridge was unknown ground to me; and when I struck down by the river, I found that the spot I wanted was not where I had supposed it to be, and was anything but easy to find. It was called Mill ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens

... I c'n smell a rat already, Jack," chuckled Perk as he wrapped up the remnant of the food supply which he had taken from their main stock—"I'm the goat in the deal—you figger on me stayin' here in this 'gator hole to stand by the ship an' knock the block off'n anybody what tries to get away with our property—how's that for a straight hit ...
— Eagles of the Sky - With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes • Ambrose Newcomb

... allude to Fort Leavenworth, he always told the story of his "contracting" at Leavenworth on the corner of Fifth and Shawnee Streets. Out there at Fort Zara, Bill enjoyed himself as only Irishmen can, but his stumbling block was Captain Conkey, who was the biggest crank on earth, "take it from me," for he and I had a little "set-to." Daugherty always sent his "red, white and blue regards to the old merchant" by ...
— The Second William Penn - A true account of incidents that happened along the - old Santa Fe Trail • William H. Ryus

... and so it must. And I will add, it is a shame, it is a reproach, it is a stumbling-block to the blind; {131f} for though men be as blind as Mr. Badman himself, yet they can see the foolish lightness that must needs be the bottom of all these apish and wanton extravagancies. But many have their excuses ready; to wit, their Parents, ...
— The Life and Death of Mr. Badman • John Bunyan

... gates are flung open, and straightway, By Ambrose and Cyril led on, Our own men rush out through the gateway; One charge, and the entrance is won! No! our foes block the gate and endeavour To force their way in! Oath and yell, Shout and war-cry wax wilder than ever! Those children of Odin fight well; And my ears are confused by the crashing, The jarring, the discord, the din; And mine eyes are perplex'd by the flashing ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon

... tramp through the muddy winter streets, they came upon a new block of warehouses, in the lower windows of which some bills announced a night-school for boys and men. Here, to judge from the commotion round the doors, a lively scene was going on. Outside, a gang of young roughs were hammering at the doors, and shrieking witticisms through the ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... Long Island, they came to an island, which may have been Block Island, and thence to a harbor, which was probably that of Newport. Here they stayed fifteen days, most courteously received by the inhabitants. Among others appeared two chiefs, gorgeously arrayed in painted deer-skins,—kings, ...
— Pioneers Of France In The New World • Francis Parkman, Jr.

... spoken by the resolute men. The stony pavement echoed their measured, heavy tread. Turning into Broadway they saw the enemy but a block and a half away, a howling mob, stretching northward as far as the eye could reach. It was sweeping the thoroughfare, thousands in line. Pedestrians, stages, vehicles of all kinds, were vanishing down side-streets. Pallid shopkeepers were closing their stores as sailors take in sail ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe

... small, dark, sometimes cut out of one block of stone. It was surrounded on all sides by chapels equally small, filled with garments, furniture, vessels and jewels of the god which in its inaccessible seclusion slept, bathed, was anointed with perfumes, ate, drank, ...
— The Pharaoh and the Priest - An Historical Novel of Ancient Egypt • Boleslaw Prus

... strength and secret endurance of sorrow. He wore one of those tight, frogged overcoats which were then called "polonaise." Thick, black hair, rather unkempt, covered his square head, and Clementine noticed his broad forehead shining like a block of white marble, for Paz held his visored cap in his hand. The hand itself was like that of the Infant Hercules. Robust health flourished on his face, which was divided by a large Roman nose and reminded Clementine of some ...
— Paz - (La Fausse Maitresse) • Honore de Balzac

... go with you," Farrell answered, "but it's just a chance in a thousand. I should be on the block down at Sheepshead, but, to tell you the truth, the hot pace the backers set me at Brooklyn knocked me out a bit. I'm goin' to take a breather for a few days an' lay again' 'em next week. Yes, I'll ...
— Thoroughbreds • W. A. Fraser

... mother until he went to sleep and that when he awoke it was to find that the clasp still held. It was a long time before he realized that what to him were whimsical pranks, were in the nature of tragedies to his parents. If he put a stumbling-block in one of their paths, it upset the whole fabric of their daily life, made them feel, I suppose, that they were losing such faculties as they possessed: memory and the sense of touch—and they would be obliged either to walk with infinite ...
— The Spread Eagle and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris

... praise from travellers and writers for their industry; their thrift; their cleanliness; Charles Dickens saw all this, but it never occurred to him to credit their religion with it. When the contrary occurs, and when fault is to be found, Popery, like a hack-block kept for such purposes, is made responsible, and receives a blow. He had, indeed, a sad misgiving that the religion of Ireland lay deep at the root of her sorrows. Surely this is enough to try one's patience. We have passed ...
— The History of the Great Irish Famine of 1847 (3rd ed.) (1902) - With Notices Of Earlier Irish Famines • John O'Rourke

... solid. If in the doors of the Pantokrator or the Pantepoptes the line of the inner jamb be continued through the rebate, it will correspond on the outside with the bowtell moulding, as though the inner and outer architrave had been cut from one square-edged block, placing the bowtell at the angle and adding the rebate. This formation is not followed in S. John ...
— Byzantine Churches in Constantinople - Their History and Architecture • Alexander Van Millingen

... Until they reached the corner of Thames Street they saw nothing beyond the red column of flame and the showers of sparks mingling with clouds of smoke; but when once they reached the corner, a terrible sight was revealed to them, for the whole block of buildings between Pudding Lane and New Fish Street was a mass of flames, and the fire seemed to be like a living thing, driven onwards before ...
— The Sign Of The Red Cross • Evelyn Everett-Green

... are still fair judges of public matters; for, unlike any other nation, regarding him who takes no part in these duties not as unambitious but as useless, we Athenians are able to judge at all events if we cannot originate, and, instead of looking on discussion as a stumbling-block in the way of action, we think it an indispensable preliminary to any wise action at all. Again, in our enterprises we present the singular spectacle of daring and deliberation, each carried to its highest point, and both ...
— The History of the Peloponnesian War • Thucydides

... Our segundo had thoroughly ridden over the country, the range was a desirable one, and we soon came to terms with the agent. He was looked upon as a necessary adjunct to the success of our company, a small block of stock was set aside for his account, while his usefulness in various ways would entitle his name to grace the salary list. For the present the opposition of the army followers was to be ignored, as no one gave them credit for being able to thwart ...
— Reed Anthony, Cowman • Andy Adams

... perambulator at three o'clock in the morning; and I guess our young lady lets the people below understand when she's wakeful. But it's the only way to live, after all. I wouldn't go back to the old up-and-down-stairs, house-in-a-block system on any account. Here we all live on the ground-floor practically. The ...
— The Elevator • William D. Howells

... left the control-room to go down into the storage areas of the Med Ship's hull. He found an ultra-frigid storage box, whose contents were kept at the temperature of liquid air. He donned thick gloves, used a special set of tongs, and extracted a tiny block of plastic in which a sealed-tight phial of glass was embedded. It frosted instantly he took it out, and when the storage-box was closed again the block was covered with a thick and opaque coating of ...
— Pariah Planet • Murray Leinster

... issues: NA natural hazards: ice floes often block up the entrance to Bellsund (a transit point for coal export) on the west coast and occasionally make parts of the northeastern coast inaccessible to ...
— The 1996 CIA Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... was to take place in a little green area within the Tower. The platform was erected here, and the block placed upon it, the whole being covered with a black cloth, as usual on such occasions. On the morning of the fatal day, Anne sent for the constable of the Tower to come in and receive her dying protestations that she was innocent of the crimes alleged against her. She told ...
— Queen Elizabeth - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... ordinary theological knowledge at the time. It was a strong thing to say that the Articles left a great deal of formal Roman language untouched; but to work this out in dry, bald, technical logic, on the face of it, narrow in scope, often merely ingenious, was even a greater stumbling-block. It was, undoubtedly, a great miscalculation, such as men of keen and far-reaching genius sometimes make. They mistake the strength and set of the tide; they imagine that minds round them are going as fast as their own. We can see, looking back, that such an interpretation ...
— The Oxford Movement - Twelve Years, 1833-1845 • R.W. Church

... Prefaces are another stumbling-block. "The 'I,'" said Pascal, "is hateful." Speak as little of yourself as possible; for you must know that the reader's self-esteem is as great as yours. He will never forgive you for wanting to condemn him to have a good opinion of you. It is for your ...
— Voltaire's Philosophical Dictionary • Voltaire

... runs clean over to the Utah line, and we can't go back the way we come, or—and we can't go anywhere till this big slob here puts our car together. He's got pieces of it strung from here around the block. Say, what kinda town is this you wished on to us, anyway? Holding night court, mind you, so they ...
— Casey Ryan • B. M. Bower

... writing the above, this statement has been fully proved. In February, 1902, a party of Turkish soldiers, half starved in their frontier block-houses, attempted a raid into Montenegro. They were accompanied by a brother of the famous Achmet Uiko; whose story has been related elsewhere. In spite of the caution which the raiders displayed, the news reached Podgorica as soon as they had crossed the border ...
— The Land of the Black Mountain - The Adventures of Two Englishmen in Montenegro • Reginald Wyon

... then, for airn or steel; [iron] The brawnie, banie, ploughman chiel, [bony, fellow] Brings hard owre-hip, wi' sturdy wheel, The strong forehammer, Till block an' studdie ring an' ...
— Robert Burns - How To Know Him • William Allan Neilson

... means earnest, determined work. We must give the Indian the Gospel of the Son of God as his only safeguard for the life that now is as well as that which is to come. Civilization, education alone can never lift the Indian to his true position. You may take a rough block of marble and chisel it never so skillfully into some matchless human form, and it is marble still, cold and lifeless. Take the rude Indian and educate him, and he is still an Indian. He must be quickened by the breath of the Almighty before he will live. It is ...
— The American Missionary, Volume 42, No. 12, December, 1888 • Various

... from the wall against which he'd been resting himself and his two-stone tickler and moved to block the hall. But Gusterson simply walked up to him. He shook his hand warmly and looked his tickler full in the eye and said in a ringing voice, "Ticklers should have bodies of their own!" He paused and then added casually, "Come ...
— The Creature from Cleveland Depths • Fritz Reuter Leiber

... brilliant rays, bringing out in strong relief the noble visages of the professors and scientific gentlemen, who, some with bald heads, some with red heads, some with brown heads, some with grey heads, some with black heads, some with block heads, presented a coup d'oeil which no eye-witness will readily forget. In front of these gentlemen were papers and inkstands; and round the room, on elevated benches extending as far as the forms could reach, were assembled a brilliant concourse of those lovely and ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens

... she sat down in a corner close to Cleopatra's Needle—that mocking obelisk that has looked upon the decay of empires, itself impassive, and that still appears to say, "Pass on, ye puny generations! I, a mere carven block of stone, shall outlive you all!" For the first time in all her experience the child in her arms seemed a heavy burden. She put aside her shawl and surveyed it tenderly; it was fast asleep, a small, peaceful smile ...
— Stories By English Authors: London • Various

... to me, and stuck close to me wherever I went. I fancy most of his tribe managed to escape at the last; but after the capitulation, when I found myself with a number of our Canadian volunteers lodged in a shattered block-house awaiting the decision of our captors, whom should I find seated quietly by my side but my ...
— The King's Warrant - A Story of Old and New France • Alfred H. Engelbach

... as I have said, small, but extremely well proportioned, every detail of it being in the most excellent taste though unornamented by sculpture or painting. I have to add that in front of the sanctuary door stood a large block of lava, which I concluded was an altar, and in front of this a stone seat and a basin, also of stone, supported upon a very low tripod. Further, behind the sanctuary was a square house ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard

... all kinds of well-preserved relics is met with in a carelessly constructed hut in the fourth and last enclosure. Symmetrically placed there is a stone crocodile to the right and left in front of a stone block artificially rounded and set on end. These vary but little in shape between a drop and an egg or onion, always inclining toward the first, so that I would like to call them 'drop stones,' ... before such of these drop stones, ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 6, 1921 • Various

... the city by the old Recollet Monastery gate, the French retired to la Citadelle, a strong wood block house at the other end of the town. General Haldimand was the First Englishman to enter within the walls, remains of which are still frequently dug up in excavating. The oldest Ensign in Amherst's army received the French colours, and it is said the keys of the city were ...
— Famous Firesides of French Canada • Mary Wilson Alloway

... perception how bright, how beautiful, was the image in the memory of that seemingly stern, commonplace woman, and how of all that in her mind's eye she saw and remembered, she could find no outward witness but this black block. "So some day my friends will speak of me as a distant shadow," she said, as with a sigh she turned her head ...
— The Pearl of Orr's Island - A Story of the Coast of Maine • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... grey stone structure and had been completed less than two years. It covered half a block on Mission street between Sixth and Seventh streets. The ground on which the building stood was of a swampy character and some difficulty was experienced ...
— Complete Story of the San Francisco Horror • Richard Linthicum

... in the country capable of mounting them on carriages, nor is there wood proper for making them. Did a few vessels only wait for the sailing of those small frigates, which are almost all unfit for sea, except only two, nothing would be easier than to prevent them from returning, and to block up the ports of Mogador, Rabat, and Sallee. What would become of his commerce, and, above all, his marine, did the Christian princes cease to assist him, contrary to the interests of humanity! Would England ...
— Perils and Captivity • Charlotte-Adelaide [nee Picard] Dard

... Behmaroo was loopholed, and outlying buildings to the front were placed in a state of defence. The unfinished eastern wall was heightened by logs built up in tiers, and its front was covered with abattis, a tower and garden outside being occupied by a detachment. A series of block houses had been built along the crest of the Behmaroo heights supporting a continuous entrenchment, gun emplacements made in the line of defence, and the gorge dividing the heights strongly fortified against an attack ...
— The Afghan Wars 1839-42 and 1878-80 • Archibald Forbes

... organic law, where civilization was assumed to exist in its most enlightened and progressive stage, there, alone, the slave owner marshalled boastfully his human slaves, selling them on the auction block or otherwise at will, to be carried to distant parts, separating wife and husband, parents and children, and in a thousand ways shocking all the purer instincts ...
— Slavery and Four Years of War, Vol. 1-2 • Joseph Warren Keifer

... begun to dread the separation from Gladys, were overjoyed at the prospect of having her in school with them. "To think," said Sahwah, "that I have lived in the next block to you for fifteen years, and never knew ...
— The Camp Fire Girls in the Maine Woods - Or, The Winnebagos Go Camping • Hildegard G. Frey

... had seen the mightiest ruined, the brightest and most admired brought down to shame and death, men struck down with all the forms of law, whom the age honoured as its noblest ornaments. They had seen the flames of martyr or heretic, heads which had worn a crown laid one after another on the block, controversies, not merely between rivals for power, but between the deepest principles and the most rooted creeds, settled on the scaffold. Such a time of surprise,—of hope and anxiety, of horror ...
— Spenser - (English Men of Letters Series) • R. W. Church

... is a depressing village, and there is little to remember about the place except an extraordinary block of two or three shops, suitable only for a business street in a big city, but dumped right into the middle of this village of low cottages. The church is modern enough to be uninteresting, but in the graveyard St. ...
— Yorkshire—Coast & Moorland Scenes • Gordon Home

... bloody schemes for overturning that covenanted interest that he had so solemnly bound himself to defend and maintain, proving abortive, he fell at last into the hands of Cromwel and the Independent faction, who never surceased, till they brought him to the block, Jan. 30. 1649. At his death, notwithstanding his religious pretences, (being always a devotee of the church of England) he was so far from repentance, that he seemed to justify the most part of his former conduct[276]—Civil ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie

... time since. He gives it her every bit as hot—I will say that for him. His mother went by name o' old Maud Touchup, and he doth her no disfavour. She knew how to hit folks—she did. And Michael's a chip o' th' old block." ...
— Our Little Lady - Six Hundred Years Ago • Emily Sarah Holt

... geologist can find in that mass of rock the tiny crevice where the water first gained entrance. It has split it asunder because it was able to gain entrance through a little crack and each day sent in its drops of water where now with that roar rushes the tide. Farther along the shore is a solid block of granite. Its face is polished smooth by the dashing waves. There is not a crack in it, not a tiny crevice. It presents its splendid, shining surface to the great sea but offers it ...
— The Girl and Her Religion • Margaret Slattery

... said Vivian, who was surprised to find him really alarmed; "I see nothing but a block of granite, no uncommon sight in ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield

... engineer, "the time has come for us to separate. The Aberfoyle mines, which for so many years have united us in a common work, are now exhausted. All our researches have not led to the discovery of a new vein, and the last block of coal has just been extracted from the Dochart pit." And in confirmation of his words, James Starr pointed to a lump of coal which had been kept at the bottom ...
— The Underground City • Jules Verne

... there is a break; a great block of the bluff has been rent away by some convulsion of nature, and stands out like a lone tower, divided from the main by a gulf of the sea. Its high walls beetle from their tops, upon which neither man nor goat can climb. But you can behold on the flat summit of this islet bluff, portions of ancient ...
— Hawaiian Folk Tales - A Collection of Native Legends • Various

... the Arabian desert. The monarch in question was Kadashman-Kharbe, the grandson of Ashur-uballit of Assyria. As we have seen, he combined forces with his distinguished and powerful kinsman, and laid a heavy hand on the "Suti". Then he dug wells and erected a chain of fortifications, like "block-houses", so that caravans might come and go without interruption, and merchants be freed from the imposts of petty kings whose territory they had to penetrate when travelling by ...
— Myths of Babylonia and Assyria • Donald A. Mackenzie

... middle, and was fastened at the edge to a pliable handle. The blistering pain inflicted by this brutal instrument can well be imagined. At another school, whipping of unlucky wights was done "upon a peaked block with a tattling stick;" and this expression of colonial severity seems to take on additional force and cruelty in our minds that we do not at all know what a tattling stick was, nor understand what was ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle

... to street level, and parked before the scholar's three-story, brick house. Baltimore-like, it was identical to every other house in the block; Larry wondered vaguely how anybody ever managed to find his own place when it ...
— Status Quo • Dallas McCord Reynolds

... violence of the shock was extreme. "Trees have been overthrown or killed as they stood; a huge mass of rock, dislodged from near the crest of the hills, has rolled down the slope, scoring the side of the hill. On the opposite side an equally large block has been dislodged, and in its downward course cleared a straight track down the hill; and on the summit a gap has been cleared by the overthrow of trees along the line of fracture." Being only a few inches in width where it has rent the solid rock, the ...
— A Study of Recent Earthquakes • Charles Davison

... party must win 5% of the national vote or three direct mandates to gain representation; members serve four-year terms) and the Federal Council or Bundesrat (68 votes; state governments are directly represented by votes; each has 3 to 6 votes depending on population and are required to vote as a block; term is not fixed) elections: Federal Assembly-last held 16 October 1994 (next to be held by 27 September 1998); Federal Council-last held NA (next to be held NA) election results: Federal Assembly-percent of ...
— The 1998 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... cardinal's hat at the hands of the Pope, and became along with Strafford a chief adviser of the unfortunate Charles I.; his advice did not help the king out of his troubles, and his obstinate, narrow-minded pedantry brought his own head to the block; he was beheaded for treason on Tower Hill, Jan. 10, 1645; he "could see no religion" in Scotland once on a visit there, "because he saw no ritual, and his soul ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... virtue failed to soften the cruel mind of Bertacca, and having caused Lore to be seized, in order to add the greatest indignity to his brutal act, he ordered his servants to chop off the youth's hand upon a block used for cutting meat upon, and then said to him, "Go to thy father, and tell him that sword wounds are cured with iron and ...
— History Of Florence And Of The Affairs Of Italy - From The Earliest Times To The Death Of Lorenzo The Magnificent • Niccolo Machiavelli

... Corinth, who for some offence he gave the gods was carried off to the nether world, and there doomed to roll a huge block up a hill, which no sooner reached the top than it bounded back again, ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... hour later the boys reached the city and were given a cheer as they passed through the main street and up to Gen. Sanchez' home, which was located half a block from the plaza. And in another ten minutes Billie was facing the mayor over a plate of steaming soup, while a mozo stood at his back waiting to serve the leg of a twenty-five pound turkey. Raising his eyes from the table, he caught sight of what was coming and gave ...
— The Broncho Rider Boys with Funston at Vera Cruz - Or, Upholding the Honor of the Stars and Stripes • Frank Fowler

... of the hall, high above the heads of the multitude, was a terrace-like ledge of considerable height, caused by the receding of the upper part of the cavern-wall. Upon this sat the king and his court: the king on a throne hollowed out of a huge block of green copper ore, and his court upon lower seats around it. The king had been making them a speech, and the applause which followed it was what Curdie had heard. One of the court was now addressing the multitude. What he heard him say was to the following effect: 'Hence ...
— The Princess and the Goblin • George MacDonald

... block of suffering in my breast, growing larger and larger, stifling me, strangling me. The physician that was called to treat me for the nervous crisis I was enduring, which recurred four or five times a day, injected morphine, which made ...
— Strong as Death • Guy de Maupassant

... much composure, smiling half proudly, half reproachfully, yet wholly kindly upon the crowd in front of him. "Citoyens," he said, "Je me nomme Buffon," and laid his head upon the block. ...
— Evolution, Old & New - Or, the Theories of Buffon, Dr. Erasmus Darwin and Lamarck, - as compared with that of Charles Darwin • Samuel Butler

... The Communist Block immediately gave its Stamp of Disapproval, denouncing the movement as a filthy Capitalist Imperialist Pig plot. Red China, which had been squabbling with Russia for some time about a matter of method, screamed for ...
— And All the Earth a Grave • Carroll M. Capps (AKA C.C. MacApp)

... I found a cipher despatch from the Secretary of State informing us that President McKinley thinks that our American commission ought not to urge any proposal for "seconding powers"; that he fears lest it may block the way of the arbitration proposals. This shows that imperfect reports have reached the President and his cabinet. The fact is that the proposal of "seconding powers" was warmly welcomed by the subcommittee when it was presented; that the members ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White Volume II • Andrew Dickson White

... new frame building of about forty rooms, lighted by electricity, having large halls, pleasant double parlors overlooking the bay, with a good view of incoming ships from the north. Just across the street stood an old block house or fort containing the funny little cannon used by the Russians over a hundred years ago. The antiquated lock on the door, the hundreds of bullet holes in the outer walls, ...
— A Woman who went to Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan

... that gun I would have nailed a duck, a duck and a half, or two ducks, as I was just getting good. I loaded up, and I must have been flustered a bit, as I blew one of the decoys clear into the next block. ...
— Billy Baxter's Letters • William J. Kountz, Jr.

... set of gods, and certain sacred objects connected with its gods. One god is found by those who kiss or rub a certain black stone, another in connection with a white stone, another with a tree. And of many of them there are images; the stone has some work done on it, or there is a wooden block roughly hewn. The "Caaba" is originally a black stone which is kissed or rubbed at Mecca. The name was given, however, to the cube-shaped building, in one of the walls of which the black stone had been fixed. In this building there stood in old days images of Abraham and Ishmael, each with divining ...
— History of Religion - A Sketch of Primitive Religious Beliefs and Practices, and of the Origin and Character of the Great Systems • Allan Menzies

... lantern-jawed sad-eyed man in his forties, had been hard to get through to at first, but as soon as MacHeath discovered that the hard block Kent had built up around himself was caused by grief over a wife who had been dead five years, he became as easy to read as a billboard. Kent had submerged his grief in work; the eternal drive of the true scientist to drag the truth out of Mother Nature. He was constitutionally incapable ...
— Psichopath • Gordon Randall Garrett

... the post-office and ask some of the gang there," he suggested. "Tell 'em you'll give 'em three guesses. There, there!" he added, good-naturedly, pushing the irate Mr. Chase out of the "channel." "Don't block the fairway any longer. It's all right, Isaiah. You and me have been shipmates too long to fight now. You riled me up a little, that's all. ...
— Mary-'Gusta • Joseph C. Lincoln

... unnatural war, he set himself to justify his passion to Hermione, endeavouring to render the life he had led with her, innocent and blameless in the sight of heaven; and all the churchmen could persuade could make him speak of very little else. Just before he laid himself down on the block, he called to one of the gentlemen of his chamber, and taking out the enchanted tooth-pick-case, he whispered him in the ear, and commanded him to bear it from him to Hermione; and laying himself down, suffered the justice of the law, and died more pitied than lamented; so that it became ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn

... north, in the plateau of Bashan, another Amorite king, Og, had his capital, while Amorite tribes were settled on the western side of the Jordan, in the mountains of southern Canaan, where the tribe of Judah subsequently established itself. We even hear of Amorites in the mountain-block of Kadesh-barnea, in the desert south of Canaan; and the Amorite type of face, as it has been depicted for us on the monuments of Egypt, may still be often observed among the Arab tribes of the district between Egypt ...
— Early Israel and the Surrounding Nations • Archibald Sayce

... to be at the works of the Cathedral of St. Mary of the Flowers a huge block of marble which no one knew how to use. Leonardo da Vinci had been invited to carve a statue out of it, but he had refused to try, saying he could do nothing with it. But when the marble was offered to Michelangelo his eye kindled and he stood for a long ...
— Knights of Art - Stories of the Italian Painters • Amy Steedman

... refuge at The Hague, earnestly joined in the entreaty; but all that could be obtained from the states-general was their consent to an embassy to interpose with the ferocious bigots who doomed the hapless monarch to the block. Pauw and Joachimi, the one sixty-four years of age, the other eighty-eight, the most able men of the republic, undertook the task of mediation. They were scarcely listened to by the parliament, and ...
— Holland - The History of the Netherlands • Thomas Colley Grattan

... him out on the field in front of the reviewing officers, got up on its hind feet and walked for half a block, making the chaplain appear as though climbing up the horse's neck, and when some of the general's staff came out to arrest him, the horse whirled around and kicked, in every direction at once, and ...
— How Private George W. Peck Put Down The Rebellion - or, The Funny Experiences of a Raw Recruit - 1887 • George W. Peck

... A block away from the little side street that opened to the gully, Starr stopped short, shocked into a keener attention to his surroundings. He had just stepped over an automobile track on the walk, where a machine had crossed it to ...
— Starr, of the Desert • B. M Bower

... Honourable John Augustus Horlock stepped into his motor-car and drove away. Tallente, after a glance at his watch, called a taxi and proceeded to keep his appointment at Demos House, the great block of buildings where Dartrey had established his headquarters. In the large, open waiting room where he was invited to take a seat he watched with interest the faces of the passers-by. There seemed to be visitors from every class of the community. ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... speaking from afar, "How lost in these lone woods his footsteps are!" Then paused I, and, beneath the tall beech shade, All wrapt in thought, around me well survey'd, Till, seeing how much danger block'd my way, Homeward I turn'd me though at noon ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch

... and Patroclus obeyed his dear companion. But he [Achilles] placed in the flame of the fire a large dressing-block, and upon it he laid the chine of a sheep and of a fat goat, with the back of a fatted sow, abounding in fat. Automedon then held them for him, and noble Achilles cut them up; and divided them skilfully into small pieces, and transfixed them with spits; whilst the son of Menoetius, ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer

... the cave a council of war was held, and it was decided to block up the entrance fronting the bay with large rocks, leaving only two loopholes open, for watching ...
— The Rover Boys on Land and Sea - The Crusoes of Seven Islands • Arthur M. Winfield

... scale for the second grade, which includes words which have proved to be of a difficulty represented by a seventy-three percent correct spelling for the class. Such a list might be composed of the following words: north, white, spent, block, river, winter, Sunday, letter, thank, and best. A similar list could be taken from the scale for a third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, or eighth grade. For example, the words which have approximately the same difficulty,—seventy-three percent to be spelled ...
— How to Teach • George Drayton Strayer and Naomi Norsworthy

... his mendicant brethren. They hear the gold jingle before it is counted, and run with outstretched palms. Each is in the depths of misfortune; on the eve of ascending the fatal slope; lost, unless the helpful hand of Lampron will provide, saved if he will lend wherewithal to buy a block of marble, to pay a model, to dine that evening. He lends—I should say gives; the words mean the same in many societies. Of all that he has gained, fame alone remains, and even this he tries to do without—modest, retiring, shunning all entertainments. I believe he would ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... his way home saw the girl hurry in as if each second were important. Hardly had she vanished when a man strolled round the corner. He was walking slowly, and looking up at the facade as if interested. Roger, at the farther end of the block, recognized Justin O'Reilly. ...
— The Lion's Mouse • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... for turning, he came back towards me, sword up, and we met within a dozen paces of the edge. I say met, but in truth we did not meet, for he stopped again, well out of reach of my sword. I sat down upon a block of lava and looked at him; it seemed to me that I could not feast my eyes enough upon his face. And what a face it was; that of a more than murderer about to meet his reward! Would that I could paint to show it, for no words can tell the fearfulness ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard

... confronted by anything intangible which would not, as she put it in her own mind, "get out of her way." It was natural enough, she knew, that a material object or condition should possess the power to block one's progress or even to change the normal current of one's existence. Such things had happened a dozen times at least in her limited experience. But when a mere emotion assumed the importance and the reality of a solid body, she was seized by the indignant astonishment with which ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow

... kept. In the third act, the King, aware that the conspirators are to meet in the catacombs of Aquisgrana, conceals himself there, and when the assassins meet to decide who shall kill him, he suddenly appears among them and condemns the nobles to be sent to the block. Ernani, who is a duke, under the ban of the King of Castile, demands the right to join them, but the King magnanimously pardons the conspirators and consents to the union of Ernani and Elvira. Upon the very eve of their happiness, and in the midst of their festivities, the fatal horn is ...
— The Standard Operas (12th edition) • George P. Upton

... shrine of the saint. Feeble as it was, however, the light was powerful enough to display in the centre a pile of scaffolding covered with black drapery. Standing at the foot, they could trace the outlines of a stage at the summit, fenced in with a railing, a block, and the other apparatus for the solemnity of a public execution, whilst the saw-dust below their feet ascertained the spot in which ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey

... windy and foggy days in the Trade Wind Season, so if the walls are high and near together, the courts on the inside of those walls will be well protected from both winds and fogs. The high walls lift the cool air so that it passes over the buildings of the great block, thus sheltering the ...
— Palaces and Courts of the Exposition • Juliet James

... this association block out at least a tentative nut research program for the whole United States? What are the problems that should have first consideration? What do you think the Pennsylvania Agricultural Experiment Station should do for nut culture in this state? As Director of the Pennsylvania Station, I ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Sixth Annual Meeting. Rochester, New York, September 1 and 2, 1915 • Various



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