"Needle" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and brought him on one occasion before a London police magistrate for attempting to commit suicide. Inquiry showed that the man could work hard, and, strange to say of a man over six feet high and broad in proportion, was handy with his needle at embroidery, etc. The Committee kept him a few nights at a common lodging-house—for he was homeless since leaving the infirmary—and then by great good fortune got him work at a tent and sail ...
— Friendly Visiting among the Poor - A Handbook for Charity Workers • Mary Ellen Richmond
... reappearing at the end of half an hour, "Madame Bijou is on her way, but you are not to expect little Olympe. Your needle-woman, madame, is settled in life; she ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... on Aug. 25, the Belgian soldiers found there the corpse of an old woman who had been killed by bayonet thrusts; she still held in her hands the needle with which she was sewing when she was attacked; one mother and her son, aged about 15 or 16 years, lay there, pierced with bayonet wounds; ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War from the Beginning to March 1915, Vol 1, No. 2 - Who Began the War, and Why? • Various
... tragic enough one. We ought to change the old proverb, 'It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of the needle than for a poor man to marry ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... some small cells in the wall, which might once have been used as burial places for the dead, and on the walls themselves were hundreds of figures or letters cut in the rock, in very thin lines, as if engraved with a needle. We could not decipher any of them, as they appeared more like Egyptian hieroglyphics than letters of our alphabet, and the only figure we could distinguish was one which had the appearance ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... enjoyed life accordingly. But the white man's foot, well booted, was on the way, and one fine afternoon came tramping through. 'I wish I was a tree,' said this white man, one Jarvis Waring by name. 'See that young pine, how lustily it grows, feeling its life to the very tip of each green needle! How it thrills in the sun's rays, how strongly, how completely it carries out the intention of its existence! It never, has a headache, it—Bah! what a miserable, half-way thing is man, who should be a demigod, and is—a creature for the very trees to pity!' And then ...
— Castle Nowhere • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... gone, Kate prepared for him for the next day, and did a little Italian reading with Mrs. Lacy; after which followed reading of history, and needle-work. Lady Barbara was very particular that she should learn to work well, and was a good deal shocked at her very poor performances. "She had thought that plain needle-work, at least, would be ...
— Countess Kate • Charlotte M. Yonge
... three assorted flat files, one hollow handle tool holder with tools and little saw, one good hand-saw, one hack-saw, one upholsterer's regulator, one pair fine tweezers (such as jewelers use), one claw hammer, an assortment of round and furriers' needles, one or two darning needles, a sack needle, and an assortment of artists' small bristle and sable brushes (both round ...
— Taxidermy • Leon Luther Pray
... making suits for her young nephews all spring, for Aunt Kate was very handy with the needle. She had made shirts for Teddy and Billy with elaborate "flossin'" down the front, so elaborate indeed that it threatened to upset the peace of the family. Billy rebelled openly, and Teddy said when he was out of his Aunt's hearing, that ...
— The Second Chance • Nellie L. McClung
... in the drawing-room with her friends, working with the needle, conversing, and finding recreation in stepping through the wide-open folding-doors upon the balcony, from which a most enchanting view could be had of the lovely valley, and the mountains which stood round about it. While there, busily embroidering ...
— The Empress Josephine • Louise Muhlbach
... different ways both Phoebe and Ishmael possessed, there was in him a strain of elusiveness; you could not coerce him to a definiteness he did not wish any more than you could catch a butterfly by stabbing at it in air with a needle. ...
— Secret Bread • F. Tennyson Jesse
... voice that ever was heard. It had a tinkling sound, such as Susan had often made when she tied her mother's gold thimble to a string and struck it with a knitting-needle. Just as she was wondering where it came from, a little old woman stepped from behind one of the andirons and shook the ...
— Little Mr. Thimblefinger and His Queer Country • Joel Chandler Harris
... exclaimed the rabbit in a jolly voice, "this is too bad. I must see what I can do for you. First we will take the sliver out of Alice's foot," and he did so with a sharp needle. It hurt a little, but ...
— Uncle Wiggily's Travels • Howard R. Garis
... of nature. That mirror is the best that reflects the least which does not matter, and, as a consequence, reflects most clearly that which does. In actual life, truth is buried beneath a bewilderment of facts. Most of us seek it vainly, as we might seek a needle in a haystack. In this proverbial search we should derive no assistance from looking at a reflection of the haystack in an ordinary mirror. But imagine a glass so endowed with a selective magic that it would not reflect hay but would reflect steel. Then, assuredly, there ...
— The Theory of the Theatre • Clayton Hamilton
... For instance, we begin with simple over and over stitches, measuring the time and the character of the right hand movements for 50 stitches under a variety of technical conditions. The first variation refers to the length of the thread. The thread itself, fixed at the needle's eye, varied between 3 feet and 6 inches in length. Other changes refer to the voluntary speed, to the number of stitches, to fatigue, to external stimuli, to attention, to methods of training, and so ...
— Psychology and Industrial Efficiency • Hugo Muensterberg
... like," I replied, joyfully, for at that moment I was ready to tear him to pieces. I ran at once to see Ivan Ignatius, whom I found with a needle in his hand. According to orders from the Commandant's wife, he was stringing mushrooms which were to be dried for ...
— Marie • Alexander Pushkin
... Newbridge, just before I left, with the news. You could have knocked me down with a feather. I should have thought that firm was as steady as the Rock of Gibraltar! But they're ruined—absolutely ruined. Louisa, dear, can you find me a good needle?" ...
— Further Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... get into the garden in time to fix up the starboard fence. After working feverishly for three hours, glancing at the sky at frequent intervals, I heard the "All clear" signalled from a back window, the needle having swung ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, December 1, 1920 • Various
... them with the coriander and sassafras and so arrange the top blanket that when the watcher lay down, the stuff touched his neck or throat and made that the point of attack for the snake, whose fang makes a small round spot not bigger than the end of a knitting needle, which is easily passed over by those not used to looking for such a thing. There was such a spot on Tolliver's throat; such another at the base of Murple's skull, and there is a third in poor Logan's ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... going naked, as those of Senegal do, where cotton is very scarce. The women dress in the same manner; and, when they are very young, take great delight in delineating figures on their necks, breasts, and arms, with the point of a hot needle, which are never obliterated, and which resemble the flowers and ornaments which are wrought on silk handkerchiefs. The country is excessively hot, and the heat increases as we go to the south; besides which, we found it much ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. II • Robert Kerr
... because of the latter's headaches and backaches, and other disorders; she herself sat on an ordinary chair of the bedside species, to which by this time she had become used. Their sewing, when they did any, was strictly indispensable; if nothing demanded the needle, both preferred a book. Alice, who had never been a student in the proper sense of the word, read for the twentieth time a few volumes in her possession—poetry, popular history, and half a dozen novels such as the ...
— The Odd Women • George Gissing
... harm done," said Uncle Wiggily to himself, as he found no bones broken. "I had a little slide, that's all. I must bring Sammie and Susie Littletail here some day, and let them slide on pine needle hill. Johnnie and Billie Bushytail, the two squirrels, would also like it, and so would Nannie and Billie ...
— Uncle Wiggily in the Woods • Howard R. Garis
... a knitting needle to where Brettison sat, propped up in a chair in the shadow of the rock with a table before him, and Miss Jerrold, who looked very old and grey and stately, turned her head, nodded, and went on with the embroidery about which her ...
— Witness to the Deed • George Manville Fenn
... peace. The offer is accepted, and so the matter is amicably settled. As the worthy citizen is about to take his leave, the general ventures a word of inquiry as to the cause of the town's revolt. "What, then, is your grievance, my good friend?" Our hosier knight, though deft with needle and keen with lance, has a stammering tongue. He ...
— Civil Government in the United States Considered with - Some Reference to Its Origins • John Fiske
... and intensive training in the fundamentals of sewing than is now provided by the household arts course. The skill required in trade work cannot be obtained in the amount of time now devoted to this subject. It should be made possible for a girl who expects to make a living with her needle to elect a thoroughly practical course in sewing in which the aim is to prepare for wage earning rather than merely to teach the girl how to make and mend her own garments. As proficiency in trade sewing requires first of all ample opportunity for practice, provision should be made for extending ...
— Wage Earning and Education • R. R. Lutz
... "Mrs. Bygrave is a naturally domestic woman. When she is able to employ herself, she finds unlimited resources in her needle and thread." Having reached this stage of the explanation, and having purposely skirted, as it were, round the confines of truth, in the event of the housekeeper's curiosity leading her to make any private inquiries ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... the hill, passes a conical knoll of deep red syenite, clothed with verdure, and known as Primrose Hill. The summit is 1,320 feet above the level of the sea, and commands a prospect embracing a radius of seventy miles. Our engraving represents a severed cliff of greenstone at the top, called the Needle's Eye, and which tradition alleges to have been riven at the Crucifixion. Near it is a culminating boss of pinkish felspar known as the Bladder Stone, a name derived, it is supposed, from Scandinavian mythology; whilst ...
— Handbook to the Severn Valley Railway - Illustrative and Descriptive of Places along the Line from - Worcester to Shrewsbury • J. Randall
... Mr. Horne divested himself of the work of the London artist's needle, and, carefully placing his own garments beyond the reach of dust, essayed to ...
— The Relics of General Chasse • Anthony Trollope
... sluggard; take the wheel And steer to knowledge, glory, and success. Great mariners have made the pathway plain For thee to follow; hold thou to the course Of Concentration Channel, and all things Shall come in answer to thy swerveless wish As comes the needle to the magnet's call, Or sunlight to the prisoned blade of grass That yearns all winter for the ...
— Poems of Power • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... who had a valley-full of needles. And one day the mother of Jesus came to him and said: "Friend, my son's garment is torn and I must needs mend it before he goeth to the temple. Wouldst thou not give me a needle?" ...
— The Madman • Kahlil Gibran
... to drop my work now, dearie," said Aunt Trudy in response to her niece's appeal. "I always lose my needle when I get up; I'll meet your little friend some other time. Ask her to dinner to-night if you wish—Winnie is going to have ...
— Rosemary • Josephine Lawrence
... science; the transactions of several of our societies were sent to me, and I began to write. I was now an old woman, very deaf and with shaking hands; but I could still see to thread the finest needle, and read the finest print, but I got sooner tired when writing than I used to do. I wrote regularly every morning from eight till twelve or one o'clock before rising. I was not alone, for I had a mountain sparrow, a great pet, which sat, and indeed is sitting on my arm as I write ...
— Personal Recollections, from Early Life to Old Age, of Mary Somerville • Mary Somerville
... is supported by ten powerful legs, its enormous jaws are equipped, like those of the calot, or Martian hound, with several rows of long needle-like fangs; its mouth reaches to a point far back of its tiny ears, while its enormous, protruding eyes of green add the last touch of terror to ...
— The Gods of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... the help of these small bar magnets to show you how he explains it. These little pieces of steel, which I hope you can see lying on this white cardboard, have been rubbed along a magnet until they have become magnets themselves, and I can attract and lift up a needle with any one of them. But if I try to lift one bar with another, I can only do it by bringing certain ends together. I have tied a piece of red cotton (c, Fig. 21) round one end of each of the magnets, and if I bring two red ends together they will not cling together but ...
— The Fairy-Land of Science • Arabella B. Buckley
... residence with Amelia has made her at last almost equally at home in our native English. She is a treasure, that girl; so neat and dexterous, and not above dabbling in anything on earth she may be asked to turn her hand to. She walks the world with a needle-case in one hand and an etna in the other. She can cook an omelette on occasion, or drive a Norwegian cariole; she can sew, and knit, and make dresses, and cure a cold, and do anything else on earth you ask her. Her salads are the most savoury I ever tasted; while as for her ...
— An African Millionaire - Episodes in the Life of the Illustrious Colonel Clay • Grant Allen
... spent it frank and freely too. For Saints themselves will sometimes be 495 Of gifts, that cost them nothing, free. By means of this, with hem and cough, Prolongers to enlighten'd stuff, He cou'd deep mysteries unriddle As easily as thread a needle. 500 For as of vagabonds we say, That they are ne'er beside their way; Whate'er men speak by this New Light, Still they are sure to be i' th' right. 'Tis a dark-lanthorn of the Spirit, 505 Which none see by but those that ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... exists with the South, and it is cultivated exclusively by native African labor, the national government will as surely tend, in spite of all momentarily disturbing influences, towards a united South as the needle to the pole. But even if the government were permanently wrested from its control, would the evil be remedied? Surely not. The disease which is sapping the foundations of our liberty is not eradicated because its workings are forced inward. What ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 42, April, 1861 • Various
... so-called "poisoned needle" cases. Might she not have been spirited off in that way? Constance had doubted the stories. She knew that almost any doctor would say that it was impossible to inject a narcotic by a sudden jab of a hypodermic syringe. That was rather a slow, careful and deliberate operation, to be submitted ...
— Constance Dunlap • Arthur B. Reeve
... they were bound for the Klondyke. Every creature in the North-west was bound for the Klondyke. Men from the South too, and men from the East, had left their ploughs and their pens, their factories, pulpits, and easy-chairs, each man like a magnetic needle suddenly set free and turning sharply to the North; all set pointing the self-same way since that July day in '97, when the Excelsior sailed into San Francisco harbour, bringing from the uttermost regions at the top of the map close upon a million ...
— The Magnetic North • Elizabeth Robins (C. E. Raimond)
... already reached a state of anaesthesia. He is remarkable,—an unusually impressionable subject, and might be subjected to interesting experiments!... (Sits down, rises, sits down again.) Now one might run a needle into his arm. If ...
— Redemption and Two Other Plays • Leo Tolstoy et al
... hillside among tangled masses of jasmine, in which here and there were set star-like golden flowers, whose gardenia-like perfume mixed with the resinous aromatic smell of the long-needle pines. I rode a little behind, on purpose, for I love to see a pretty woman turn her head and look backward across her shoulder. She has no pose more charming, unless it be when she stands before the "laughing mirror" and lifts her hands to ...
— We Three • Gouverneur Morris
... as he laid it down that it was foreign. He was well aware that no smith in Germany could fashion a lancet so exquisitely tempered. He then turned his attention to the document which had been fastened to the table by this needle-like stiletto. At the top of the parchment were the same letters that had been cut in the handle ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr
... small gate in the hedge. Samuel observed, that the hawthorn of the hedge grew very thick and close, so that a bird could scarcely get through it. The roots and branches were twisted into each other, appearing like strong, thick chains woven together; and on the vines grew sharp thorns, longer than a needle. Mr. Harvey's boys told their cousin, that neither man nor beast could get through such a hedge; and that if a man were placed on the top, he could walk on the vines without sinking down, they were so strong and close. "It would be uneasy ...
— The Summer Holidays - A Story for Children • Amerel
... that Henry became acquainted with one who was to form the greatest happiness of his life. There was a poor girl in Hamburg who was a seamstress, and who not only supported herself but her mother by her needle. Her name was Agatha. She had a lovely face and very engaging manners; her character was still more lovely than her face; and she had only these to recommend her, for she was very poor. Henry became strongly attached to her, and she soon returned ...
— The Pedler of Dust Sticks • Eliza Lee Follen
... 'eager,' which pricked the scepticism of a practical man. He locked his mouth, looking at her with a twinkle she refused to notice. 'Determined to master details' he could have accepted. One may be determined to find a needle in a dust-heap; one does not with any stiffness of purpose go at a dust-heap eagerly. Hungry men have eaten husks; they have not betrayed eagerness for such dry stuff. Patrick's voracity after details exhibited a doubtfully genuine appetite, and John deferred ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... his remarks becoming more personal and ever pointing like a compass needle to the occupant of that seat in the corner. The minister's determination to attend a Come-Outer meeting, though it had reached the sticking point only a half hour before, was the result of considerable deliberation. He had argued with himself and had made up his ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... gravity of a philosopher and the indifference of a destroying angel. There is a diabolic spleen more strongly developed in Rops than in any of his contemporaries, with the sole exception of Baudelaire, who inspired and spurred him on to astounding atrocities of the needle and acid. This diabolism, this worship of Satan and his works, are sincere in the etcher. A relic of rotten Romanticism, it glows like phosphorescent fire during his last period. The Church has in its wisdom employed a phrase for frigid depravity of the Rops kind, naming ...
— Promenades of an Impressionist • James Huneker
... prerogative of Israel and of Palestine. The philosophers have nothing to do with it. A mere philosopher has no more chance of entering the kingdom of prophecy than a camel of passing through the eye of a needle.[B] Have the philosophers ever produced prophets? And yet, if their explanation is correct, their ranks should abound in them. Prophecy is a supernatural power, and the influence comes from God. The prophet is a higher species of mortal. He is ...
— A History of Mediaeval Jewish Philosophy • Isaac Husik
... hotels, at the grand old palaces, untouched since the middle ages—the glory of the city—at every house, great and small—flutter gaudy draperies; crimson, amber, violet, and gold, according to purse and condition, either of richest brocade, or of Eastern stuffs wrought in gold and needle-work, or—the family carpet or bed-furniture hung out for show. Banners wave from every house-top and tower, the Italian tricolor and the Savoy cross, white, on a red ground; flowers and garlands are wreathed on the fronts of ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot
... Austria, "you build your pyramids on needle points; be careful. What harm, I ask you, can there be in a man giving to his countrywoman a recipe for a new essence? These strange ideas, I protest, painfully recall your father to me; he who so frequently and so ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... was thinking I would come here so early, when the first thing I knew, Aunt Fortune brought out all those heaps and heaps of apples into the kitchen, and made me sit down on the floor, and then she gave me a great big needle, and set me to stringing them all together; and as fast as I strung them, she hung them up all round the ceiling. I tried very hard to get through before, but I could not; and I am so tired! I thought I never should get to the bottom of that ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... made of the needle must not be forgotten. For a year and a half, whilst at Canterbury, he went regularly for five hours a day to a tailor to learn the trade, and was found very handy with his needle. He proved to be of much use in the ordinary ...
— Kalli, the Esquimaux Christian - A Memoir • Thomas Boyles Murray
... brood, which, if I remember rightly, already counted a grandchild or more: as pleasant a sight as one could readily see. Later, in the autumn evenings, a lamplit replica of the same picture presented itself. Or, if the dinner was cleared away, one would see Madame Millet busy with her needle, the children at their lessons, and the painter, whom even then tradition painted a sad and cheerless misanthrope, contentedly playing at dominoes with one of the children, or his honest Norman face wreathed in smiles ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. VI., No. 6, May, 1896 • Various
... country, which is kept damp by frequent showers, they are found in tormenting profusion. They are terrestrial, never visiting ponds or streams. In size they are about an inch in length, and as fine as a common knitting needle; but capable of distension till they equal a quill in thickness, and attain a length of nearly two inches. Their structure is so flexible that they can insinuate themselves through the meshes of the finest stocking, not only seizing on the feet and ankles, but ascending to the back and throat ...
— Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and • James Emerson Tennent
... thee I turn, As turns the needle toward the pole, And feel my heart within me yearn For all thou offerest to the soul; Why should I join in feverish haste The crowd for which I have no taste, The precious boon of ...
— Poems • John L. Stoddard
... each of its innumerable papillae being abundantly supplied in this respect. As a proof of the amount of blood circulating within the skin, and of its extensive nerve supply, it is only necessary to mention the fact that the finest needle cannot be passed into it without drawing blood and inflicting-pain. In addition to the foregoing the skin also contains a countless number of very fine tubes, which penetrate through its layers and open on its surfaces by minute openings called pores. There are altogether ...
— The Art of Living in Australia • Philip E. Muskett (?-1909)
... trio to snug, early, neighbourly dinners, and was always under lock and key before twelve o'clock. It must be owned I began to have rather an old-fashioned look; my body was ridiculously small, and the rector's thin daughter, the bodkin, or rather packing-needle of the party, sat more forward, and on a smaller space than bodkins do now-a-days. I was perched up three feet higher than more modern vehicles, and my two lamps began to look like little dark lanterns. But my obsoleteness rendered me only more ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 14, - Issue 400, November 21, 1829 • Various
... a rose among the roses," he said. He wondered a bit at its apparent expensiveness. Perhaps, however, Becky was skillful with her needle. Some women were. He did not care greatly for such skill, but he was charmed by ...
— The Trumpeter Swan • Temple Bailey
... the dark was toting a needle-ray. The impression came through so strong that I could almost read the filed-off serial number of the thing, but the guy himself I couldn't dig at all. I stopped to look back but the only sign of life I could see was the fast flick of taxicab lights as they crossed an intersection ...
— Stop Look and Dig • George O. Smith
... adjustable top head and clamping nut, Y. The double finger, T, covers or opens a small hole in the face, U, communicating by the pipe, W, to the diaphragm, L. The action of the magnet yoke is to attract the needle toward the poles of the magnet, while by turning the head the spiral spring, X, is brought into tension to resist and balance this force, and can be set and adjusted to any degree of tension. The double finger, T, turns with the needle, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 633, February 18, 1888 • Various
... by the light he spies Lucretia's glove, wherein her needle sticks: He takes it from the rushes where it lies, And griping it, the needle his finger pricks; As who should say 'This glove to wanton tricks Is not inured: return again in haste; Thou see'st our mistress' ...
— The Rape of Lucrece • William Shakespeare [Clark edition]
... way,' I explained, 'to the gymkhana. Miss Harris is in one of the events. You did enter for the needle-threading race, didn't you, with Lord Arthur? I think we must ...
— The Pool in the Desert • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... reached the spot at which he usually turned off by a gap in the hedge to NEEDLE his way through the unpathed wood, he yielded to the impulses of memory and habit, and sought the yew-circle, where for some moments he stood by the dumb, disfeatured stone, which seemed to slumber in ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... CHICKEN POX.—Exclude other children. The child should be lightly fed and on ordinary food. Large vesicles on the face, when yellow, should be pricked with a needle that has been boiled, then wash them with a disinfecting ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... spot. Here the wounded man was stretched upon buffalo skins, and the captain, who officiated on all occasions as doctor and surgeon to the party, proceeded to examine his wounds. The principal one was a long and deep gash in the thigh, which reached to the bone. Calling for a needle and thread, the captain now prepared to sew up the wound, admonishing the patient to submit to the operation with becoming fortitude. His gayety was at an end; he could no longer summon up even a forced smile; ...
— The Adventures of Captain Bonneville - Digested From His Journal • Washington Irving
... illustration will give the best idea of what this is. It consists of a pair of needle-pointed spring compasses, capable, by means of an adjusting screw, of measuring with the greatest accuracy all surcharges up to 40 millimetres in length. In addition to the measure a millimetre gauge is obtained by running the head of the screw along a piece of paper, a series of lines exactly ...
— Stamp Collecting as a Pastime • Edward J. Nankivell
... not notify this frail waif that these tasks of the needle were measured by the ability of the most expert, and that the majority of girls were obliged to work overtime in order to accomplish them; that to many this was an impossibility, ...
— Mlle. Fouchette - A Novel of French Life • Charles Theodore Murray
... foregoing circumstances, she became pious, attended camp meetings, donation parties, and quilting matches at young ministers' houses, who were just preparing to get a rib. And though she was praised as the best needle lady in the town, her epistles on love to young preachers were the most admirable mixture of classical and biblical composition that could be found. Though she had a good pair of hands at making pies, puddings, and other culinary preparations, though she was praised, ...
— The Cross and the Shamrock • Hugh Quigley
... Sheldon; for he had entered the Stock Exchange an inexperienced stranger, and he held his place there amongst men whose boyhood had been spent in the offices of Capel-court, and whose youthful strength had been nourished in the chop-houses of Pinch-lane and Thread-needle-street. ...
— Birds of Prey • M. E. Braddon
... anything.... The only thing in careers that I can fancy at the moment is art dealing—picking up nice things cheap and selling them dear, you know. Only I should always want to keep them, of course. If I don't do that I shall have to live by my needle. If they pass the Sweated Industries Bill, I suppose one will get quite a lot. It's the only Bill I've ever been interested in. My uncle was extremely struck by the intelligent way I took notice of it, when I had disappointed him so much about ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay
... volute, the bishop's mitre, and the papal crown, distributed upon tables 12 and 13. The Melons, the large varieties of which are put to domestic uses by the Chinese, the olives, and butter shells, upon table 11; the magilus, whelks, and the needle shell upon table 10; the purple shell that emits the colour from which it is named, the mulberry shell, and the unicorn shell, distributed upon table 9; the tun shell, the harps, the harp helmets, and the helmets upon which ...
— How to See the British Museum in Four Visits • W. Blanchard Jerrold
... very nicely now. She had learned to knit lace, and do some fancy work that was then called lap stitching. You pulled out some threads one way of the cloth, then took three and just lapped them over the next three, drawing your needle and thread through. Now a ...
— A Little Girl in Old New York • Amanda Millie Douglas
... about Mademoiselle Godeau. She was not quite free from the vanity of her father, but her good nature was ever uppermost. She was, in the full meaning of the term, a spoilt child. She habitually spoke very little, and never was she seen with a needle in her hand; she spent her days at her toilet, and her evenings on the sofa, not seeming to hear the conversation going on around her. As regards her dress, she was prodigiously coquettish, and her own face was surely what she thought most of ...
— International Short Stories: French • Various
... emporium for the manufacture of shirts, collars and cuffs. They formed a trades union of several hundred members and demanded an increase of wages. It was refused. So one May morning in 1867, each woman threw down her scissors and her needle, her starch-pan and flat-iron, and for three long months not one returned to the factories. At the end of that time they were literally starved out, and the majority of them were compelled to go back, but not at ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 2 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... him a pair of pretty and delicate bracelets, made of gold and silver thread, worked with marvellous neatness. The other presented him a handsome purse of crimson satin very cleverly ornamented with the needle. The knight received these graceful gifts with warm thanks, saying that presents which came from hands so fair were more to him than a hundred-fold their value in gold. To do them the more honor, he put the bracelets on ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 6 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality. French. • Charles Morris
... impersonate them as they were related and impersonated by the Author himself of this peerless ghost-story! Fezziwig, for example, with his calves shining like moons, who, after going through all the intricacies of the country dance, bow, corkscrew, thread-the-needle, and back again to your place, cut—"cut so deftly that he appeared to wink with his legs, and came upon his feet again without a stagger!" The very Fiddler, who "went up to the lofty desk and made an orchestra of it, and tuned like fifty stomach-aches!" ...
— Charles Dickens as a Reader • Charles Kent
... on each side the blade, and you have an idea of the Saw-fish. This strange Shark is said to be as strong as it is fierce. It kills its prey by tearing them open with side blows from its sharp, two-edged saw. Its big mouth is fitted with a great many rows of needle-like teeth. ...
— Within the Deep - Cassell's "Eyes And No Eyes" Series, Book VIII. • R. Cadwallader Smith
... and his passengers that although their chase after the steamer might reasonably suggest a needle and a haystack, still, if the Dunkery Beacon kept down the coast in as straight a line as she could for Cape St. Roque, and if the Summer Shelter also kept the same line, and if the yacht steamed a great deal faster than the other ...
— Mrs. Cliff's Yacht • Frank R. Stockton
... what with his ludicrous Milanese jargon and his silly way of talking, he gave us so much matter for mirth, that, instead of bemoaning our ill-luck, we could not hold from laughing at every word he uttered. When the doctor wanted to sew up his wound, and had already made three stitches with his needle, the fellow told him to hold hard a while, since he did not want him out of malice to sew his whole mouth up. Then he took up a spoon, and said he wished to have his mouth left open enough to take that spoon in, in order that he might return alive to his own ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... with our crude and inaccurate instruments; we searched the chart; we cudgeled our brains; and at last it was Bradley who suggested a solution. He was in the tower and watching the compass, to which he called my attention. The needle was pointing straight toward the land. Bradley swung the helm hard to starboard. I could feel the U-33 respond, and yet the arrow still clung straight and ...
— The Land That Time Forgot • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... ray is said to have sides, and the different sides have different properties, as demonstrated by many interesting phenomena. Strange as it may seem, these rays thus described as having sides, could pass through the eye of a needle by hundreds of thousands without disturbing each other. Availing themselves, therefore, of the assistance of polarised light, and an instrument named the polariscope, or polarising telescope, observers obtain a double image of the sun, both alike, and both white; but on reflecting ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 441 - Volume 17, New Series, June 12, 1852 • Various
... if I like," she said sadly. "You seem so indifferent, Irgens! Yes, I admit I should like to go to the opera, but—Where are you going this evening? I am just like a compass-needle now: I oscillate, I may even swing all the way round, but I hark constantly back to one point—I point continually in one direction. It is you I ...
— Shallow Soil • Knut Hamsun
... that condition she was attacked and bitten by some dogs, and a committee of three men was ordered by the Court to examine this woman. They removed her clothing, and searched for what they were pleased to call witch-spots—that is to say, spots into which a needle could be thrust without giving pain; they reported to the Court that such spots were found. She denied that she had ever changed herself into a fox. On the report of the committee she was found guilty, and she was actually executed by our Puritan fathers, the gentlemen who braved ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll, Volume I • Robert Green Ingersoll
... hat," said Robinson to himself. "But how?" He had no straw, no thread and no needle. He looked around for a long time, but found nothing. The sun mounted even higher in the heavens, and shone hotter and hotter. He went to seek shelter at last in the deep shade ...
— An American Robinson Crusoe • Samuel B. Allison
... then in an instant I had shot out from it, and there was an unclouded sky and a brilliant sun above my head—all blue and gold above, all shining silver below, one vast, glimmering plain as far as my eyes could reach. It was a quarter past ten o'clock, and the barograph needle pointed to twelve thousand eight hundred. Up I went and up, my ears concentrated upon the deep purring of my motor, my eyes busy always with the watch, the revolution indicator, the petrol lever, and the oil pump. No wonder aviators are said to be a fearless race. With ...
— Tales of Terror and Mystery • Arthur Conan Doyle
... the little neighbourhood, and her cargo is home-grown. She carries no special carpenter and sailmaker, like a Britisher, because a Bluenose has an all-round crew, every man of which is smart enough, either with the tools or with the fid and palm and needle, for ordinary work, while some are sure to be equal to any special job. She of course carries two suits of canvas, her new best and older second best. Each sail has required more skill than tailors need to make a perfect fit in clothes, because there is a constant strain on sails, exceeding, ...
— All Afloat - A Chronicle of Craft and Waterways • William Wood
... to be cold here, and I only await the results of my inquiries about possible houses at Thebes to hire a boat and depart. Yesterday I saw a camel go through the eye of a needle—i.e., the low arched door of an enclosure; he must kneel and bow his head to creep through—and thus the rich man must humble himself. See how a false translation spoils a good metaphor, and turns a familiar simile into a ferociously communist sentiment. I expect Henry and Janet here ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon
... when no needle-work was to be had, and distress was threatening them, a little girl came to their room, and asked if they had finished the bracelets she had been told to call for. Finding she had mistaken the direction, ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier
... his knee, and needle and thread in hand, he commenced a lecture, from which, as Dick and I listened attentively, we really gained a considerable amount of information. It was, I afterwards discovered, in the first pages of the book, which ...
— Saved from the Sea - The Loss of the Viper, and her Crew's Saharan Adventures • W.H.G. Kingston
... woman who will be quite unworthy of him. It's always the case. The block of ice you can not smash with your biggest hammer is broken into smithereens by a needle. That's the peril before Stafford—but let us hope he will prove the exception to the rule and escape. He's safe at ...
— At Love's Cost • Charles Garvice
... the city was practically packed with slim, long, needle-like ships of every size—from tiny private ships less than fifteen feet long to giant freighters of six hundred feet and longer. And every one of them conformed to the ...
— Islands of Space • John W Campbell
... trained by his jocker, an ugly ex-convict, who on account of his ape-like face had been dubbed "Jocko", to peddle needle cases from house to house. These needle cases are paper packages containing an assortment of needles and are always retailed in every store in the land for five cents. These harmless packages have made more useless, if not dangerous men out of harmless ...
— The Trail of the Tramp • A-No. 1 (AKA Leon Ray Livingston)
... here," said the trooper, "rising like a phoenix from the flames? Oh! by the soul of Hippocrates, but it is the identical she-doctor, of famous needle reputation. Well, good woman, what ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... we drift! Sometimes the sun shines bright on the wave, and the wheeling birds dip and hover, and our heart is full of song. But sometimes we plunge on rising billows, with the wind wailing, and the rain pricking the surface with needle-points; we are weary and uncomforted; and we do not know why we suffer, or why we are glad. Sometimes I have a far-off hope that I shall know, that I shall understand and be satisfied; but sometimes, alas, I fear that my soul will flare out upon the darkness, and know ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... cause, or produces her effects, which are not properly laws at all. Fire burns, water flows, rain falls, birds fly, fishes swim, food nourishes, poisons kill, one substance has a chemical affinity for another, the needle points to the pole, by a natural law, it is said; that is, the effects are produced by an inherent and uniform natural force. Laws in this sense are simply physical forces, and are nature herself. The natural ...
— The American Republic: Its Constitution, Tendencies, and Destiny • A. O. Brownson
... a profane mate were fitting a couple of biscuit sacks over a twisted figure which lay on the grimy greasy deck planks. They pulled one over the head and another over the heels, and then with a palm and needle made them fast about the figure's middle. Afterwards they lashed a fire-bar along the shins, and then, with faces screwed up and turned away, they lifted the body as though it had been red-hot, and toppled ...
— The Harmsworth Magazine, v. 1, 1898-1899, No. 2 • Various
... hand escapes us. Why? We might know that a cannon-ball passes through our field of vision, but we cannot locate it. Why not? Our sense of touch is also very weak and only extends over a very limited space. And as it is on the large scale, so is it with the small. We see the eye of a needle, but infusoria and bacteria, which we know to be there and which affect us so much, we cannot see. With telescopes and microscopes we can slightly extend the field of our perception, but the limitations and weakness ...
— The Silesian Horseherd - Questions of the Hour • Friedrich Max Mueller
... their delight. Of this class was Mr. Thomas Bunting, who resided in a village a few miles out of New York. Bunting kept a store for the sale of almost every article known in domestic and agricultural life, from a number ten needle up to a hoe-handle; and from a mintstick up to a bag of coffee. Consequently, he was pretty well acquainted with all the town'speople, who were, likewise, pretty well acquainted ...
— The Last Penny and Other Stories • T. S. Arthur
... but—we'll all admit that there are forces of nature that we don't understand. Who can explain the principle of magnetic attraction, for instance? What causes the glowing splendor of the Aurora Borealis? What force holds the compass needle to the north? What makes a carpet tack jump onto a magnet like"—the speaker paused and stared hard at a member of his audience who had passed a humorous remark at his expense—"just like I'll jump you, ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... last days, did everything that her aunts told her. She was as good and docile as she could be. But, oh! there were some dreary hours as she sat, alone, in that stuffy drawing-room, trying to sew, her heart aching with loneliness, her needle always doing the wrong thing, the clock heavily ticking, Thomas watching her from the mat in front of the fire, and the family group sneering ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... Madame Cauchat, the land-lady, bewailing the continued illness of her lingere, Diane had begged to be allowed to take charge of the linen-room of the hotel, not merely as a means of earning a living, but because she delighted in such work. Methodical in her habits and nimble with her needle, the neatness, smoothness, and purity of piles of white damask stirred all those house-wifely, home-keeping instincts which are so large a part of every Frenchwoman's nature. Her fingers busy with the quiet, delicate task of mending, her mind could dwell with the greater content on such subjects ...
— The Inner Shrine • Basil King
... trifle pallid, but bland and urbane, strolled out to the porch, saluting us gracefully. He paused beside Dorothy, who slipped her needle through her work and held out her hand for ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers
... 'voila,'" sharply interjected Pierre, as he pushed the needle through a button he was ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... bought this compass of you, t'other day, but it's no good. It points north, east, south or west, just as it happens." "Ah, but you don't understand. You see the needle points this way. Now turn the compass around this way—see?—there you are. That's north." "Yes, but if I know where north is, what in time do I want ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls, Vol. XII, Jan. 3, 1891 • Various
... good health, so long as she is carefully looked after; so who would wish to ask her to take them in hand? Last year she managed to just get through a scented bag, after a whole year's work. But here we've already reached the middle of the present year, and she hasn't yet taken up any needle or thread!" ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... that ought to be read, and a new life standing in it, that ought to read them, the sacred thing is not the books the child ought to read. The sacred thing is the way the child feels about the books; and unless the new life, like the needle of a magnet trembling there under the whole wide heaven of them all, is allowed to turn and poise itself by laws of attraction and repulsion forever left out of our hands, the magnet is ruined. It is made a dead thing. It makes no difference how many similar books may be placed ...
— The Lost Art of Reading • Gerald Stanley Lee
... that I have passed the pons asinorum of Bar Exam with facility of a needle penetrating the camel's ...
— Baboo Jabberjee, B.A. • F. Anstey
... had saved proved of no utility, one of the people having trod upon, and broken it; it was accordingly thrown overboard. They now proposed to make a sail of some frocks and trowsers, but they had got neither needles nor sewing twine, one of the people however, had a needle in his knife, and another several fishing lines in his pockets, which were unlaid by some, and others were employed in ripping the frocks and trowsers. By sunset they had provided a tolerable lug-sail; having split one of the boat's thwarts, (which was of yellow deal,) with a very large knife, ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous
... drainage will afford a better prospect of early recovery, and avert the risk of serious inflammation and lockjaw, which sometimes follow punctured wounds of the hands and feet. Foreign bodies, as splinters, may be removed with tweezers or a needle, being careful not to break the splinter in the attempt. If a part remains in the flesh, or if the foreign body is a needle that cannot be found or removed at once, the continuous application of a hot flaxseed or other poultice ...
— The Home Medical Library, Volume I (of VI) • Various
... own heart. No bolt from heaven came to answer his supplication. Stooping, he, with some difficulty, drew the poniard from its resting-place. The malignant ingenuity of its construction had caused its needle point to penetrate the chain armour, while its keen double edge cut link after link of the hard steel as it sunk into the victim's breast. The severed ends of the links now clutched the blade as if to prevent ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr
... with her low song, was working a gift against the return of her mother, with labour all to be in vain. In it, she marked out with her needle the houses of the gods and the series of the elements, showing by what law, nature, the parent of all, settled the strife of ancient times, and the seeds of things disparted into their places; the lighter elements are borne aloft, the heavier fall ...
— Greek Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater
... Needle-Woman! Wrought of sterner stuff than clay; And, unlike the drudges human, Never weary night or day; Never shedding tears of sorrow, Never mourning friends untrue, Never caring for the morrow, Never begging work ...
— Poems • George P. Morris
... away, until it would cut a single hair pulled strait up on eend out o' your head, without bendin' it—take it off slick. 'Now,' sais I, 'I'll mend my trowsers I tore, a goin' to see the ruin on the road yesterday; so I takes out Sister Sall's little needle-case, and sows away till I got them to look considerable jam agin; 'and then,' sais I, 'here's a gallus button off, I'll jist fix that,' and when that was done, there was a hole to my yarn sock, so I ...
— The Attache - or, Sam Slick in England, Complete • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... appreciate art, and yet save his country. What he did not see was, that the temptations of luxury, though compatible with virtue, are antagonistic to it. The camel may be made to go through the eye of the needle—but it is difficult. ...
— Life of Cicero - Volume One • Anthony Trollope |
