"Nimbly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the little Urad ran nimbly to the bed and offered her supper to the afflicted Houadir, who received it with great pleasure from her hands, being assured her mother would not let Urad be a ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various
... told you that Josie Fifer, moving nimbly about the great storehouse, limped as she went? The left leg swung as a normal leg should. The right followed haltingly, sagging at hip and knee. And that brings us back to the reason for her being where ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber
... Running nimbly up the broad stairway, she entered the deserted classroom and hurried down the aisle to the end of the room where ...
— Grace Harlowe's Sophomore Year at High School • Jessie Graham Flower
... dismounted, and went forward to strike it with a piece of wood. Yuranigh did the same, both missed it, when it unexpectedly turned upon us, took a position on higher ground beside a large tree, then descended with head erect, moving nimbly towards the horses, and the rest of the party. The deadly reptile glided straight to the forefeet of my horse, touched the fetlock with his head, but did not bite; then passed to the hind legs and did the same, ...
— Journal of an Expedition into the Interior of Tropical Australia • Thomas Mitchell
... arbors rippling all over with the exquisite purple, dark and pale, the thin fine leaves of a strange olive-green, the delicate tendrils; they passed into open spaces where, on gray rocks, it streamed like the tresses of a cascade; it climbed and heaped itself on wayside trellises and ran nimbly, in a shower of fragile color, up the trunks, along the branches, of the trees. Jack always afterward associated the soft, falling purple, the soft, languorous fragrance, the almost uncanny beauty of the wistaria, ...
— A Fountain Sealed • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... in a moment, and fell so lightly on the grass it did not hurt him in the least, though it was as far as if Bevis had tumbled down out of the clouds. Bevis tried to catch him, but he jumped so nimbly this way and that, and hopped to and fro, and lay down in the grass, so that his green coat could not be seen. Bevis got quite hot trying to catch him, and seeing this, the grasshopper, much delighted, ...
— Wood Magic - A Fable • Richard Jefferies
... contrary, was a little thin woman, who looked as though she could move about nimbly at any .season; but, as she herself often said, she was a poor, unfortunate creature, and pitied herself a great deal, as she was in justice bound to do, for nobody else cared, she said, how much ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... left bare; Upon their virgin rites pale moonbeams glance. Softer the music! for their foam-bright feet Print not the moist floor where they trip their round: Affrighted they will scatter at a sound, Leap in their cool sea-chambers, nimbly fleet, And we shall doubt that we have ever seen, While our sane eyes behold stray wreaths of mist, Shot with faint colors by the moon-rays kissed, Floating snow-soft, snow-white, where these had been. Already, look! the wave-washed ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. I (of II.), Narrative, Lyric, and Dramatic • Emma Lazarus
... least attention to us. They seemed to be directed by a man who served as a prompter, and mentioned each motion they were to make. But they never changed the spot, as we do in dancing, and though their feet were not at rest, this exercise consisted more in moving the fingers very nimbly, at the same time holding the hands in a prone position near the face, and now and then also clapping them together.[153] Their motions and songs were performed in such exact concert, that it should ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 15 (of 18) • Robert Kerr
... orders for our little camp, and given leave to our negroes to lay down their loads, but they fell to work to build our huts; and though they were tied as above, yet they did it so nimbly as surprised us. Here we set some of the negroes quite at liberty, that is to say, without tying them, having the prince's word passed for their fidelity; and some of these were ordered to help the carpenters, which they did very handily, ...
— The Life, Adventures & Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton • Daniel Defoe
... wife, faggot-makers by trade, who had seven children, all boys. The eldest was but ten years old, and the youngest only seven. One might wonder how that the faggot-maker could have so many children in so little a time; but it was because his wife went nimbly about her business and never brought fewer than two at a birth. They were very poor, and their seven children incommoded them greatly, because not one of them was able to earn his bread. That which gave them yet more uneasiness ...
— The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault • Charles Perrault
... Max made a jump and turned nimbly round, for Sneeshing, who had not been touched by Donald's stone, had come fidgeting round them, and had had a ...
— Three Boys - or the Chiefs of the Clan Mackhai • George Manville Fenn
... his muscular arms, all of which he laid conveniently near the trap in the floor. Then letting the hatch swing softly down, he lowered the heavy articles by the silk rope, as he had Master Gibbs, though not so suddenly, going down himself as nimbly as a rat after them. In the vault beneath, Captain Brand struck a light and set fire to a torch, which blazed out luridly, and illumined the dark excavation and passages like day. Going slowly on, with his ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... squirrel he sprang into a tree and ran nimbly to the top. One of the blacks followed more slowly and carefully. When he had reached a lofty limb beside the ape-man the latter pointed to the south, and there, some few hundred yards away, the black ...
— The Return of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... They nimbly climb a tree, But "back down," for their frame Is made so lungs would forward press, If ...
— Mother Truth's Melodies - Common Sense For Children • Mrs. E. P. Miller
... inspiration of the Scriptures—the sword of the Spirit. 'I am sure of thee now, said Apollyon; and with that he had almost pressed him to death, so that Christian began to despair of life; but as God would have it, while Apollyon was fetching of his last blow, Christian nimbly stretched out his hand for his sword, and caught it, saying, "Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy, when I fall I shall arise" (Matt 7:8), and with that gave him a deadly thrust, which made him give back as one that had received his mortal wound. Christian perceiving that, made at him again, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... leaped nimbly into the bushes, and the maddened bull was carried on by his own Impetus toward Clayton, who, with a quick spring, landed in safety in a gully below the road. When he picked himself up from the uneven ground where he had fallen, the beast had disappeared around the bowlder. The bag ...
— A Mountain Europa • John Fox Jr.
... that the Captain's blood curdled, and he said: 'I hope nothing has disagreed with me!' At that, she laughed again, a still more terrible laugh, and the shutter was opened and search made, but she was nimbly gone, and there was no one. Next day they went to church in a coach and twelve, and were married. And that day month, she rolled the pie-crust out, and Captain Murderer cut her head off, and chopped her in pieces, and peppered her, and salted her, and put her in the pie, and ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... Mrs Greenow's hospitality was very good. The dinner was exactly what a dinner ought to be for four persons. There was soup, fish, a cutlet, a roast fowl, and some game. Jeannette waited at table nimbly, and the thing could not have been done better. Mrs Greenow's appetite was not injured by her grief, and she so far repressed for the time all remembrance of her sorrow as to enable her to play the kind hostess to perfection. ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... first round he fell into the fatal embrace in which Dempsey punished him busily, with those straight body strokes that slid in methodically, like pistons. Georges seemed to have no defence that could slacken those blows. After every clinch his strength plainly ebbed and withered. Away, he dodged nimbly, airily, easily more dramatic in arts of manoeuvre. But Dempsey, tall, sullen, composed, followed him steadily. He seemed slow beside that flying white figure, but that wheeling amble was deadly sure. He was always on the inner ...
— Plum Pudding - Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned • Christopher Morley
... is pushed clear into the ground by the weight of the tree). In d the father directs his son to stand in a certain place, "so that the tree will not fall on him;" but when Sandangcal sees that he is about to be crushed, he nimbly jumps aside unobserved by his father, who thinks him killed. In f the tree is made to fall on the body of the sleeping hero. In g Darangdarang is told to stand beside the tree being cut: it falls on him. In all the stories but d the hero performs the feat of carrying home a tree on his shoulders ...
— Filipino Popular Tales • Dean S. Fansler
... orders, these men, together with certain of his own company, ran nimbly aloft and began setting the sails, which, the night now having fallen pretty thick, was not for a good while observed by any of the vessels riding ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard I. Pyle
... them. And now a fight sprung up between them, and they fought long, and many men fell. Gunnar slew many a man. Hallgrim and his men leapt on board Gunnar's ship, Gunnar turns to meet him, and Hallgrim thrust at him with his bill. There was a boom athwart the ship, and Gunnar leapt nimbly back over it, Gunnar's shield was just before the boom, and Hallgrim thrust his bill into it, and through it, and so on into the boom. Gunnar cut at Hallgrim's arm hard, and lamed the forearm, but the sword would not bite. Then down fell the bill, and Gunnar seized the ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous
... mother answered, restraining a smile. After seeing the girl to the door, she walked to the window and, smiling, looked out on the street to watch her comrade as she trotted away, nimbly raising and dropping her little feet, fresh as a spring flower and light ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky
... scaled a steep cliff, and at the top of this he found a gentle slope of sand. The sun's rays now illumined the water so brightly that the air seemed only a little distance away. Presently a beach-crab ran nimbly away from beneath the sailor's feet. The water grew very much warmer. The shore was at hand! A few steps more, and the youngest son emerged on the beach of a ...
— The Firelight Fairy Book • Henry Beston
... you, I caught him up nimbly, seeing the weakness of his argument. "Vittoria, the courtesan! She loves any man, ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... and feebleness, I took him up, and wading across the stream I bent down that he might more easily reach the bank, and bade him get down. But instead of allowing himself to be set upon his feet (even now it makes me laugh to think of it!), this creature who had seemed to me so decrepit leaped nimbly upon my shoulders, and hooking his legs round my neck gripped me so tightly that I was well-nigh choked, and so overcome with terror that I fell insensible to the ground. When I recovered my enemy was still in his place, though he had released his hold enough to allow me breathing ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments • Andrew Lang.
... snow-line, so that, as Jerdon says, it is one of the characteristic adjuncts of Himalayan scenery. Indeed I know of few things more enjoyable than to sit, when the sun is shining, on the bank of a well-shaded burn, and, soothed by the soft melody of running water, watch the forktails moving nimbly over the boulders and stones with ...
— Birds of the Indian Hills • Douglas Dewar
... such a gruesome occasion, the criminal harangued his tribesmen in a great speech, finally declared the justice of his sentence, and leaped into space. Should the rope break, as occasionally happened, then the zeal of the executioner overcame the fear of death of the victim, for he mounted the tree nimbly once more, readjusted the knots, and did his best in the second attempt to avoid the risk ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... was direct and nothing was to be gained by leaving it. With his senses alert, he finally turned to the right, in order to take advantage of a mass of rocks on ground so elevated that a more extensive view than the former one could be secured. He climbed as nimbly as a monkey to the top, glanced over the many square miles spread out before his gaze and then ...
— Deerfoot in The Mountains • Edward S. Ellis
... the sort, and the funniest of comedies took place in the barn. He would reach the sensible stage. "Pah! All foolishness. Go? Of course he'd go, and this very minute, and have the thing done with, good or bad"; he was quite amused at his former conduct—until he reached the door. Then he'd skip nimbly back again, with a hot feeling that somebody was watching him, although a careful inspection through the crack of the ...
— Red Saunders • Henry Wallace Phillips
... springing to his feet, replied nimbly: "Mademoiselle has been teaching me much of the customs ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... which in the egg-shaped yawl dances on the white wave crests up and down like a fire-fly. The yawl is soon under the steamer's lee, and a line from the big ship pulls the little boat to the ladder, and the pilot nimbly climbs to the steamer's bridge, bringing the latest papers. The schooner drifts under the steamer's stern, takes in the yawl, and again sails to the eastward in search ...
— The Harris-Ingram Experiment • Charles E. Bolton
... He sprang nimbly ashore as the boat's head touched the stairs, and after extending a hand to Mr. Chalk, which was coldly ignored, led the way up ...
— Dialstone Lane, Complete • W.W. Jacobs
... Atreides Tramples upon me himself, and has seiz'd and possesses my guerdon." Thus amid tears did he speak, and the mother majestical heard him, Sitting afar in the deep by her father the Ancient of Ocean. Nimbly anon from the foam of the waves like a cloud she ascended, And she was near to him soon, and she sat by him where he lamented, Softly caress'd with her hand on his cheek, and address'd him and nam'd him:— "Why art thou weeping, my child? what has burthen'd thy soul with affliction? Speak ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... engaged in very nimbly and dexterously making lace. A lace-pillow lay upon her breast; and the quick movements and changes of her hands upon it, as she worked, had given them the action he ...
— Mugby Junction • Charles Dickens
... at evening both, You merry were and glad, So little care of sleep or sloth These pretty ladies had; When Tom came home from labour, Or Cis to milking rose, Then merrily went their tabor, And nimbly went their toes. ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... be invited guests, of course. After she had seen two women, one man, and a little girl unhesitatingly enter the gate and walk briskly down the path, however, Pollyanna concluded that she, too, might go. Watching her chance she skipped nimbly across the ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter
... the vale, Like a top nimbly danc'd o'er the plains; With envy the lasses were pale, With wonder stood ...
— The Olden Time Series, Vol. 6: Literary Curiosities - Gleanings Chiefly from Old Newspapers of Boston and Salem, Massachusetts • Henry M. Brooks
... behind the juniper. At the same time the ram was not more than twenty or twenty-five feet distant, straight above the lamb, in a direction at right angles to the path of the bear. The ewe looked up with a startled bleat, wheeled, sprang nimbly before the lamb, and faced her ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts
... hand, Lucien climbed nimbly over the fallen trees which barred our progress. Ere long our feet sank into a quantity of liquid mud, and I discovered a slender streamlet of limpid water oozing out between two rocks. The pass between the rocks became narrower and narrower, and if a wild beast had then met us we ...
— Adventures of a Young Naturalist • Lucien Biart
... hurtling car like fragments of paper in its wake. The few down street who danced for a moment before the modern juggernaut, to stop it in its course, sprang nimbly away as it rocketed past—and Searle was headed for ...
— The Furnace of Gold • Philip Verrill Mighels
... all-odorous with divinest scents of Lubin, harmoniously dulcified, have their value, which is great and glorious, no doubt, and regally doth woman expand and glow among them; in numberless ways, and aided by numberless accessories, do feminine graces nimbly and sweetly recommend themselves unto our pleasant senses; but this I will for ever and ever say,—that nowhere, neither in gorgeous hall, nor gilded opera-box, nor in any other place, nor under any other circumstances, may such bewildering and insidious power of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... jumped upon the wheel, and clambered nimbly to a seat on the box beside the driver, from which he reached down his hand towards the dog, who was jumping and ...
— Uncle Titus and His Visit to the Country • Johanna Spyri
... He turned from a fallen foe with disdain, and braced himself for a new conflict. I made a second motion with my head suggestive of butting, and on he came, but I was prepared for him. Springing nimbly aside, I let him strike the hard pack saddle with all his force, and the result did not disappoint me. The saddle yielded, and over and over went the ram, until he picked himself up about two rods from the spot ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... living as best he could by contributing cartoons to the newspapers, writing paragraphs in a funny column, and occasional verse of the humorous order. And he designed covers for ephemeral magazines,—in a word, nimbly snatched the scanty ...
— One Woman's Life • Robert Herrick
... approach the window outside by calling one of the guards and ordering him to make the small ladder (faire la petite echelle). This meant stooping and giving a back, on which little M. Flocon climbed nimbly, and so was raised to ...
— The Rome Express • Arthur Griffiths
... op. 10, No. 5, is also treated separately, the melody being transferred to the treble. The Butterfly octaves, in another study, are made to hop nimbly along in the left hand, and the C major study, op. 10, No. 7, Chopin's Toccata, is arranged for the left hand, and seems very practical and valuable. Here the adapter has displayed great taste and skill, especially on the third page. The pretty musical idea is not destroyed, but viewed from ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker
... den. The defence will not be long against such vice, such flames, such red-hot nether energy. And in the fourth cut, to be sure, he has leaped bodily upon his victim, sped by foot and pinion, and roaring as he leaps. The fifth shows the climacteric of the battle; Christian has reached nimbly out and got his sword, and dealt that deadly home-thrust, the fiend still stretched upon him, but "giving back, as one that had received his mortal wound." The raised head, the bellowing mouth, the paw clapped upon the sword, the one wing relaxed in agony, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... after a few last hasty bangs, the heavy bell clappers cease to move; the porters quit the luggage-cars and spring nimbly ashore; the independent gentlemen dispose of their kits, each after the fashion and on the spot he "judges" most convenient; the hissing sound of escaping steam suddenly stops, and this momentary silence is succeeded by the quick motion ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power
... of the princess drew up, to give the ladies a distant view of Mr. Schnackenberger engaged with the butterwoman; and Mr. Von Pilsen wheeled his horse round into a favourable station for seeing anything the ladies might overlook. Rage gave the old butterwoman strength; she jumped up nimbly, and seized Mr. Schnackenberger so stoutly by the laps of his coat, that he vainly endeavoured to extricate himself from her grasp. At this crisis, up came Juno, and took her usual side in such disputes. But to do ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey, Vol. 2 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... different from mine, for as his adversary came within reach he stepped nimbly aside and hit him a vicious blow in the face. The man toppled over backward and ...
— The Fire People • Ray Cummings
... to take in light cargo in the shape of aneroids, barometers, bottles of brandy and water, and other useful articles. M. Duruof scrambled into the car, one of the men who had been weighing it down getting out to make room for him. Then M. de Fonvielle, amid murmurs of admiration from the crowd, nimbly boarded the little ship, and immediately began taking observations. There was a pause, and Mr. Coxwell, who stood by the car, prepared for the rush of the Thirty. But nobody volunteered. Names were called aloud; only the wind, sighing amongst ...
— Faces and Places • Henry William Lucy
... falls! An ambuscade? 'Twas impossible to strike him! Are there Tories in the glade? Such a trick is very like him. See! his comrade by him kneels, turning him in terror over, Then takes nimbly to his heels. Have they really slain the rover? It is worth some risk to know; so, with firelocks poised and ready, Up the sloping hills they go, with a quick lookout and steady. Dead! The random shot had struck, to the heart had pierced ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, No. 23, February, 1873, Vol. XI. • Various
... cut the air above them. Shot after shot from the ambushed enemy hurtled toward them. The two young men surged steadily ahead, bent only on reaching the bank and fastening the cable. They knew only one word, duty, and they did the thing they had agreed to do. Once across the river, they ran nimbly up the bank and made fast the rope's end, while cheer after cheer rose from their comrades watching them, and the battle cry of the Fighting Twentieth, "Rock Chalk, Jay Hawk, K. U.," went pulsing out across the waters of the Rio Grande as full and strong as in the days when it rolled ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter
... door. "Bless me!" said the woman, "how badly your stays are laced. Let me lace them up with one of my nice new laces." Snow-White did not dream of any mischief; so she stood up before the old woman who set to work so nimbly, and pulled the lace so tightly that Snow-White lost her breath, and fell down as if she were dead. "There's an end of all thy beauty," said the spiteful ...
— Grimm's Fairy Stories • Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm
... word said little Nelly; but at night, when Billy slept, On she flung her scanty garments and then down the stairs she crept. Through the silent streets of London she ran nimbly as a fawn, Running on and running ever till the night ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... away under the seats, and then one by one the heroes of New Swishford stepped on board, the painter was thrown loose, silent adieux were waved to the land of their birth, and their gallant boat, nimbly propelled by Gayford and the boat-hook, threaded its way through the rocks and made for the ...
— Parkhurst Boys - And Other Stories of School Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... blood, as he was wont to remark while negotiating his periodical loans, is thicker than water, a brother-in-law's affection has its limits. A day came when Mr Warden observed with pain that his relative responded less nimbly to the touch. And a little while later the other delivered his ultimatum. Mr Warden was to leave England, and to stay away from England, to behave as if England no longer existed on the map, and a small but sufficient allowance would be made to him. If he declined to do this, not another ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... was fulfilled, And there they had the law; And whilst that they did nimbly spin, The hemp he needs must taw. He ground, he thumped, he grew So cunning in his art, He learnt the trade of beating hemp By bussing ...
— The Sources and Analogues of 'A Midsummer-night's Dream' • Compiled by Frank Sidgwick
... a pleasant seat; the air Nimbly and sweetly recommends itself Unto our gentle senses. This guest of summer, The temple-haunting martlet, does approve By his loved mansionry, that the heaven's breath Smells wooingly here: no jutty, frieze, buttress, Nor coin of vantage, but this bird hath ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 195, July 23, 1853 • Various
... all rather puzzling. Carroll's mind leaped nimbly from one mental trail to another. He held himself in check, afraid that his deductions were proceeding too swiftly. He was acutely conscious of the danger of jumping too avidly on this single tangible clue which had come to him after four days ...
— Midnight • Octavus Roy Cohen
... need to tell Peggy to get the water canteen ready. Her busy little, fingers were fumbling with it. As they touched the ground she leaped nimbly from the chassis and sped over the burning desert floor to the side of the recumbent wayfarer. A second later Roy and Jess joined her. Very tenderly they turned the insensible man upon his back and dashed the water ...
— The Girl Aviators on Golden Wings • Margaret Burnham
... their seats, they vociferated advice. The conductor appeared on the scene, and I said that if he would head the bird off I would catch him. This he agreed to do, but he no sooner saw the eagle bearing down on him with his savage eye and beak than he, as nimbly at the best of them, hopped upon a seat, and stood beside a woman, probably for her protection. A minute or two later the train stopped at my station, and I was almost desperate. Fortunately I was in the last car, and I drove my eagle toward the rear door, from which, by the vigorous use ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... a frightful yodel and immediately with his flock stood right before the ladies, for with his bare feet he leaped as nimbly and lightly ...
— Moni the Goat-Boy • Johanna Spyri et al
... unsuccessfully? Old Saturn of the Woolsack sits there mute, we will say, a relic of other days, as seated in this divan. The hall in which he rules is now elsewhere. Is our Mercury of the Post Office ever ready to fly nimbly from globe to globe, as great Jove may order him, while Neptune, unaccustomed to the waves, offers needful assistance to the Apollo of the India Board? How Juno sits apart, glum and huffy, uncared for, Council President ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope
... make an effort to recall the principles of the system which we have just described in order to involve his wife in the nets which our second part has set for her, he would resemble Wurmser, Mack and Beaulieu arranging their halts and their marches while Napoleon nimbly turns their flank, and makes use of their own tactics ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... not old yet, if I am grey," laughed Mrs. Raymond, jumping nimbly up to prove her assertion. "I don't know what the ladies will say, Paul, to see you finally succumbing to feminine attractions; they have all eyed you in your seclusion with evident regret. You know there ...
— Six Girls - A Home Story • Fannie Belle Irving
... so that he groaned aloud. But the dog only laughed. Finally they reached a place where it was quite muddy. Of course the mud was only jelly, but it hadn't dried up since the last rain. The dog jumped over the place nimbly enough, but when the King tried to do likewise he failed, and came down into the jelly with both hands ...
— The Surprising Adventures of the Magical Monarch of Mo and His People • L. Frank Baum
... this yearning and pining to the world at large, you are very much mistaken. As has been told, she had the right chord of genuine nobility and generosity in her, and she laboured to fit her cross to her own back, so that it might not overshadow and crush others. Her fingers went nimbly about her gifts—trifling things, only enough to gladden simple hearts. She gratified Miss Sandys by praising her rusty accomplishments in cookery; she uttered a jest or two for the benefit of Jenny and Menie, who had a liking for her, though they called her "scornful;" and she brought ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... Immediately on falling it gnashed its teeth and began to utter a loud wailing cry like the screams of an infant in pain. Vikram having heard the sound of its lamentations, was pleased, and began to say to himself, "This devil must be alive." Then nimbly sliding down the trunk, he made a captive of the body, and asked " Who ...
— Vikram and the Vampire • Sir Richard F. Burton
... to take up the tart a veal sandwich came whizzing down, and cuffed one of her ears. Next a wheaten loaf made her dodge nimbly, and then a broad ham fell flat-footed at her toes. A sack of flour burst in the middle of the street; a side of bacon impaled itself on an iron hitching-post. Pretty soon a chain of sausages fell in a circle around her, flattening ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce
... onwards over the now darkened landscape, and ever took the lead to urge us forward. If it came to a great upstanding mountain, with marked politeness it ran round by a circuitous route, more easily if of greater length; at other times it scaled clear up, nimbly and straight, turning not once to us in its self-appointed task, and at the top, standing like some fairy on a steeple-point, beckoned us on encouragingly. At times it became exhausted and stretched ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle
... thieves tried to get into her house at night, knowing that she was alone like an owl in the house. The thieves began to pry open the door with a crowbar, and when Nurse Hripsime heard it she sprang nimbly out of bed, seized her stick from its corner, and began to shout: "Ho, there! Simon, Gabriel, Matthew, Stephan, Aswadur, get up quickly. Get your axes and sticks. Thieves are here; collar the rascals; bind them, skin them, strike them dead!" The thieves probably ...
— Armenian Literature • Anonymous
... reef of rocks which lies to the south of the harbour at Colombo, the beautiful little painted crabs[1], distinguished by dark red markings on a yellow ground, may be seen all day long running nimbly in the spray, and ascending and descending in security the almost perpendicular sides of the rocks which are washed by the waves. Paddling Crabs[2], with the hind pair of legs terminated by flattened plates to assist them in swimming, are brought up in the fishermen's nets. Hermit Crabs ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent
... waste of distant beaches riding down it, and every now and then a broken branch or tree-stem glancing through waves whose crests a fresh wind lifted and sowed in golden showers in the intervening furrows. The Martians seemed expert upon the water, steering nimbly between these floating dangers when they met them, but for the most part hugging the shore where a more placid stream better suited their fancies, and for a ...
— Gulliver of Mars • Edwin L. Arnold
... thought, there actually was some fun left. So he handed her out, and told Denny to wait for them, and they skirted the high board fence to the gap in the back. Madame Beattie, holding up her long dress in one hand and tripping quite nimbly, was clinging to his arm. By the gap they halted for her to recover breath; she drew her hand from Jeff's arm, opened her little bag, took out a bit of powder paper and mechanically rubbed her face. Jeff looked on indulgently. He knew she did not expect to need an enhanced ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... Ohioan's, Illinoisian's, Wisconsinese', Kanadian's, Iowan's, Kansian's, Missourian's, Oregonese' joys! To rise at peep of day and pass forth nimbly to work, To plough land in the fall for winter-sown crops, To plough land in the spring for maize, To train orchards, to graft the trees, to gather apples ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman
... foot, were brought to a stand for want of wind, in consequence of the hearty dinner they had eaten, and would have been put to utter rout but for the arrival of a gallant corps of voltigeurs, composed of the Hoppers, who advanced nimbly to their assistance on one foot. Nor must I omit to mention the valiant achievements of Antony Van Corlear, who, for a good quarter of an hour, waged stubborn fight with a little pursy Swedish drummer, whose hide he drummed most magnificently, and whom he would infallibly ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... what more than heavenly thing Hath fortune hither brought? She, seeing mine eyes still on her were, Soon, smilingly, quoth she, Sirrah, look to your rudder there, Why look'st thou thus at me? And nimbly stepp'd into my boat With her a little lad, Naked and blind, yet did I note That bow and shafts he had, And two wings to his shoulders fixt, Which stood like little sails, With far more various colours mixt Than be your peacocks' tails! I seeing ...
— The Children's Garland from the Best Poets • Various
... Wreathes, Our bruised armes hung vp for Monuments; Our sterne Alarums chang'd to merry Meetings; Our dreadfull Marches, to delightfull Measures. Grim-visag'd Warre, hath smooth'd his wrinkled Front: And now, in stead of mounting Barbed Steeds, To fright the Soules of fearfull Aduersaries, He capers nimbly in a Ladies Chamber, To the lasciuious pleasing of a Lute. But I, that am not shap'd for sportiue trickes, Nor made to court an amorous Looking-glasse: I, that am Rudely stampt, and want loues Maiesty, To strut before a wonton ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... attendant, "a stout lubber, began to reprove him for not relenting to so rich a proffer." Hussy's answer was, to cut down the knave; next, "he raught to O'Kelly's squire a great rap under the pit of the ear, which overthrew him; thirdly, he bestirred himself so nimbly, that ere any help could be hoped for, he had also slain O'Kelly, and perceiving breath in the squire, he drawed him up again, and forced him upon a truncheon to bear his lord's head into ...
— Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... Hither our neighbors nimbly fare— The boys agog, the maidens snickering, And savory smells possess the air As skyward ...
— John Smith, U.S.A. • Eugene Field
... Harry nimbly climbed upon the box, and took his seat by the side of John Lane—though that worthy told him he had better crawl under the cover, where he would find plenty of room to finish his nap on ...
— Try Again - or, the Trials and Triumphs of Harry West. A Story for Young Folks • Oliver Optic
... jumped nimbly into the berline. The door closed, the postillion's whip cracked briskly, and they set out upon a journey which to La Boulaye was to be as the passing from ...
— The Trampling of the Lilies • Rafael Sabatini
... time came the halt, and Norman, bounding out, sprang lightly and nimbly up the side of the mound, and, while the spy-glass was yet pointed full at Wales, had hold of a pair of stout legs, and with the words, "Keep a good lockout!" had tumbled Mr. May headforemost down the grassy slope, with ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... tilted, threw himself violently backwards, upsetting his chair, and then scrambled nimbly to his feet. Between him and the table yawned a square black hole ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang
... must be nimbly, cleanly, and swiftly done, and conueyed so as the eyes of the beholders may not discerne or perceaue the tricke, for if you be a bungler, you both shame your selfe, and make the Art you goe about to be perceaued and knowne, and so bring ...
— The Art of Iugling or Legerdemaine • Samuel Rid
... Forrester, who had just left the chamber of Ralph, emerged from the tavern into the open air. The outlaw had not placed himself within the shadow of the trees in time sufficient to escape the searching gaze of the woodman, who, seeing the movement and only seeing one person, leaped nimbly forward with a light footstep, speaking thus as ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... The judge passed nimbly around the desk and shook the Scratch Hiller warmly by the hand. "Where's my nevvy, sir—what's all this about him and Miss Betty?" Yancy's ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester
... to leave her berth under the water-hose. Her gruff whistle-call had ordered hawsers cast off. Mayo's 'longcoast acquaintance was fairly extensive. This was a coal-barge tug, and he waved quick greeting to the familiar face in her pilot-house and leaped aboard. He climbed the forward ladder nimbly. ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... for the first time he heard a sound, far away upon the other side of the arena, and, looking thither, saw the strangest sight that ever his eyes beheld. Over the railing of the pavilion opposite to him a woman climbed nimbly as a cat, and from it, like a cat, dropped to the ground full ten feet below, then, gathering up her dress about her knees, ran swiftly towards him. It was Betty! Betty without a doubt! Betty in her gorgeous garb, with pearls and ...
— Fair Margaret • H. Rider Haggard
... exhausted as they were, had begun to despair. Piskaret, seeing a hollow tree, crept into it like a bear, and hid himself; while the Iroquois, losing his traces in the dark, lay down to sleep near by. At midnight he emerged from his retreat, stealthily approached his slumbering enemies, nimbly brained them all with his war-club, and then, burdened with a goodly bundle of scalps, journeyed homeward in triumph. [ ...
— The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century • Francis Parkman
... State Affairs I must have done, And to the Business of my Lamps must run; When Sun and Moon from you do hide their Head, Your busy Streets with artful Lights are spread, And gives you Light with great indulgent Care, Makes the dark Night like the bright Day appear; Then we poor useful Mortals nimbly run To light your Lamps before the Day is gone: With strictest Care, we to each Lamp give Fire, The longest Night to burn: you do require Of us to make each Lamp to burn that time, But, oft, we do fall short of that Design: Sometimes a Lamp goes out at Master's ...
— A Righte Merrie Christmasse - The Story of Christ-Tide • John Ashton
... dodged the weapon, and, with a cutlass suddenly pulled from behind him, made a fierce blow at the cat. Puss leaped nimbly away, with a scream of triumph and defiance. Then they set to with all their skill and ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, October 1878, No. 12 • Various
... here stopped at a small landing to take in wood, and Eva, hearing her father's voice, bounded nimbly away. Tom rose up, and went forward to offer his service in wooding, and soon ...
— Pictures and Stories from Uncle Tom's Cabin • Unknown
... edges of the road. The ditches were covered with ice. The dogs on the neighbouring farms barked; and Felicite, with her hands beneath her cape, her little black sabots and her basket, trotted along nimbly in the middle of the sidewalk. She crossed the forest, passed by the ...
— Three short works - The Dance of Death, The Legend of Saint Julian the Hospitaller, A Simple Soul. • Gustave Flaubert
... a rocky canon, crossing and recrossing a clear, cold stream that winds its serpentine course from one precipitous wall to another. Mountain trout are observed disporting in this stream, and big, gray lizards scuttle nimbly about among the loose rocks on the bank. The canon gradually dwindles into a less confined passage between sloping hills of loose rock and bowlders, a wild, desolate region through which the road leads gradually ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... the legislation of extermination, the animal sped nimbly along the ledge of a cliff, becoming visible from the ravine below, a tawny streak against the gray rock. Swift though he was, a jet of red light flashing out in the dusk was yet swifter. The echoing crags clamored ...
— Down the Ravine • Charles Egbert Craddock (real name: Murfree, Mary Noailles)
... were of a polished and finished accuracy and balance that promised months and years of trouble-free operation. Everything ready for the test, Stevens took off his frayed and torn leather coveralls and moccasins and climbed nimbly up the penstock. He never walked down. Opening the head-gate, he poised sharply upon its extremity and took off in a perfect swan-dive; floating unconcernedly down toward that boiling maelstrom two hundred feel below. He struck the water with a sharp, smooth ...
— Spacehounds of IPC • Edward Elmer Smith
... that was expressed by it. To sleep ... To long to live simply and wholly for the feeling that sweetly and indolently satisfies itself, without the obligation of becoming a deed and a dance—and nevertheless to dance, to have to execute nimbly and with presence of mind the hard, hard and dangerous knife-dance of art, without ever quite forgetting the humiliating contradiction that lay in having to dance while one was in ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... commanded the situation; she saw the daughter get out of the stage, and hurry into the house for a chair so that the mother might descend more easily. She also saw a little, white-haired old lady take that opportunity to leap nimbly, and quite ...
— An Encore • Margaret Deland
... and insufferable dignity—taking not the slightest notice of a dozen solicitous inquires after his health, and humbly facetious and flattering accostings, and obsequious tenders of service, from five or six hairy and half-civilized station-keepers and hostlers who were nimbly unhitching our steeds and bringing the fresh team out of the stables—for in the eyes of the stage-driver of that day, station-keepers and hostlers were a sort of good enough low creatures, useful in their place, and helping ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... he said as he scrambled nimbly to the ground. "The roads in this country are such that, although I have left nearly half my load at Stangate, it has taken me four long hours to come from the Abbey here, most of which time we spent in mud-holes that have wearied ...
— The Brethren • H. Rider Haggard
... towards him. Every thought, every fancy was forgotten, and with winged steps she flew down the corridor to the stairs. Meantime he had entered, and she called his name. "Maria, child, are you there!" he shouted, rushed up the steps as nimbly as a youth, met her on one of the upper stairs and drew her with overflowing tenderness ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... Wealth: mark now how a plaine Tale shall put you downe. Then did we two, set on you foure, and with a word, outfac'd you from your prize, and haue it: yea, and can shew it you in the House. And Falstaffe, you caried your Guts away as nimbly, with as quicke dexteritie, and roared for mercy, and still ranne and roar'd, as euer I heard Bull-Calfe. What a Slaue art thou, to hacke thy sword as thou hast done, and then say it was in fight. What trick? what deuice? what starting hole canst thou now find out, to hide ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... with clouds significant of more than a remote possibility of rain. All the animal world was astir. Birds flitted or hopped from spray to spray; butterflies eddied around flowers within or upon which bees were bustling; ants and earwigs ran nimbly about on the mould; a member of the Universal Knowledge Society ...
— The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales • Richard Garnett
... though, when properly arranged on my head, with its long blue silken tassel hanging down by my cheek, I believe it becomes me well. I remember the time when it was in the course of manufacture. I remember the tiny little hands that pushed the coloured silks so nimbly through the cloth that was stretched on the embroidery-frame,—the vast trouble I was put to to get a coloured copy of my armorial bearings for the heraldic work which was to decorate the front of the band,—the pursings up of the little mouth, and the contractions of the ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery - Riddle Stories • Various
... appear that Prudy was much injured, after all. In a few minutes she was skipping about the room almost as nimbly as ever, only stopping to groan every now and then, when she ...
— Little Prudy's Sister Susy • Sophie May
... board the Talisman, which weighed, anchor, and sailed, with a light breeze, towards the north end of the island—guided through the dangerous reefs by Gascoyne. Henry and his followers were toiling nimbly up the hills in the direction indicated by the little footprints of Alice; and John Bumpus, proceeding into the mountains in another direction, pushed, under the guidance of Corrie, towards the bay, where the Foam still ...
— Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader - A Tale of the Pacific • R. M. Ballantyne
... the doctor, helping to drag him out, red, breathless, and covered with sand and perspiration. "Now, let me lead the way." And he slipped down nimbly into the hole, so that a moment later we heard his voice, muffled by sand and distance, rising ...
— Three John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... imagine they have caught a Tartar, and that the white ducks are not so recent an importation as they at first supposed; for now they catch up the pole of the palkee nimbly, and jou jeldie (that is, trot up smartly) to quite ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... about in different parts of the road and the neighboring village, all begging their charity in doleful strains, and telling dismal stories of their distress. Among these they found some upon crutches, who had danced very nimbly at the wedding, others stone-blind, who were perfectly clear-sighted at the feast. The Doctor distributed among them the money which he had received as his pay; but the Dean, who mortally hated these sturdy vagrants, rated them ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous
... to death, and Christian began to despair of life. But, as God would have it, while Apollyon was fetching his last blow, to make an end of this good man, Christian nimbly reached out his hand for his sword, and caught it, and gave him a deadly thrust. With that, Apollyon spread forth his wings, and sped him away, and Christian saw ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books - Vol. II: Fiction • Arthur Mee, J. A. Hammerton, Eds.
... the newcomer, staring into a bleak future. The leading lady came to the end of her refrain, and the gentlemen of the ensemble, who had been hanging about up-stage, began to curvet nimbly down towards her in a double line; the new arrival, with an eye on his nearest neighbor, endeavouring to curvet as nimbly as the others. A clapping of hands from the dark auditorium indicated—inappropriately— that he had failed ...
— The Little Warrior - (U.K. Title: Jill the Reckless) • P. G. Wodehouse
... quantity of clean lead, and melted it with a strong fire, and then immediately pouring it out into a clean vessel of convenient shape and matter (we used one of iron, that the great and sudden heat might not injure it), and then carefully and nimbly taking off the scum that floated on the top, we perceived, as we expected, the smooth and glossy surface of the melted matter to be adorned with a very glorious colour, which, being as transitory as ...
— Six Lectures on Light - Delivered In The United States In 1872-1873 • John Tyndall
... teacher, getting up nimbly, and backing away from the mud-bedaubed figure of the girl. "Your feet are wet! Did—did you dare get into such a mess, just ...
— A Little Miss Nobody - Or, With the Girls of Pinewood Hall • Amy Bell Marlowe
... he mounted Dandy again, while I jumped up nimbly on Prince's back; and, in another moment we were cantering along the sandy beach towards the point in question, with Jake running behind holding on to Dandy's tail, and still laughing ...
— The White Squall - A Story of the Sargasso Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson |
