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Scum   /skəm/   Listen
Scum

verb
(past & past part. scummed; pres. part. scumming)
1.
Remove the scum from.



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"Scum" Quotes from Famous Books



... Lasker said, 'A man who can humanize a rock, or a tree, or a chipmunk ought to be able to make even those things seem human. You've got what they call the fresh viewpoint. New York's full of people with a scum over their eyes, but a lot of them came to New York from Winnebago, or towns just like it, and you'd be surprised at the number of them who still get their home town paper. One day, when I came into Lee Kohl's office, ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber

... effected by one in a standing posture, not by one while he is going along.' And Utanka having agreed to this, sat down with his face towards the east, and washed his face, hands, and feet thoroughly. And he then, without a noise, sipped thrice of water free from scum and froth, and not warm, and just sufficient to reach his stomach and wiped his face twice. And he then touched with water the apertures of his organs (eyes, ears, etc.). And having done all this, he once more entered the apartments of the women. And this time he saw the Queen. And as ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... ludicrous appearance which Santander presented. He had come to the surface again, and, with some difficulty, owing to the encumbrance of his under-shirt, clambered out upon the bank. But not as when he went under. Instead, with what appeared a green cloak over his shoulders, the scum of the stagnant water long collecting undisturbed. The hackney-driver—there was but one now, the other taken off by Duperon, who had hired him, their doctor too—joined with Rock in his laughter, while Kearney, Crittenden, ...
— The Free Lances - A Romance of the Mexican Valley • Mayne Reid

... west and a good watersky. It consisted partly of heavy hummocky ice showing evidence of great pressure, but contained also many thick, flat floes evidently formed in some sheltered bay and never subjected to pressure or to much motion. The swirl of the ship's wash brought diatomaceous scum from the sides of this ice. The water became thick with diatoms at 9 a.m., and I ordered a cast to be made. No bottom was found at 210 fathoms. The 'Endurance' continued to advance southward through loose pack that morning. We saw the spouts of ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton

... Government only troubled itself about the corps d'elite; that the object in the line regiments was to get substitutes as cheaply as possible; consequently, they are filled with men physically and morally the scum of the nation. Semaphore telegraphs have been put up on all the high public buildings. There are also semaphores on the forts. I see that one opposite me is exchanging signals. The crowd watch them as though by looking they would discover what they ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere

... know them? I know they are the scum of the earth! Do you suppose I am going to yield to such blackguards?" cried the general. "Good heavens, I'd rather ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac

... Horse Egan, for the peppery Major's peculiarities of speech and manner were as well known as his tanned face; "'an' then, ye dissolute, half-baked, putty-faced scum o' Connemara, if I find a man so much as lookin' confused, begad, I'll coort-martial the whole company. A man that can't get over his liquor in six hours is not fit to ...
— This is "Part II" of Soldiers Three, we don't have "Part I" • Rudyard Kipling

... six ozs., Molasses four pints, Alcohol eight ozs., Water six pints, Carbonate Potash four drms., Oil Sassafras cut with Alcohol one drm. Dissolve the Potash in water, add the Molasses; heat over a gentle fire till it simmers, remove the scum, add the other ingredients, the oil dissolved in ...
— One Thousand Secrets of Wise and Rich Men Revealed • C. A. Bogardus

... motion in the atmosphere is perceptible. 'A fire?'—yes; then why is my grate full of grey, cold ashes, and one little spark in the corner? 'A fountain springing into everlasting life?'—yes; then why in my basin is there so much scum and ooze, mud and defilement, and so little of the flashing and brilliant water? 'The power that works in us' is sorely hindered by the weakness in which ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ephesians; Epistles of St. Peter and St. John • Alexander Maclaren

... the noblemen of the South, which they can fill up, in the place of the French scum who now riot over Wessex. And if that should not suffice, what higher honor for me, or for my daughter the Queen-Dowager, than to devote our lands to the heroes who have won ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley

... morning with the entire disappearance of a green mantle of Confervoid scum from the surface of a foul pool close to my quarters. Yesterday the pool was quite green, now there is no green, nor any traces of the scum except such portion as was not in the water ...
— Journals of Travels in Assam, Burma, Bhootan, Afghanistan and The - Neighbouring Countries • William Griffith

... carbon by adding broken lumps of pure hematite or magnetite iron ore. This causes a violent boiling, which is kept up until the metal becomes soft enough, when it is allowed to stand to let the metal clear from the slag which floats in scum upon the top. The separation of the slag and iron is facilitated by throwing in some lime from time to time. Spiegel, or specular iron, is then added; about 1 per cent. more than in the scrap process. From ...
— Heroes of the Telegraph • J. Munro

... that boasted half a million population. The dome that now covered the city was the fourth one. Four times, like the nautilus, the city had outgrown its shell, until today it was the greatest domed city in the Solar System. Where life had once been cheap and where the scum of the system had held rendezvous, he had seen Ranthoor grow into a city of dignity, ...
— Empire • Clifford Donald Simak

... with young pigs when their eyes swell shut? Before they shut they look as if there was a white milky scum ...
— One Thousand Questions in California Agriculture Answered • E.J. Wickson

... boils, after the meat is in it, the scum should be carefully removed from time to time, while it is cooking. If the scum be allowed to boil down, it will settle on the joint and discolour it. It is best, however, as a precaution, to wrap the meat in a very clean cloth; this will effectually ...
— The Skilful Cook - A Practical Manual of Modern Experience • Mary Harrison

... inside and out, a dozen small birds, quail, snipe, woodcock, etc., and split them in half; put them in a saucepan with about two quarts of water; when it boils, skim off all scum that rises; then add salt and pepper, a bunch of minced parsley, one onion chopped fine, and three whole cloves. Cut up half a pound of salt pork into dice, and let all boil until tender, using care that there ...
— The Whitehouse Cookbook (1887) - The Whole Comprising A Comprehensive Cyclopedia Of Information For - The Home • Mrs. F.L. Gillette

... her gracious hand are seen The dregs and scum of earth and seas, Her kindness counting all things clean That lend the sighing ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... My name you already know. And upon the word of yon scum, you have judged. By the glint o' hate, as you looked into my eyes, I know—for one does not so welcome a stranger beyond the outposts. But, since you have asked, I will tell you; my name is MacNair—Robert MacNair, by my christening—Bob ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx

... of the lake. Most of the Maharadjas of Hindustan used formerly to spend here the summer months, and to take part in the magnificent festivals given by the Grand Mogul; but times have greatly changed since, and the happy valley is today no more than a beggar retreat. Aquatic plants and scum have covered the clear waters of the lake; the wild juniper has smothered all the vegetation of the islands; the palaces and pavilions retain only the souvenir of their past grandeur; earth and grass cover the buildings which are now falling in ruins. The surrounding mountains and their eternally ...
— The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ - The Original Text of Nicolas Notovitch's 1887 Discovery • Nicolas Notovitch

... substance to get the shadow. Mysterious it is, for a man does not ordinarily empty his pockets of gold in order to fill them with gravel. Mysterious it is, for a thirsty man will not usually turn away from the full, bubbling, living fountain, to see if he can find any drops still remaining, green with scum, stagnant and odorous, at the bottom of some broken cistern. But all these follies are sanity as compared with the folly of which we are guilty, times without number, when, having known the sweetness of Jesus Christ, we turn away to the fascinations of ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... bullets. They toiled up the bed of the brook until it was no longer passable. Huge bowlders lay jammed and crowded in clefts of the mountain before them. Penn remembered the spot. He had been there in spring, when down over the rocks, now covered with lichens and dry scum, poured ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge

... communities; the latter indeed, must have embellished the type retrospectively with characters which can be understood only as serving the purposes of war and of propaganda. That strange and sickly world into which the Gospels lead us—a world apparently out of a Russian novel, in which the scum of society, nervous maladies and "childish" idiocy keep a tryst—must, in any case, have coarsened the type: the first disciples, in particular, must have been forced to translate an existence visible only in symbols and incomprehensibilities into their own crudity, in order to understand ...
— The Antichrist • F. W. Nietzsche

... what comes," he said, "of making London the asylum for all the foreign scum of the earth. ...
— The Great Secret • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... always "a worm" when asked after her health, and everything that pleased her was "pucka." She knew no language but her own, and that she spoke indifferently, her command of it being limited for the most part to slang expressions, which are the scum of language; and a few stock phrases of polite quality for special occasions. But she used the latter awkwardly, as workmen ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand

... Baltic, to pursue the corsairs with whom every sea was infested. In one year alone he estimated the loss to Dutch merchants by these pirates at 800,000 florins. "We have just captured two of the rovers, but the rascally scum is ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... Guy de Warre, the fair Rowena's sire, Of haughty Norman birth, With pure descent, Held Saxon, high or low, as scum of earth; And deemed his name more worth and honour lent, Than line directly traced from Alfred ...
— Rowena & Harold - A Romance in Rhyme of an Olden Time, of Hastyngs and Normanhurst • Wm. Stephen Pryer

... the Scots farmer. It was known on this occasion that he had a good bit of money to bring home; the word had gone round loosely. The laird had shown his guineas, and if anybody had but noticed it, there was an ill- looking, vagabond crew, the scum of Edinburgh, that drew out of the market long ere it was dusk and took the hill-road by Hermiston, where it was not to be believed that they had lawful business. One of the country-side, one Dickieson, they took ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson

... that the cabbage be covered with brine; remove the scum as it rises to the top. The kraut will be ready for use in six weeks and it must be kept in a very cool place or it ...
— Mrs. Wilson's Cook Book - Numerous New Recipes Based on Present Economic Conditions • Mary A. Wilson

... weeks at Ujiji, Dr. Livingstone set out, 12th July, 1869, to explore the Manyuema country. Ujiji was not a place favorable for making arrangements; it was the resort of the worst scum of Arab traders. Even to send his letters to the coast was a difficult undertaking, for the bearers were afraid he would expose their doings. On one day he despatched no fewer than forty-two—enough, ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie

... stone is finished it is etched; that is, treated with a weak solution of nitric acid and gum-water, in order to remove all accidental traces of scum from its surface, and to prepare it for printing. Then proofs are made, which serve as a guide to the lithographer during the progress of his work, and finally as a guide to the transferrer and to the printer. The proving is done on a hand press, and it ...
— The Building of a Book • Various

... remembered. Some months before I had been riding back the road from Green Springs, and in a dark, woody place had come across an Indian sore beset by three of the white scum which infested the river-side. What the quarrel was I know not, but I liked little the villainous look of the three, and I liked much the clean, lithe figure of their opponent. So I rode my horse among them, and laid on to them with the butt of my whip. They had their knives out, but ...
— Salute to Adventurers • John Buchan

... sleep in importance was the fortnightly bath. Sometimes we cleansed ourselves, as best we could, in muddy little duck ponds, populous with frogs and green with scum; but oh, the joy when our march ended at a military bathhouse! The Government had provided these whenever possible, and for several weeks we were within marching distance of one. There we received a fresh change of underclothing, and our uniforms were fumigated while we splashed and scrubbed ...
— Kitchener's Mob - Adventures of an American in the British Army • James Norman Hall

... cold water a head of cauliflower, head downward, add half a teaspoonful of salt, and a wineglass of vinegar. Let stand for half or three-fourths of an hour, drain, and put it into a saucepan to boil until tender. The length of time for boiling depends upon the size of the head. Remove the scum carefully as it rises, or it will discolor the cauliflower. When done separate the sprigs, and arrange them around the bowl, heads outward. Put into the centre of the dish a head of cabbage-lettuce, cover it with red mayonnaise (see Lobster ...
— Fifty Salads • Thomas Jefferson Murrey

... dome; then London Bridge; then the Tower, with its Traitors' Gate; then the new Thames Bridge; and then we were in the region of the barges and wharfs and warehouses, with their colliers and coasting traders, and with the scum of coal and refuse floating on the ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine

... knew better than did his soldiers the treacherous nature of the ground in front of the enemy. He saw that it was one of those districts where peat had been taken out in large squares for fuel, and where a fallacious and verdant scum upon the surface of deep pools simulated the turf that had been removed. He saw that the battle-ground presented to him by his sagacious enemy was one great sweep of traps and pitfalls. Before he could carry the position, many men ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... thought of the vast accumulation of past experience; both alike will tend to minimise the value of human effort, because they will both be aware that the phenomenon of human activity and human volition is but the froth and scum working on the lip of some gigantic forward-moving tide, and that men probably do not so much choose what they shall do, as do what they are compelled to do by some unfathomable power behind and above them. This thought may seem, to men of practical activity, to weaken the force of ...
— The Silent Isle • Arthur Christopher Benson

... and chaffer with me! You would dictate your terms, you scum! You with your head in a noose, a spy that has failed in his mission, a miserable wretch that I can send to his death with a flip of my little finger! You impudent hound! Well, you'll get your deserts this time, Captain Desmond Okewood ... but ...
— The Man with the Clubfoot • Valentine Williams

... himself out of the rut of machine politics, and to justify his right of admission to her house. There Mr. French discoursed at great length, until the fourth of March sent him home to Connecticut; and he brought more than one intelligent member of Congress to Mrs. Lee's parlour. Underneath the scum floating on the surface of politics, Madeleine felt that there was a sort of healthy ocean current of honest purpose, which swept the scum before it, and kept the ...
— Democracy An American Novel • Henry Adams

... body and soul, to match the littleness of books, and go to church in a rich fool's pocket. Natheless affection rules us all, and when the poor wench would bring me her thorn leaves, and lilies, and ivy, and dewberries, and ladybirds, and butterfly grubs, and all the scum of Nature-stuck fast in gold-leaf like wasps in a honey-pot, and withal her diurnal book, showing she had pored an hundred, or an hundred and fifty, or two hundred hours over each singular page, certes I was wroth that an immortal soul, and many hours of labour, ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade

... we tell? For some reason altogether beyond our conception—and man may have been a mere accident, a by-product evolved in the process. It is as if the scum upon the surface of the ocean imagined that the ocean was created in order to produce and sustain it or a mouse in a cathedral thought that the building was ...
— The Poison Belt • Arthur Conan Doyle

... unfledged scribbler whose crudities are utter abominations. We care nothing for mere names, though a good deed is none the worse for coming from a good hand; but the small fry of literature—the lackadaisical geniuses—Heaven bless the mark—who, scum-like, float upon the surface, soiling what they touch and disturbing by their presence what, but for them, might be free from offence—we ...
— The Philadelphia Magazines and their Contributors 1741-1850 • Albert Smyth

... real movement of their nation, are fain to get their bread with tongue and pen, by retailing to 'silly women,' 'ever learning and never coming to the knowledge of the truth,' second-hand German eclecticisms, now exploded even in the country where they arose, and the very froth and scum of the Medea's caldron, in which the disjecta membra of ...
— Phaethon • Charles Kingsley

... take the risk," added the sergeant, who had not quite finished. He ended with an irrepressible outburst of honest indignation: "Why, you blasted, thieving Dutch scum, do you think I don't know you were stealing that ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... glory of God, who are, perhaps half-unconsciously, using it as a stalking-horse, behind which they may shoot game for their own larder! A drop of quicksilver oxidises and dims as soon as exposed to the air. The purest motives get a scum on them quickly unless we constantly keep them ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren

... sojourn in our cities, he tells us that he found sights and scenes that would shame Sodom and Gomorrah, and bemoans the fact that in this young, fresh land things should be as bad as in London and Paris, whither the scum and wrecks of society ...
— A Man's Value to Society - Studies in Self Culture and Character • Newell Dwight Hillis

... taken to show the commandants where the British tyrants have hidden away the stones that belong of right to the Boers, the stones that have been stolen from the earth—the land they fought for and won with their blood from the savage black scum who infested the country. I know where the stones are hidden away, and I can, if you like, lead you to what the British think you will never find. But if you are going to believe the words of this malicious boy, and consider ...
— A Dash from Diamond City • George Manville Fenn

... We quenched our thirst with water from the pool, which I was rather surprised to find quite pure. These pools are, of course, sometimes fouled for a time by the movements of alligators and other tenants in the fine mud which settles at the bottom, but I never observed a scum of confervae or traces of oil revealing animal decomposition on the surface of these waters, nor was there ever any foul smell perceptible. The whole of this level land, instead of being covered with unwholesome swamps emitting malaria, forms in the dry season ...
— The Naturalist on the River Amazons • Henry Walter Bates

... corner of a city park, called it "the Canadian wilds" and shot at least one man every thousand feet of film. But here in Northern Ontario, a few miles from the luxurious trans-continental passenger trains de luxe—! Scum and all as these fellows were, they would not dare do this unless they were crazy ...
— Every Man for Himself • Hopkins Moorhouse

... For my part, I had thought it praiseworthy, but he says none of the rest of us care a rush for my mother, and so the only one of us good for anything has to be the victim. But don't plume yourself. You'll be the scum of the earth when he has you before him. Poor old boy, it is a sore business to him, and it doesn't improve his temper. I believe this place is a greater loss to him than to my mother. What are ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge

... dancing eyes. "I, a So'th'n girl, actually set my foot on the head of a No'th'n scum of ...
— Sally Dows and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... of the stokers, and that provoked the nastiness. Until then it had been uncouth mirth caused by the vile liquor sold by the saloons licensed by the Government, and against the Papeete regulations that no more intoxicants shall be sold to a man already drunk. But when this British citizen, scum of Sydney or Glasgow as he might be, saw the deadly weapon, he felt aggrieved. This revolver practice is all too common on the part of Monsieur Lontane. Six such complaints I have had in as many months. As to that part of your letter that the crew of the ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien

... Strokr is due to its peculiar form. An observer states that, "The bore is eight feet in diameter at the top, and forty-four feet deep. Below twenty-seven feet it contracts to nineteen inches, so that the turf thrown in completely chokes it. Steam collects below; a foaming scum covers the surface of the water, and in a quarter of an hour it surges up the pipe. The fountain then begins playing, sending its bundles of jets rather higher than those of the Great Geyser, flinging up the clods of turf which have been its obstruction like a number of rockets. This ...
— The San Francisco Calamity • Various

... have the regiment removed. The 25th Infantry, with its honor undimmed by any such wanton crime, with a record unexcelled by any regiment in the service, was the target for all sorts of criticism and persecution as soon as it arrived. The one is a white regiment, composed of the scum of the earth, the other a black regiment composed of men who have yet to do one thing of which they should be ashamed. Yet Denver welcomes the one with open arms and salutes with marked favor, while she barely suffered ...
— The Colored Regulars in the United States Army • T. G. Steward

... 'an artist and philosopher—if it be true that you are a pervert, you deserve a heavier punishment than the scum whom we have ...
— Catharine Furze • Mark Rutherford

... London—Limehouse. Down in the dregs of the town—with West India Dock Road for its spinal column—it lies, redolent of ways that are dark and tricks that are vain. Not only the heathen Chinee so peculiar shuffles through its dim-lit alleys, but the scum of the earth, of many colors and of many climes. The Arab and the Hindu, the Malayan and the Jap, black men from the Congo and fair men from Scandinavia—these you may meet there—the outpourings of all the ships that sail the Seven Seas. There many drunken beasts, with their pay in ...
— The Agony Column • Earl Derr Biggers

... green and stagnant waters lick His feet, And from their filmy, iridescent scum Clouds of mosquitoes, gauzy in the heat, Rise with His gifts: ...
— India's Love Lyrics • Adela Florence Cory Nicolson (AKA Laurence Hope), et al.

... will you please get Hanna a saucer of milk?" said Cousin Emelene now, seeing the maid's round eyes glaring startled from the dining-room door. "And just warm it a little bit, don't scald it. She won't touch it if there's the least bit of a scum on it. Just take that ice-box chill off. Here, I'll go with you this time. Since we're going to live here now, you'll have to do it a good many times, and I'd better show you just how to ...
— The Sturdy Oak - A Composite Novel of American Politics by Fourteen American Authors • Samuel Merwin, et al.

... scum, ye lousy sons o' dogs!" he ended. "Ha, will ye fight agin my orders, then—mutiny ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol

... with a longing that made him sick, for "God's country" where all that is worst and best on earth still boils in the vast and seething cauldron of a continent in the making. There bubbles the elemental broth, dregs, scum, skimmings, residue, by-products, tailings, smoking corruption above the slowly forming and incorruptible matrix in its depths where lies imbedded, and ever growing, the Immam, the Hope of the World—gem indestructible, pearl beyond price. ...
— Athalie • Robert W. Chambers

... women of saffron color or quite black, either free or slave. Will any one dare to deny this fact? I will only designate, in support of my assertion (and to say no more), the famous house of Coquet, located near the center of the city, where all that scum is to be seen publicly, and that ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday

... headland, and then rushed up the face of the cliffs to toss their gory spray high in the air. The restless, heaving lake boiled and bubbled, never remaining the same for two minutes together. Its normal colour seemed to be a dull dark red, covered with a thin grey scum, which every moment and in every part swelled and cracked, and emitted fountains, cascades, and whirlpools of yellow and red fire, while sometimes one big golden river, sometimes four or five, flowed across it. There was an island on one side of the lake, which the fiery waves seemed ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey

... arch was evidently the favourite spot. Carefully looking over that side again, the moorhen who had been out rushed back; the water-rat was gone. Were there any fish? In the shadow the water was difficult to see through, and the brown scum of spring that lined ...
— Nature Near London • Richard Jefferies

... along that vale of Good and Ill Where London streets ferment in full activity, While everything around was calm and still, Except the creak of wheels, which on their pivot he Heard,—and that bee-like, bubbling, busy hum Of cities, that boil over with their scum:— ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron

... the other day, when you proclaimed yourself a low-born impostor. She thought you a high-born gentleman, and you told her of the gutter up north and the fried-fish shop and the Sicilian organ-grinding woman. She, royalty—you of the scum! She left you. This morning she learned worse. She learned that you were the son of a convict. What does she do? She comes somehow—I don't know how—to Hickney Heath and hears you publicly give yourself away—and she ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke

... Ferrara assisted them to cross the Po, and the Duke of Urbino made no effort to bar the passes of the Apennines. Losing one leader after the other, these ruffians, calling themselves an Imperial army, but being in reality the scum and offscourings of all nations, without any aim but plunder and ignorant of policy, reached Rome upon the 6th of May. They took the city by assault, and for nine months Clement, leaning from the battlements of Hadrian's ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds

... new, for during my early travels I heard such discussions again and again. Your arguments may or may not be correct. We will not discuss the matter. One thing you must not forget, however: the Jews in Russia and elsewhere are despised and rejected; they are degraded to the very scum of the earth. Social standing, pursuit of knowledge, means of amusement, everything is taken from them. What is left? Only the consolation which their sacred religion brings. The observance of the thousand ceremonials which you decry, is to them not only a religious necessity, ...
— Rabbi and Priest - A Story • Milton Goldsmith

... laughed at the long-forgotten word. 'Forty years ago that might have been said, and not without truth. Ay. thirty years ago. But it is the fault of this gadding up and down Hind that a king's widow must jostle all the scum of the land, and be ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling

... who call themselves the best people—Society, that is to say," said Mrs. Kilroy cheerfully. "Society is the scum that comes to the surface because of its lightness, and does not count, except in ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand

... his skill and adroitness; he loved to present the smouldering and flashing of passions, the thrill and sting of which he had never known. Saved as he was by his temperament alike from deep suffering and tense emotion, and from any vital mingling either with the scum and foam or with the stagnancy and mire of life, the books remain as a brilliant illusion, with much of the shifting hues and changing glimmer of his own ardent and restless mind rippling over the surface of a depth which is always a little mysterious ...
— Hugh - Memoirs of a Brother • Arthur Christopher Benson

... Chance, this I hold firm: Virtue may be assailed, but never hurt, Surprised by unjust force, but not enthralled; 590 Yea, even that which Mischief meant most harm Shall in the happy trial prove most glory. But evil on itself shall back recoil, And mix no more with goodness, when at last, Gathered like scum, and settled to itself, It shall be in eternal restless change Self-fed and self-consumed. If this fail, The pillared firmament is rottenness, And earth's base built on stubble. But come, let's on! Against the opposing will and arm of Heaven ...
— Milton's Comus • John Milton

... tables, he wheedled secrets from the prostitutes of princes; he stood by and egged on human dog-fights; he took part in church-rows about doctrines; he had inside glimpses of the venality of Austrian kept-press-writers, "the scum of the earth," he calls them, "who sell opinions as the petty merchant sells butter and eggs." Bismarck seemed to be the only man in Europe who really was able to grasp the solution of the ...
— Blood and Iron - Origin of German Empire As Revealed by Character of Its - Founder, Bismarck • John Hubert Greusel

... am wrong to speak to you so. I give you free liberty to say what you will to me. Say I am not a bit of a soldier, or anything! Abuse me—do now, there's a dear. I'm scum, I'm froth, I'm dirt before ...
— The Trumpet-Major • Thomas Hardy

... easily catch the spirit of the place. For when you merely observe and admire some view, and if industrious make a note of your impression, and then go home to luncheon, you are but a vulgar tripper, scum of the earth, deserving the ridicule with which the natives treat you. The romantic spirit is your only justification; when by the comeliness of your life or the beauty of your emotion you have attained that, (Shelley when he visited Paestum had it, but Theophile Gautier, ...
— The Land of The Blessed Virgin; Sketches and Impressions in Andalusia • William Somerset Maugham

... into his brother's pocket; but I'm not going to do it at his sister-in-law's command. If you ask me whether I feel inclined to help Hilary Margerison and his wife, my answer is simply no I don't. They're merely scum; and why should one have anything to ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay

... whom they had with them and the way that those villains treated their captive I noted that his face paled, and that there came a look into his eyes which I had not often seen there, but which meant no good for Jensen and his scum if Lancelot got the top of them. For Lancelot was a staunch Churchman and a respecter of ministers of God's Word, and as loyal to his religion as he was ...
— Marjorie • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... her and said that he'd despise her if she didn't stand by Mr. Bingle now that he needed her so much; and Stokes said that she was crying because she hated herself for even thinking of leaving and that the other girls were the scum of the earth, take ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon

... replanking. Was it a realization of this fact, I wonder, that caused it on a sudden to run violently down a steep place into the Bay, as if it were possessed of Devils? Well it might be, for the human scum of the town gathered about the base of the hill, and the nights ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard

... large as the bay of New-York, to have fallen in to the depth of several thousand feet. At the bottom of this great cauldron, you behold the liquid fire boiling and bubbling up, partly covered with a thick black scum. There are two or three inner craters, which have been formed by the lava cooling on its sides while the liquid sunk below. The gentlemen mostly descended into this crater, but I was fully satisfied with a look from above. The earth ...
— Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, March 1844 - Volume 23, Number 3 • Various

... was, from the beginning of the world. Finally, they brought the Hebrew nation into contempt, that they might themselves appear comparatively less impious with regard to strangers. They confessed what was true, that they were the slaves, the scum, and the spurious and abortive offspring of our nation, while they overthrew the city themselves, and forced the Romans, whether they would or no, to gain a melancholy reputation, by acting gloriously against them, and did ...
— The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem • Flavius Josephus

... queen of France appeared disguised as a violet-seller. I found there flower-merchants disguised as vivandieres. I expected to find libertinism there, but in fact I found none at all. One sees only the scum of libertinism, some blows, and drunken women lying in deathlike stupor on ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... were closed, from which we gathered that the folk who owned it had fled away from their perilous position. On either side the marsh extended, reedy and shallow at the edge, but deeper at a distance, with a bright green scum which covered its treacherous surface. We knocked at the weather-blotched door, but receiving, as we expected, no reply, I presently put my shoulder against it and forced the ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle

... and I had too much spirit to give in at this signal instance of insult towards me; so we danced with some of the very commonest low people at the bottom of the set—your apothecaries, wine-merchants, attorneys, and such scum as are allowed ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray

... bone to one and a half quarts of cold water; the meat and bones to be well chopped and broken up, and put over the fire in cold water, being brought slowly to a boil, and carefully skimmed as often as any scum rises; and being maintained at a steady boiling point from two to six hours, as time permits; one hour before the stock is done, add to it one carrot and one turnip pared, one onion stuck with three cloves, and ...
— Twenty-Five Cent Dinners for Families of Six • Juliet Corson

... scattered, each from each, under a ragged bank of mortar, and scoria; and brick-layers' refuse, on one side, which the clean water nevertheless chastises to purity; but it cannot conquer the dead earth beyond; and there, circled and coiled under festering scum, the stagnant edge of the pool effaces itself into a slope of black slime, the accumulation of indolent years. Half-a-dozen men, with one day's work, could cleanse those pools, and trim the flowers about their banks, and make every breath of summer air above them rich ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin

... hotel office with a desperate glance, trying to select a face to which she might appeal. There wasn't one. Estabrook was filling with its usual week-end scum; crafty faces, hard faces, faces shallowly good-natured, and therefore doubly treacherous. Even the pimply clerk at the desk, discerning her unescorted state, had changed subtly in ...
— Winner Take All • Larry Evans

... it wrote down on the record!" He laughed harshly. "There's goin' to be hell to pay here. Trevison won't stand for it—though the other gillies are advisin' caution. Caution hell! I'm for cleanin' the scum out! Do you know what Corrigan done, yesterday? He got thirty or so deputies—pluguglies that he's hired—an' hid 'em behind some flat-cars down on the level where they're erectin' some minin' machinery. He laid a trap for 'Firebrand,' expectin' him to come down there, ...
— 'Firebrand' Trevison • Charles Alden Seltzer

... explosive material enabled them to make a more effective defence of their citadel against the Dutch fleet; the other revealed to the Portuguese and their Mussulman allies that "the Netherlanders could not exist without English protection, that they were the scum of nations, and that if they should get possession of this clove monopoly, their insolence would become intolerable." Samples of polite literature such as these, printed but not published, flew about in volleys. ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... large, deep vessels, provided with copper steam coils in the bottom for the purpose of heating the juice. Sufficient milk of lime is added here to nearly or quite neutralize the acids in the juice, the test being made with litmus paper. The juice is brought to the boiling point, and as much of the scum is removed as can be taken quickly. The scum is returned to the diffusion cells, and the juice is sent by a pump to the top of the building, where it is boiled and thoroughly skimmed. These skimmings are also returned ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 633, February 18, 1888 • Various

... hive may be used, if you will only first destroy the virus. This, I have ascertained, may be done by scalding: add a half-pint of water to about ten lbs.; stir it well, and heat it to the boiling point, and carefully remove all the scum. ...
— Mysteries of Bee-keeping Explained • M. Quinby

... glaze, which will adhere lightly to the spoon; then fill up the pot with cold water, and when on the boiling point, draw it to the back of the stove, where it may gently simmer three hours, if veal, six if beef, carefully skimming it to remove scum. This stock, as it is, will make a delicious foundation, with the addition of salt, for all kinds of clear soup or gravies. To reduce it to glaze proceed as follows: Pass the stock through a fine hair sieve or cloth into a ...
— Culture and Cooking - Art in the Kitchen • Catherine Owen

... cruelties of the early buccaneers were therefore not merely a brutal exhibition of unpitying greed, indicative of the scum of nations as yet barely emerging from barbarism. They were this, doubtless, but they were something more. In the march of events, these early marauders played the same part, in relation to what was to succeed them, as the rude, unscrupulous, lawless adventurers who now precede the ruthless march ...
— The Interest of America in Sea Power, Present and Future • A. T. Mahan

... wine grower is glad to see his must deposit the greater part of these chemical ingredients in the "tartar," a product much disliked, and therefore named Sal Tartari, or Hell Salt; and Cremor Tartari, Hell Scum (Cream of Tartar). ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie

... them being the ship's sole survivors on the deserted island, and both of them lean with hunger—it was the Elderly Naval Man (the villain of the piece) who "ups with his heels, and smothers his squeals in the scum of the boiling broth." ...
— There's Pippins And Cheese To Come • Charles S. Brooks

... move not a foot, nor speak not, For if thou doest, upon this point thy death sits. Thou miserable, base, and sordid lecher, Thou scum of noble blood, repent and speedily, Repent thy thousand thefts, from helpless Virgins, Their innocence ...
— Beaumont & Fletcher's Works (1 of 10) - The Custom of the Country • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... off the hard Ends, and put them in White-Wine Vinegar and Salt, well covered with it; and so let them remain for six Weeks: Then taking them out, boil the Liquor or Pickle, and scum it carefully. If need be, renew the Vinegar and Salt; and when 'tis cold, pot them up again. Thus may one ...
— Acetaria: A Discourse of Sallets • John Evelyn

... them in fair water till they be somewhat tender, then take them out, and peel off the skins and put them into a fair earthen pot, and cover them till they be cold, then make the syrup with fair water and Sugar, seeth it, and scum it very clean, then being almost cold, put in your Pippins, so boil them softly together, put in as much rind of Oranges as you think will tast them, if you have no Oranges take whole Cinamon and Cloves, so boil them high enough to keep them ...
— A Queens Delight • Anonymous

... from the crater. Gliding to its rim, I looked down. A pool of water lay on the bottom. A greenish scum covered the surface. The scum moved with ...
— Lonesome Hearts • Russell Robert Winterbotham

... their neighbours of the trade that are scattered about the town, but all over England, ay, and beyond sea, too, and send abroad their circulators, and in this manner get into their hands all that is valuable. The rest of the trade are content to take their refuse, with which, and the fresh scum of the press, they furnish one side of the shop, which serves for the sign of a bookseller, rather than a real one; but instead of selling, deal as factors, and procure what the country divines and gentry ...
— The Book-Hunter in London - Historical and Other Studies of Collectors and Collecting • William Roberts

... Looks mean enough," said Yellin' Kid. The cattle men could say nothing too strong against this despised class of breeders and their innocent charges. Sheep herders were the scum of the earth to the ranchmen, and to say that a man has "gone in for sheep" was to utter the last word against him, though he might be a decent member of society for all that, and with as kind and human instincts as his more affluent ...
— The Boy Ranchers at Spur Creek - or Fighting the Sheep Herders • Willard F. Baker

... condensation within the pipes. The primary object of the defecator is to remove all impurities and perfectly clarify the liquid passing through it. All portions of pomace and other minute particles of foreign matter, when heated, expand and float in the form of scum upon the surface of the cider. An ingeniously contrived floating rake drags off this scum and delivers it over the side of the pan. To facilitate this removal, one side of the pan, commencing at ...
— Scientific American Supplement No. 360, November 25, 1882 • Various

... Fear was nearly taking the place of mercy, words of pardon were on his lips, when a certain Athanasius Vaya, a Greek schismatic, and a favourite of the pacha's, whose illegitimate son he was supposed to be, advanced at the head of the scum of the army, and offered to carry out the death sentence. Ali applauded his zeal, gave him full authority to act, and spurred his horse to the top of a neighbouring hill, the better to enjoy the spectacle. The Christian Mirdites and the Mohammedan guards ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - ALI PACHA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... him! The pond be close at hand. Let's give him a taste of his deservings! What do he the scum, turn himself up at West Lynne for, bearding Mr. Carlyle? What have he done with Lady Isabel? Him put up for others at West Lynne! West Lynne's respectable, it don't want him; it have got a better man; it won't have a ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood

... or five from Charley's hut. I had camped at dusk on the previous evening; and the equipment of my two horses, with other impedimenta, was lying about. A small damper was maturing under the handful of fire, and a quart pot of tea was slowly collecting a scum of dirt which made it nothing the worse to a man of my nurture. Pup was reposing on my possum rug, and Cleopatra and Bunyip were in Eden, per favour of the kindly scoundrel who held that property by right of discovery, and who, in spite of some ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy

... gravely, more impressed than ever with the seriousness of the situation. "I heard of him two years ago—he killed a man in the Sixth North Carolina, and took to the hills. Since then he has developed into quite a leader for such scum, and has proven himself a merciless monster. You have no suggestion to offer as to how we had better attempt ...
— My Lady of the North • Randall Parrish

... it when put to the fire, it will not cook well. The best way to boil it is to put it in cold water, and boil it gently, with just water enough to cover it, as it hardens by furious boiling. The part that is to be up on the table, should be down in the pot, as the scum that rises is apt to make the meat look dark—the scum should be taken off as soon as it rises. The liquor in which all kinds of fresh meat is boiled, makes a good soup, when thickened and seasoned. Boiling is the cheapest way of cooking meat, ...
— The American Housewife • Anonymous

... distant Thunder hem, Maryland! The Old Line's bugle, fife, and drum. Maryland! She is not dead, nor deaf, nor dumb— Hnzza! she spurns the Northern scum! She breathes—she burns! she'll come! she'll come! Maryland! ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy



Words linked to "Scum" :   scum bag, riffraff, remove, dross, slag, scoria, ragtag, pond-scum parasite, rabble, film, ragtag and bobtail, get rid of



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