"Astride" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... surges up before me with a crimson smear across its sunlight. There was a Low Country fellow there, waist deep in schnapps, and a Finlander sucking strong beer like a hog. Meinheer and the Finn came to words and blows, and I, who was sitting astride of the railing staring, heard a shrill scream from the old man and a rattle as he dropped his fiddle, and then a flash and a red rain of blood on the table as my Finn fell with a knife in him, the Hollander's knife, smartly pegged in between the left breast and the shoulder. I declare that, even ...
— Marjorie • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... one of the pursuers returned. He had seen Carrot splash through the drift. He took his time and went at it leisurely, I gathered, with his piccanin astride upon his shoulders. On the other side a crowd of natives had received him in triumph. They jeered at the police and shook their spears and knobkerries. Carrot was safely across the ...
— Cinderella in the South - Twenty-Five South African Tales • Arthur Shearly Cripps
... had got, who demanded great vails, For conducting me over the mountains of Wales: Twenty good shillings, which sure very large is; Yet that would not serve, but I must bear his charges; And yet for all that, rode astride on a beast, The worst that e'er went on three legs, I protest: It certainly was the most ugly of jades, His hips and his rump made a right ace of spades; His sides were two ladders, well spur-galled withal; His neck was a helve, and his head was a mall; For his colour, my pains and ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... tropical; rainy season (March to June); dry season (June to October); constantly high temperatures and humidity; particularly enervating climate astride ...
— The 2001 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... to the Tiger: "I could not bring you any of the other beasts because the way was blocked by a fat old Tiger with a Flying Squirrel sitting astride its muzzle." On hearing this the Tiger exclaimed, "Let us go and find it and drive it away." The three therefore set out, the Flying Squirrel perched upon the Tiger's muzzle and the Mouse-deer sitting astride upon its hind quarters. On reaching ...
— The Talking Beasts • Various
... Several rode astride upon cannon, boasting in the most horrible songs of the crimes they had committed themselves or seen others commit. Those who were nearest the carriage sang ballads, the allusions in which, by means of their gestures, they applied ...
— The False Chevalier - or, The Lifeguard of Marie Antoinette • William Douw Lighthall
... companionship with an intelligent animal, the freedom, the fresh air, the scenery, all give enjoyment of life, and the constant movement acts as a most delicious tonic. There is only one correct way to ride for both sexes, and that is astride. The side saddle position keeps the spine twisted so that it takes away much of the benefit to be derived from riding. Out west the approved manner of riding for women is astride. The women of the west make a ...
— Maintaining Health • R. L. Alsaker
... Philippines astride typhoon belt, usually affected by 15 and struck by five to six cyclonic storms per year; landslides; active ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... day, Clara, her mother, her little sister, and myself were walking by the port, and as we looked on the sea I was telling them old gossip tales of mermaids and sea-serpents,—when a red-faced bottle-nosed Frenchman clapped himself right before me, and placing his spectacles very deliberately astride his proboscis, echoed out, 'Sacre, mille tonnerres! This is the damned pirate that boarded ...
— Zicci, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... realized that it was the young commander of the guard, they seemed to give way without further struggle, and so it resulted that in a moment more every red-skin was off that sacred square of board, and that a thick, deep semicircle of warriors, some few afoot, but most of them astride their ponies, glowered in silence now at the tall soldier who, interposing between them and the victim of their rude horse play, stood confronting them with grave, set, indomitable look in his pale face, on which the sweat was already ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... not long in finding a new resource. He spied Mr. Goodworth's cane standing in a corner; and, instantly getting astride of it, prepared to amuse himself with a little imaginary horse-exercise up and down the room. He had just started at a gentle canter, when his father called out, "Zachary!" and brought the boy ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins
... the world that the victorious Speed wanted was to lie down and stretch out and allow those glowing coals in his chest to cool off. But rough hands seized him, and he found himself astride of Stover's shoulders and gyrating about the Echo Phonograph in the midst of a war-dance. He kicked violently with his spiked shoes, whereat the foreman bucked like a wild horse under the spur and dropped him, and he staggered out of the crowd, where ...
— Going Some • Rex Beach
... ever see the main street without a horse or two tied to posts, and making a fine figure with their Mexican housings. It struck me oddly to come across some of the Cornhill illustrations to Mr. Blackmore's "Erema," and see all the characters astride on English saddles. As a matter of fact, an English saddle is a rarity even in San Francisco, and you may say a thing unknown in all the rest of California. In a place so exclusively Mexican as Monterey, you saw not only Mexican saddles but true ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the gentleman's appearance George was sitting astride of a big limb in a tree at the side of the road, his pockets bulging with stones, which he was hurling with unpleasant accuracy at every one who came within range. Several youngsters were howling from having served as targets to the urchin up the tree, and as soon as Mr. Pangborn ...
— Dewey and Other Naval Commanders • Edward S. Ellis
... out almost entirely, but they did not give up. When it was stormy and they could not dig, and the ex-pilot was in a talkative vein, he would sit astride the bunk and distribute to his hearers riches more valuable than any they would dig from the Esmeralda hills. At other times he did not talk at all, but sat in a corner and wrote. They thought he was writing home; they did not know that he was "literary." Some of ...
— The Boys' Life of Mark Twain • Albert Bigelow Paine
... first to adopt and the first to abandon a new fashion. Accused of nothing worse than spending too much time at his toilet and wearing a corset, he presented the type of those persons who displease no one by adopting incessantly the ideas and the follies of everbody, and who, astride ...
— Beatrix • Honore de Balzac
... Phronsie," he said, coming back to get astride the railing again; this time he turned a cold shoulder on Phronsie's "white needle." "Now, to-morrow, we'll have no end of fun." And he launched forth on so many and so varied delights, that Phronsie's pleased little laugh rang out again and again, bringing ...
— Five Little Peppers Abroad • Margaret Sidney
... horse made a step forward; "he's an old un, dead lame." "Don't leave go, Rube," I said. "He'll do for our turn." He was a miserable old beast, but I felt that he would do as well as the best horse in the world for us. Rube saw my meaning, and in a minute we were both astride on his back. He tottered, and I thought he'd have gone down on his head. Kicking weren't of no good; so I out with my knife and gave him a prod, and off we went. It weren't far, some two hundred yards or so, but it was the way ...
— Out on the Pampas - The Young Settlers • G. A. Henty
... the criminal to the numerous sufferers, whom he had deprived of a father, a husband, or a friend. His teeth and hair, an eye and a hand, were torn from him, as a poor compensation for their loss: and a short respite was allowed, that he might feel the bitterness of death. Astride on a camel, without any danger of a rescue, he was carried through the city, and the basest of the populace rejoiced to trample on the fallen majesty of their prince. After a thousand blows and outrages, Andronicus was hung by the feet, between two pillars, that supported the ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... as one of the Chambers of "Rhetoric" in which the hard-handed but half-artistic mechanics and shopkeepers of the Netherlands loved to disport themselves was called, then exhibited upon an opposite scaffold a magnificent representation of Jupiter astride upon an eagle and banding down to the Stadholder as if from the clouds that same principality. Nothing could ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... ten minutes. Beg. Pray for it as you never prayed before. (He thrusts out a figged fist and foul cigar) Here, kiss that. Both. Kiss. (He throws a leg astride and, pressing with horseman's knees, calls in a hard voice) Gee up! A cockhorse to Banbury cross. I'll ride him for the Eclipse stakes. (He bends sideways and squeezes his mount's testicles roughly, shouting) Ho! Off we pop! I'll nurse ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... London and Westminster. The picture of a modern Hell, in the centre, between the pedestals, has the very appropriate emblems of Misery and Death, in the niches on each side. Crowning the whole, the Genius of Wit is seen astride of an eagle, demonstrative of strength, and wielding in his hand the lash of Satire; an instrument which, in the present work, has been used more as a corrective of we ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... long it took him to come to Washington from his country. He replied by placing the index and second finger of the right hand astride the extended forefinger (others closed) of the left; then elevating the fingers of the left hand (except thumb and forefinger) back forward (three); then extending the fingers of both hands and bringing them to a point, thumbs ...
— Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples And Deaf-Mutes • Garrick Mallery
... found, was with the common people an almost unwritten law. Then, too, they were of great assistance in crossing streams where the depth would have necessitated the stripping of garments; although their fiery little steeds sometimes objected to having an extra rider astride their haunches, and a bicycle across their shoulders. They seized every opportunity to impress us with the necessity of being accompanied by a government representative. In some lonely portion of the ...
— Across Asia on a Bicycle • Thomas Gaskell Allen and William Lewis Sachtleben
... was Richard Mutimer. He was dressed in a light tweed suit; his fair moustache and beard were trimmed, and the hand which rested on the table was no longer that of a daily-grimed mechanic. His linen was admirably starched; altogether he had a very fresh and cool appearance. His companion was astride on a chair, his arms resting on the back, a pipe in his mouth. This man was somewhat older than Mutimer; his countenance indicated shrewdness and knowledge of the world. He was dark and well-featured, his ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... a rattle and bang Of his bones, he sprang From his famous Pale Horse, with his spear; By the neck and the foot Seized the fellow, and put Him astride with his face ...
— The Devil's Dictionary • Ambrose Bierce
... not observe Yorke, or I might have prevented what followed. He had stolen up softly behind me, and, unconscious that he was on the edge of a bluff, had stepped a step beyond me. Of course he went over at once, heels over head, turning a complete somersault, and alighted erect, astride the ...
— The Rose of Old St. Louis • Mary Dillon
... fight!" rasped Pearse, stepping astride Venner and glaring down at Tomlin. "Venner, draw aside. Let me punish this scoundrel we have called friend; then meet me if ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... this crowning of young Henry by York and London so violated the immemorial usage of the Church, that, like the gravedigger's child I have heard of, trying to ring the bell, he hath half-hanged himself in the rope of the Church, or rather pulled all the Church with the Holy Father astride of it ...
— Becket and other plays • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... slowly ever since, it needed only a slight shock to bring it to a finish. I grasped a stout snag and tried to swing myself over the place, but there came a splitting report; and there was just time to drop astride above that stub of limb, when the log parted below it, and I was in the river. I managed to keep my hold and my head out of water, though the current did its best to suck me under. Then I saw that while the main ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... house; so I started to go and ask for a light from some neighbour; but as it was very dark I did not like to leave my wife all alone: nor did I like to send her out alone to ask for the light; so at last I took my hookah in my hand and set my wife astride on my shoulder and went round from house to house like that, asking for a light; and all the villagers laughed like anything; so I am a fool." Then they agreed that they were all three fools and had better divide the plantains equally among them ...
— Folklore of the Santal Parganas • Cecil Henry Bompas
... from cholera), resulted in the surrender of over 5,000 Turks, including a divisional commander, 22 miles north-west of Hit. The prisoners were fugitives from the battle of Baghdadieh, and the cavalry were astride their communications. "On the morning of the Armistice (November 11, 1918) two British Cavalry Divisions were on the march east of the Scheldt, and before orders to stop reached them they had already ...
— Lectures on Land Warfare; A tactical Manual for the Use of Infantry Officers • Anonymous
... out at the crowing boy: And yesterday it was he perch'd him fair Upon his broad rough shoulder, like a lamb Laid on the topmost reaches of a hill, And so he bore him, all his face a-glow, When heralds came with war-notes from the king; At which he turn'd him soft—the startled babe Still set astride, and looking fondly up, Said he, "See! here's the only lord that sets His foot upon my shoulder." The man's heart Scarce beats, I warrant, now the ...
— Poems • Walter R. Cassels
... I climbed. I will not say there was no groaning and puffing, but any how I at last found myself astride of a branch and looking over the wall into ...
— The O'Ruddy - A Romance • Stephen Crane
... the Morning Star I beheld the packing-cases brought up from the hold, and my new purchase with all its parts and appurtenances loaded in a ship's boat, with the iron box that held my gold. So I arrived in Atuona for the second time, high astride the sewed-up mattress on top of the metal parts, and so deftly did the Tahitians handle the oars that, though we rode the surf right up to the creeping jungle flowers that met the tide on Atuona beach, I was not ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... carbine slings over their shoulders and flew to their horses. "Never mind your saddles—no time for that!" yelled Blake, as he slipped the bit between the teeth of his startled charger, then threw himself astride the naked back. "Up with you and come on!" Then with a dozen ready fellows at his heels away he darted into the gloom, guided only by the yells and flashes far out over the sandy plain. In less than two minutes every trooper in the little command had ...
— A Wounded Name • Charles King
... took me a month to travel over, and then I came to the sea-side. It happened at the time to be perfectly calm, and I espied a vessel about half a league from the shore: unwilling to lose so good an opportunity, I broke off a large branch from a tree, carried it into the sea, and placed myself astride upon it, with a stick in each hand to serve me ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... experience" I had never seen an animal that pleased me so much; his well-arched neck and slightly-dipped back showed that an Arab cross had mingled with the stronger qualities of the Norman horse. I sprung to my saddle with delight; to be astride such a beast was to kindle up all the enthusiasm of my nature, and as I grasped the reins, and urged him forward, I was ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... Sir Persaunt in the side, and the latter's attack became less eager. Finally Beaumains hit the other so great a stroke that he fell headlong, and instantly Beaumains leaped astride of him and unlashed his helm, as if about to ...
— King Arthur's Knights - The Tales Re-told for Boys & Girls • Henry Gilbert
... and hopeful. They rode into the place which is called Roncevaux, the Vale of Thorns, and there they put themselves in battle array, and waited the onset of their foes. Roland sat astride of his good war steed, and proudly faced the Moorish host. In his hand he held the bared blade Durandal, pointing toward heaven. Never was seen a more comely knight. Courteously he spoke to the warriors about him. Then, putting spurs to his steed, ...
— Hero Tales • James Baldwin
... they serve us to date the poems. The miniatures conform to the tale; tonsured monks bear Achilles to the grave; they carry tapers in their hands. Queen Penthesilea, "doughty and bold, and beautiful and virtuous," rides astride, her heels armed with huge red spurs.[175] Oedipus is dubbed a knight; AEneas takes counsel of his "barons." This manner of representing antiquity lasted till the Renaissance; and till much later, on the stage. Under Louis XIV., Augustus wore a perruque "in-folio"; and in ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... leaped astride the frightened beast, and the men have let go their hold. Like an arrow sprung from a strong bow, the pony, with extended nostrils, plunges halfway to the centre tepee. With all his might the rider draws the strong reins in. The pony halts with ...
— American Indian stories • Zitkala-Sa
... art. When I look at that wet road and rainy sky, I go back in thought to the days when I lived near Barnet, and the world was mine on Sunday. I recall how I was wont to throw off my morning lethargy, get astride my bicycle, a pipe in one pocket and a book in the other, and plunge into the open country beyond Hadley Heath. It had rained, very likely, in the morning, and the roads were clean and fresh, and the trees were sweet after ...
— An Ocean Tramp • William McFee
... entered. Mary forgot my existence in a moment, and raced toward him, opening a conversation at the top of her voice while he was still a quarter of a mile distant. When they met, he dismounted, and, placing her astride on the saddle, continued his way with the expression of a man whose cup of ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... opened, and a man covered with dust, astride a weary, foam-flecked horse, rode under the archway of the keep into the first courtyard of ...
— St. Martin's Summer • Rafael Sabatini
... with her; sometimes some old salt, sitting astride of a cask, would tell her a mariner's tale of far-away lands and mysteries of the deep; sometimes some curly-headed cabin-boy would give her a shell or a plume of seaweed, and try and make her understand what the wonderful wild water ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... supple bodies like willow branches, and touching the ground with their necks without displacing their heels, supporting in that impossible attitude the weight of their companions; others juggled with a ball, two balls, three balls, before, behind, their arms crossed, astride of or standing upon the loins of one of the women of the company. One, indeed, the cleverest, put on blinkers like Tmei, the goddess of justice, and caught the globes in her hands without letting a single one fall. The Pharaoh was not moved by ...
— The Works of Theophile Gautier, Volume 5 - The Romance of a Mummy and Egypt • Theophile Gautier
... way out of the overturned wagon. The traces were unfastened and the horse was free, and the strange man was actually astride ...
— Dorothy Dale's Camping Days • Margaret Penrose
... and out of this crowd the train of automobiles with their flags dashed up and down the Mall for hours, appearing and disappearing. Intoxicated youths with inflamed faces, in full evening dress, squatted on the roofs of taxi-cabs or rode astride on the engines of their ...
— The Tree of Heaven • May Sinclair
... what a night! The devil astride the jib boom, his tail lashing in the wind. "Pokker!" says Tobias, "fa'n ta mig. Hold tight and here ...
— A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago • Ben Hecht
... driving small parcels of pigs, sheep, goats, or cattle, or carrying baskets full of eggs, cheese, and butter, and often an old hen; others with carts loaded with potatoes; others travelling comfortably in their char—bancs; and others on horseback, the women as well as the men being astride. ...
— The South of France—East Half • Charles Bertram Black
... of Oz came around the bend in the road, riding astride a wooden Sawhorse which was so small that its rider's legs nearly ...
— The Patchwork Girl of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... Jeff remained sitting where he had put himself astride of a chair, with his face over the back. The painter walked slowly up and down before him in the capricious play of the street light. He turned a little sick, and he stopped a moment at the window for a ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... thrice-ploughed fallow field, Jove came to hear of it before so very long and killed Iasion with his thunderbolts. And now you are angry with me too because I have a man here. I found the poor creature sitting all alone astride of a keel, for Jove had struck his ship with lightning and sunk it in mid ocean, so that all his crew were drowned, while he himself was driven by wind and waves on to my island. I got fond of him and cherished him, and had set my heart on making him immortal, so that he should never ...
— The Odyssey • Homer
... Valle describes those of an Indian Embassy at Ispahan: "The Indian Ambassador was also accompanied by a variety of warlike instruments of music of strange kinds, and particularly by certain Naccheras of such immense size that each pair had an elephant to carry them, whilst an Indian astride upon the elephant between the two Naccheras played upon them with both hands, dealing strong blows on this one and on that; what a din was made by these vast drums, and what a spectacle it was, I leave you ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... little distance, watching her pull off her gloves with a queer comic twitch of his elastic mouth. "Well, I guess it's only when you want to be," he said, grasping a lyre-backed chair by its gilt cords, and sitting down astride of it, his light grey trousers stretching too tightly over his plump thighs. Undine was perfectly aware that he was a vulgar over-dressed man, with a red crease of fat above his collar and an impudent swaggering eye; yet she liked to see him there, and was conscious ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... near the door; draws it near the table; and sits astride it, with his elbows folded on ...
— John Bull's Other Island • George Bernard Shaw
... had seen the band early in the morning from their village, and had been making a large circuit, to avoid giving them the wind, when they discovered us. In a few minutes the women came galloping up, astride on their horses, and naked from their knees down and the hips up. They followed the men, to assist in cutting up and carrying off ...
— The Exploring Expedition to the Rocky Mountains, Oregon and California • Brevet Col. J.C. Fremont
... was in that condition called repaired, having just been whittled into the required semi-cylindrical form with the shovel and scraper, with all the softest inequalities in the middle, like a hog's back with the bristles up, and Jehu was expected to keep astride of the spine. As you looked off each side of the bare sphere into the horizon, the ditches were awful to behold,—a vast hollowness, like that between Saturn and his ring. At a tavern hereabouts the hostler ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... Ulysses; Lucian and Apuleius the story of an ass; and somebody else records the last will of a hog, of which St. Hierom makes mention. So that if they please, let themselves think the worst of me, and fancy to themselves that I was all this while a playing at push-pin, or riding astride on a hobby-horse. For how unjust is it, if when we allow different recreations to each particular course of life, we afford no diversion to studies; especially when trifles may be a whet to more serious thoughts, and comical matters may be so treated of, as that a reader ...
— In Praise of Folly - Illustrated with Many Curious Cuts • Desiderius Erasmus
... that he had simply studied in Holland for an inn-keeper. This rascal of composite order was, in all probability, some Fleming from Lille, in Flanders, a Frenchman in Paris, a Belgian at Brussels, being comfortably astride of both frontiers. As for his prowess at Waterloo, the reader is already acquainted with that. It will be perceived that he exaggerated it a trifle. Ebb and flow, wandering, adventure, was the leven of his existence; a tattered conscience ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... a gentleman in black, who, with his wristbands tucked up, and his hat cocked loungingly on one side, and his hands in his pockets, sat down astride on the table-beer barrel, and ...
— The Chimes • Charles Dickens
... the tree where Hardy sat. The boy was apparently oblivious of everything but the parrots up aloft, and it was not till after he had had his shot that he returned the young man's salutation. Then he took a seat astride the log and offered some commonplace information about a nest of joeys in a neighboring tree and a tame magpie that had escaped, and was teaching all the other magpies in Wilson's paddocks to whistle a jig and curse ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson
... sailors jumped into the water nearly waist deep, and each took a passenger on his shoulders, soon placing him on terra firma. I have travelled in a great variety of ways, but I was never before placed on a man's shoulders, astride of his neck; but in this way I took my leave of the German Ocean. There is not a rock to be seen on the shore; which consists of fine sand thrown up from the sea, and forms a bank about twenty feet high; the highest land on the coast of Holland, ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... the juices already imbibed may sustain it awhile, but with every passing day will sustain it less. If Louis Napoleon is so removed from conversation with reality as not to perceive the colossal satire implied in his gift, it will soon require more vigor than he possesses to keep astride the Gallic steed. That Chinese etiquette explains the condition of the Chinese nation. Indeed, it is easy to give a recipe for mummying men alive. Take one into keeping, prescribe everything, thoughts, actions, manners, so that he never shall find either permission or opportunity to ask his own ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various
... come, if they will, but ye shan't go," cried the doctor, sitting astride of his fallen foe and glancing at Fred and I in triumph, while the perspiration streamed down his face ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... and set them an easy pace. Work had begun again, the work of my heart's desire, and all along the Chester road there was no blither spirit than mine that night. I was astride a flaming sorrel, no match for Sultan, but still a good sound horse. He knew I was his master and so I made him a friend, patting his neck, crooning to him, and giving him a lick of sugar out of my hand. The danger we were in was like wine to ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... rocked, The moon was drowned in black; At Hirsel woods I shrieked to find A fiend astride my back. ...
— Georgian Poetry 1920-22 • Various
... Male spirit for Hercules, if ever there be nine worthies of women, this wench shall ride astride, and be their Captain. ...
— Philaster - Love Lies a Bleeding • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... much at home with her now that, sitting carelessly astride of his chair, with his arms folded on the back, he felt a fraternal element in their mutual relation. She bent more closely over her work, and spoke without ...
— The Wild Olive • Basil King
... to seize the bait placed within, the aperture closes behind and secures him. A professional "crocodile charmer" then enters muttering a spell, and with one end of a stick pats the creature gently on the head for a time. The operator then boldly mounts astride upon its shoulders, and continues to soothe it with his one hand, whilst with the other he contrives to pass a rope under its body, by which it is at last dragged on shore. This story serves to corroborate the narrative of ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent
... appropriate manner, now only spitting appraisingly upon it, now kicking it or scratching it with his penknife. If he came across some strange wonder or other, that he could not get into his little brain in any other way, he set himself astride ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... where the current came from. In the sitting room, a cluster of electric bulbs glowed from a fancy wicker work basket that hung from the ceiling. The housewife had made use of what she had throughout the house. Old-fashioned candle-shades sat like cocked hats astride electric bulbs. There is little heat to an electric bulb for the reason that the white-hot wire that gives the light is made to burn in high vacuum, which transmits heat very slowly. The housewife had taken advantage of this fact and ...
— Electricity for the farm - Light, heat and power by inexpensive methods from the water - wheel or farm engine • Frederick Irving Anderson
... Westminster through the streets was safely accomplished. The retinues of the lords protected the queen from insult, and London put on its usual outward signs of rejoicing; St. Paul's spire was rigged with yards like a ship's mast, an adventurous sailor sitting astride on the weathercock five hundred feet in the air:[140] there was no interruption; and the next day (October 1), Arras having sent the necessary unction,[141] the ceremony was performed at the Abbey without fresh burdens being laid on ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude
... way the wind blew." After observing the tinman for a while, I put on rubber shoes and slunk up to the ridgepole, the very watershed of my sixty-foot kingdom, my legs slanting into the infinities of the North and South. It sounds unexciting when written, but there I was, astride my house, up among the vents and exhausts of my former cloistered life, my head outspinning the weathercock. My Matterhorn had been climbed, "the pikes of darkness named and stormed." Next winter when I sit below snug by the fire and hear the wind funneling ...
— Journeys to Bagdad • Charles S. Brooks
... lost in gloom. Now and again the redness of a lighted cottage window, blurred and contorted in shape, showed through the gray pall. Slow-moving, country figures, passing vehicles, a herd of some eight or ten cows—preceded by a diabolic looking billy-goat, and followed by a lad astride the hind-quarters of a bare-backed donkey—grew out of pallid nothingness as the carriage came abreast of them, and receded with mysterious rapidity into nothingness again. The effect was curiously fantastic and unreal. And as the minutes passed that effect of unreality gained upon ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... wanted, and the twelfth had not done drinking before the first sat and snored. Then the Master Thief threw off his beggar's rags, and took one groom after the other so softly off their horses, and set them astride on the beams between the stalls; and so he called his eleven men, and rode off with the Squire's twelve horses. But when the Squire got up in the morning, and went to look after his grooms, they had just begun to come to; and some of them ...
— Popular Tales from the Norse • Sir George Webbe Dasent
... laugh thus!" And when coming from Roche-Corbon to Tours he passed on horseback along the Fauborg St. Symphorien, the little girls would say, "Ah! this is the justice day, there is the good man Bruyn," and without being afraid they would look at him astride on a big white hack, that he had brought back with him from the Levant. On the bridge the little boys would stop playing with the ball, and would call out, "Good day, Mr. Seneschal" and he would reply, jokingly, ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... then heading south-east, with all her lights burning brightly, as in duty bound, and I was sitting astride a camp-stool, with my shoulders resting against the port rail of the bridge, while Yagi, also occupying a camp-stool, sat facing me. He was spinning some yarn— a sort of Japanese fairy tale, it seemed to be—about a ...
— Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun - A Story of the Russo-Japanese War • Harry Collingwood
... quite unabashed, "when I behold Happiness riding astride the full moon, I shall just reach up, in the most natural manner in the world, and—take it down, that it may abide ...
— The Money Moon - A Romance • Jeffery Farnol
... proper for trail trips, as ladies are required to ride astride. Heavy denim for skirt and bloomers is very satisfactory. Such skirts can be hired in ...
— Indians of the Yosemite Valley and Vicinity - Their History, Customs and Traditions • Galen Clark
... oil. Like entering into the machinery of a clock and becoming one of the cogs or wheels, inevitably and remorselessly turning around and around, so I entered back into the grey life of Nahala. Out of bed was Husband George at half after four every morning, and out of the house and astride his horse at five. There was the eternal porridge, and the horrible cheap coffee, and the fresh beef and jerky. I cooked, and baked, and scrubbed. I ground around the crazy hand sewing machine and made my cheap holokus. Night after night, through the endless ...
— On the Makaloa Mat/Island Tales • Jack London
... on his face, then step astride his body, facing toward his head, and, with hands under his armpits, lift him to his knees, then clasp your hands over the patient's abdomen and lift him to his feet; then draw his left arm around your neck and hold it against the left side of your chest, the patient's left side resting against ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... ere the golden sun was an hour high, down the winding trail past the monastery of San Sebastian, came a brilliant cavalcade. Abul Malek led, seated upon an Arabian steed whiter than the clouds which lay piled above the westward mountains. His two sons, Hassam and Elzemah, followed astride horses as black as night—horses the distinguished pedigrees of which were cited in the books of Ibn Zaid. Back of them came one hundred swarthy warriors on other coal-black mounts, whose flashing sides flung back the morning rays. Their flowing linen ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... he saw in front of him. Despair must have leant him extra strength when making that last awful leap, for, though the distance was fully twenty feet, he actually reached and succeeded in grasping the end of the blade. To swing himself up astride upon it was the work of a moment; and then he paused to rest and recover from this last shock to his nervous system. Not for long, however; he knew that his companions must be nearly exhausted, and that their lives now probably depended solely on his activity and the celerity with which he ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... to command admiration. They seem to be particularly fond of bounding up and down the trees, and sometimes rest in the strangest attitudes, stuck in the fork of a bough, or sitting, as it were; astride of one, with their hind legs hanging down. M. Sonnini bears testimony to the extraordinary climbing powers of the jaguar; "For," says he, "I have seen, in the forests of Guiana, the prints left by the claws of the jaguar on the smooth bark of a ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... of little weight, was placed astride on the back of the Horse Vivian. Richard walked beside. The dragon nodded good-bye, and disappeared into its home, a low tunnel-like barn, evidently built specially for it, with a door at each end, and a conveniently placed chimney which enabled ...
— Living Alone • Stella Benson
... return to Harrison. It took Johansen, insulting and reviling the poor wretch, fully ten minutes to get him started again. A little later he made the end of the gaff, where, astride the spar itself, he had a better chance for holding on. He cleared the sheet, and was free to return, slightly downhill now, along the halyards to the mast. But he had lost his nerve. Unsafe as was his present ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... breath, at my coming, the sleeper strains, And the freezing current forsakes his veins! Vainly for pity the wretch may sue— Merciless Mara no prayers subdue! To his couch I flit— On his breast I sit! Astride! astride! astride! And one charm alone —A hollow stone!—[23] Can ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... old pony, Bosun," said Jim. "We're making her very unhappy by telling her she's grown too big for him, but he really carries her like a bird. A habit might look too much on him, but not that astride kit. You got yours, by the way, ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... into a loose, fluffy ball, on the end of a length of salmon-twine. Then, having thrown the rope over the limb of the sycamore, he held both ends, and sent the hired boy up into the tree, where he sat astride, grinning and expectant, and peered ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts
... becoming quite woe-begone about it when she offered him a pipe of his father's that had been shut up in a cupboard. He accepted it, took it up in his hand, recognized it, smelled it, spoke of its quality in a tone of emotion, filled it with tobacco, and lighted it. Then he set Emile astride on his knee, and made him play the cavalier, while she removed the tablecloth and put the soiled plates at one end of the sideboard in order to wash them as soon ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant
... said he, "the witches set me astride o' t' riggin' o' my own house.[42] It was a bitter cold time, an' I was nearly perished when I wakened. I am weary of my life, and will flit; for this country, the deil, I do think, holds in his own ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... to have fallen overboard into the river. In each case several contestants pretended to drag him out, placing him face downward, with his arms above his head, and his face a little to one side. Then one of the rescuers knelt astride the body, allowing his hands to press upon the spaces between the short ribs. By pressing downward the air was forced from the other's lungs, to creep in again when this was relaxed; and in this fashion an artificial respiration was induced that should grow stronger ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts - Or, The Struggle for Leadership • George A. Warren
... surprise and delight, as the mahout took hold of the rifle and examined it curiously, uttering another order to his great charge, Peter Pegg felt the great coiling trunk wrap round his waist, swing him up in the air, and drop him astride of the huge beast's neck. "Oh, but, I say, this 'ere won't do," cried Peter; "I am wrong ways on:" and scrambling up from sitting facing the howdah, he gradually reseated himself correctly, nestling ...
— Trapped by Malays - A Tale of Bayonet and Kris • George Manville Fenn
... night: my Lord Bruncker being going with Dr. Wilkins, Mr. Hooke, and others, to Colonell Blunts, to consider again of the business of charriots, and to try their new invention. Which I saw here my Lord Bruncker ride in; where the coachman sits astride upon a pole over the horse, but do not touch the horse, which is a pretty odde thing; but it seems it is most easy for the horse, and, as they say, for the man also. Thence I with speede by water home and eat a bit, ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... help comprehending. With a sheepish grin he sat astride of Jack Benson's back as the latter stood ...
— The Submarine Boys and the Middies • Victor G. Durham
... horse then, and was in the habit of riding out for exercise, almost every afternoon. He was never very artistic in his manner of dressing, and for horseback he had a long and singular fur coat, which enfolded his legs. Between Chelsea and Maida Vale, some boys were attracted by this quaint figure astride a horse. Not knowing in the least, who it was, they shouted at Carlyle; he spoke something to them ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne
... dat chile nothin' 'bout ridin'", was Jefferson's fiat when he saw Beverly astride her little mouse-colored and white mount. "She paht ...
— A Dixie School Girl • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... care not whither, so thou art safe and I with thee. It was, however, now agreed that they should return. The weight of the loads some of these slim-figured girls and young wives carried, mostly on their heads, was astonishing, especially when a good-sized child was perched astride on their shoulders as well. The men, of course, carried nothing but a few spears and sticks; they would generally stay behind to hunt or dig out game, and when obtained, leave it for the lubras or women to bring ...
— Australia Twice Traversed, The Romance of Exploration • Ernest Giles
... the Standing Stone, and there was a little boy astride it. His hair stood up through holes in his bonnet, and he was ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... circle the Indians were massed together, even beyond the limits of the glade. Under the trees on every side sat warriors astride their steeds; some lounged on the green turf; many reclined in ...
— The Spirit of the Border - A Romance of the Early Settlers in the Ohio Valley • Zane Grey
... Affonsos by times this morning, and shortly afterwards met an original-looking group of travellers. First came rather a handsome woman, in a blue joseph and broad black hat, riding astride; then three gentlemen in Indian file, all natural Falstaffs, in enormous straw hats, and mounted on good well-groomed horses; next followed the lady's maid, also astride, with her mistress's portmanteau buckled behind ...
— Journal of a Voyage to Brazil - And Residence There During Part of the Years 1821, 1822, 1823 • Maria Graham
... idea," replied the Major, standing astride with his hands in his pockets. "Young Paget of ours told me the other day that he saw Muriel driving in the Terminus Road at Eastbourne, but she didn't notice him. They were a queerish lot, ...
— The Czar's Spy - The Mystery of a Silent Love • William Le Queux
... now, for the bad country-roads ahead;—and has struck straight SOUTHeastward, if Daun were noting him. And, in the afternoon of Wednesday, Daun is astonished to learn that this wily Enemy is arrived in Reichenbach vicinity; sweeping in our poor posts thereabouts; immovably astride of the Silesian Highway, after all! An astonished Daun hastens out, what he can, to take survey of the sudden Phenomenon. Tries it, next day and next, with his best Loudons and appliances; finds that ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVIII. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Seven-Years War Rises to a Height.—1757-1759. • Thomas Carlyle
... general outline of the rider was that of a short slight man, with rather long hair which flowed from beneath the brim of his Stetson hat. The most curious distinguishable feature was his slightness. The horse was big and the man, was so small that, as he sat astride of his charger, he looked to be little more than a boy of fifteen ...
— The Story of the Foss River Ranch • Ridgwell Cullum
... a letter of yours from an elastic band, and is holding it wide open as if he were reading it; an untamed siamang, which lives on the roof, but has mustered up courage to-day to come down into the veranda, has jumped like a demon on the retriever's back, and riding astride, is beating him with a ruler; and jolly, wicked Mahmoud, having taken the cushions out of the chairs, has laid them in a row, has pulled a table cover off the table, and having rolled it up for a pillow, is now lying down in an easy, careless attitude, occasionally ...
— The Golden Chersonese and the Way Thither • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs. Bishop)
... his gun again in its holster, Texas threw himself astride his Pinto pony and loped down toward the sloping banks of ...
— Golden Stories - A Selection of the Best Fiction by the Foremost Writers • Various
... two or three minutes later she reached the top of the railway bridge and peered over the stone wall, it was with quite a big pang of dismay that she beheld the empty platform. Not a soul! Not a single soul except a cross-looking porter sitting astride a barrow, with his hands ...
— A College Girl • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... blithely) how and where I would until he (his arm useless), misliking my bludgeon-play and reading no mercy in my look, very wisely betook him to his heels. Hereupon I turned to find the little peddler sitting astride his man's neck and his fist ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... safe?" asked Vernon anxiously, as his chum, having got astride the parapet, was about to lower ...
— The Submarine Hunters - A Story of the Naval Patrol Work in the Great War • Percy F. Westerman
... assembled the house of Kantor. Attuned to the intimate atmosphere of the tenement which is so constantly rent with cry of child, child-bearing, delirium, delirium tremens, Leon Kantor had howled no impression into the motley din of things. There were Isadore, already astride his chair, leaning well into center table, for first vociferous tear at the four-pound loaf; Esther, old at chores, settling an infant into the high chair, careful of tiny fingers ...
— Humoresque - A Laugh On Life With A Tear Behind It • Fannie Hurst
... influence among the young men of family. In the day time they attend the Maha Rani or queen; and when she goes out, some of them armed with swords follow her on horseback, and form her body guard. They are well dressed, and ride astride like men. They are allowed to carry on intrigues with any person of good birth: but the young Rajputs of the guard are their usual favourites. Some Brahmans and Bankers from the low country, induced by the beauty of these girls, have formed connexions with them; but ...
— An Account of The Kingdom of Nepal • Fancis Buchanan Hamilton
... proceed. The first of these was Miss Diana Tonkin, a young lady, who kept her brother's snuff-shop, at the sign of the African astride the Tobacco Barrel—a rare beauty, who was on the most intimate talking terms with half a hundred young bloods and beaux, who looked in during lounging hours, being students of law, physic, and divinity, half-pay ensigns, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 339, Saturday, November 8, 1828. • Various
... was courteously respectful to the women, and played with the children. Among those of more gentle birth there was little question of their reception of him after once he had ridden to their doors, making the first visit, as in the old country. To be sure, he had appeared astride a mule, but neither his mount nor his dress could conceal a soldierly bearing that made him the envy of every man who saw him. And he had but to click his heels together and make his queer foreign bow that displayed the top of his fair head, and to kiss ...
— A Tar-Heel Baron • Mabell Shippie Clarke Pelton
... seated himself astride upon a chair, and, with his folded arms resting on the back of it, contemplated this hideous spectacle. It was a picture that he had never thought to see, and the feeling with which he surveyed it was ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... so. He sat astride on the goat, struck his heels into its side, and went rattling down the high-road like ...
— The Yellow Fairy Book • Various
... moving, ill-tempered ears, and a tail that seems to be the seat of intellect, if a person is to take its quick and furious whisking as being given in reply to Mr. Lucre's observations, or by way of corroboration of the truth uttered by the huge and able-bodied individual who is astride of him. That individual is no other than the Rev. Father M'Cabe, who is dressed in a coat and waistcoat of coarse black broadcloth, somewhat worse for the wear, a pair of black breeches, deprived of their original gloss, and a pair of boots well greased with honest hog's lard—the fact being, ...
— Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... like children to the pond. Some of them are ordinary paths, which have a rail on each side, and are made by men with their coats off, but others are vagrants, wide at one spot, and at another so narrow that you can stand astride them. They are called Paths that have Made Themselves, and David did wish he could see them doing it. But, like all the most wonderful things that happen in the Gardens, it is done, we concluded, at night after the gates are closed. We have also decided that the paths make ...
— Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens • J. M. Barrie
... backwoodsman, speaking in a whisper. "Two astride o' each critter. Injuns, for sure. See the feathers stickin' up out o' their skulls! Them on the krupper look like squaws; though that's kewrous too. Out on these Texas parayras the Injun weemen hez generally a hoss to theirselves, ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... Beaumont on one occasion staked the entire Bretton estate on a game of chance. She lost; and her opponent, being apparently as sporting as herself, dared her to win it back by riding through Bretton Park and village astride on a jackass with her face to the tail The idea of the haughty and pompous lady undertaking such a penance must have seemed actually incredible, but Madame Beaumont was not readily daunted. To the unbounded surprise of her fellow-gamester she accomplished ...
— The Letter-Bag of Lady Elizabeth Spencer-Stanhope v. I. • A. M. W. Stirling (compiler)
... finished we placed two parallel pieces of assahy from one end to the other, on which we could sit astride, with our ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... amiable and softer qualities began to bud about his heart; a genial warmth was diffused over him; his soul got green within him; every day was serene; and if a cloud happened to be come visible, there was a roguish rainbow astride of it, on which sat a beautiful Iris that laughed down at him, and seemed to say, "why the dickens, Neal, don't you marry ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton
... crossed when David on Bess, with Ben at the end of a trail rope, started into the stream. Susan watched him go, his tall, high-shouldered figure astride the mare's broad back, one arm flung outward with the rope dipping to the current. As the water rose round his feet, he gave a wild, jubilant shout and went forward, plowing deeper with every step, his cries swelling ...
— The Emigrant Trail • Geraldine Bonner
... Alda, the twin girls who had succeeded Felix, and whose beauty had been the marvel of Vale Leston, their shabby dress the scorn of the day school at Bexley. And forming the apex of the pyramid, perched astride on the very shoulders of much-enduring Wilmet, was three years old Angela—Baby Bernard being quiescent in a cradle near mamma. N.B.—Mrs. Underwood, though her girls had such masculine names, had made so strong a protest against their being called ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... two, succeeded in throwing his opponent violently to the ground. The shock seemed partially to stun the thrown one for a few seconds, and of this his opponent took instant advantage by flinging himself astride upon his antagonist's body, pinning his arms down by kneeling upon them, and gripping his throat with both hands in a throttling grasp that soon reduced his enemy to a condition of utter helplessness. Then, rising heavily and somewhat unsteadily to his ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood
... sentiments sitting astride of a chair before the fire, with his arms on the back, and his sulky face on his arms. His sister sat in the darker corner by the fireside, now looking at him, now looking at the bright sparks as ...
— Hard Times • Charles Dickens*
... Fortunately for Newton, it proved to be the latter. At last it was brought down by the tide to within a few yards of him, and appeared to be checked. Newton dashed out towards the boat, and in a minute was safely astride upon it. As soon as he had recovered a little from his agitation, he perceived that it was the very boat belonging to the brig, in which Jackson had so treacherously deserted and ...
— Newton Forster - The Merchant Service • Captain Frederick Marryat
... prevent the Virginian from learning all about our respective families away back to the third generation. He was a short, chubby man, with a Dixie goatee, his flannel shirt negligee, and a wide-brimmed straw hat jauntily set on the back of his head. He was sociable, and sat astride of our beached prow, punctuating his remarks with squirts of tobacco juice, and a bit of lath with which he meditatively tapped the gunwale, the meantime, with some skill, casting pebbles into the water with his bare toes. "Ax'n ...
— Afloat on the Ohio - An Historical Pilgrimage of a Thousand Miles in a Skiff, from Redstone to Cairo • Reuben Gold Thwaites
... still smiling at her anger when Ippolito himself, astride a horse, came clattering into the courtyard and dismounted stiffly, giving him a good morning ...
— The Net • Rex Beach
... sea. We paddled back, and getting hold of such spars and planks as we could find, placed them crosswise under our raft to prevent it from upsetting, though it was even thus a ticklish affair. Ben had taken his seat forward, I sat astride at the other end, Boxall and Halliday occupied the middle. How far we were off the coast of Africa we could not exactly tell, but we judged that we should have fifteen or twenty leagues to paddle before we could reach it. This would take ...
— Saved from the Sea - The Loss of the Viper, and her Crew's Saharan Adventures • W.H.G. Kingston
... this, distressful rogues, the shorter our life the less we sin, the which is a fair, good thing. As for these shackles, though our bodies be 'prisoned our souls go free, thus, while we languish here, our souls astride a sunbeam may mount aloft, 'bove all pains and tribulations soever. Thus if we must dance together in noose, our souls, I say, escaping these fleshy bonds, shall wing away to freedom everlasting. Bethink ye of this, grievous knaves, and take ...
— The Geste of Duke Jocelyn • Jeffery Farnol
... of his that he kept concealed on the premises, loaded and lighted it, sat down astride a spindling little chair that looked hardly up to his weight, settled his elbows comfortably on the back of it, and then asked his sister what Martin had meant—what ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... resulted in the massacre of some Russians afforded Peter a pretext for sailing down the Volga and seizing the southern shore of the Caspian Sea, which now became virtually a Russian lake. This ended Peter's conquests. The Russian colossus now "stood astride, with one foot on the Baltic and ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers
... way, passed by with his servants and escort, wondering how he could find his way home, for the forest was very vast. He too heard the music, and told one of his men to find out whence it came. The man came under the tree, and looking up to the top there he saw Jack my Hedgehog astride ...
— The Green Fairy Book • Various
... of the rigging of his ship—or when he slipped down through the branches of the tree—Twinkleheels stood just beneath the lowest limb. Johnnie Green swung off it, hung by his arms for a moment, and then dropped astride ...
— The Tale of Pony Twinkleheels • Arthur Scott Bailey
... afforded some support, for by standing on the heavy coping I could with my fingers touch the sill of the balcony above. Thus I hoisted myself, and presently I threw an arm over the parapet. Already I was astride of that same Parapet before she became aware ...
— Bardelys the Magnificent • Rafael Sabatini
... and here at any social function the musical program is given and cakes and ices are served; here morning callers are received, or gay riding parties, the ladies in pretty divided skirts, worn for convenience in riding astride, —the universal mode adopted by Europeans and Americans, as well ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... next instant, he vaulted astride the bare back of the mare, and started at a gallop in the direction of ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow
... sought temporary excuse, entered. Chu[u]dayu again was dreaming, horribly. Ah! This vision would never pass. O'Kiku was standing by him. At first faint, then loud came the voice, and Chu[u]dayu counted with her—"One"—"One"—"Two"—"Two"—"Three"—"Three".... On went the count. Now she was astride of him, pressing him down, throttling him. "O'Kiku Dono! It was not Chu[u]dayu. The treachery was his; but the Tono Sama gave the blow." He writhed and struggled in his sleep. Then O'Yui dealt the thrust, straight downward. "Yai! Yai! Ah!" The scream rang out, startling all around. Alas! A little ...
— Bakemono Yashiki (The Haunted House) - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 2 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... for loading. O'er hill and dale our merry pilgrims pass'd, Till, coming to a river's ford at last, They stopp'd quite puzzled on the shore. Our asseteer had cross'd the stream before; So, on the lighter beast astride, He drives the other, spite of dread, Which, loath indeed to go ahead, Into a deep hole turns aside, And, facing right about, Where he went in, comes out; For duckings, two or three Had power the salt to melt, So that the creature felt His burden'd shoulders free. The sponger, like ...
— A Hundred Fables of La Fontaine • Jean de La Fontaine
... hours before in this very chamber where she frisked about like an eel, is now a junk of lead. Were you the Tropical Zone in person, astride of the Equator, you could not melt the ice of this little personified Switzerland that pretends to be asleep, and who could freeze you from head to foot, if she liked. Ask her one hundred times what is the matter with her, Switzerland replies ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... on many a car you 'll see A broomstick plain as plain can be; On every stick there's a witch astride,— The string you see to her leg is tied. She will do a mischief if she can, But the string is held by a careful man, And whenever the evil-minded witch Would cut some caper, he gives a twitch. As for the hag, you can't see her, But ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... knew Frontino gay, And, through that courser, knew the knight astride; And on his lance with bending shoulder lay, And in fierce tone the African defied. Job was outdone by Rodomont that day, In that the king subdued his haughty pride, And the fell fight which he had ever used To seek ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... own. Her first attempts to make fast to the Mole ahead of Vindictive failed, as her grapnels were not large enough to span the parapet. Two officers. Lieutenant Commander Bradford and Lieutenant Hawkins, climbed ashore and sat astride the parapet trying to make the grapnels fast till each was killed and fell down between the ship and the wall. Commander Valentine Gibbs had both legs shot away and died next morning. Lieutenant Spencer, B.N.R., though wounded, conned the ship and Lieutenant Henderson, R.N., came up from aft ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various
... but was rather that of a man who feels he is not in his right place and will make no concessions. He was just beginning to find out that he possessed no literary talent whatever; he meant to stay in the profession, however, by living on the brains of others, and getting astride the shoulders of those more able than himself, making his profit there instead of struggling any longer at his own ill-paid work. At the present moment he had drunk to the dregs the humiliation of applications ...
— Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau • Honore de Balzac
... pitchy sides for wax: Then Ariadne kindly lends Her braided hair to make thee ends; The points of Sagittarius' dart Turns to an awl by heavenly art; And Vulcan, wheedled by his wife, Will forge for thee a paring-knife. For want of room by Virgo's side, She'll strain a point, and sit[6] astride, To take thee kindly in between; And then ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift
... with their hands behind them, just as they had stood every Sunday since they could speak; Lionel was astride on the music stool, spinning round and round, and Johnny balancing himself with one leg on the floor, and one hand on the window sill. When the first question was asked, the grave voice that replied, "Edmund Gerald," was drowned in ...
— The Two Guardians • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... with infinite gusto of an occasion where on a dare he had jumped astride the back of a big bull that was caught in a lagoon, and ridden him to and fro for the space of five moments, despite his bellowing and the angry lashing ...
— Chums in Dixie - or The Strange Cruise of a Motorboat • St. George Rathborne
... decisively in the name of the law that I had made up my mind to see neither of them any more. The captain of the boat whispered in my ear that a mejidieh would do it, I tried a French five-franc piece! which proved instantly efficacious; and a minute or two later I was on shore at Galata, astride a donkey whose tail was industriously twisted round by his driver, and who was followed by an unequally laden brother ass, who bore my portmanteau on one flank ...
— The Making Of A Novelist - An Experiment In Autobiography • David Christie Murray |
