"Button" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... show, and I do, by gum! know a traveling-man likes his bed tucked in at the foot! Oh, it's fierce! The traveling public kicks if they get bum service, and the help kick if you demand any service from 'em, and the boss gets it right in the collar-button both ways ...
— The Job - An American Novel • Sinclair Lewis
... heart hung humble as a button On the bright splendid shroud of your son, Do not weep. ...
— War is Kind • Stephen Crane
... the master of the house. The great artist had a diplomatic bearing: buttoned-up black frock-coat, long cravat with pin (a present from a royal highness who paid her bills slowly), and a many-colored rosette in his button-hole (the gift of a small reigning prince who paid slower yet the bills of an opera-dancer). He came and went—precise, calm, and cool—in the midst of the solicitations and supplications of his customers. "M. Arthur! M. Arthur!" One heard nothing but that phrase. He ...
— Parisian Points of View • Ludovic Halevy
... spent all his time running after girls who were manicured, or who wore shining buttons, and, when he married, he besought his wife to sew buttons on every article of her apparel. In the end, he is said to have swallowed a button, merely to enjoy the sensation of its smooth surface on ...
— Byways of Ghost-Land • Elliott O'Donnell
... carelessly-made hives, as to discourage the efforts of equally careless people in keeping them. Inside the hive, on each end, we fasten, by shingle nails, about half-way between the bottom and top, a small piece of half-inch board, about the size of a common window button, and with a like notch in it, set upward, but stationary, on which, when the hive is to receive the swarm, a stick is laid across, to support the comb as it is built, from falling in hot weather. At such ...
— Rural Architecture - Being a Complete Description of Farm Houses, Cottages, and Out Buildings • Lewis Falley Allen
... throw them overboard, that would keep us head to sea—because these things would all float in the water, and the wind would not get hold of them. They call a contrivance like that a floating anchor. Then we would both lie down in the bottom, button the flaps over the holes in the cover, and lie there as snugly as possible. You see our weight would be down quite low in the boat then, and that would keep her steady. Oh, we should get on capitally if there were plenty of room for us ...
— Condemned as a Nihilist - A Story of Escape from Siberia • George Alfred Henty
... proud beauty!' says Ben Button. Then he turns to the bunch. 'What we really ought to do,' he says, 'we ought to make a believer of ...
— Somewhere in Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... say. But that's neither here nor there. He ain't so thin-skinned as all that, your gander ain't. And if I choose to put whisky, or brandy, or champagne-cup about my grounds, I'm not obliged to consult your ridik'lous gander, I do hope. I didn't ask him to sample 'em. I don't care a brass button for your summonses. You can summon me till you're black in ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey
... back into the lobby of my apartment and dug into the mailbox of another party, thus identifying myself as the man in three eight four. Then I punched the elevator button for the Fourth and leaned back against the elevator and let my mind wander up through ...
— Stop Look and Dig • George O. Smith
... revolves between two metallic rings, c, provided with points that attract and collect in Leyden jars, D, the electricity produced by the friction. For discharging the condensers there is employed a manipulator formed of a rod, mm, which can be acted upon, from the exterior, by means of a button, k. Upon bringing the ball, m, of the rod in contact with the ball, p, of the condenser, the lever (which then takes the position shown by the dotted line) continues to remain in connection with a small ring, q, through a special spring. Another ring, t, is connected ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 441, June 14, 1884. • Various
... the church, had been too completely quelled by outward circumstances to take any notice of Joe Mixet, who was standing there, quite unabashed, with a splendid nosegay in his button-hole. She certainly had no right on this occasion to complain of her husband's silence. Whereas she could hardly bring herself to utter the responses in a voice loud enough for the clergyman to catch the ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... contented with the usual ornament of the double tuft. The cap was small, and jaunty; trimmed with silk velvet—as is common here with men careful to adorn their persons; but this man's cap was finished off with a jewelled button and golden filigree work. He was dressed in a short jacket with a stand up collar; and that also was covered with golden buttons and with golden button-holes. It was all gilt down the front, and all lace down the back. The rows of buttons were double; and those of the more backward row ...
— John Bull on the Guadalquivir from Tales from all Countries • Anthony Trollope
... gardener, he would have wished to see the fruits ripen before the blossoms had fallen off. This inconsiderate haste nearly proved fatal to the creation of the Legion of Honour, a project which ripened in his mind as soon as he beheld the orders glittering at the button-holes of the Foreign Ministers. He would frequently exclaim, "This is well! These are the things ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... was a relic of the days of the dandies, when country squires had their town houses, and before labour found itself in London drawing-rooms. Consumed by curiosity, Hugh pressed the electric button marked "visitors," and a few moments later a smart young footman ...
— Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo • William Le Queux
... dispatched to Harley Street. I had some little leaden mice in my hand the size of half-a-dozen pins' heads. Handkerchiefs an inch square, babies' woollen shoes, pinafores, shirts, all of the tiniest, but perfectly made, with buttons and button-holes complete, and even buns with currants no bigger than a pin's point. Sheep, dogs, cats, monkeys, pigs, giraffes—in short, convert the entire Zoo into miniature china knick-knacks, and you have a considerable portion of Mrs. Kendal's collection realized. ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 27, March 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... and we do the rest" is the slogan of a famous camera firm, and really it seems as if this might almost be called the slogan of modern times; we have only to press a button nowadays, and someone ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... shadow there seemed something familiar about him. However, before anything had been said on either side, the belligerence faded from the young man's manner, his attitude altered, and he gave vent to a lazy chuckle, as with his free hand he fastened the top button of his sleeping attire and ...
— Juggernaut • Alice Campbell
... supercilious smile at Mr Chegg's toes, then raised his eyes from them to his ankles, from that to his shin, from that to his knee, and so on very gradually, keeping up his right leg, until he reached his waistcoat, when he raised his eyes from button to button until he reached his chin, and travelling straight up the middle of his nose came at last to his eyes, when ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... held her breath; now I felt it like the lightest zephyr. And quite unconsciously I had retained the enamel button. ...
— Mr. Justice Raffles • E. W. Hornung
... with as you, Sir Henry. I tell you that he is sure on our side; and Sir Henry Dudley hath spoken with all the gentlemen that be soldiers, that be about the town, and they be all sure ours, so that we have left the queen never a man of war that is worth a button."[555] ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude
... you now?" Harrison wasn't fooling. I looked at Sol, on the seat next to me; I thought I had heard him snicker. He began to fiddle with his camera without looking at me. I pushed the "talk" button and told Harrison where I was. It pleased him very much; I wasn't more than six blocks from where this big rumble was going on, he told me, and he made it very clear that I was to get on ...
— The Day of the Boomer Dukes • Frederik Pohl
... all that. The elevator is an electric one and any person can run it by pushing the button. All you have to do then is to unpack the wireless instrument here in your room, and after you have adjusted it you can certainly arrange in some way to get it on top of ...
— L. P. M. - The End of the Great War • J. Stewart Barney
... afraid, Deacon," said I, as the old gentleman commenced to button up his coat, "I am not going into the details of these wonderful experiments; but I am sure you will be interested in the results of the first ...
— Talks on Manures • Joseph Harris
... Miss Walton," he replied, a little nettled, "I have no sympathy with that style of men. To me they are very repulsive and ridiculous. They remind me of the breathless, perspiring politicians of our time, who button-hole you and assert that the world will come to an end unless John Smith is elected. To me, the desperate earnestness of people who imagine it their mission to set the world right is excessively tiresome. For one man or a thousand to proclaim that they speak ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe
... So many things had to go in it—the darning needle, thimble, picayune, ring, and button. The makers would have scorned utterly the modern subterfuge of baking plain, and thrusting in the portents of fate before frosting. They mixed the batter a trifle stiff, washed and scoured everything, shut eyes, dropped them, and stirred them well about. Thus nobody ...
— Dishes & Beverages of the Old South • Martha McCulloch Williams
... cut and fit its thought with greater attention to one model than any other age before or since; and the result is that when you turn to verse as a medium of expression, it is just as if you were pressing a button liberating a perfect flood of these perfectly good but stereotyped formulae of expression. The result is very ingenious, but just because it is such a skillful mosaic of Georgian 'rubber-stamp' phrases, it must ever fall short of true art." Mr. Moe is correct. ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... top of the stairs an entrance slide showed darker on the left. Wat fumbled for a moment until he found the button. The door whirred open, even as they heard Joan's clear voice below: "Come in, Magnificents!" There was a ...
— Slaves of Mercury • Nat Schachner
... lesion, which has obtained for it the name of "hard chancre," is its most important characteristic. It is best appreciated when the sore is grasped from side to side between the finger and thumb. The sensation on grasping it has been aptly compared to that imparted by a nodule of cartilage, or by a button felt through a layer of cloth. The evidence obtained by touch is more valuable than that obtained by inspection, a fact which is made use of in the recognition of concealed chancres—that is, those which are hidden by a tight prepuce. The induration is ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles
... mistress of everything, the chief ornament of the house. With your looks—and your manners—oh, success will be assured! Enormous! You'll sit like a queen in the office and keep the slaves going by the touch of an electric button. The guests will pass in review before your throne and timidly deposit their treasures on your table. You cannot imagine how people tremble when a bill is presented to them—I'll salt the items, and you'll sugar them with your sweetest smiles. Oh, let us get away from ...
— Plays by August Strindberg, Second series • August Strindberg
... saloon was now done with Louis Quinze decorations, said the newspapers. Its walls were panelled in satinwood and inlaid walnut, and under foot were velvet carpets twelve feet wide and woven without seam. Its closets were automatically lighted, and opened at the touch of a button; even the drawers of its bureaus were upon ball-bearings. The owner's private bedroom measured the entire width of the vessel, twenty-eight feet, and opened upon a Roman bath of ...
— The Moneychangers • Upton Sinclair
... since it filled his whole being with a sense of abasement and a hope of gain, thereby suspending for the time those emotions in him which had excited my curiosity. Clearly he had unstinted visions of lucrative patronage, dreams, probably, of a piece of coloured ribbon for his button-hole, and a right to try to induce people to call him "Chevalier." He made Coralie a present, handsome enough. I respected the conscientiousness of this act; my friendship was an unlooked-for profit, a bonus on the marriage, and he gave his wife her commission. But he seemed ...
— The King's Mirror • Anthony Hope
... flicked off as Brandon pushed the pre-ejection lever into the lock position severing all connections between the ship and the pilot's capsule. Brandon had a strange, detached feeling as he pushed the ejection button. ...
— The Quantum Jump • Robert Wicks
... these other people passed away. The waiters resumed their tasks. The room was once more hilariously gay. Upon the threshold a newcomer was standing, a tall man in correct morning dress, with a short gray beard and a tiny red ribbon in his button-hole. He stood there smiling slightly—an unobtrusive entrance, such as might have befitted any habitue of the place. Yet all the time his eyes were travelling restlessly up and down the room. As he stood there, ...
— The Lost Ambassador - The Search For The Missing Delora • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... piety is a lucid interval by which the hearers profit. They follow his textual allusions in their little Bibles, and devoutly receive the crude and amusing interpretations as utterances of the highest exegetical skill. But their faces shine when the discourse moralizes; it seems to take them by the button, so friendly it is,—but it looks them closely in the eye, without heat and distant zeal, with great, manly expostulation, rather, and half-humorous argument, that sometimes make the tears stand upon the lids. The florid countenances become a shade paler with ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 92, June, 1865 • Various
... century ago, the dress of the English naval officer was exceedingly simple, though more appropriate to the profession perhaps, than the more showy attire that has since been introduced. Epaulettes were not used by any, and the anchor button, with the tint that is called navy blue, and which is meant to represent the deep hue of the ocean, with white facings, composed the principal peculiarities of the dress. The person introduced to the reader, whose name was Dutton, and who was simply the officer in charge of the signal-station, ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... had finished there were other interruptions; the chief of his band of musicians came for instructions for the concert at his Ferragosto on the first of August; and—most vexatious of all—a couple of goldsmiths came with their work, and with rival models of a button for the Pontifical cope. Giuseppe fumed and fretted while the Holy Father put on his spectacles to examine the great silver vase which was to receive the droppings from his table, its richly chased handles and its festoons of acanthus ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... very merry at breakfast, and Joseph and Fanny rather more chearful than the preceding night. The Lady Booby produced the diamond button, which the beau most readily owned, and alledged that he was very subject to walk in his sleep. Indeed, he was far from being ashamed of his amour, and rather endeavoured to insinuate that more than was really true had passed between him and the ...
— Joseph Andrews, Vol. 2 • Henry Fielding
... to consider this question; and finally waiving it, went on pulling at a button of his uncle's coat in the energy ...
— Nobody • Susan Warner
... has vilipended. Still, we must not set down every coincidence as borrowing. Thucydides himself insists on the recurrence of the same or similar events in a history of which human nature is a constant factor. "Undo this button" is not necessarily a quotation from King Lear. "There is no way but this" was original with Macaulay, and not stolen from Shakespeare. "Never mind, general, all this has been my fault," are words attributed to General Lee after the battle of Gettysburg. This is very much the ...
— The Creed of the Old South 1865-1915 • Basil L. Gildersleeve
... never saw so much excitement and hurry in all my life," exclaimed a boy, who with three companions stood on the deck of the brig and looked on at these activities without actually taking part in them themselves. The speaker was Fred Button. He was a tiny little fellow, known affectionately among his friends as Stub, or Peewee or Pygmy. This last name was frequently shortened into Pyg, much to Fred's disgust, though he had learned better than to ...
— The Go Ahead Boys and the Treasure Cave • Ross Kay
... as Santa Claus sat staring blankly with open mouth and fingers plucking nervously at what seemed to be the only button on his coat, he added, "Please, sir, did you ...
— Thankful's Inheritance • Joseph C. Lincoln
... never be trusted. Accidents happen so quickly that it is over before we know it and the terrible damage is done. Sometimes the trigger will catch on a coat button or a twig, and, bang! an unexpected discharge takes place and if you were careless just for an instant, it may cost some one his life. Especial care must be taken in loading and unloading a gun. It is at this time that a gun is most likely ...
— Outdoor Sports and Games • Claude H. Miller
... he be; let un! Who cares a brass button for him? 'T is awnly Miller I thinks of. What's ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts
... again, Mr. Necker. Come in, please. I will call my brother." She pressed a button on the veranda wall. "That will bring him right down, Mr. Necker. And now I'm leaving you with Mr. Balfe. Diana, our cook's little ...
— Sonnie-Boy's People • James B. Connolly
... that on which we leave a nest egg in a hen's nest for the hen to lay a new one to; a very little will do, but even the boys know that there must be a germ of increment left, and when they stole the coppers from the Ecce Homo chapel not long since, they still left one centesimo and a waistcoat button on the floor. ...
— Ex Voto • Samuel Butler
... most likely Nanny was right, so I looked down on the floor with the candle, and there I picked up a pensioner's button. ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... me when she speaks, but fixes her dim eyes on my middle waistcoat button, till I get nervous and begin to think it isn't on straight, or is the wrong sort of ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Ghost Stories • Various
... he concealed his profanity from her; how one morning, when he thought the door was shut between their bedroom and the bathroom, he was in there dressing and shaving, accompanying these trying things with language intended only for the strictest privacy; how presently, when he discovered a button off the shirt he intended to put on, he hurled it through the window into the yard with appropriate remarks, followed it with another shirt that was in the same condition, and added certain collars and neckties and bath-room requisites, decorating the shrubbery ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... was up to more mischief, and was on her guard. She saw him stealthily press a button, and in the same instant a deep gulf opened in the floor of the cave, half way between the ...
— The Surprising Adventures of the Magical Monarch of Mo and His People • L. Frank Baum
... they did; In a sieve they went to sea: In spite of all their friends could say, On a winter's morn, on a stormy day, In a sieve they went to sea. And when the sieve turned round and round, And every one cried, "You'll all be drowned!" They called aloud, "Our sieve ain't big; But we don't care a button, we don't care a fig; In a sieve we'll go to sea!" Far and few, far and few, Are the lands where the Jumblies live: Their heads are green, and their hands are blue; And they went to ...
— The Best Nonsense Verses • Various
... children, would buy a machine for every family. This matter of stitching being done for us, then, we may say that the other varieties of sewing required are very few: "sewing over-and-over," or "top-stitching" as the Irish call it, hemming, button sewing, button-hole making, and gathering. Indeed, hemming, including felling, might be also omitted, as, with a very few exceptions, hems and fells are also handed over to the rapid machine; and "over-casting" is but a variety of "top-stitching." There are then ...
— The Education of American Girls • Anna Callender Brackett
... before and was now completing his thirty-first trip, and getting madder and madder about it every minute. I saw him only with his clothes on; but I should say, speaking offhand, that he had at least fourteen rattles and a button. His poison sacs hung 'way down. Others may have taken them for dewlaps, but I knew ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... enough, and firm too; but when he had said and done, I wondered that he did not go away. He and Baldwin came to the window to which I had retreated, and Baldwin, like a city bear as he is, got in his awkward way between us, and seizing one button of my coat and one of Mr. Montenero's, held us there face to face, while he went on talking of my ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth
... this great feat possible, wires had been laid, connecting the Exposition with Washington; and they had been so arranged that the pressure of the President's finger on an electric button would start the current and put ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1, No. 28, May 20, 1897 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... method of touching off explosives from a great distance by wireless telegraphy without the need of a specially prepared receiver at the end where the explosion is desired. Suppose it were possible for him simply to press a button and blow up all the ships of the British Navy, or all the stores of munitions in Germany. What would be the first duty of such an inventor? Very likely it would be his immediate duty to keep the secret closely locked in his own mind. If such a discovery ...
— Understanding the Scriptures • Francis McConnell
... plainly now in the dark closet. There was a big button on the door. She no sooner discovered it than she put up her hand and tried to turn it. It was tight and made a slight squeak in turning. She stopped but the noise seemed to have no effect upon the evenly modulated ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... like Rogers are all very good fellows. They are genial and tolerant in their judgment of others. Yes, they are mighty good fellows, until you turn them around and look at their other side. Rogers is lovable enough until he touches the other button. Then he goes with perfect ruthlessness for what he wants. And yet, though you are his victim, you can't bring yourself to hate him. After he has thrown you down and taken all you have and you turn yourself ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson
... rich with conciliation and concession; he bent over and tore a pair of button boots from his bare feet, which he stretched towards the fire, ...
— The Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung
... through the house from top to bottom. The servants would be sure to come. Perhaps a crowd would gather in the street. And, impelled by a sort of despairing hope, she kept her finger on the button. ...
— The Confessions of Arsene Lupin • Maurice Leblanc
... girls, as well as married women of every age. They are generally loose-fronted, but tight-fitting at the back, the fronts being lined with coloured silk. Many of them are braided, some gold braid being used, and many have a flat braided plastron in the front to button over and give a double-breasted effect. Serge in all hues seems very much liked, but the most popular are dark navy-blue and cream-white. Short cloaks, with sling-sleeves and hoods, are very much worn, also short mantelettes, like our paper-pattern for last month. These ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII: No. 356, October 23, 1886. • Various
... in the Capitol, within eight minutes of the time they are applied for; and, most wonderful of all, the endless chain, with its series of baskets, whereby books are not only brought down to the reading room, but re-delivered, at the mere touch of a button on whatever "deck" of the nine-storied "book-stacks" they happen to belong to. So ingenious is this triumph of mechanism that the baskets seem positively to go through complex processes of thought and selection. Talking of thought and selection, by the way, every one connected ...
— America To-day, Observations and Reflections • William Archer
... me?" Sylvie Argenter asked one day, when she had walked over to the shop with a small basket, in which to put brown bread, little fine rolls for her mother, and some sugar cookies. Ray and Dot were both there. Dot was sitting with her sewing, putting in finishing stitches, button-holes, and the like. She was behind the counter, ready to mind the calls. Ray had come in to see what was wanting of fresh supplies from ...
— The Other Girls • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... with her little wild white face almost lost in the masses of loose dark hair escaped from the net she wore in the morning, and falling anyhow beneath her hat, and her small bare hands grasping the jacket she would not stop to button at her throat, she ran through ...
— Mrs. Day's Daughters • Mary E. Mann
... and comfortably did this excellent family vegetate under the shade of a mighty button-wood tree, which by little and little grew so great as entirely to overshadow their palace. The city gradually spread its suburbs round their domain. Houses sprung up to interrupt their prospects. The ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... father," repeated M. Thiers, and we mounted our horses. The review went on well enough, except that we all remarked the presence of a large number of insolent-looking individuals, with red carnations in their button-holes—the members, evidently, of the secret societies, who had not been warned of what was going to happen, but to be ready for anything that might happen We had not been able to take any precautions, ...
— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville
... given him by the lieutenant, Eric pressed the button. There was a tremendous roar as a waterspout shot up from the surface of the sea. As though some vast leviathan had passed underneath the old bark and shouldered her out of the water, the long black hull ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Life-Savers • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... heavy chains precluded any such possibility. I looked about for some means of escape from my bonds. Upon the floor between me and the Mahars lay a tiny surgical instrument which one of them must have dropped. It looked not unlike a button-hook, but was much smaller, and its point was sharpened. A hundred times in my boyhood days had I picked locks with a buttonhook. Could I but reach that little bit of polished steel I might yet effect at ...
— At the Earth's Core • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... present Germains had in the early part of the century either established this special pack, or at any rate become the master of it. Previous to that the hunting probably had been somewhat precarious; but there had been, since his time, a regular Brotherton Hunt associated with a collar and button of its own,—a blue collar on a red coat, with B. H. on the buttons,—and the thing had been done well. They had four days a week, with an occasional bye, and 2500l. were subscribed annually. Sir Simon Bolt had ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope
... never so glad in her life. All the unhappy things seemed to have melted away like snow. Louis was safe; Maggie had a happy home; mamma and papa were with her, and soon she should see sister and the boys; and Edna gave a long sigh of content as she fastened her last button and turned ...
— A Dear Little Girl • Amy E. Blanchard
... bracelets and the hair done up delicatessen store mode—sausages, rolls and buns—whereupon both of them laugh in a significant, silvery way, and you feel the back of your neck setting your collar on fire. You can smell the bone button back there scorching and you're glad it's not celluloid, celluloid being more inflammable and subject to combustion ...
— Cobb's Anatomy • Irvin S. Cobb
... about six feet wide and very low, had no door, but merely a velvet hanging, which was nearly always drawn up, leaving the arch uncovered. Under the hanging, among the moldings of the cornice, was a button that had only to be pressed to bring down the iron curtain against which he had thrown ...
— The Teeth of the Tiger • Maurice Leblanc
... his Colt and, being a dead shot, drilled the undershirt through the second button. This had the desired effect. Our crew almost immediately appeared on deck and shouted peevishly, ...
— The Cruise of the Kawa • Walter E. Traprock
... latter attempted to change the native dress of the Russian soldier for the ancient attire of Germany. His fair locks, which the Russian was used to wash every morning, he was now bidden to bedaub with grease and flour, while he energetically cursed the black spatterdashes which it took him an hour to button every morning. Orders to establish these novelties among his men were sent to Suwarrow, then in Italy with the army, the directions being accompanied with little sticks for models of the tails and side curls in which the soldiers' hair was to be arranged. The old warrior's lips curled ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 8 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... but when, notwithstanding their menaces, we approached them, they left all their goods, and with their weapons only hurried up the rocks with wonderful agility. Three koolimans (vessels of stringy bark) were full of honey water, from one of which I took a hearty draught, and left a brass button for payment. Dillis, fish spears, a roasted bandicoot, a species of potatoe, wax, a bundle of tea-tree bark with dry shavings; several flints fastened with human hair to the ends of sticks, and which are used as knives to cut their skin and food; a spindle to make strings of opossum wool; and ...
— Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia • Ludwig Leichhardt
... post-marked 'New York,' sir, and nothing else—Yes, here is 'Forwarded by Cane, Spriggs, and Button, Rio de Janeiro.' It must have been put into a ...
— The Sea Lions - The Lost Sealers • James Fenimore Cooper
... truly be said to be a permanent resident of our country. The Mexican species are sometimes met with along the southwestern boundaries of the United States, but they emigrate only a few miles northward of their own regions. The salt-licks in the great button-wood bottoms along the Mississippi were once the favorite resorts of these birds, and they delighted to drink the saline water. It is to be regretted that so interesting a bird should have been so ...
— Four Months in a Sneak-Box • Nathaniel H. Bishop
... laid his pen down to tell it. He was talking with half-shut lips, with eyes that shifted back and forth alert for a glance of disfavour. His rusty black derby sat on the back of his head: his white pique tie had slipped away from a bright brass collar button.... ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... distinctly oblique, otherwise the effect will be unpleasant. A clever sketch of a cornice by Mr. George F. Newton is shown in Fig. 42. Notice how well the texture of the brick is expressed by the looseness of the pen work. Some of the detail, too, is dexterously handled, notably the bead and button moulding. ...
— Pen Drawing - An Illustrated Treatise • Charles Maginnis
... Ede, trying to button his dirty nightshirt across his hairy chest. 'I'm not going to listen to that noise all night. Kate, you ...
— A Mummer's Wife • George Moore
... may have a warm sponge bath, a fresh band, shirt and skirt put on. In the winter he should sleep in a flannel nightdress and this can be made with a drawing string or button on the bottom so that he cannot expose his feet. In the summer he can wear a cotton night-dress and after the third month the skirt may be left off in very warm weather. By the time baby has entered his second month he may wear simple little "Bishop" ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... Horn, excepting a few stumps, which he managed to keep on by clapping both hands to the side of his head, to save the rim of his hat when the crown was carried away. But his nose—foes, if by possibility he could have had any, might have called it a snub, or a button; supposing it was either one or the other, or both, it was full of expression,—the best of snubs, the best of button noses, all that expression betokening fun and humour, and kindness and benevolence. Yes, that dear nose of Uncle Boz's was a jewel, though unadorned ...
— Tales of the Sea - And of our Jack Tars • W.H.G. Kingston
... down again. He pressed a small button on his desk and waited, silently considering the cadets, his eyes cool and level. The door opened and Governor Hardy walked ...
— The Space Pioneers • Carey Rockwell
... deep. As my friend Captain Con O'Donnell says, it's plain to the naked eye as a pair of particularly fat laundry drawers hung out to dry and ballooned in extension—if mayhap you've ever seen the sight of them in that state:—just held together by a narrow neck of thread or button, and stretching away like a corpulent frog in the act of swimming on the wind. His comparison touches the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... guided by its electric trail, we reached the Nautilus. The outside door had been left open, and Captain Nemo closed it after we reentered the first cell. Then he pressed a button. I heard pumps operating within the ship, I felt the water lowering around me, and in a few moments the cell was completely empty. The inside door opened, and we ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... suppose, not very high rank, for he only had a blouse on. General officers always wear double-button frocks even if they don't carry ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... poets succeeded so well in writing their verse in their own language, I can hardly understand. I find it very difficult to write poetry which will be greedily snapped up and paid for, even when written in the English language, but if I had to paw around for an hour to get a button-hook for the end of the fourth line, so that it would rhyme with the button-hook in the second line of the same verse, I believe it ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye
... about six feet by eight in size, and have a wooden platform to sleep on. There is no bedding of any kind. There is one shelf, on which a pitcher of drinking-water stands, and there is an electric button by which the ...
— Three Times and Out • Nellie L. McClung
... her for the invitation, and promising to try and come to dinner. Having written one note, he tore it up, as it seemed too intimate. He wrote another, but it was too cold; he feared it might give offence, so he tore it up, too. He pressed the button of an electric bell, and his servant, an elderly, morose-looking man, with whiskers and shaved chin and lip, wearing a grey cotton apron, entered at ...
— Resurrection • Count Leo Tolstoy
... parallel seams, and these are only tacked or basted, as the garments, when washed, are taken to pieces, and each piece, after being very slightly stiffened, is stretched upon a board to dry. There is no underclothing, with its bands, frills, gussets, and button-holes; the poorer women wear none, and those above them wear, like Yuki, an under-dress of a frothy-looking silk crepe, as simply made as the upper one. There are circulating libraries here, as in most villages, and in the evening both Yuki ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird
... touching him on the shoulder; "there are certain kindnesses which can never be repaid. The profit is about that which you would have made; but the interest of your money still remains to be arranged." And, saying this, he unfastened from his sleeve a diamond button, which the goldsmith himself had often valued at three thousand pistoles. "Take this," he said to the goldsmith, "in remembrance of me. And farewell; ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... Street, bounded by sixteen languages, runs its intact Latin length of push-carts, clothes-lines, naked babies, drying vermicelli; black-eyed women in rhinestone combs and perennially big with child; whole families of button-hole makers, who first saw the blue-and-gold light of Sorrento, bent at home work around a single gas flare; pomaded barbers of a thousand Neapolitan amours. And then, just as suddenly, almost without osmosis and by the mere stepping-down from the curb, Mulberry becomes Mott Street, hung in ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various
... of soldiers. Now, the Confederate has no ambition to imitate the regular soldier at all; he looks the genuine rebel; but in spite of his bare feet, his ragged clothes, his old rug, and tooth-brush stuck like a rose in his button-hole,[65] he has a sort of devil-may-care, reckless, self-confident look, which is ...
— Three Months in the Southern States, April-June 1863 • Arthur J. L. (Lieut.-Col.) Fremantle
... may be fine, but when I think of my unhappy portrait I tremble for the whole. He has communicated this striking idea under the pledge of solemn secrecy to fifty chosen spirits, to every one he has ever been able to button-hole for five minutes. I suppose he wants to get an order for it, and he is not to blame; for Heaven knows how he lives. I see by your blush," my hostess frankly continued, "that you have been honoured with his confidence. ...
— The Madonna of the Future • Henry James
... is very disagreeable to find a button giving way, with no studs at hand to fall back upon; but it is worse still in a large company to be conscious that your wife and mother-in-law are talking nonsense, and that you cannot depend upon yourself to produce a little ready wit to carry off the stupidity ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... family. Comely indeed he was, especially on state occasions, when he appeared in all the radiance of rosy health, overflowing spirits, and the richest crapes and satins,—decorated with the high order of the peacock's feather, the red button, and numberless glittering ornaments of ivory and lapis-lazuli. Beloved or envied by all the men, and with all the women dying for him, he was fully able to appreciate the comforts of existence. Considering the homage universally accorded him, he was as little of a dandy ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 20, June, 1859 • Various
... giving a narrow doorway into the cell which he had excavated between the double beams of the thick wall. Next, when the person that had taken refuge was inside, with the two sliding doors closed behind him, it was possible for him, by an extremely simple device, to turn a wooden button and thus release a little wooden machinery which controlled a further opening into the parlour, and which, at the same time, was braced against the hollow panelling and one of the higher beams in such ...
— Come Rack! Come Rope! • Robert Hugh Benson
... lessons at Camden, where she had been to school, and he had heard her express a wish that someone nearer than the village had an instrument, as she should soon forget all she had learned. Somehow Melinda was a good deal in Richard's mind, and when a button was missing from his shirts, or his toes came through his socks—as was often the case at Saratoga—he found himself thinking of the way Melinda had of helping "fix his things" when he was going from home, and of hearing his mother say what a handy ...
— Ethelyn's Mistake • Mary Jane Holmes
... to the top button of Mr. Brewster's coat, and was immediately dislodged by an irritable jerk of the other's ...
— Indiscretions of Archie • P. G. Wodehouse
... I had dramatized the little event I have been trying to relate, I should have reached the precise point where the auditor would button up his coat, put on his hat, let his patent spring-seat go up with a click, and begin to leave the theatre with all expedition. What would it matter to him that I had prepared a circumstantial account of how all petty objections were got over, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., April, 1863, No. LXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics. • Various
... Meantime discretion bids the tongue be still, And mild good-humour strives with strong ill-will Till prudence fails; when, all impatient grown, They make their grief by their suspicions known, "Sir, I protest, were Job himself at play, He'd rave to see you throw your cards away; Not that I care a button—not a pin For what I lose; but we had cards to win: A saint in heaven would grieve to see such hand Cut up by one who will not understand." "Complain of me! and so you might indeed If I had ventured on that foolish lead, That ...
— The Borough • George Crabbe
... all better than I am, and yet you never try to make me feel it; but I do all the same. And I love you three and Queen Mab; and I love the place; and I should like to live here always. But outside of that," he added quickly, "I don't care a button ...
— Soldiers of the Queen • Harold Avery
... right, Will, it won't do. But it's hard to forget—when one has seen a comet. Touch that button if you don't mind. It's time ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck
... gazed about us in awe. No hotel had ever affected any of us like this before. At first we talked in whispers; then as our courage revived, we became critical. Then somebody thought of having a "Scoot"; tremulously he pressed the button for the waiter. The waiter came and they had two "Scoots" each. Then somebody made a funny remark and one of us laughed out loud. Suddenly the laugher stopped and said, "I feel as if I ought not to laugh; I feel that nobody ever laughed in ...
— On the Fringe of the Great Fight • George G. Nasmith
... marched straight up to the steps and up onto the porch and pushed the button. "That's one thing you have to learn when you're a scout," he called ...
— Roy Blakeley's Bee-line Hike • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... than the rest of them, or maybe I'm not as deeply conditioned. For one thing, I'm tone-deaf. Well, here's the way it is. Gregory can set the machine to function automatically. You stand where he shows you, press the button he shows you, and fifteen seconds later it'll take you forward in time five seconds and about a kilometer in space, to The Guide's office. He'll be at his desk now. You'll have forty-five seconds to do the job, from the time the field ...
— Hunter Patrol • Henry Beam Piper and John J. McGuire
... a few flowers, which she threw to Lucan through the window, with a burst of laughter. He fastened them in his button-hole, making the gesture of a man who understands nothing of what is going on, but who has no ...
— Led Astray and The Sphinx - Two Novellas In One Volume • Octave Feuillet
... this last reply, Commander Bainbridge touched a button. The ward-room door was thrown open, and the ...
— Dave Darrin at Vera Cruz • H. Irving Hancock
... their turn, in the early year, and mourned over their absence. But Mary preferred Autumn, and would not agree with him. She was enthusiastic for ferns and heather. He gathered some sprigs of the latter for her, from a little sandy patch which they passed, and some more for his own button-hole, and then they engaged in the absorbing pursuit of nutting, and the talk almost ceased. He caught the higher branches, and bent them down to her, and watched her as she gathered them, and wondered at the ease and grace of all her movements, ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... circumference of the dial there is arranged a series of circular cases, C, containing the messages to be received, and similar triangular cases, containing the messages to be forwarded, radiating from the center of the dial. Between each of these there is a button, b. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 315, January 14, 1882 • Various
... was playful, but she was quick to grasp at an inference—since his glance was fixed on the red button she wore. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... Fox, he button up his coat-collar tight en des put out fer home. En dat w'at you better do, honey, kaze I see Miss Sally's shadder sailin' backerds en forerds 'fo' de winder, en de fus' news you know she'll ...
— Uncle Remus • Joel Chandler Harris
... you to button my glove, Molly," she said, holding out her wrist, "Rachel's so busy on my new silk, and you have nothing to do. What a fortunate child you are to be able to take your ease ...
— Elsie's children • Martha Finley
... rolling eyes which showed the whites, a truly hideous sight.[FN7] He walked boldly up to her and threw his arms round her neck while she embraced him as warmly; then he bussed her and winding his legs round hers, as a button loop clasps a button, he threw her and enjoyed her. On like wise did the other slaves with the girls till all had satisfied their passions, and they ceased not from kissing and clipping, coupling and carousing till day began to wane; ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... compartment. Water rushed into the [v]ballast tanks, the boat grew heavy, and its rolling and pitching ceased: the Kate sank and ran ahead under water, steering by means of the [v]periscope. Andrey pushed a button and a cone of pale blue rays poured from the tube. The [v]screen of the periscope grew alive with tiny waves, passing clouds, and a tail of smoke on the skyline. With his chin resting on his arm, Andrey scanned the image of the sea which lay before him. Presently the smoke vanished, ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various
... myself was a very dapper gentleman of what I should call lively middle age, with very upstanding gray mustaches. I took him to be a marooned motorist, also. He was well-dressed, with the added touch of an orange blossom in his button-hole, and he had a slightly roving eye. His hand-baggage was most "refined." I had noticed him looking my way at intervals, and wondered if he craved a hard-boiled egg; I could easily have spared him one! While I am certainly not in the habit of seeking ...
— The Smiling Hill-Top - And Other California Sketches • Julia M. Sloane
... reign of Charles II., indeed, we may date the beginnings of modern English life. What we call "society" was forming, the town, the London world. "Coffee, which makes the politician wise," had just been introduced, and the ordinaries of Ben Jonson's time gave way to coffee-houses, like Will's and Button's, which became the head-quarters of literary and political gossip. The two great English parties, as we know them to-day, were organized: the words Whig and Tory date from this reign. French etiquette and fashions came in and French phrases of convenience—such as coup de grace, ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... other retired mariners and their better-halves. Obed brought his fiddle and sat in the corner and played the music for a Virginia reel, and Ralph laughed until he choked to see Captain Jerry—half of his shirt-collar torn loose from the button and flapping like a sail—convoy stout Mrs. Wingate from one end of the line to the other, throwing into the performance all the fancy "cuts" and "double-shuffles" he learned at the Thanksgiving balls of a good many years before. Captain Perez danced with Miss Patience, ...
— Cap'n Eri • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... its surface with my hands, and presently was rewarded by the feel of the button which as commonly denotes a door on Mars as does a door ...
— The Gods of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... an object as meaningful and significant, and waves the flag for the emotion; the emotion fires up the engine, pulls the levers all over the body that release its energy and get it ready for action, and pushes the button that calls into the mind an intense, almost irresistible desire or impulse to act. Once aroused, the emotion and the impulse are not to be changed. In man or beast, in savage or savant, the intense feeling, ...
— Outwitting Our Nerves - A Primer of Psychotherapy • Josephine A. Jackson and Helen M. Salisbury
... and journalistic discussion, indicating, as Frank thought it did, a coolness on Mike's part, determined the relation of these two men. When they ran against each other in the corridor of a theatre, Frank eagerly button-holed Mike, and asked him why he had not been to dine at Lubini's, and not suspecting that he dined there only when he was in funds, was surprised at his evasive answers. Mistress and lover were equally anxious to know why they ...
— Mike Fletcher - A Novel • George (George Augustus) Moore
... carved arm, one foot on the edge of the dais. A long robe of black silk enveloped him; on its bosom a Chinese unicorn was embroidered. His girdle clasp was of Imperial jade set with rubies. The girdle itself was yellow. A great ruby button, nearly an inch in diameter, set in a mounting of worked gold, crowned a hat like an inverted round bowl. His black silk shoes were heavy with golden embroidery, and had white soles an inch thick. Authority lent inches to his stature, ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance
... according to my plan? Wrap the muffler well around the lower part of your face, button this second overcoat closely about your neck, and enter the private carriage which I ordered for 'Mr. Lee,' waiting now at the Forty-fifth Street Side. Then drive leisurely to the West Forty-second Street ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball
... serve a large number of rooms if an indicator be used to show where the call was made from, by a card appearing in one of a number of small windows. Before answering a call, the attendant presses in a button to return the ...
— How it Works • Archibald Williams
... said I; "that arrangement will do excellently. And, see here, Polson, if all you seamen are willing to sign, I don't care a brass button whether the emigrants do or not. If you men for'ard are all agreed that those conditions of mine are just and reasonable, we need not trouble ourselves as to what the emigrants think of them, because, you know, they can't ...
— Overdue - The Story of a Missing Ship • Harry Collingwood
... they played romping games under the trees—hunt the slipper, and button, and Copenhagen. Mrs. Barnard and two other women had come over to see the festivity, and they sat at a little distance with Mrs. Berry, awkwardly disposed against the trunks of trees, with their feet tucked under their skirts to keep them from the ...
— Pembroke - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... an afternoon affair where ladies meet and chat as they sew and are served a luncheon of German dishes—cold meats, salads, coffee-cake, pickles, coffee, etc. Each guest is given a bit of needlework, button-holes to work, or a small doily to embroider and a prize is given for ...
— Breakfasts and Teas - Novel Suggestions for Social Occasions • Paul Pierce
... Doris, holding him fast by, one button as they stood together on the threshold of the little studio, "do you know my real reason for giving up my ambition ...
— The Girl in the Mirror • Elizabeth Garver Jordan
... opportunity for mutual recalling of old times. Then suddenly the sibilant sounds dropped to silence as the result was announced. Wilksley had the most votes, the dark horse the least; Hume enjoyed a happy medium, with fifteen more to his count than forecast by the man behind the button, as Joe ...
— David Dunne - A Romance of the Middle West • Belle Kanaris Maniates
... the alms and the pity that his venerable green frock coat invites, by wearing the red ribbon at his button-hole. This proves the utility of the Order of the Legion of Honor which has been contested too much in the past ten years, the new Knights of the ...
— A Street Of Paris And Its Inhabitant • Honore De Balzac
... wax. What's for a seal?" They looked about. Mac's eye fell on a metal button that hung by a thread from the old militia jacket he was wearing. He put his hand up to it, paused, glanced hurriedly at the Colonel, and ...
— The Magnetic North • Elizabeth Robins (C. E. Raimond)
... an' he walked along, an' he walked along, an' he met a tiger. An' e tiger eat 'em up. Evly bit of 'em. Escept hims feet. An' he walked along, an' he walked along, an' he walked along, an' he met a horsh. An' e horsh ate 'em all up. Evly bit of 'em. An' nofing was left. Ony hims button. An' hims mover had no dear ittle boy left', ...
— In the Mist of the Mountains • Ethel Turner
... moment, hoping against hope. Then, with a groan of despair, I seized luggage and raincoat, made for the door and flung it open, only to find myself face to face with an attractive young girl, apparently on the point of pressing the electric button. ...
— In Search of the Unknown • Robert W. Chambers
... ninnies, all of them, and——But, contrary to my expectation, one of them did perk up courage, and, wriggling very much on his seat, ventured to ask if the cuff he had seen on the man's hand when it was thrust through the doorway had a button in it. ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... cob was yet under his hands, the fellow—who was what the Irish call a fairy smith—had done all he could to soothe the creature, and had at last succeeded by giving it gingerbread-buttons, of which the cob became passionately fond. Invariably, however, before giving it a button, he said, 'Deaghblasda,' with which word the cob by degrees associated an idea of unmixed enjoyment: so if he could rouse the cob to madness by the word which recalled the torture to its remembrance, he could as easily soothe it by the other word, which the cob knew would be ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... growth, the caterpillar, Fig. 14, a, which is about an inch in length, wanders off to some sheltered place, as under a board, fence rail, or even under the edge of clapboards on the side of a building, where it spins a button of silk, in which to secure its hind legs, then the loop of silk to support the forward ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 803, May 23, 1891 • Various
... let me go away without having taken a drink from "the spring where Anne used to drink." After presenting me with "lavender" and "rosemary" for mementoes, and a button-hole boquet consisting of a fine rose and buds, for immediate display, she wished me god-speed on my journey, and I retraced the path across ...
— The Youthful Wanderer - An Account of a Tour through England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany • George H. Heffner
... had one glimpse of horribly lacerated red tissues.... She gripped her hands together after this and looked fixedly at a button on her glove, until Miss Lindstroem's voice announced: "It's the Embury stitch that makes that possible: we've just worked out the application of it to skin-graft cases. Two years ago she'd have lost her leg. Isn't ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... among themselves. I don't think these Piutes are smart or bold enough to steal nowadays; their intercourse with the whites along the railroad has, in a measure, relieved them of those aboriginal traits of character that would incite them to steal a brass button off their pale-faced brother's coat, or screw a nut off his bicycle; but they have learned to beg; the noble Piute of to-day is an incorrigible mendicant. Gathering up my tools from among them, the monkey-wrench seems to have found favor in the eyes of a wrinkled-faced brave, who, ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... and the men were impressed by the important point to which his line of argument was leading, then went on excitedly: "We only have t' reason deflectively t' put our fingers on th' button what caused th' doggonedest Injun fights this ...
— Injun and Whitey to the Rescue • William S. Hart
... about education, at two minutes' notice; and I mayn't pretend to know much about ploughin' and wear a button in my coat to excuse it. But I reckon that for a pound a side I could ...
— Hocken and Hunken • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... November 1909 that Lieutenant-Commander Francis Erskine, in command of his Majesty's Fishery Cruiser, the Cormorant, got up on to the navigating bridge, and, as usual, took a general squint about him, and buttoned the top button of his ...
— The World Peril of 1910 • George Griffith
... was spoken with great energy. Mrs. Babington at the moment was employed in sewing a button on the wristband of her husband's shirt, and in the start which she gave stuck the ...
— John Caldigate • Anthony Trollope
... ef you wanter, but I boun' you ef Sis Tempy wuz ter come dar en say de wuds w'at I say, de button on dat ar do' 'ud des nat'ally twis' hitse'f off but w'at 't would let 'er in. Now, I boun' ...
— Nights With Uncle Remus - Myths and Legends of the Old Plantation • Joel Chandler Harris
... the best of England, and are still; and my father and I have had as good as any were in our times in Wiltshire. They are generally of a fallow colour, or black; but Mr. Button's, of Shirburn in Glocestershire, are some white and some black. But Gratius, ...
— The Natural History of Wiltshire • John Aubrey
... the days o' mi bell-button jacket, Wi' its little lappels hangin' down ower mi waist, An' mi grand bellosed cap,—noan nicer I'll back it,— Fer her at hed bowt it wur noan withaht taste; Fer shoo wur mi mother an' I wur her ...
— Revised Edition of Poems • William Wright
... well," she said. "If the Uncle really is as sensible as the nephew perhaps he will consent to leave the children here with me to-night—instead of bearing them off to the confusion and general mis-button-ness ...
— Fairy Prince and Other Stories • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... a concertina: I've a tongue like a button-stick: I've a mouth like an old potato, and I'm more than a little sick, But I've had my fun o' the Corp'ral's Guard: I've made the cinders fly, And I'm here in the Clink for a thundering drink and blacking the Corporal's eye. With a second-hand overcoat under my head, And a beautiful view of ...
— Barrack-Room Ballads • Rudyard Kipling
... with a glance of loving distress. "You wouldn't really care a button. I know you wouldn't, ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... he, stopping short in his walk and taking hold of the collar of his companion's coat, not loosely by the button, but with a firm grip which Undy felt that it would be difficult to shake off—'Scott, you will find that I am not to be trifled with. You have made a villain of me. I can see no way to escape from my ruin without your aid; but by the living God, if I fall, you shall fall with me. Tell ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope |
