"Covey" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... flying," said Vane to himself, as he stood sheltering his eyes to watch the last covey till it passed out of sight—"ten of them, and they went along just as if they had nothing to do but will themselves over the ground. It must be a fine thing to fly. Find it out some day," he said; and he hurried on again to reach the spot where a little rill made a demarcation ...
— The Weathercock - Being the Adventures of a Boy with a Bias • George Manville Fenn
... their sport till late; and returning, loaded with game, had nearly reached the palace, when Corny, who had marked a covey, quitted Harry, and sent his dog to spring it, at a distance much greater than the usual reach of a common fowling-piece. Harry heard a shot, and a moment afterwards a violent shout of despair;—he knew the voice to be that of Moriarty, ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth
... Massachusetts. But no harm came from the "fi'penny-bit" blunder, and I confidently and cheerfully went to work with my saw and buck. It was new business to me, but I never did better work, or more of it, in the same space of time on the plantation for Covey, the negro-breaker, than I did for myself in these earliest ...
— Collected Articles of Frederick Douglass • Frederick Douglass
... be up with another covey in five minutes,' said the long gamekeeper. 'If the gentleman begins to fire now, perhaps he'll just get the shot out of the barrel by the time ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... dead, now washed by the dew and caressed by the sun, revived, to fade again. Arctic petrels flew across the road with joyful cries; marmots called to one another in the grass. Somewhere, far away to the left, lapwings uttered their plaintive notes. A covey of partridges, scared by the chaise, fluttered up and with their soft "trrrr!" flew off to the hills. In the grass crickets, locusts and grasshoppers kept up their ...
— The Bishop and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... thousand five hundred acres, lying along the banks of Newport Creek. Since the civil war it has been worked by tenants. Much of it is woodland and salt-marshes. Five years before my visit, a Philadelphian sent the doctor a few pairs of prairie-chickens, and a covey of both the valley and the mountain partridge. I am now using popular terms. The grouse were from a western state; the partridges had been obtained from California. The partridges were kept caged for several weeks and were then set at liberty. They soon ...
— Voyage of The Paper Canoe • N. H. Bishop
... one, two, three—there are seven of them. I suppose this is what they call a covey in these parts. Were you ever wolf-hunting ...
— The Poacher - Joseph Rushbrook • Frederick Marryat
... the—," "generally said of a goshawk when, having 'put in' a covey of partridges, she takes stand, marking the spot where they disappeared from view until the falconer arrives to put them out to her" (Harting, Bibl. ...
— The Alchemist • Ben Jonson
... servant, rushed to the head of the dining-room table, and threw my arms round my mother's neck, who only screamed, "Good heavens, my child!" and fell into hysterics. My father, who was in the very midst of helping his soup, jumped up to embrace me and assist my mother. The company all rose, like a covey of partridges: one lady spoiled a new pink satin gown by a tip of the elbow from her next neighbour, just as a spoonful of soup had reached "the rosy portals of her mouth;" the little spaniel, Carlo, set up a loud and incessant bark; and in one minute the ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... in appearance, they provoke an association of that kind, they certainly are not in good taste; and a foot or two of increased height in a wall, or a low window sufficient for the purpose intended, would give a tone of dignity, of comfort, and real utility, which a whole covey of such pretentious things could not. All such trumpery should be scouted from the dwelling house of the farmer, and left to the special indulgence of the ...
— Rural Architecture - Being a Complete Description of Farm Houses, Cottages, and Out Buildings • Lewis Falley Allen
... foot's-pace, and the spaniels behind rose on their hind legs, choked by the chain, whimpering, fifty yards in the rear. Slowly the dogs advanced, each a frozen model of craft and blood-lust, till an instant afterwards, with a whir and a chattering like a broken clock, the covey whirled from the thick growth underfoot, and flashed away northwards; and, a moment later, up went the peregrines behind them. Then, indeed, it was sauve qui peut, for the ground was full of holes here and there, though there were grass-stretches as well ...
— Come Rack! Come Rope! • Robert Hugh Benson
... uniform want of success that Lord Stowell had truth as well as humor on his side when he observed, "My brother has done much execution this shooting season; with his gun he has killed a great deal of time." Having ineffectually discharged two barrels at a covey of partridges, the Chancellor was slowly walking to the gate of one of his Encome turnip-fields when a stranger of clerical garb and aspect hailed him from a distance, asking, "Where is Lord Eldon?" Not anxious to declare himself to the witness of his ludicrously ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... a remarkable good shooter; he-had always kept a pointer on our former farm, and thought no harm in doing so now; when one day, having sprung a covey in our own ground, the dog, of his own accord, followed them into the justice's. My son laid down his gun, and went after his dog to bring him back: the game-keeper, who had marked the birds, came up, and seeing the pointer, shot him just as my son ...
— The Man of Feeling • Henry Mackenzie
... and down the little stream called Knob Creek, Abe said: 'Right up there'—pointing to the east—'we saw a covey of partridges yesterday. Let's go over.' The stream was too wide for us to jump across. Finally we saw a foot-log, and decided to try it. It was narrow, but Abe said, ...
— The Story of Young Abraham Lincoln • Wayne Whipple
... until September the war dragged on. It was a dull and dreary time, and as September drew near Gordon thought of happy days in England, with the scent of autumn leaves, and the whir of a covey of birds rising from the stubble, and he longed for partridge-shooting. But they shot men, not birds, in the Crimea. "The Russians are brave," he wrote, "certainly inferior to none; their work is stupendous, their shell practice ...
— The Story of General Gordon • Jeanie Lang
... wait any longer, good-by to our covey: you will certainly find an empty cage, and the birds flown. You smile? Yes, I know you are clever, and can accomplish anything; but they are cunning blades, and as slippery as eels. They know that ...
— File No. 113 • Emile Gaboriau
... Seize the knave!' Alas! the deed is done; Down went the steed, and o'er his head flew bright Apollo's son. 'Undo his helmet! cut the lace! pour water on his head!' 'It ain't no use at all, my lord; 'cos vy? the covey's dead!' ...
— The Bon Gaultier Ballads • William Edmonstoune Aytoun
... with Mr. Elwes, missed a dozen times successively. At length, firing at a covey of partridges, he lodged two pellets in Mr. Elwes's cheek, which gave him considerable pain; but on the other apologizing, and expressing his sorrow for the unfortunate accident, "My dear Sir," said the old man, "I give you ...
— The Book of Anecdotes and Budget of Fun; • Various
... A covey of Uhlans entered the shambles, picking their way across the wreckage of the battle, a slim, wiry, fastidious company, dainty as spurred gamecocks, with their helmet-cords swinging like wattles and their ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... of her shadows in New York, but had been called off when she proved unprofitable and before she met Easton. And now he found her at work in a shipyard where strange things were happening! He was all afire with the covey of spies he had flushed. His first impulse was to shoot off a wire in code to announce his discovery. Then he decided to work this gold-mine himself. It would be pleasanter to cultivate this pretty woman than Jake ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... Towers' carriages rolled through the lodge, and drove to different houses, wherein dwelt a woman to be honoured; picking them up by ones or twos, till the loaded carriage drove back again through the ready portals, bowled along the smooth tree-shaded road, and deposited its covey of smartly- dressed ladies on the great flight of steps leading to the ponderous doors of Cumnor Towers. Back again to the town; another picking up of womankind in their best clothes, and another return, and so on till the whole party were assembled either in the house or in ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... October, as he slowly munched his crust, watched the squire strolling about the fields, with his gun under his arm, and wondered why he did not try the turnips. The squire never went into the turnip field, and seemed quite oblivious that he carried a gun, for when a covey rose at his feet he did not fire, but simply marked them down. His mind, in fact, was busy with more important matters, and, fond as he was of shooting, he wanted the birds for some one else's delectation. After he had had the place a little while, there ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... was deeply mortified when he looked down on Rome from these hills (the hills at least close by called the Prati d'Annibale) at having twice just missed taking it. Poetry and history contribute alike to the interest of this beautiful scenery. We met an Englishman, a single bird who had lost his covey, and had procured a guide who could not understand what he said. He wanted to go to Albano, and the man was taking him to the Emissarium. We put him right, but his fury in mixed Italian, French, and English was exceedingly comical. It was unlucky that ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... we ain't got to shoot Putney or Battersea," said Travers with a grim smile, as he stood shaping her course by inches with his magic-like steering, in the midst of a little covey of pleasure boats: "with this wind we might ha' brought either on 'em about our ears ...
— The Marquis of Lossie • George MacDonald
... longer. Seems like I c'n just get a whiff of the steak a sizzling on the gridiron at our house; and say, when I think of it, I get wild. I'm as hungry as that bear that came to our camp, and sent us all up in trees like a covey of partridges." ...
— Boy Scouts on a Long Hike - Or, To the Rescue in the Black Water Swamps • Archibald Lee Fletcher
... through layers of jewel-weed and mint, the white setter in the lead swung suddenly west, quartered, wheeled, crept forward and stiffened to a point. Behind him his mate froze into a silvery statue. But Gordon walked on, gun under his arm, and the covey rose with a roar of heavy wings, driving blindly through the tangle deep into the ...
— A Young Man in a Hurry - and Other Short Stories • Robert W. Chambers
... it mayn't be seeing death, friend Louis" he snorted. "There are a couple of rogues in that covey who would spit you or split you or slit you for ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... towards half-past five, about a score of small boys, chattering, pushing, and tumbling over one another like a covey of partridges, issued from one of the religious schools of Chartres. The joy of the little troop just escaped from a long and wearisome captivity was doubly great: a slight accident to one of the teachers had caused the class to be dismissed half an hour earlier than usual, ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... when he announced, as original, ideas and discoveries that reflected her own dreams in the past. Sometimes she thought he was catching up; sometimes, again, she distanced him and felt herself grown up and Raymond still a boy. Then, sometimes, he would flush a covey of ideas outside her reflections, and so remind her of the things that interested men, in which, as yet, women took no interest. When he spoke of such things, she strove to learn all that he could teach concerning them. But soon she found that was not much. He did not think ...
— The Spinners • Eden Phillpotts
... reached the confines of the wood when he was startled by a loud whirr, which he recognized as the flight of a covey of partridges from a cover close at hand. What had startled them? Glancing fearfully around him he saw, or thought he saw, the crouching figure of a man in one of the bypaths of the wood, partly hidden by the thick branches which stretched across ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... somber cypress told of the presence of water. In a nearby bunch of palmetto a pair of horns were visible; and a herd of wild cattle, incredibly thin and fleet, leaped with a snort into the open, stared an instant at the intruders and sprang out of sight with the speed of deer. A covey of small, brown quail broke close at hand and sailed away, skimming the top of the grass. Fox squirrels were to be seen through the hanging moss on the cypress trees. A great whooping crane waded into view and flapped away in clumsy fashion. A flock of teal duck, ...
— The Plunderer • Henry Oyen
... I think," said Jeekie, kneeling down and letting fly at a clump of the little men, which scattered like a covey of partridges, leaving one of its number kicking on the ground. "Ah! my boy," shouted Jeekie in derision, "how you like bullet in tummy? You not know Paradox guaranteed flat trajectory 250 yard. You remember that next time, sonny." Then ...
— The Yellow God - An Idol of Africa • H. Rider Haggard
... At the word of command the dog rushed forward; the covey rose with a mighty whir, and the hunter fired both barrels, and the dog looked in vain for a dead bird, and ...
— The Century Handbook of Writing • Garland Greever
... If the engineer has reason to suspect that the dog's mind is occupied with some engrossin' topic, he must stop the train. That case has been tested in this very state, where a dog was on the track settin' a covey of birds in the adjoinin' field. The railroad was held responsible for the death of that dog, because the engineer ought to have known by the action of the dog that his mind was on somethin' else beside railroad trains ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various
... Prussia is found again—where do you think? only in Poland, up to the chin in Russians! Was ever such a man! He was riding home from Olmutz; they ran and told him of an army of Muscovites,(941) as you would of a covey of partridges; he galloped thither, and shot them. But what news I am telling you! I forgot that all ours comes by water-carriage, and that you must know every thing a fortnight before us. It is incredible how popular he is here; ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... I had held with Jennie and her little covey of Birds of Paradise appeared to have worked in the minds of the fair council, for it was not long before they invaded my study again in a body. They were going out to a party, but called for Jennie, and of course gave me and Mrs. Crowfield ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 103, May, 1866 • Various
... way to flush a covey of crooks is to whistle for old Judge Lynch," the other man agreed. ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach
... isolated specimen, especially in the month of July, he will certainly masquerade in an entirely new guise. Look! quick. Turn your magnifier hither on this green shoot. No thorn this. Is it not rather a whole covey of quail, mother and young creeping along the vine? Who would ever have thought of a thorn! Turning now to our original group, how perfectly do they take the hint, for are they not a family of tiny birds with long necks and swelling breasts and ...
— My Studio Neighbors • William Hamilton Gibson
... and bladders, at all events,' Mr. Fenellan said. 'But if we let our journals go on making use of them, in the shape of sham hawks overhead, we shall pay for their one good day of the game with our loss of the covey. An ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... no bird life here, beyond a rare covey of partridges well behind the line, or a solitary lark searching for summer. One misses—oh, so much!—the cheeky chirp of the sparrow or the note of the thrush. We found a stray terrier about yesterday and have adopted it, but I don't think it will go into ...
— Winning a Cause - World War Stories • John Gilbert Thompson and Inez Bigwood
... glance through the brushwood as they moved onward, but saw no living thing, excepting a family of chipmunks gaily chasing each other along a fallen branch, and a covey of quails, that were feeding quietly on the red berries of the Mitchella repens, or twinberry, [FN: Also partridge-berry and checker-berry, a lovely creeping winter-green, with white fragrant flowers, and double scarlet berry.] as it is commonly called, of which the partridges and ...
— Canadian Crusoes - A Tale of The Rice Lake Plains • Catharine Parr Traill
... and, at one particular point, intersected by a deep and brawling brook. Soon after Grace had crossed this stream, she came in view of the cottage, looking like a misshapen mound of earth; and, upon peering in at the window, which was only partially lined by a broken shutter, Covey, the lurcher, uttered, from the inside, a sharp muttering bark, something between reproof and recognition. There had certainly been a good fire, not long before, on the capacious hearth, for the burning ashes cast a ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, No. - 580, Supplemental Number • Various
... of a covey soon after. He and Ernest slipped out of the wagon and stole up as close as possible. Ernest got two with the scattering bird shot, but ...
— Chicken Little Jane on the Big John • Lily Munsell Ritchie
... make for himself that breeze in the still air for which you are panting. You close your eyes, and smile to think that such a little thing as a karoo-blended lizard can interest you. A sound catches your ear: it is the upbraiding note of the bustard. Again and again you hear it. A covey of these birds must have been raised. As the clatter of their cry dies away, you distinguish the muffled strokes of a galloping horse. This is significant. No man in his senses would gallop in this heat unless his mission was serious. Nearer and ...
— On the Heels of De Wet • The Intelligence Officer
... of the dogs through the silent woods were musical. Soon they sounded sharp and clear—the hounds were crossing an open stretch leading down to the meadow behind me. As I leaned, listening, I heard near by a low, uneasy murmuring from a covey of quails sleeping in the brush beside the path, and before I had time to think what it meant, a fox trotted up the path I had just climbed, and halted in the edge of the shadows ...
— Roof and Meadow • Dallas Lore Sharp
... case of the lady in the car the similitude is clear enough. I aspire to show that the analogy applies just as surely to the young fellow and his faith. And to that end let me raise a cloud of questions as a dog might start a covey of birds. ...
— Mushrooms on the Moor • Frank Boreham
... Flame, blaze, flare, glare, glow. Flat, level, even, plane, smooth, horizontal. Flatter, blandish, beguile, compliment, praise. Flexible, pliable, pliant, supple, limber, lithe, lissom. Flit, flutter, flicker, hover. Flock, herd, bevy, covey, drove, pack, brood, litter, school. Flow, pour, stream, gush, spout. Follow, pursue, chase. Follower, adherent, disciple, partisan, henchman. Fond, loving, doting, devoted, amorous, enamored. Force, strength, power, energy, vigor, might, potency, cogency, efficacy. ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... being comparatively unknown. He had never permitted himself the luxury of making enemies: except for a few ex-reporters who had once worked on the Balloon he had not a foe in the world. Quimbleton had been eager to import a covey of gunmen from other cities, but when these arrived there was really nothing for them to do. They were glad to accept jobs from Bishop Chuff, and were well paid for waylaying and sniping the few grapes and apples that had ...
— In the Sweet Dry and Dry • Christopher Morley
... them, the lift had returned and ascended with another covey of fancy costumes, including a man with a nose a foot long and a girl with bright green hair, dressed as an acrobat. On its next journey the lift held Tommy and Nick's party, ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett
... they had been brought down by the Huns, and everybody with glasses was looking to the south-eastward for signs of them. But at last, when they had almost been given up, the first one suddenly reappeared in the midst of a snow squall. He was hoisted in, and within the next ten minutes the whole covey, except two, ...
— Stand By! - Naval Sketches and Stories • Henry Taprell Dorling
... the spruce forest. Then he came to a shallow, roaring river. The horses drank the water, foaming white and amber around their knees, and then with splash and thump they forded it over the slippery rocks. As they cracked out upon the trail a covey of grouse whirred up into the low branches of spruce-trees. ...
— The Mysterious Rider • Zane Grey
... came upon a field, where, among the brown and green nobbly grass, was gathered a sort of parliament of creatures: rooks on the fences, seagulls and peewits wheeling overhead, plovers strutting and wagging their tails; and, undisturbed by the white darting of rabbits, a covey of young partridges, hopping leisurely ...
— Laurus Nobilis - Chapters on Art and Life • Vernon Lee
... moment up flew a covey of wild-fowl, when Martin, forgetting that it might be of importance to ascertain what Mr Pipe was about, fired at one of the birds, which, however, ...
— Snow Shoes and Canoes - The Early Days of a Fur-Trader in the Hudson Bay Territory • William H. G. Kingston
... went off. Hautot Senior had fired. They all stopped, and saw a partridge breaking off from a covey which was rushing along at great speed to fall down into a ravine under a thick growth of brushwood. The sportsman, becoming excited, rushed forward with rapid strides, thrusting aside the briers which stood in his path, and disappeared ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant
... (7) A covey of partridges rose out of shot, flew over the hedge, and was lost to view. "Where do you think they've gone?" said the sportsman to his keeper. "There's a man digging potatoes in the next field. Ask if he saw them." ...
— From a Cornish Window - A New Edition • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... be right, too, before they had been two hours on the way, for first one or two, then a covey of the large partridge-like birds that haunted the open appeared, and as the day went on several plump additions to their stores ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... down upon them as they came. Suddenly there was a change. So quickly that he could scarcely believe his eyes the flying Mormons had disappeared. Not a man was visible upon that narrow plain between the hill and the sea. Like a huge covey of quail they had dropped to the ground, their rifles lost in that ghostly gloom through which the voices of the mainlanders came in fierce cries of triumph. It was magnificent! Even as the crushing truth of what it all meant came to him, the fighting blood in his veins leaped at the sight ...
— The Courage of Captain Plum • James Oliver Curwood
... another cigar, put up a covey of partridges, remembered how he used to shoot with Margaret's father, told himself that there was no fool like an old fool—not referring to Mr. Mildmay in the least—and took himself impatiently ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 6, June, 1891 • Various
... nobody wouldn't care!" These utterances, it may be imagined, went to the very heart of the errand-boys, who were collected in a circle, plotting how to release Rosa, when Elsworthy, mortified and furious, came back from his unsuccessful assault on the Curate. They scattered like a covey of little birds before the angry man, who tossed their papers at them, and then strode up the echoing stairs. "If you don't hold your d——d tongue," said Elsworthy, knocking furiously at Rosa's door, "I'll turn you to the door this instant, ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... of Apacheland. Numberless birds are singing their songs of life and love. Within my reach lies a tree, felled only last night by a beaver, which even now darts out into the light, scans his surroundings, and scampers back. A covey of mourning doves fly to the water's edge, slake their thirst in their dainty way, and flutter off. By the brookside path now and then wander prattling children; a youth and a maiden hand in hand wend their way along the cool stream's brink. The words of the children ...
— The North American Indian • Edward S. Curtis
... should they hang around here? The last idea in their heads would be the possibility of our ever drifting in alive. Hogan has gone back to Chicago to make a report to Hobart, and the rest have scattered like a covey of partridges. Not one of them has a thought but that we went down in the Seminole. Now they'll pull off their graft, and pull ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish
... clean pearly colour, clear and definite like the glance of a child or the voice of a girl, and a golden wisp of cloud hung in the sky over the tower of the church. There was a mist upon the pond, a soft grey mist not a yard high. A covey of partridges ran and halted and ran again in the dewy grass outside his garden railings. The partridges were very numerous this year because there had been so little shooting. Beyond in the meadow a hare sat up as still as a stone. A horse neighed.... ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... being level enough for the nurse to act as her own helmsman, a tremendous "whurr! whurr!" under my feet restored sufficient leaping power to my weary legs to leave me head down and only my racquets out of the snow—all for a covey of white partridges on which I had nearly trodden. At length we made a tiny winter cottage. The nurse slept on the bench, the doctor on the floor, the driver on a shelf. Our generous host had almost ...
— A Labrador Doctor - The Autobiography of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... yellowish sea anemone from the genus Caryophylia with translucent tentacles, plus anemone with grassy tufts from the genus Zoantharia; and to complete the illusion, minnows flitted from branch to branch like a swarm of hummingbirds, while there rose underfoot, like a covey of snipe, yellow fish from the genus Lepisocanthus with bristling jaws and sharp scales, flying gurnards, and ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... green dragon flies dart above them. Thistledown is pouting forth from the swollen tops of thistles crowded with seed. In a gateway the turf has been worn away by waggon wheels and the hoofs of cart horses, and the dry heat has pulverised the crumbling ruts. Three hen pheasants and a covey of partridges that have been dusting themselves here move away without much haste at the approach of footsteps—the pheasants into the thickets, and the partridges through the gateway. The shallow holes in which they were sitting can be ...
— Nature Near London • Richard Jefferies
... haven't," he said. "Our huntsman Eryomka w as saying that on Elijah's Day he started one covey near Pustoshye, but I dare say he was lying. ...
— The Witch and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... faces they had any chance of seeing were those of the two men who conveyed the annual winter packet of letters from the next station. Outside of the fort, all was a wide, waste wilderness for thousands of miles around. Deathlike stillness and solitude reigned everywhere, except when a covey of ptarmigan whirred like large snowflakes athwart the sky, or an arctic fox prowled stealthily through the ...
— The Young Fur Traders • R.M. Ballantyne
... artillery rang out the Confederate bugles, and along the whole length of the ridge beyond the railroad long lines of infantry, streaming forward from the woods, ran down to the embankment. "The effect," said an officer who witnessed this unexpected apparition, "was not unlike flushing a covey ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... absurdity is invested with habits, strong interests, and chummy Congressmen. Attack all along the line and you engage every force of reaction. You go forth to battle, as the poet said, and you always fall. You can lop off an antiquated bureau here, a covey of clerks there, you can combine two bureaus. And by that time you are busy with the tariff and the railroads, and the era of reform is over. Besides, in order to effect a truly logical reorganization of the government, ...
— Public Opinion • Walter Lippmann
... monarch of Scotland sprung this strong covey of his favourite game, they afforded the Privy Council and him sport for the greatest part of the remaining winter. He attended on the examinations himself, and by one means or or other, they were indifferently well dressed ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... on the 1st of September, having failed time after time in bringing down a single bird, had at last pointed out to him by his attendant bag-carrier, a large covey, thick and close on the stubbles. "Noo! Mr. Jeems, let drive at them, just as ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... initial giving. Was there ever a troubadour of old who struck upon as royal a castle in his wanderings? While he lay thus, meditating upon his blessings, little brown cottontails would shyly frolic through the yard; a covey of white-topknotted blue quail would run past, in single file, twenty yards away; a paisano bird, out hunting for tarantulas, would hop upon the fence and salute him with sweeping flourishes of its long tail. In the eighty-acre horse pasture the pony with the Dantesque face grew ...
— Sixes and Sevens • O. Henry
... scour'd, you might have seen your face; And over all, to frighten thieves, was hung Well clean'd, altho' but seldom us'd, my gun. Ah! that damn'd gun! I took it down one morn— A desperate deal of harm they did my corn! Our testy Squire too loved to save the breed, So covey upon covey eat my seed. I mark'd the mischievous rogues, and took my aim, I fir'd, they fell, and—up the keeper came. That cursed morning brought on my undoing, I went to prison and my farm to ruin. Poor Mary! for her grave the parish paid, ...
— Poems • Robert Southey
... and unexploded shells. No plough can be put here—the only solution for the land for years to come is forest. Just before we gained the road at the bottom, where the car was awaiting us, we were startled by the sudden flight of a covey of partridges. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... match you five dollars agin de gurl, an' I said if you was to win I wouldn't trouble you. You said if I winned I could have her. All right. I lost, an' I give up my good money. Den you went ter work wallopin' de gurl. You'd er kilt her if dis covey hadn't er lit in. All right, dat wasn't no fault er mine. An' fur all me, he kin stick dat blazin' iron clear down yer t'roat, an' I'll set yere an' take it in ...
— Tin-Types Taken in the Streets of New York • Lemuel Ely Quigg
... hunter said he would carry the dead fox for them, and again they went forward. They spent the best part of the afternoon looking for more foxes, but in this they were disappointed. However, deep in the woods they came upon a covey of partridges. All banged away at a lively rate, and had the satisfaction of killing ...
— The Rover Boys on a Hunt - or The Mysterious House in the Woods • Arthur M. Winfield (Edward Stratemeyer)
... no idleness in that camp. Each man was busy within and without the conical-walled tents in which the troopers lie like the spokes of a wheel, with heads out like a covey of partridges. Before one tent sat the tall soldier—Abe—and the boy, his comrade, whom Crittenden ...
— Crittenden - A Kentucky Story of Love and War • John Fox, Jr.
... single covey we at last reached another clearing. There the aspen-trees had only lately been felled, and lay stretched mournfully on the ground, crushing the grass and small undergrowth below them: on some the leaves were still ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Works of Ivan Turgenev, Vol. I • Ivan Turgenev
... still alive. Soon a large flight came over, mixed up with mallard and widgeon. I took the right-hand angle bird, so that it could not be supposed I had "browned the lot," as here in England they say of one who fires at a covey and not at a particular partridge. Down he came, shot straight through the breast. Then I knew that I had got my nerve, and felt no ...
— Marie - An Episode in The Life of the late Allan Quatermain • H. Rider Haggard
... a gun-shot in the old man's ears. There was a whirr of wheels, a patter of feet grappling with dirt and throwing it all over him—another whirr and flutter and buzz as of a covey flushed, and the field was off, leaving ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore
... exceedingly tame—so tame, indeed, that sometimes they did not take wing until two or three shots had been fired. On one occasion, after walking about for half an hour without getting a shot, we started a covey of seven, which alighted upon a tree close at hand. We instantly fired at the two lowest, and brought them down, while the others only stretched out their long necks, as if to see what had happened to their comrades, but did not fly away. Two more were ...
— Hudson Bay • R.M. Ballantyne
... the sportsmen crouched in a dry ditch and crawled stealthily along in order to approach the tempting covey as near ...
— The Sketches of Seymour (Illustrated), Complete • Robert Seymour
... in a twinkling round a reach of the canal where we were anchored, and we, that is the gunroom-officers, all except the second lieutenant, who had the watch, and the master, now got into our own gig also, rowed by ourselves, and away we all went in a covey; the purser and doctor, and three of the middies forward, Thomas Cringle, gent., pulling the stroke oar, with old Moses Yerk as coxswain;—and as the Dragon-flies were all red, so we were all sea-green, boat, oars, trousers, shirts, and night-caps. The strain was ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 579 - Volume 20, No. 579, December 8, 1832 • Various
... to her, prepared to return to his playmates. She thanked him, and gave him the smallest coin in her purse, which happened to be a shilling. He, in a transport at possessing what was to him a fortune, uttered a piercing yell, and darted off to show the coin to a covey of small ragamuffins who had just raced into view round the corner at which the public-house stood. In his haste he dashed against one of the group outside, a powerfully built young man, who turned and cursed him. The boy retorted passionately, and ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... prey. The Boys and myself could easily have mastered him and his Servant, and then the two thousand Pistoles would have been shared between us four. Now we must let in the Band for a share, and perhaps the whole Covey may escape us. Should our Friends have betaken themselves to their different posts before you reach the Cavern, all will be lost. The Lady's Attendants are too numerous for us to overpower them: Unless our Associates arrive in time, we must needs let these Travellers ...
— The Monk; a romance • M. G. Lewis
... unless kept in tin boxes. Can one wonder therefore that the human system soon breaks down in this vapour bath and that sickness is very common in this part. There is not much game to be seen from the river but occasionally a covey of partridges rises from the grass and comes within gun shot of ...
— A Journal of a Tour in the Congo Free State • Marcus Dorman
... describe Daddy Jack's imitation of the flushing of a covey of partridges, or quail; but it is needless to say that it made its impression upon the little boy. The old African ...
— Nights With Uncle Remus - Myths and Legends of the Old Plantation • Joel Chandler Harris
... Battalion, who enjoyed during those shining autumn days their first vision of Gibraltar "grand and grey," with its covey of German prizes in harbour, and of the Mediterranean, then free of the submarine, and who half feared that the War would be over while they were still buried in the African desert, only a small number survive unscathed. Many sleep amid the cliffs and nullahs ...
— With Manchesters in the East • Gerald B. Hurst
... the beginning of fox-ways. I have not spoken of his occasional tree climbing; nor of his grasshopper hunting; nor of his planning to catch three quails at once when he finds a whole covey gathered into a dinner-plate circle, tails in, heads out, asleep on the ground; nor of some perfectly astonishing things he does when hard pressed by dogs. But these are enough to begin the study and still leave plenty of things to find ...
— Ways of Wood Folk • William J. Long
... of Reginald Drake Biffin, and the sportsman who tries to get on without it is positively courting disaster. The first thing he knows, he will be talking to well-informed people about a flock of sparrows or a covey of weasels, and their quiet smiles will show him that he has been guilty of a ludicrous blunder. If he had read his Biffin he would have known that the correct terms are a "susurration of sparrows" and a "pop of weasels." These ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, December 9, 1914 • Various
... dog'll spring all the birds out of shot,' observed Mr. Sponge; and, just as he spoke, whirr! rose a covey of partridges, eleven in number, quite at an impossible distance, but Jog blazed ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... on and sometime during it Raf fell asleep. But the two or three hours of restless, dream-filled unconsciousness was not what he needed, and he blinked in the dawn with eyes which felt as if they were filled with hot sand. In the first gray light a covey of winged things, which might or might not have been birds, arose from some roosting place within the city, wheeled three times over the building, and then vanished out over ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton
... The King!" Brilliana cried, in an ecstasy, and as the loyal syllables died on her lips there came a trampling of near feet, and then through the yawning doorway rushed a covey of young gentlemen waving their drawn swords and yelling their cry, "The King! The King!" As they flooded into the room, bright foam on the wave of victorious loyalty, Brilliana knew them all. Sir Rufus Quaryll, her neighbor and hot lover; the Lord Fawley, who had vainly wooed her for wife; ...
— The Lady of Loyalty House - A Novel • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... was a flourishing covey of fifteen: Pa Tridge, Ma Tridge, and thirteen little Tridges, all brown and speckled and very chirpy. They had been born in a hollow under some big leaves beside a hedge, and they now moved about the earth, pushing their way through the grass, all keeping close together ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May 30, 1917 • Various
... wondering who the expert was. In a half hour I found out—I was. When Major Gregory and I walked into the lobby of the Roger Smith Hotel to check in, reporters and photographers rose from the easy chairs and divans like a covey of quail. They wanted my secrets, but I wasn't going to tell nor would I pose for pictures while I wasn't telling anything. Newspaper reporters are a determined lot, but Greg ran interference and we reached the elevator ...
— The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects • Edward Ruppelt
... a strange-looking old covey any how," said one of the boys in an undertone. "Did you notice that red muffler about his neck, and how pinched up and crooked his hat is, and that odd-looking moustache, and how savagely he cocks ...
— Red-Tape and Pigeon-Hole Generals - As Seen From the Ranks During a Campaign in the Army of the Potomac • William H. Armstrong
... A covey of patridges, A nide of pheasants, A wisp of snipe, A flight of doves or swallows, A muster of peacocks, A siege of herons, A building of rooks, A brood of grouse, A plump of wild fowl, A stand ...
— Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889 • Barkham Burroughs
... and she did not tremble much even before the maitre d'hotel. She was a trifle alarmed at the covey of waiters who hastened to their table to pull out the chairs and push them in and fetch the water and bread and butter and silver and plates. She was glad to have long gloves to take off slowly while she recovered ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... clumps came the calling of the male quail, and around sounded the different murmurs of clucking, of twittering, of the ruffling of feathers: in a word, the divers voices of the small inhabitants of the plains. Sometimes there flew up a whole covey of quail; the gaudy-topped pheasants scattered on their approach; the black squirrels dived into their holes; the rabbits disappeared in all directions; the gophers were sitting on their hind legs beside their holes, looking like fat German farmers ...
— Sielanka: An Idyll • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... penetrated further than his own garden on the occasions when he roamed abroad at night. For cat-shooting the Wain spinneys were unsurpassed. There was one particular dustbin where one might be certain of flushing a covey any night; and the wall by the potting-shed was a ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... floor in front of the fire and stared into it. It was pretty to look at just then, for the wood was burning redly, and at the tiniest touch a whole bevy of lovely sparks would fly out like bees from a hive, or a covey of birds, or better still, like a thousand imprisoned fairies escaping at some magic touch. Of all things, Jeanne loved to give this magic touch. There was no poker, but she managed just as well with a stick of unburnt wood, or sometimes, when she was quite ...
— The Tapestry Room - A Child's Romance • Mrs. Molesworth
... the guyser's bannock. At the very next door, Meg Johnston was in the act of being "smecked oot" by a covey of twelve devils, who had inserted into every cranny a horn, and were blowing, with puffed cheeks, a choking death in every blast. One kept watch, to give the concerted signal when Meg should appear with her stick. On ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland Volume 17 • Alexander Leighton
... was azure with the bluebells swaying in the soft breeze. Several times he started up with a laugh of delight as a rabbit leaped up from under the greenery and scudded away with a twinkle of short white tail behind it. Once a covey of partridges rose with a sudden whir and flew away, and then he ...
— Little Lord Fauntleroy • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... coming at full speed directly toward us. Our mimic buffalo hunt turned into a very real buffalo scare. Fortunately, we were near the edge of the woods and we soon disappeared among the leaves like a covey of young prairie-chickens and some hid in the bushes while others ...
— Indian Boyhood • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... in his rubbed leather armchair and yarned for twenty minutes. He told me how at the beginning of the war Scotland Yard had had a pretty complete register of enemy spies, and without making any fuss had just tidied them away. After that, the covey having been broken up, it was a question of picking off stray birds. That had taken some doing. There had been all kinds of inflammatory stuff around, Red Masons and international anarchists, and, worst of all, international finance-touts, but they had mostly been ordinary ...
— Mr. Standfast • John Buchan
... eyes; 'I know where he's keeping a covey of birds up against game day—nineteen of them. I've seen them every day, and I could go to the place ...
— Fern's Hollow • Hesba Stretton
... freshman at Oxford, 1642, I was wont to go to Christ Church, to see King Charles I. at supper; where I once heard him say, " That as he was hawking in Scotland, he rode into the quarry, and found the covey of partridges falling upon the hawk; and I do remember this expression further, viz. and I will swear upon the book 'tis true." When I came to my chamber, I told this story to my tutor; said he, that ...
— Miscellanies upon Various Subjects • John Aubrey
... so new, so untouched, so absolutely unknown. The high ridges on either side frowned down austerely on the little meadows that smiled back quite unabashed. As I crossed the brown dry meadow toward the river a covey of quail whirred away before me, lit, and paced off at a great rate. Two big grouse ...
— Gold • Stewart White
... there, Quail, Mr. Sammy would say. He'd nearly always get eight or ten out uv a covey an' sometimes the whole covey. I yousta go along jess to see him shoot. He hardly ever missed. There was so many quail that nobody ever thought to leave any uv a covey if he wanted that many an' they didn't get so scattered that he couldn't ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - From Interviews with Former Slaves - Kentucky Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... the sort of thing I should like to work at," exclaimed Harry. "It should be a thoroughly marine grotto. I see that there is a covey of flying fish already finished. You might have Neptune and his car and attendant tritons at the further end, dolphins and swordfish and other inhabitants of the sea on either side. I must compliment the artist who executed those flying fish. They ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston
... strayed stock, went to the spring for water, or tilled the fields. If two men were together, one always watched while the other worked, ate, or drank; and they sat down back to back, or, if there were several, in a ring, facing outwards, like a covey of quail. The Indians were especially fond of stealing the horses; the whites pursued them in bands, and occasionally pitched battles were fought, with loss on both sides, and apparently as often resulting in the favor of one party as of the other. The most ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Two - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1777-1783 • Theodore Roosevelt
... morning drink of tea, my three guests took their leave. I remained out of doors and was engaged in splitting wood for my stove. Suddenly, from a distance, rifle shots rang through the woods, first one, then a second. Afterwards all was still. From the place near the shots a frightened covey of blackcock broke and came over me. At the top of a high pine a jay cried out. I listened for a long time to see if anyone was approaching my hut but ...
— Beasts, Men and Gods • Ferdinand Ossendowski
... going back, I flushed a whole covey of the prettiest little birds you ever saw. They'd been crouching under a bush while the old one played lame; just as if she'd told them all about it. But I heard her calling in the brush later on, and of course she ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts Afloat • George A. Warren
... committed; and there we two were, I looking up at the viper, and the viper looking down upon me, flickering at me with its tongue. It was only the kindness of God that saved me: all at once there was a loud noise, the report of a gun, for a fowler was shooting at a covey of birds, a little way off in the stubble. Whereupon the viper sunk its head, and immediately made off over the ridge of the hill, down in the direction of the sea. As it passed by me, however—and it passed close by me—it hesitated a moment, ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... marked the earnest red-heads from the north—and accomplished two mud-hens, a ruddy duck, and a dozen blackbirds. In the uplands they knew almost to a feather how many partridge each thicket had bred; to a covey where the quail used; and once in a great while, by strategy on their own side and foolishness on the part of the quarry, they caught one sitting and brought it down. What is quite as much to the point, they felt the season as it changed. The gradual transformation from the ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White
... Nature in her wildest grace, These northern scenes with weary feet I trace; O'er many a winding dale and painful steep, Th' abodes of covey'd grouse and ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... desperately to regain his feet. At last he managed to get erect, and came spluttering for the bank with such a mixture of godly ejaculations and of profane oaths that, even in our terror, we could not keep from laughter. Rising from under his feet like a covey of wild-fowl, we scurried off across the fields and so back to the school, where, as you may imagine, we said nothing to our good master of what ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... battery was specially handicapped by the colour of its horses, and was evidently easily spotted by hostile aircraft, for we had more than our share of ill fortune at this period. To take the worst case that befell us, one night the wagon line lost 35 horses. A covey of enemy planes had been over at daybreak, and apparently made a mental note of our location, as they returned the same evening and dropped several bombs, though, strange to say, no damage was effected. However, towards midnight, a 4.2 battery suddenly opened fire with instantaneous ...
— Three years in France with the Guns: - Being Episodes in the life of a Field Battery • C. A. Rose
... respect the causes while enjoying the effects; and from the secondary causes he will mentally ascend to the primitive one, which produced them all from nought. This is the sense and intention of the prohibitions of taking in a covey the mother with the young, of slaughtering a quadruped together with that which gave it birth, of cutting down a tree, were it even for the necessity of a siege, while ...
— A Guide for the Religious Instruction of Jewish Youth • Isaac Samuele Reggio
... hawk in spirit, was proved on an occasion of almost equal interest. A neighbour had sent us a very fine specimen of the smaller horned owl (Strix brachyotus,) which he had winged when flying in the midst of a covey of partridges; and after having tended the wounded limb, and endeavoured to make a cure, we thought of soothing the prisoner's captivity by a larger degree of freedom than he had in the hen-coop which he inhabited. No sooner, however, had our former acquaintance, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XVII. No. 473., Saturday, January 29, 1831 • Various
... bind him to you, my lord," said Monkbarns, "body and soul: give him leave to crack off his birding-piece at a poor covey of partridges or moor-fowl, and he's yours for everI will enchant him by the intelligence. But O, my lord, that you could have seen my phoenix Lovel!the very prince and chieftain of the youth of this age; and not destitute of spirit neitherI promise you he gave ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... "To-day shall you make your trial shot, so that I may release you from your apprenticeship, and make you huntsmen." They went with him to lie in wait and stayed there a long time, but no game appeared. The huntsman, however, looked above him and saw a covey of wild geese flying in the form of a triangle, and said to one of them, "Shoot me down one from each corner." He did it, and thus accomplished his trial shot. Soon after another covey came flying by in the form of ...
— Household Tales by Brothers Grimm • Grimm Brothers
... I objected, "being overdue at Ferrok-Shahn, will cause alarm. You'll have a covey of ...
— Brigands of the Moon • Ray Cummings
... Scalding Wike). The pluckers and scorchers of the feathered fowl occupied the shops between the Stocks' Market (now the Mansion House) and the Great Conduit. Just before Stow's time the poulterers seem to have taken wing in a unanimous covey, and settled down, for reasons now unknown to us, and not very material to any one, in Gracious (Gracechurch) Street, and the end of St. Nicholas flesh shambles (now Newgate Market). Poultry was not worth its weight ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... keep their heads out of the shop-windows. However, as soon as they began to get warm to their work, things improved, and we rattled along merrily. We were spinning away at about twelve miles an hour when, just as we were getting clear of the town, we came suddenly upon a covey of juvenile blackguards who were manufacturing dirt pies right in the centre of the road. As soon as I saw them I sung out to them to clear the course, but before they had time to cut away we were slap into the middle of them. Well, I thought ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... plate, let into the woodwork of this door, is misleading. Reading it, you get the impression that on the other side quite a covey of lawyers await your arrival. The name of the firm leads you to suppose that there will be barely standing-room in the office. You picture Thorpe jostling you aside as he makes for Prescott to discuss ...
— Three Men and a Maid • P. G. Wodehouse
... their own fights amongst themselves, but they settle 'em themselves, too, and keep their own counsel and hush it up. Lige Willetts, Minnie's friend—I guess she's told you about Lige?—well, Lige Willetts will go anywhere when he's following a covey, though mostly the boys leave this part of the country alone when they're hunting; but Lige got into a thicket back of the forge one morning, and he came on a crowd of buzzards quarrelling over a heap on the ground, and he got out in a hurry. He said he was sure it ...
— The Gentleman From Indiana • Booth Tarkington
... heart of man leap up in gladness and to enable him to understand how there came to be a poet called Wordsworth. Meadow-larks were singing in the grass, and once in an old hedgerow over-grown with sweet-smelling wild honeysuckle I saw a covey of young quails. These hedgerows of locust and cedar are broken now, but along the old road to the mill and Pohick Church and between fields the scattered trees and now and then a bordering ditch are evidences of ...
— George Washington: Farmer • Paul Leland Haworth
... of the great fire illumined not only all the island but the waters for miles around. As Bascom's boat drew away, its owner called Staff's attention to a covey of sails, glowing pink against the dark background of the mainland as they stood across the arm of the ...
— The Bandbox • Louis Joseph Vance
... defined, That speeds the startled partridge down the wind; The whistled warning as the winged ones rise Large and more large upon our straining eyes, Till with a sweep, while every nerve is tense, The chattering covey hurtles o'er the fence; The double crack of every lifted gun, The dinting thud of birds whose course is done— These sounds, delightful to his listening ear, He heeds no longer, for he cannot hear. None stauncher, till the drive was done, defied Temptation, rooted to his master's side; None swifter, ...
— The Dog's Book of Verse • Various
... deep ravine overgrown with oak saplings and alder-trees; there was a moist feeling in the air—there must have been a spring at the bottom. On the near side, on the very edge of the ravine, a covey of partridges rose noisily. Vera remembered that in old days they used to go for evening walks to this ravine; so it must be near home! And now she could actually see the poplars, the barn, black smoke rising on one side—they were burning old ...
— The Duel and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... had set. There were no shadows anywhere as Richard and his sheep went homeward, but on every side the colors of the world were more sombre. Twice his flock roused a covey of partridges which had settled for the night. The screech-owl had come out of his hole, and bats were already blundering about, and the air was cooling. There was as yet but one star in the green and cloudless heaven, and this was very large, like a beacon: ...
— Chivalry • James Branch Cabell
... terns—small birds with black-capped heads, dove-grey backs and silvery-white breasts. They were very nervous of the ship, rising in great numbers when it had approached within a few hundred yards. One startled bird would fly up, followed by several more; then a whole covey would disturb the rest of the flock. Hamilton managed to shoot two of them from the fo'c'sle, and, after much manoeuvring, we secured ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... his charts meanwhile, for there was a nasty little experience awaiting them when they reached Lewes, where they must watch for a favorable opportunity to pass out upon the open Atlantic, and cover ten miles or so like a covey of frightened partridges, heading for the inlet to Rehoboth Bay, and actually passing around Cape Henlopen, since boats the size of theirs could not well be carted across the land to Love Creek, as if ...
— Motor Boat Boys Down the Coast - or Through Storm and Stress to Florida • Louis Arundel
... Are you going to let him sandbag us into electing him? Is that the sort of hold-up you stand for? Well, then, I tell you I'll never vote for him. I'd rather see these lakes and streams of ours dry up; I'd rather see the last pheasant snared and the last covey leave for the other end of the island, than buy off that Dutchman with a certificate of membership ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers
... me most in Joshua's domain was the quantity and the tameness of the game. The hen partridge scarce abandoned the roost, at the foot of the hedge where she had assembled her covey, though the path went close beside her; and the hare, remaining on her form, gazed at us as we passed, with her full dark eye, or rising lazily and hopping to a little distance, stood erect to look at us with more curiosity than apprehension. I observed to Miss Geddes the extreme ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... not of books that he had spoken much to-day. He had not spoken at all. He had bade her listen to the meadow-lark, when its song fell upon the silence like beaded drops of music. He had showed her where a covey of young willow-grouse were hiding as their horses passed. And then, without warning, as they sat by the spring, he had spoken potently ...
— The Virginian - A Horseman Of The Plains • Owen Wister
... Norwegian would be puzzled to think why we should attach a joke to such an act; and to prove to an Englishman the inaptitude of the proverb, the Norseman will go forth with his handful of salt, and take, not his covey of sparrows, for his country has none; but a fine ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross
... danger has no existence; he takes in a room at a glance. He has the sportsman's eye which, in a covey of partridges, marks its bird at a glance. He never hesitates. "That is the thing to make for," he says, "come along"—and we make for it. He plants himself right in front of the picture, with both hands in his overcoat pockets, and his chin sunk in his collar; says nothing, ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... is called, by which a long stretch would be saved, and we were cracking on cheerily, my mind full of my recent promotion, when, scur, scur, scur, we stuck fast on the bank. Our black boatmen, being little encumbered with clothes, jumped overboard in a covey like so many wild—ducks, shouting, as they dropped into the water, "We must all get out,—we must all get out;" whereupon Mr Callaloo, a sort of Dominie Sampson in his way, promptly leaped overboard up to his waist in the water. The ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... was about to fight; but they waited not for me. It is all over now. The king hath no more chance than a butterfly three days at sea amongst a covey of Mother Carey's chickens. I would pursue, but lack spurs and a horse, or you should not find me here; [Aside.] or ...
— Cromwell • Alfred B. Richards
... me, 'There's a covey of ten in thicky holler,' where you could see neither land nor bird. 'I allow 'tis ten,' he says, 'but we won't be particular to a chick.' There was nine, if you credit me, that rose out of a kind of a dimple in the down, that you couldn't see, and no ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... her wildest grace, These northern scenes with weary feet I trace; O'er many a winding dale and painful steep, Th' abodes of covey'd grouse and ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... though their flight sometimes equals the speed of a railroad train, they have little to fear when well above the ground. Collision with other birds seems scarcely possible, although it sometimes does occur. When a covey of quail is flushed, occasionally two birds will collide, at times meeting with such force that both are stunned. Flycatchers darting at the same insect will now and then come together, but not hard enough to injure ...
— The Log of the Sun - A Chronicle of Nature's Year • William Beebe
... about the genesis of the book. Some time ago I wrote a number of short tales of an allegorical type. It was a curious experience. I seemed to have come upon them in my mind, as one comes upon a covey of birds in a field. One by one they took wings and flew; and when I had finished, though I was anxious to write more tales, I could not discover any more, though I beat the covert ...
— The Child of the Dawn • Arthur Christopher Benson
... bed. But the kitchen maid has struck an inspired streak. It suddenly seems to have come home to her that she isn't catering for a covey of buzzards in the Sahara Desert, and she has put out something quite fit for human consumption. There is good in the girl, after all, and I hope she enjoys ...
— Right Ho, Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse
... A huge covey came over at the moment, but the voices and the bright-blue dress attracted their attention, and they all wheeled off to the right, so that, but for two stray birds killed by Antony, this end of the line found the ...
— The Reflections of Ambrosine - A Novel • Elinor Glyn
... started a covey of partridges. The small brown and white shapes vanished in a skurry of dead leaves. "No doubt, no doubt!" said the soldier of fortune. "At any rate, I have rubbed off particularity in such matters. Live and let live—and each man to run the great race according ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... So in the early hours their pickets came running in, all mixed up with German Askaris, and the ring of rifle and machine-gun fire told them that their time had come. Capsizing the tell-tale lamp, they scattered in the undergrowth like a covey of partridges, Hallam badly wounded in the leg and only able to crawl. The friendly shelter of the papyrus leaves beside the river-bank was his refuge; and as he plunged into the river the scattered volley of rifle shots tore the reeds above him. All night they remained there. Hallam up ...
— Sketches of the East Africa Campaign • Robert Valentine Dolbey
... dogs in a crowded street is great sport. A young man with a new revolver shooting at a mad dog is a fine sight. He may not kill the dog, but he might shoot into a covey of little children and possibly ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye |
