"Dice" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... settle priority, Doctor Hilton?" a girl called out; a tall, striking, brunette laboratory technician whose name Hilton needed a second to recall. "By pulling straws or hair? Or by shooting dice or each ...
— Masters of Space • Edward Elmer Smith
... spirit-room were also constantly tipsy at night, though the chief mutineers, from necessity, kept sober. The once well-ordered man-of-war soon became like a lawless buccaneer. The men rolled about the decks half tipsy, some were playing cards and dice between the guns, some were fighting, and others were sleeping in any shady ...
— Paul Gerrard - The Cabin Boy • W.H.G. Kingston
... peerage, who was playing high; and it was after hearing of the passion of this young English nobleman that my uncle, then at Prague, determined to visit Berlin and engage him. For there is a sort of chivalry among the knights of the dice-box: the fame of great players is known all over Europe. I have known the Chevalier de Casanova, for instance, to travel six hundred miles, from Paris to Turin, for the purpose of meeting Mr. Charles Fox, then only my Lord Holland's dashing son, afterwards ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... preference for either hand was discernible during this period; indeed, the neutrality was as complete as if it had been arranged beforehand, or had followed the throwing of dice. ...
— The Story of the Mind • James Mark Baldwin
... conservator of the moral and spiritual destiny of his fellow-mortals. A fine was imposed on every woman wearing her hair cut short like a man's; all gaming for amusement or gain was forbidden, and cards and dice were not permitted in the colony. A father was fined if his daughter did not spin as much flax or wool as the selectmen required of her. No Jesuit or Roman Catholic priest was permitted to make his residence within the colony. All persons were forbidden to run or even walk, "except to ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick
... should be cold and quite dry, very finely, also the mushrooms, cut the potato into small dice, chop the parsley, then mix all well together with the seasonings, and moisten with the German sauce. When perfectly cold, roll into small balls, dip them in the egg and bread crumbs, and fry in ...
— New Vegetarian Dishes • Mrs. Bowdich
... from a word.' Missy S'wanee rush for'ard an' take his han', an' say, 'Eben ef you is my en'my you'se a gallant soger an' a gemlin, an' I tanks you.' De cap'n smile an' bow, an' say, 'In overcomin' your prej'dice I'se 'chieved my bes' vict'ry.' An' he gib her back all de jewels an' watches, an' drew de doah to, an' lef us to ourselves. Den we hear 'im go to a wes' room back ob de house wid anoder soger, an' soon he come back alone, an' den de ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe
... enough to win when you play with loaded dice. I get boiling mad when I think of these low-down, worthless rascals who don't stop at any meanness, ready to commit murder for fifteen cents. They ought to be treated worse than rattlesnakes. But, as you said ...
— Forty-one Thieves - A Tale of California • Angelo Hall
... time England is nothing but a tennis-court, in which the players throw dice for the crown of my father. The two most eager players are Lambert and Monk. Well, sire, I, in my turn, wish to take part in this game, where the stakes are thrown upon my royal mantle. Sire, it only requires a million to corrupt one of these players ...
— Ten Years Later - Chapters 1-104 • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... liking the young woman are not in the dice-box. You call her Lady Ormont: you are not one of the servants. Don't call her Lady ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... thither and took up his quarters in the engineers' building. The passion for gambling was raging, and to pander thereto were collected as choice a lot of desperadoes as ever "stacked" cards or loaded dice. It came to be noticed that they were on excellent terms with a man called "Jeff" Johnson, who was lessee of the hotel; and to be suspected that said Johnson, in local parlance, "stood in with" them. With this man had come to Barker's his daughter Sarah, ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various
... the dice rattled in the boxes; those who stood around pressed closer round the gamesters; hot, avid faces, covered with sweat and grime, peered eagerly down ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... death near enough to make them reckless and far enough to make them gay. Commonly men and women more or less restrain themselves because of to-morrow; but what if there be no to-morrow? What if the dice are heavily weighted against it? And what of their already jeoparded restraint when the crisis has thrown the conventions to the winds and there is little to lighten the ...
— Simon Called Peter • Robert Keable
... sizes too big for him a week from now. Jim Halliday's all right as long as he keeps to his own side of the street, but he'd better not come over here or he'll be filled so full of bullets that he won't know himself from a dice box. Say, Judge, what's become of that John Chiny's pigtail they ...
— With Hoops of Steel • Florence Finch Kelly
... verse, not a little Gaelic idiom and verb, a half-made will and the chaptering of a novel. This game of tin soldiers, an intricate "Kriegspiel," involving rules innumerable, prolonged arithmetical calculations, constant measuring with foot-rules, and the throwing of dice, sprang from the humblest beginnings—a row of soldiers on either side and a deadly marble. From such a start it grew in size and complexity until it became mimic war indeed, modelled closely upon real conditions and actual warfare, requiring, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... hostages broke his pledge and fled, and John, shocked at such perfidy, returned Regulus-like to England. Hence it was that he appears as one of the four kings whom Picard, the mayor, entertained that same year at a banquet, followed by play at dice and hazard.(572) ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe
... in domestic games of less dignity and reputation: and in the interval between his challenge and disputation at Paris, he spent so much of his time at cards, dice, and tennis, that a lampoon was fixed upon the gate of the Sorbonne, directing those that would see this monster of erudition, to look for ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson
... political supremacy in America? But omnipotent as was the slave-power in the Government, it was not equal to this labor. In the great game, in which Texas was the stakes, Fate had, unawares, slipped into the seat between the gamesters with hands full of loaded dice. At the first throw the South got Texas, at the second the war with Mexico fell out, and at the third new national territory ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke
... mire already possessed with a demon. There, wretched, woe-begone, and wearied out with recklessness and desperation, many wooed Chance and Fortune, who they hoped might yet listen to their prayers—and kept rattling the dice—cursing them that gave the indulgence—even in their cells of punishment for disobedience or mutiny. There you saw some, who in the crowded courts "sat apart retired,"—bringing the practised skill that once supported, or the native genius that once adorned life, to bear on beautiful contrivances ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... do, or becoming tired of mere words and came to diminish the ardor of their combat, the crowd would begin to dwindle away. The judges quick to understand the loss of trade after vainly trying to induce the litigants to new efforts, would gently and suggestively push under their hands a pair of dice boxes or a pack of cards and the dispute would sometimes end upon the throw of a die or the turn ...
— The Man in Court • Frederic DeWitt Wells
... 'Players,'" Cromer directed, "stay here in our 'Homes,' and we send out our 'Counters,' just as if we were playing real parcheesi. Daisy, you throw your dice first." ...
— Patty's Butterfly Days • Carolyn Wells
... Philosophy unsettled his mind, that the two campaigns in Italy brought but withered laurels. Let it be what you will, but back he came to Paris; and because his blood was warm, his spirits high, and his heart full of vanity and vain imaginings, the red wine was poured forth, the dice rattled, fair women smiled, and the gold crowns went. It was the old, old story; but the pity of it, monsieur, was that it was such pure good steel that was fretting thus to rust! ...
— Orrain - A Romance • S. Levett-Yeats
... manner of music. Here the tumbler tumbled on his carpet. There the mime and the dancing girl put forth their feats. Of Arthur's guests some hearkened to the teller of tales and fables. Others called for dice and tables, and played games of chance for a wager. Evil befalls to winner and loser alike from such sport as this. For the most part men played at chess or draughts. You might see them, two by two, bending over the board. When one player was beaten by his fellow, he borrowed moneys to pay ...
— Arthurian Chronicles: Roman de Brut • Wace
... ever go near that cursed Naples, the common sewer of Europe? whose women, I believe, would be swallowed up by Vesuvius to-morrow, if it were not that Belphegor is afraid of their making the pit itself too hot to hold him. Well, sir, she had all of mine and more; and when all was gone in wine and dice, woodcocks' brains and ortolans' tongues, I met the witch walking with another man. I had a sword and a dagger; I gave him the first (though the dog fought well enough, to give him his due), and her the second; left them lying across each other, and fled for my life,—and ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... curse, the clink of coin, the rattle of dice, the scuffle of slippered feet, the low swish of the loose-garbed Chinese attendants went on interminably. Jimmie Dale began to toss uneasily from side to side of his bunk, and began to mumble audibly ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... Egg, shearing the whisper. "Only Dammy ain't got any sense about cards. I tried to teach him pinochle, but he never could remember none of it, and the hired men always clean him out shakin' dice. He can't even beat his papa at checkers. And that's an awful thing to say ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... a spot of rising ground not far from La Haye Sainte, had watched the advance of his Guard. His empire hung on its success. It was the last fling of the dice for him. His cavalry was wrecked, his infantry demoralised, half his artillery dismounted; the Prussian guns were thundering with ever louder roar upon his right. If the Guard succeeded, the electrifying thrill of victory would run through ...
— Deeds that Won the Empire - Historic Battle Scenes • W. H. Fitchett
... door. Two disguised friars (Marten and Nils) are seated at this table drinking beer. The other tables are surrounded by German mercenaries, peasants, and sailors. The door to the street is at the right. A fiddler is seated on top of a barrel. The soldiers are throwing dice. All are drunk and noisy. Hans Windrank, a man from Smaland, a German tradesman, and a Dane are seated together ...
— Master Olof - A Drama in Five Acts • August Strindberg
... considerations was, whether the repeal should be total, or whether only partial,—taking out everything burdensome and productive, and reserving only an empty acknowledgment, such as a stamp on cards or dice. The other question was, on what principle the act should be repealed. On this head also two principles were started. One, that the legislative rights of this country with regard to America were not entire, but had certain restrictions ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... Of course he couldn't—not in her father's time. The cards and dice were going in her great-uncle's time, who drank himself to death forty years ago. "There used to be some packs of cards," said she, "in one of these drawers. I know I saw some there, only it's a long time back—almost the only time ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... it is all hellish enough!—Well, on one side of the dice, prisoner of war; on the other, death here under poor Caliph. Might escape from prison, no escape from death. By Jove, what a thunderclap! It's Stonewall ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... satisfy thy curiosity straightway. Her story is not a long one. Thou art acquainted, perhaps personally, with Vannius, king of the Suevi, who, expelled from his country, spent a long time here in Rome, and became even famous for his skilful play with dice, and his good driving of chariots. Drusus put him on the throne again. Vannius, who was really a strong man, ruled well at first, and warred with success; afterward, however, he began to skin not only his neighbors, but his own Suevi, too much. Thereupon ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... of spinning-tops that have four corners, each marked with a letter of the alphabet, and are like dice, is very exciting. One can lose one's soul playing it. It is not so much the loss of the money as the annoyance of losing. Why should the other win? Why should the top fall on the letter G for him, ...
— Jewish Children • Sholem Naumovich Rabinovich
... cried, "The world is wide, But fettered limbs go lame! And once, or twice, to throw the dice Is a gentlemanly game, But he does not win who plays with Sin In the secret House of Shame." No things of air these antics were That frolicked with such glee: To men whose lives were held in gyves, And whose feet might not go free, Ah! wounds of Christ! they were ...
— The Ballad of Reading Gaol • Oscar Wilde
... stood in the center of the room, and a number of small tables were placed around promiscuously, The bar-tender, a smooth-faced, beetle-browed rascal, was engaged in shaking dice for the drinks with a customer, and, to the music of the violin, a light-footed Irishman was executing his national jig, to the great delight and no small edification of ...
— Jim Cummings • Frank Pinkerton
... the inn to relieve Denys of the anxiety so long and mysterious an absence must have caused him. He found him seated at his ease, playing dice with two young ladies whose manners ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... conceivable kind, in plenty, from the blare of a band at the Pioneer Dance Hall opposite, to the energetic cursing of the cook in the rear. A discordant din of voices surged up from the street below—laughter, shouts, the shrieks of women, a rattle of dice, an occasional pistol shot, and the continuous yelling of industrious "barkers." There was no safety anywhere. An exploding revolver in No. 47 was quite likely to disturb the peaceful slumbers of ...
— Keith of the Border • Randall Parrish
... curiosity. It was certainly odd that the one the Fagan woman had seen should present three spots so like those on the other paper, but people did sometimes throw treys at backgammon, and that which not rarely happened with two dice of six faces might happen if they had sixty or six hundred faces. On the whole, he did not see that there was any ground, so far, for anything more than a vague suspicion. He thought it not unlikely that Mr. Bradshaw ...
— The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... gathering some fruit, and no sooner was out of sight than smash! down fell the boy and broke his arm." Even the Pope himself has the reputation of possessing the Evil Eye to some extent. Ask a Roman how this is, and he will answer, as one did to me the other day,—"Si dice, e per me veramente mi pare di si": "They say so; and as for me, really it seems to me true. If he have not the jettatura, it is very odd that everything he blesses makes fiasco. We all did very well ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... but his nobility, native and hereditary, and his pay. I only wish uncle would do things unconditionally, in a generous, gentleman-like fashion; he is so disagreeable as to make the dowry depend on Alfred's giving his written promise that he will never touch cards or dice from the day it is paid down. They accuse my angel of a tendency to play: I don't know anything about that, but I do know he is a ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... repeated with considerable humour. My brother was only present at and bore his part in the second. The man is a perfect master of his vile trade; a practised duellist; as expert, Frank says, in killing of men as in cogging of dice. A Hibernian bravo; determined to pursue the most desperate means to effect ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... with them the blessed void repose Of oily days at sea, when only rose The porpoise's slow wheel to break the sheen Of satin water indolently green, When for'ard the crew, caps tilted over eyes, Lay heaped on deck; slept; mumbled; smoked; threw dice; The sleepy summer days; the summer nights (The coast pricked out with rings of harbour-lights), The motionless nights, the vaulted nights of June When high in the cordage drifts the entangled moon, And blocks go knocking, and the sheets ...
— Georgian Poetry 1920-22 • Various
... appealing to thought altogether apart from the mathematical, is yet one which only the mathematician can fully entertain. Nothing, for example, is more difficult than to convince the merely general reader that the fact of sixes having been thrown twice in succession by a player at dice, is sufficient cause for betting the largest odds that sixes will not be thrown in the third attempt. A suggestion to this effect is usually rejected by the intellect at once. It does not appear that the two throws which have been completed, and which ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 1 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... more demand for medicine, or perhaps because they preferred to eat the dog themselves. Many of the natives of this quarter are known, as in the South Seas, to eat the dog without paying any attention to its feeding. The dice doctor or diviner is an important member of the community, being consulted by Portuguese and natives alike. Part of his business is that of a detective, it being his duty to discover thieves. When ...
— A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries • David Livingstone
... heads; the name of the second was Claudius. He played dice with his friend Caius Silius, who was famous for his ...
— Historical Miniatures • August Strindberg
... her back angrily. "I know your writing, Mr. Shandor. I've been exposed to it for years. You've never written an honest, true story in your life, but you always want the truth to start with, don't you? I'm to give you the truth, and let you do what you want with it, is that the idea? No dice, Mr. Shandor. And you even have the gall ...
— Bear Trap • Alan Edward Nourse
... had forced the door of the saloon ajar, and was whistling through the crack; but in there it seemed to make no one afraid. Between roars of laughter, the clink of glasses and the rattle of dice on the hardwood counter were heard out in the street. More than one of the passers-by who came within range was taken with an extra shiver in which the vision of wife and little ones waiting at home for his coming was snuffed out, as he dropped ...
— Children of the Tenements • Jacob A. Riis
... to compound her own dinners. She had a salver which Angelique placed before her on the bed; and the old child played in pastry or salads, or cut vegetable dice for her soup. The baking or boiling or roasting was done with rigor at her own fireplace by her blacks, the whiplash in her hand hovering over their bare spots. Silence was the law of the presence-chamber when she labored with her ...
— Old Kaskaskia • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... idle hangers-on, eager to profit by the vices and follies of the garrison. The soldiers were oftener gambling and dancing beneath the walls than keeping watch upon the battlements, and nothing was heard from morning till night but the noisy contests of cards and dice, mingled with the sound of the bolero or fandango, the drowsy strumming of the guitar, and the rattling of the castanets, while often the whole was interrupted by the loud brawl and fierce ...
— Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada • Washington Irving
... the dwelling of high MacCuol, With the king to drink, and dice, and throw; The king was joyous, his hall was full, Though empty and dark this ...
— King Hacon's Death and Bran and the Black Dog - two ballads - - - Translator: George Borrow • Thomas J. Wise
... up and down the room, with the habitual stoop of the shoulders, and an occasional feeble wandering of the hand to his mouth, wondering a little at himself, at his coolness. For this was the last throw of the dice. After to-day, no second chance. If it succeeded—Well, he washed his hands of the world's work then. His share was finished, surely. Then for happiness! What would she say when he came back? He had earned his reward in life by this time; his work was done, well done,—repeating that to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 74, December, 1863 • Various
... it, they were taking on the tone of their new environment. They were learning to swear in voluble English; they were learning to pick up cigar stumps and smoke them, to pass hours of their time gambling with pennies and dice and cigarette cards; they were learning the location of all the houses of prostitution on the "Levee," and the names of the "madames" who kept them, and the days when they gave their state banquets, which the police captains and the ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... permit. With returning strength he got possession of a horse; but his army associates had led him into evil ways, and he became indebted to his landlord for board. This he managed to pay only by staking his horse in a game of dice against $200, which he fortunately won; and this squared him with the world and enabled him to start afresh, on a ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XII • John Lord
... 'I have many eyes.' But to continue. You gave the price of the tackling for six of the triremes with which Themistocles pretends to believe he can beat back my master. Worse still, you have squandered many minae on flute girls, dice, cock-fights, and other gentle pleasures. In short your patrimony is not merely exhausted but overspent. That, however, is not the most wonderful ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... showed a white speck in the distance, Patricia and Betty came out upon the porch and sat them down, one on either side of the Governor, with whom they were great favorites. Colonel Ludlow and Captain Laramore were at dice at a table within the hall, and Colonel Verney had excused himself in order to hear the evening report from his overseers. Sir Charles Carew, very idle and purposeless-looking, lounged in a great chair, and studied the miniature upon his snuff-box. The Governor, ...
— Prisoners of Hope - A Tale of Colonial Virginia • Mary Johnston
... wouldest sport with him; and while thou art struggling with him as in play, I will rive him through both his sides; and look thou do the same with thy dagger. After which, my dear friend, we will divide all the gold between you and me, and then we may satisfy all our desires and play at dice to our ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward
... delicately characteristic of one who had lived and been reared in the best society, and had been precipitated from it by dice and drabbing; yet still it strikes against my feelings as a note out of tune, and as not coalescing with that pastoral tint which gives such a charm to this act. It is too Macbeth-like in the ...
— Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher • S. T. Coleridge
... naked hulk alongside came, And the twain were casting dice; 'The game is done! I've won, I've won!'[39-26] Quoth ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... that worn by the menials of the Cardinal. Some one also proposed that a symbol should be added to the livery, to show the universal contempt for Granvelle. By whom should it be designed? was the question. It was agreed that the matter should be decided by lot. Dice were called for. Count Egmont won. A few days afterwards his retainers appeared in doublet and hose of the coarsest grey, long hanging sleeves, such as were worn by the humblest classes, the only ornament being a monk's cowl, or a fool's cap and ...
— The Golden Grasshopper - A story of the days of Sir Thomas Gresham • W.H.G. Kingston
... against the bank. The banker says, 'Panie Podvysotsky, are you laying down the gold, or must we trust to your honor?' 'To my honor, panie,' says Podvysotsky. 'So much the better.' The banker throws the dice. Podvysotsky wins. 'Take it, panie,' says the banker, and pulling out the drawer he gives him a million. 'Take it, panie, this is your gain.' There was a million in the bank. 'I didn't know that,' says Podvysotsky. 'Panie Podvysotsky,' said the banker, 'you pledged your honor and we pledged ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... say that all games of chance were unlawful. For inasmuch as there is no chance in the economy of this world, all use of dice or lottery in any shape is really an appeal to him of whom ...
— Tired Church Members • Anne Warner
... further remembrance of this impertinence, go among the gamesters, and there nothing is more frequent than, "God damn the dice," ...
— An Essay Upon Projects • Daniel Defoe
... of as an ingredient of the universe, absolutists interpret it to mean that double sevens are as likely to be thrown out of a dice box as double sixes are. If free-will is spoken of, that must mean that an english general is as likely to eat his prisoners to-day as a Maori chief was a hundred years ago. It is as likely—I am using Mr. McTaggart's ...
— A Pluralistic Universe - Hibbert Lectures at Manchester College on the - Present Situation in Philosophy • William James
... have said that when he was chief justice of one of the State courts, and he and his confreres found themselves in a quandary over the law, they were accustomed to send the sergeant- at-arms for what they called the "implements of decision"—a brace of dice and a copper cent. Thus the weightiest matters ...
— The Confessions of Artemas Quibble • Arthur Train
... undertaking, immoderate laughter, the least murmur or whispering, if found out, passeth not without severe rebuke. They detest cards and dice, they shun the sports of the field, and take no delight in the ludicrous catching of birds (hawking), which men are wont to indulge in. Jesters and soothsayers and story-tellers, scurrilous songs, shows, and games, they contemptuously ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 5 • Various
... a noble, sprightly sound, The trumpet's clangor, and the clash of arms! This noise may chill your blood, but mine it warms. [Shouting and clashing of swords within. We have already passed the Rubicon; The dice are mine; now, fortune, for a throne! [A shout within, and clashing of swords afar off. The sound goes farther off, and faintly dies; Curse of this going back, these ebbing cries! Ye winds, waft hither sounds more strong and quick; Beat faster, drums, and mingle deaths more thick. I'll ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Volume 4 (of 18) - Almanzor And Almahide, Marriage-a-la-Mode, The Assignation • John Dryden
... Spurius Antius, Lucius Roscius, Roman ambassadors, who came to inquire into the reason of this new line of conduct. Some palliate the guilt of the king; that an ambiguous expression of his, during a lucky throw of dice, having been mistaken by the Fidenatians, as if it seemed to be an order for their execution, had been the cause of the ambassadors' death. An incredible tale; that his thoughts should not have been drawn away from the game on the arrival of the Fidenatians, his new allies, when consulting ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius
... [techspeak] A multiple-precision computer representation for very large integers. 2. More generally, any very large number. "Have you ever looked at the United States Budget? There's bignums for you!" 3. [Stanford] In backgammon, large numbers on the dice especially a roll of double fives or double sixes (compare {moby}, sense 4). See ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... in the country nurse The poor, that else were undone; Some landlords spend their money worse, On lust and pride at London. There the roysters they do play, Drab and dice their land away, Which may be ours another day; And ...
— Pastoral Poems by Nicholas Breton, - Selected Poetry by George Wither, and - Pastoral Poetry by William Browne (of Tavistock) • Nicholas Breton, George Wither, William Browne (of Tavistock)
... Finally, he peeped into the Fourth class-room, and beheld the two invalids masquerading on the stage, and recognised the voice and sentiments of his kinsman, albeit proceeding through the nose, as he flourished his (or rather her) mop in the air, and announced that there was going to be a "dice doise." ...
— The Master of the Shell • Talbot Baines Reed
... to Parthia, be it Art or hap, He hath spoken true. The very Dice obey him, And in our sports my better cunning faints, Vnder his chance, if we draw lots he speeds, His Cocks do winne the Battaile, still of mine, When it is all to naught: and his Quailes euer Beate mine (in hoopt) at odd's. I will to Egypte: And though I make this marriage for my peace, I'th' East ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... to involve the emperor's cause in ruin with you. For war is wont to be brought to a successful issue, not by unreasoning haste, but by the use of good counsel and forethought in estimating the turn of the scale at decisive moments. You, however, act as though you were playing at dice, and want to risk all on a single cast; but it is not my custom to choose the short course in preference to the advantageous one. In the second place, you promise that you will help us do battle against the enemy; but when have you ever taken training in war? Or ...
— Procopius - History of the Wars, Books V. and VI. • Procopius
... of conflict. Our great epic, the Mahabharata, deals with this great conflict, and the few frescoes delineate some of the fundamental incidents. The coming of the discord is signalled by the rattle of dice, thrown by Yudhisthira, the pawn at stake, being the crown. Two hostile arrays are set in motion, mighty Kaurava armaments meeting in shock of battle the Pandava host with Arjuna as the leader, and Krishna as his Divine Charioteer. ...
— Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose - His Life and Speeches • Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose
... here. He willed it, and became it. He must have stood low; he must have worked hard,—and with tools, moreover, of his own invention and fashioning. He waved and whistled off ten thousand strong and importunate temptations; he dashed the dice-box from the jewelled hand of Chance, the cup from Pleasure's, and trod under foot the sorceries of each; he ascended steadily the precipices of Danger, and looked down with intrepidity from the summit; he overawed Arrogance with Sedateness; he seized by the horn and overleaped low Violence; ...
— Citation and Examination of William Shakspeare • Walter Savage Landor
... descended to the fire-lit space that held Cytherea in her mocking, her becoming, aloofness. In the brightly illuminated room beyond the hall Helena and Gregory were playing parchesi—Gregory firmly grasped the cup from which he intently rolled the dice; Helena shook the fair hair from her eyes and, it immediately developed, moved a pink marker farther ...
— Cytherea • Joseph Hergesheimer
... death. Moreover, we see that even the most indolent men, men of a singular worthlessness, are still always in motion both in mind and body; and when they are not hindered by some unavoidable circumstance, that they demand a dice-box or some game of some kind, or conversation; and, as they have none of the liberal delights of learning, seek circles and assemblies. Even beasts, which we shut up for our own amusement, though they are better fed than if they were free, still ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero
... melting lute, the soft lascivious lyre, The song from Italy, the step from France, The midnight orgy, and the mazy dance, The smile of beauty, and the flush of wine, For fops, fools, gamesters, knaves, and Lords combine: Each to his humour—Comus all allows; 650 Champaign, dice, music, or your neighbour's spouse. Talk not to us, ye starving sons of trade! Of piteous ruin, which ourselves have made; In Plenty's sunshine Fortune's minions bask, Nor think of Poverty, except "en masque," [100] When for the night some lately titled ass Appears the beggar ...
— Byron's Poetical Works, Vol. 1 • Byron
... of a human being? Was it permitted to do such a thing to a man? His nose looked like a patchwork of small dice of different colors. His mouth was awry, and the whole left cheek was like a piece of bloated raw meat, red and criss-crossed with deep scars. Ugh! How ugly! A fright! And besides, instead of a cheekbone, he had a long hollow, deep enough to hold a man's finger. And it was for this ...
— Men in War • Andreas Latzko
... John in London. Thence, at the age of sixteen, he went to study at Oxford, where he became celebrated rather for dissipation than diligence. He was, although a youth of imaginative temperament, excessively fond of gambling; and it was said of him, that he was more given to "dreams and dice than to study." His future eminence might be foreseen by some of his friends; but, in general, men looked on him rather as an idle and misled youth of fortune, than as a genius. Three years after, he removed to Lincoln's ...
— Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham • Edmund Waller; John Denham
... gai'ter plant'ain shriv'el jaun'dice clev'er das'tard jos'tle si'lex paint'er scab'bard but'ton mas'tiff way'ward scaf'fold pic'nic sar'casm di'gest sham'bles grum'ble tar'nish light'ning tran'script hus'tle tar'tar por'trait nest'ling mur'rain ha rangue' nov'ice ...
— McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book • W. H. McGuffey
... Platter is more intricate and is played with the claws of a bear or some other animal marked with various lines and characters. These dice which are eight in number and cut flat at their large end are shook together in a wooden dish, tossed into the air and caught again. The lines traced on such claws as happen to alight on the platter in an erect position indicate what number of counters the caster is ...
— The Journey to the Polar Sea • John Franklin
... by thoroughly shuffling all of the tiles face down in the middle of the table, and forming them in a double-tiered, hollow square, called the wall. This wall is then broken at some point determined by the dice and each player draws an original hand of 13 tiles. This leaves about two-thirds of the wall intact, and the rest of the play is devoted to drawing and discarding from this remainder of the wall; each player improving and matching his own individual ...
— Pung Chow - The Game of a Hundred Intelligences. Also known as Mah-Diao, Mah-Jong, Mah-Cheuk, Mah-Juck and Pe-Ling • Lew Lysle Harr
... for soup, if it is soiled, scrub the outside thoroughly with a clean cloth wet in cold water, or cut away the soiled portion. Break the bones into as small pieces as convenient; cut the meat into inch dice, remove the marrow from the bones, and put it aside. If added to the stock, it ...
— Science in the Kitchen. • Mrs. E. E. Kellogg
... father expect a self-denying son? With how ill a grace must a man who will often be disguised in liquor, preach sobriety? a passionate man, patience? an irreligious man, piety? How will a parent, whose hands are seldom without cards, or dice in them, be observed in lessons against the pernicious vice of gaming? Can the profuse father, who is squandering away the fortunes of his children, expect to be regarded in a lesson of frugality? 'Tis impossible he should, except it were that the youth, seeing how pernicious ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... in the public prison of Padua; Guido lies asleep on a pallet (L.C.); a table with a goblet on it is set (L.C.); five soldiers are drinking and playing dice in the corner on a stone table; one of them has a lantern hung to his halbert; a torch is set in the wall over Guido's head. Two grated windows behind, one on each side of the door which is (C.), look out into the passage; ...
— The Duchess of Padua • Oscar Wilde
... misfortune to be engaged in what is called "an affair of honour," it is best to toss up to see if you should follow the law or the custom; and as the law and the custom in regard to duelling are contradictory, the magistrates would also do well to frame their sentence on the throw of the dice. Probably, it was in this way that they determined that my journey should last ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VI. • Various
... round table in the centre had been tilted over upon its side, and three broken bottles of wine, with apples, pears, nuts, and the fragments of the dishes containing them, were littered over the floor. A couple of packs of cards and a dice-box lay amongst the scattered feast. Close by the door stood Decimus Saxon, with his drawn rapier in his hand and a second one beneath his feet, while facing him there was a young officer in a blue uniform, whose face was ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... but could not then ask the question that was to confirm her fate; it was worse than throwing the dice upon which a whole fortune was staked; it was like giving the signal for the ax to fall upon her own neck. At last, however, it came, in low, fearful, ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... add up the fragments or interpret them. I must be content now to sit and wait until this part of me—my relation to myself—splinters into fragments and I become a dice box shaking ...
— Fantazius Mallare - A Mysterious Oath • Ben Hecht
... second generation of Anne's audacious race: Mona, red-lipped, jewel-eyed, sweeter than wild honey; Louis, whose lovely nature and high purpose shone in his face; and Arthur, sad-eyed, impudent, cynical, who seemed ready to shake dice with the devil, and had no fear of mortals because he had no respect for them. These outcasts of a few years back were able now to seize the threads of intrigue, and shake up two governments with a single pull! He mourned while he described what he had done for them. There ...
— The Art of Disappearing • John Talbot Smith
... through the butcher shop and the galley to the cabin table. The cook was an able, swearing man whose culinary experience had been acquired on a Nantucket whaler. Cooks who could stand up for service every day in a small ship on an angry sea when the galley rattled like a dice box in the hands of a nervous player, were hard to get. Their constitutions were apt to be better than their art. The food was of poor quality, the cooking a tax upon jaw, palate and digestion, the ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller
... like men about to throw dice for our lives, and dice too that are loaded against us! Nearer and nearer they come, until they are coursing within fifty yards of the butte, and scarcely twice that distance from our guns. Were their bodies uncovered, ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... to this sentence as she might have watched a game of dice when her fate hung on the result, but she showed no emotion. "Now," she thought, "my fate has been decided; respectable people will have nothing more to do with me. I will go with the others, who, perhaps, after all are ...
— Jacqueline, Complete • (Mme. Blanc) Th. Bentzon
... to found an Institution of demoralizing tendency—say to teach you the art of cheating! The laws would annul such a bequest. Society has an original, inherent right to defend itself from all evil—and that gaming is an evil, whether played with cards, lotteries, dice, stocks, or betting, not even Mr. ...
— Secret Band of Brothers • Jonathan Harrington Green
... cool itself more wholesomely by the help of shade or water? Let the young keep their arms then to themselves, their horses, spears, their foils and ball, their swimming baths and running path. To us old men let them, out of the many forms of sport, leave dice and counters; but even that as they choose, since old age can be quite happy ...
— Treatises on Friendship and Old Age • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... Cards, dice, brethren's brethren, father's money, sickness of private enemies, enemies of friends, death of kings, friends of ...
— Myths and Marvels of Astronomy • Richard A. Proctor
... dances where ballet-girls in short dresses perform very modern-looking pirouettes; of exercises in wrestling, games of ball, games of chance like chess or checkers, of throwing knives at a mark, of the modern thimblerig, wooden dolls for children, curiously carved wooden boxes, dice, and toy-balls. There are men and women playing on harps, flutes, pipes, cymbals, trumpets, drums, guitars, and tambourines. Glass was, till recently, believed to be a modern invention, unknown to the ancients. But we ...
— Ten Great Religions - An Essay in Comparative Theology • James Freeman Clarke
... between the Plantagenet and le Temeraire the leading French vessel, might have been about a league, allowing for the difference in the respective lines of sailing—"Mr. Bunting, bend on the signal for the ships to go to quarters. We may as well be ready for any turn of the dice." ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... they returned to the hotel. They settled for ham and eggs in the Cortez Coffee Shop, then stopped on the way through the casino to watch the gambling. Even at noontime the dice table was jammed with customers, and the blackjack tables were nearly full. The roulette table was not getting much play, however, and they watched for a few spins of ...
— The Scarlet Lake Mystery • Harold Leland Goodwin
... every one of 'em," he beamed upon his confederate. "They'll be so easy fleecin' it seems hardly worth while. All they need is liquor, and cards, and dice. Yes, an' a few women hangin' around. You can leave the rest to themselves. We'll get the gilt, and to hell with the dough under it. Gee, it's an elegant proposition!" And he rubbed his hands gleefully. "But ther' must be no delay. We ...
— The Golden Woman - A Story of the Montana Hills • Ridgwell Cullum
... friends can have a nice game of ball with the merry Dutchman, only refrain from trying his relative hardness or softness by hammering the head of MUGG, the stupidest boy in the school, with it. Now cut up your cheese into small dice and carefully toast them on a triangular piece of slate, which you will cause "GYP Minor" to hold over a spirit-lamp. When, as the slate grows hotter, "GYP Minor" will probably howl, box his ears smartly, and the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, May 21, 1892 • Various
... very young, and several mere children. On our left a fat, middle-aged Chinese man sat, with two or three little girls, one in his lap and one on either side of him, in his arms; two more were throwing something that resembled dice on a table within the front alcove, and the rest were sitting on the opium couches. There were ten girls in all; the two youngest could not possibly have been more than eight years old; only one, out of the ten, claimed to be over sixteen; we all doubted her claim, because of her extreme immaturity ...
— Heathen Slaves and Christian Rulers • Elizabeth Wheeler Andrew and Katharine Caroline Bushnell
... the wall of heaving water which the rollers presented as they thundered on the shingle, dragging back the pebbles in their back-wash with a rattling noise, as if the spirits of the deep were playing with dice in the depths below ...
— Fritz and Eric - The Brother Crusoes • John Conroy Hutcheson
... you shall cast your die. The table is the sand of Egypt, the dice-cup is your hand, the dice are your life and my life, the stakes our happiness. Decide again and quickly for I hear the rumbling of wheels. Make known your choice, for although we travellers through the desert of life lie down to sleep, and rise again to live, to fight, to hate, and above all to ...
— Desert Love • Joan Conquest
... dice, I think the safest and best way is never to learn to play them, and so be incapacitated for those dangerous temptations and encroaching wasters ...
— Life and Literature - Over two thousand extracts from ancient and modern writers, - and classified in alphabetical order • J. Purver Richardson
... highest cast of the dice. The meaning here is, Who shall be the master of our feast?—that office falling to the member of the wine-party who ...
— Horace • Theodore Martin
... best to reform. I have sold off my horses, and I have not touched dice nor card these six months: I would not even put into the raffle for the last Derby." This last was said with the air of a man who doubted the possibility of obtaining belief to some assertion of ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... when we really think of them by the mean or mode, e.g. as to skin color. The coherence, unity, and solidarity of a genetic group is a very striking fact. It seems to conceal a play of mystic forces. It is, in fact, no more mysterious than the run of dice. The propositions about it would all become, in the last analysis, identical propositions; e.g. it is most probable that we shall meet with the thing which is present in the greatest number; or, it is most probable that the most probable ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... playing Woskate Tanpan, or the game of dice, as it is known to the Sioux. Three women were on each side, and they played it with tanpan (the basket), kansu (the dice), and canyiwawa (the counting sticks). The tanpan, made of willow twigs, was a tiny basket, about three inches in diameter at the bottom, but ...
— The Last of the Chiefs - A Story of the Great Sioux War • Joseph Altsheler
... took a sly sip at the liquor, but nearly choked myself, not being used to strong waters, and finding it heady and burning in the throat. Neither man spoke, and there was no sound except the constant rattle of the dice, and the rubbing of the pieces being moved across the board. Now and then one of the players stopped to light his pipe, and at the end of a game they scored their totals on the table with a bit of chalk. So I watched them for an hour, knowing the game myself, ...
— Moonfleet • J. Meade Falkner
... some foreign princes. These maskers, after they had entered Kennington, alighted from their horses, and entered the hall on foot; which done, the prince, his mother, and the lords came out of the chamber into the hall, whom the said mummers did salute, showing by a pair of dice upon the table their desire to play with the prince, which they so handled that the prince did always win when he cast them. Then the mummers set to the prince three jewels, one after another, which were a bowl of gold, a cup of gold, and a ring of gold, which the prince won at three ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... is very fond of dice-play although he doth not know how to play. That king if asked to play, is ill able to refuse. I am skillful at dice. There is none equal to me in this respect on earth, no, not even in the three worlds, O son of Kuru. Therefore, ask him to play at dice. Skilled at dice, I will win his ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Part 2 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
... man, who more freely entertained her than servants use to do. He now considers how he had seen them once on a bed together, when Sylvia was in the disorder of a yielding mistress, and Brilliard of a ravished lover; he considers how he has found them alone at cards and dice, and often entertaining her with freedoms of a husband, and how he wholly managed her affairs, commanded her servants like their proper master, and was in full authority of all. These, and a thousand more ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... She said this calmly and quietly, as though to impress her informant and reassure him. "What is it?" It was almost unnecessary to ask, for she knew already what had happened, knew that the boy had flung his dice ...
— Dust • Mr. and Mrs. Haldeman-Julius
... is touching the silver plate on one side, and your fingers touching the plate on the other side. Then you set this dial for whatever number you want to come up and concentrate on it while the ball is spinning. For dice, of course, you only need to use the first six or twelve numbers on the dial, depending on ...
— ...Or Your Money Back • Gordon Randall Garrett
... filtered through small panes between heavy leads. The azure of the ceiling was darkened to navy blue, and the golden stars, at that height, were as the heads of steel pins. In the shadows of the vaults appeared the ermine of the ducal arms, dimly seen in escutcheons which were like great dice with black dots. ...
— La-bas • J. K. Huysmans
... not to be the property of the pledger, and pawned without the authority of the owner. [395] [See note 3 F, at the end of this Vol.] With respect to gaming, the act ordained that all publicans suffering journeymen, labourers, servants, or apprentices, to game with cards, dice, shuffleboards, mississippi, or billiard tables, skittles, nine-pins, &c. should forfeit forty shillings for the first offence, and for every subsequent offence, ten pounds ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... drink goes round, an' Cornwallis surrenderin' to Washington takes hold of our imaginations. We throws dice, an' settles it that Red Dog'll be the English, with Bland as Cornwallis, while Wolfville acts as the Americans, Boggs to perform as Washington—Boggs bein' six foot an' some inches, besides as wide as a door. By the time we gets the stock of the Votes ...
— Faro Nell and Her Friends - Wolfville Stories • Alfred Henry Lewis
... within," are these your fine Christians? "Yea," say they. "Yea but," say the serious people, "they are not of Christ's life." And to see such a company as are in the fashions of the world ... get a couple of bowls in their hands or tables [dice] or shovel-board, or a horse with a Company of ribbons on his head as he hath on his own, and a ring in his ear; and so go to horse-racing to spoil the creature. Oh these are gentlemen, these are bred up gentlemen! these are brave fellows and they must have their recreation, ...
— A Book of Quaker Saints • Lucy Violet Hodgkin
... reading and gave its name to a special method, called the bureau-method, of learning to read.] and cards, they turn the nursery into a printer's shop. Locke would have them taught to read by means of dice. What a fine idea! And the pity of it! There is a better way than any of those, and one which is generally overlooked—it consists in the desire to learn. Arouse this desire in your scholar and have done with your "bureaux" and your dice—any ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... rooms each. This is by far the most extensive watering place in the Union. Of the effect of such establishments on morals I shall say nothing. The reader will draw his own conclusions, when he understands that the card-table, roulette, wheel of fortune, and dice-box are amongst its principal amusements. Here, not unfrequently, cotton bales, negroes, and even plantations, change owners in a night. The scenery around is highly picturesque and romantic. Declivities and mountains, sprinkled over with evergreens, are scattered in wild confusion. ...
— A New Guide for Emigrants to the West • J. M. Peck
... (840 B.C.). In the summer of 839 they once more ventured southwards, but this time Hazael changed his tactics: pitched battles and massed movements, in which the fate of a campaign was decided by one cast of the dice, were now avoided, and ambuscades, guerilla warfare, and long and tedious sieges became the order of the day. By the time that four towns had been taken, Shalmaneser's patience was worn out: he drew off his troops and fell back on Phoenicia, ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 7 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... other lands and is encouraged to claim the title, 'ruler of the world.' The claim is made at a great sacrifice accompanied by a feast. The claim incenses the Kauravas and once again the ancient feud revives. Themselves expert gamblers, they challenge Yudhisthira to a contest by dice. Yudhisthira stupidly agrees and wagering first his kingdom, then his brothers and finally his wife, loses all and goes again into exile. With him go the other Pandavas, including Arjuna who has since returned. ...
— The Loves of Krishna in Indian Painting and Poetry • W. G. Archer
... the place. All manner of rich goods were bought by the flushed soldiers, the high and the low. And there dwelled here a host of those who sold entertainment,—mummers and jugglers and singers, dwarfs and giants. Dice rattled, now there were castanets and dancing, and now church bells seemed to ...
— 1492 • Mary Johnston
... answered. "On the contrary, I have paid three months' rent in advance and a month's board at Zaton's; I have added two suits to my wardrobe, and I have lost fifty crowns on the dice." ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman
... "Burra Burra," and it is procured in barter or war from the Islanders of Torres Straits, who frequently visit the continent. It is neatly made of a solid piece of wood scooped out, in shape like an elongated dice box. One end is covered with the skin of a snake or iguana, the other being left open. When this instrument is played upon by a muscular and excited "nigger," a music results which seems to please him in proportion to its intensity; ...
— The Overland Expedition of The Messrs. Jardine • Frank Jardine and Alexander Jardine
... in his hate he gave you his true name when he would have stabbed you—at play. Even then he had an evil fame, though he was scarcely more than a lad, but he was handsome in person, set high in birth, and of a pleasing manner. It chanced that he won of me at the dice, and being in a good humour, he took me to visit at the house of his aunt, his uncle's widow, a lady of Seville. This aunt had one child, a daughter, and that daughter was your mother. Now your mother, Luisa de Garcia, was affianced to ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard
... laid down his shilling, the raffle began, and the dice went round. When it came to Christian's turn he took the box with a trembling hand, shook it fearfully, and threw a pair-royal. Three of the others had thrown common low pairs, and all the ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... contingents were wild on their respective horses; for the Handicappers had done their work well. The Honorary Secretary shouted himself hoarse through the din; and the smoke of the cheroots was like the smoke, and the rattling of the dice-boxes like the rattle of ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... the lucky class. Many conclusions did I form, and many experiments did I try, to determine from which of those tickets I might most reasonably expect riches. At last, being unable to satisfy myself by any modes of reasoning, I wrote the numbers upon dice, and allotted five hours every day to the amusement of throwing them in a garret; and, examining the event by an exact register, found, on the evening before the lottery was drawn, that one of my numbers had been turned up ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson
... temerity to attack Burke's pension, and thereby drew down upon himself the most splendid repartee in literature) was a bosom-friend of Fox, and lived in a like-minded society. One night at Newmarket he lost a colossal sum at hazard, and, jumping up in a passion, he swore that the dice were loaded, put them in his pocket, and went to bed. Next morning he examined the dice in the presence of his boon companions, found that they were not loaded, and had to apologize and pay. Some years afterwards one of the party was lying on his death-bed, and he sent for the duke. "I ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell
... not to talk, but because he has not the first motion. A man who is used to the applause of the House of Commons, has no wish for that of a private company. A man accustomed to throw for a thousand pounds, if set down to throw for sixpence, would not be at the pains to count his dice. Burke's talk is the ebullition of his mind; he does not talk from a desire of distinction, but because his ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... Lady just going off. When I returned, signed the bond for L10,000, which will disencumber me of all pressing claims;[110] when I get forward W——k and Nap. there will be L12,000 and upwards, and I hope to add L3000 against this time next year, or the devil must hold the dice. J.B. writes me seriously on the carelessness of my style. I do not think I am more careless than usual; but I dare say he is right. I will be ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... showed him tricks with cards—and then explained the mathematics of it, making the most puzzling mysteries seem only unusual applications of very simple principles. Another day, the puzzle-maker told him of curious problems of chance, by dice, by lotteries, and so forth, and almost before Eric realized what the old man was driving at, the essential ideas of insurance and actuary work were firmly ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Life-Savers • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... "I want the dice and the box for casting lots. The captains have arranged—most wisely, as I think—that Chance shall decide among us who goes with the expedition and who stays behind in the huts. The officers and crew of the Wanderer will be here in a few minutes to cast the lots. Neither ...
— The Frozen Deep • Wilkie Collins
... and emptied. Cards and dice were then called for. The company drew their chairs into a closer circle round the table; deep play, and deeper drinking, set in. The Palais resounded with revelry until the morning sun looked into the great window, blushing red at the scene of drunken ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... no viuda; el moro que a mi me tiene muy grande bien me queria. page 3 Fonte-frida, fonte-frida, fonte-frida y con amor, do todas las avecicas van tomar consolacion, 5 sino es la tortolica que esta viuda y con dolor. Por alli fuera a pasar el traidor de ruisenor: las palabras que le dice 10 llenas son de traicion: —Si tu quisieses, senora, yo seria tu servidor. —Vete de ahi, enemigo, malo, falso, enganador, 15 que ni poso en ramo verde, ni en prado que tenga flor; que si el agua hallo clara, turbia la ...
— Modern Spanish Lyrics • Various
... the footsteps of strangers; and into every window the old garden trees thrust their dark boughs, like the arms of night-burglars; and ever and anon the nails start from the wainscot; while behind it the mice rattle like dice. Up and down in such old specter houses one loves to wander; and so much the more, if the place be haunted by some ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. I (of 2) • Herman Melville
... resorted to by the Romans wishing to pry into futurity. The lots were dice, or articles resembling those instruments of chance. They were thrown into an urn filled with water, or cast as dice in the ordinary way. If there was any difficulty in ascertaining the import of the dice throwing, the priests were ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... of Magister William de Dice, who wanted the vicarage of Chevington, he answered: "Thy Father was Master of the Schools; and when I was an indigent clericus, he granted me freely and in charity an entrance to his School, and opportunity of learning; wherefore ...
— Past and Present - Thomas Carlyle's Collected Works, Vol. XIII. • Thomas Carlyle
... goes over to fireplace, where he stands looking at Mrs. Gladstone, who is now beginning to "cast-off" a completed piece of knitting. The rattle of the dice is heard.) ...
— Angels & Ministers • Laurence Housman
... father to-day, though stained with yesterday's blood, two-faced of love and vengeance, to you, dice cast into the wind, goes my ...
— Rosinante to the Road Again • John Dos Passos
... battle. This very day, O prince, O lord of Nishadhas, go to the delightful city of Ayodhya, and present thyself before Rituparna skilled in gambling, saying, 'I am a charioteer, Vahuka by name.' And that king will give thee his skill in dice for thy knowledge of horses. Sprung from the line of Ikswaku, and possessed of prosperity, he will be thy friend. When thou wilt be an adept at dice, thou shalt then have prosperity. Thou wilt also meet with thy wife and ...
— Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa Bk. 3 Pt. 1 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
... force: then follows a droning and cracking, almost as loud as a shot, and on every snap follows a glittering fissure in the ice, which till then was clear as glass. In every direction the gigantic mirror is flawed till it is like a huge mosaic, formed of millions of tiny dice, pentagons, and many-sided prisms, and whose surface is of glass. This is what causes the sound. He who hears it for the first time finds his heart beating faster; the whole surface hums, rings, and ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... cio si biasmi il debolo intelletto E' l'parlar nostro, che non ha valore Di ritrar tutto cio che dice amore. ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown
... straightened his head on the pillows and closed his eyes. "You gave me leave to grumble—well, then, I am so horribly disappointed. Here have life and death been sitting on either side of me for the past month, and throwing with dice for me. I saw them as plainly as I can see you. The queer thing was they were exactly alike, yet I knew them apart from the first. Day and night I heard the rattle of the dice—it became hideously monotonous—and felt the mouth of the dice-box ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... for ever, or sleeping who would wake only at the knife's edge? These things I could not know, any more than I could picture how many boon-companions were parting at that instant, just risen from the dice, one to go blindly—the other watching him—to his death? I could not imagine, thank Heaven for it, these secrets, or a hundredth part of the treachery and cruelty and greed that lurked at my feet, ready to burst all bounds at a pistol-shot. It had no significance for me that the past day was the ...
— The House of the Wolf - A Romance • Stanley Weyman
... the approach of the Dewali, thoughts of the future came flocking like birds at sundown. Because, on Dewali night, all tried their luck in some fashion; and Mai Lakshmi's answer failed not. The men tossed coin or dice. The maidens, at sunset, when the little wind of evening stirred the waters, carried each her chiragh—lamp of her life—and set it afloat on tank or stream, praying Mai Lakshmi to guide it safe across. If the prayer was heard, ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... full nobly born, and one that reverences the throne of Modesty, and detests too haughty language, for he is wont to be slow at base acts, but no dastard. And from the sown heroes whom Mars spared is Melanippus sprung a scion, and he is thoroughly a native. But the event Mars with his dice will decide. And justice, his near kinswoman, makes him her champion,[126] that he may ward off the foeman's spear from ...
— Prometheus Bound and Seven Against Thebes • Aeschylus
... No. 80, he wrote:—'It is scarcely possible to pass an hour in honest conversation, without being able, when we rise from it, to please ourselves with having given or received some advantages; but a man may shuffle cards, or rattle dice, from noon to midnight, without tracing any new idea in his mind, or being able to recollect the day by any other token than his gain or loss, and a confused remembrance of agitated passions, and ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 3 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... wandered into the centre of the camp, and saw with astonishment groups of retainers everywhere eating, drinking, talking, and even playing cards or dice, but not a single officer of any rank. At last, stopping by the embers of a fire, he asked timidly if he might have breakfast. The soldiers laughed and pointed to a cart behind them, telling him to help himself. The cart was turned with the tail towards the fire, and laden with bread and sides ...
— After London - Wild England • Richard Jefferies |
