"Gnaw" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of that man when you thrashed him at the railway station. You've pluck enough of that kind. You must now show that you've that other kind of pluck. You know the story of the boy who would not cry though the wolf was gnawing him underneath his frock. Most of us have some wolf to gnaw us somewhere; but we are generally gnawed beneath our clothes, so that the world doesn't see; and it behoves us so to bear it that the world shall not suspect. The man who goes about declaring himself to be miserable will be not only miserable, ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... his love for my mother; speaking of himself throughout as Rene might, as of her humble devoted servant merely. And then the question began to gnaw at me. "Did she love him?" and somehow, I felt as if I could not rest till I knew; and I had it on my lips twenty times to cry out to him: "I know you loved her: oh! tell me, did she love you?" And yet I dared no more have done so, and overstepped the barrier of his ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... Ophelia and Ralph Waldo finishing third and fourth, respectively. We fades away down the big road, and the last thing we sees as we turns a wistful farewell look over our shoulders is them two man-eaters raging back and forth inside the fence trying to gnaw down the palings, and the old guy standing on ...
— Sundry Accounts • Irvin S. Cobb
... tempest, an ague not appearing, heating worse than any fire, and a battle that hath no end. It crucifies worse than any tyrant; no torture, no strappado, no bodily punishment is like unto it." 'Tis the eagle without question which the poets feigned to gnaw [1642]Prometheus' heart, and "no heaviness is like unto the heaviness of the heart," Eccles. xxv. 15, 16. [1643]"Every perturbation is a misery, but grief a cruel torment," a domineering passion: as in old Rome, when the Dictator ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... deeper; into the forest; but I could not regain my former elasticity of mind. I found cheerfulness to be like life itself—not to be created by any argument. Afterwards I learned, that the best way to manage some kinds of pain fill thoughts, is to dare them to do their worst; to let them lie and gnaw at your heart till they are tired; and you find you still have a residue of life they cannot kill. So, better and worse, I went on, till I came to a little clearing in the forest. In the middle of this clearing stood a long, low hut, built ...
— Phantastes - A Faerie Romance for Men and Women • George MacDonald
... grew older, I gave him brown bread and corn cake, and once in a while I let him have a beef bone to play with. He liked that very much, and he did not object to being tied up sometimes, if he had a bone to gnaw." ...
— Friends and Helpers • Sarah J. Eddy
... nos moutons, or rather our forks. We disposed of the vegetables somehow, and as for the meat, we were obliged to split and gnaw it after the fashion of our primitive ancestors. We drank out of the mouth of the claret bottle, passing it round till it was emptied. It was probably a good honest bottle, but in the circumstances it seemed a despicable ...
— Prisoner for Blasphemy • G. W. [George William] Foote
... won't," he began, then, feebly surrendering to the gnaw of desire, he reached hastily for the glass, as if in fear that it ...
— A Son Of The Sun • Jack London
... protest of many, that is so irritating to the home-rule. True, it might be only the quiescence of despair, but at least she veiled it decently under a show of Spartan cheerfulness. The fox of bitterness might gnaw, but she drew the mantle of her pride closer round her. She might suffer and pine, like a caged lark in her narrow cage, but at least no one, not even Archie, and least of all her mother, should guess the extent of her sufferings. ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... after this another vision saw, In France, at Aix, in his Chapelle once more, That his right arm an evil bear did gnaw; Out of Ardennes he saw a leopard stalk, His body dear did savagely assault; But then there dashed a harrier from the hall, Leaping in the air he sped to Charles call, First the right ear of that grim bear he caught, And furiously the ...
— The Song of Roland • Anonymous
... correction. His vocabulary is apt and ample to an extraordinary degree. God knows where he collected it, but by some instinct or some accident he has avoided all profane or gross expressions. "Obliged," "stabbed," "gnaw," "lodge," "power," "company," "slender," "smooth," and "wonderful," are a few of the unexpected words that enrich his dialect. Perhaps what pleased him most was to hear about saluting the quarter-deck of a man-of-war. In his gratitude for this hint ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... said Albert, "but I think I could gnaw down a good-sized sapling. Hold me, Dick, or I'll be devouring ...
— The Last of the Chiefs - A Story of the Great Sioux War • Joseph Altsheler
... lot of fellows in this garrison. We mixed the handful of flour given to us with snow water, and, wrapping the unsalted dough around a sagebrush spike, we cooked it in the flames, and ate it from the stick, as a dog would gnaw a bone. The officers put a guard around the few little hackberry trees to keep the men from eating the berries and the bark. Not a scrap of the few buffalo we found was wasted. Even the entrails cleansed in the snow and eaten raw gives hint of how ...
— The Price of the Prairie - A Story of Kansas • Margaret Hill McCarter
... intervals to breathe. I suppose the trap holds them down beyond their allotted time, and then they suffer, just as a fellow might after a minute had passed. Now, foxes are caught on the land—are they ever know to gnaw their foot ...
— Canoe Mates in Canada - Three Boys Afloat on the Saskatchewan • St. George Rathborne
... hunter bethinks him of a solution for this problem. The broken blade will do to gnaw off this bough, and it will serve to make a split in the end of it. And if one be fortunate, and if this split bestride the tail of the concealed animal, and if ...
— The Singing Mouse Stories • Emerson Hough
... strange bird-beaked creature, with long legs and horns laid flat by its sides, and miniature wings on its back. Observe that the sides of the tail, and one pair of legs, are fringed with dark hairs. After a fortnight's rest in this prison this 'nymph' will gnaw her way out and swim through the water on her back, by means of that fringed tail and paddles, till she reaches the bank and the upper air. There, under the genial light of day, her skin will burst, and a four-winged fly emerge, to buzz over the water as a fawn-coloured Caperer— deadliest of ...
— Prose Idylls • Charles Kingsley
... broad and massive walls of the Romans, if the noble and pathetic architecture of the Middle Ages, had not been ground to dust by mere human rage. You talk of the scythe of time and the tooth of time; I tell you time is scytheless and toothless; it is we who gnaw like the worm, we who smite like the scythe. All these lost treasures of human intellect have been wholly destroyed by human industry of destruction; the marble would have stood its 2,000 years as well in the polished statue as in the Parian cliff; ...
— A Man's Value to Society - Studies in Self Culture and Character • Newell Dwight Hillis
... either; but it's a well-known fact that I am an intelligent man; so I feel such things more than others would, and that's why I have to drink. My neighbor Moens Christoffersen often says to me, speaking as my good friend, "May the devil gnaw your fat belly, Jeppe! You must hit back, if you want your old woman to behave." But I can't do anything to protect myself, for three reasons: in the the first place, because I haven't any courage; in the second, because of that damned Master Eric hanging ...
— Comedies • Ludvig Holberg
... music must be beautiful to be music and seeing the real significance of the characteristic, the ugly. Had Strauss developed courage or gone to the far East when young—Illowski would shrug his high shoulders, gnaw his cigarette and ...
— Melomaniacs • James Huneker
... chests Vast sums of money should to you afford, Would ne'ertheless add more unto that hoard, And yet not be content,—you clunchfist dastards, Insatiable fiends, and Pluto's bastards, Greedy devourers, chichy sneakbill rogues, Hell-mastiffs gnaw your ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... family permitted him to lie outside in the cold passage among the dogs who were his pillows and his quilt. They gave him no good meat, but flung him bits of tough walrus hide such as they gave to the dogs, and he was obliged to gnaw it as the dogs did, for ...
— A Treasury of Eskimo Tales • Clara Kern Bayliss
... havin' plenty to eat three times a day. There was roast beef, an' roast mutton, an' duck, an' chicken, an' soup, an' peas, an' beans, an' termaters, an' plum-puddin', an' mince-pie—' 'Shut up with your mince-pie!' sung out Tom Simmons. 'Isn't it enough to have to gnaw on these salt chips, without hearin' about mince-pie?' 'An' more'n that' says Andy, 'there was canned peaches, an' ...
— The Magic Egg and Other Stories • Frank Stockton
... swallow whatever was offered. When he realised the sad truth that a huge hook with a strong barb was hidden inside this tempting dish and that it was no easy matter to disgorge the tasty morsel, he would try to gnaw through the shaft of the hook with his teeth. Very occasionally he might succeed, but usually his efforts failed. Attached to the book was a length of strong iron chain; and sometimes, though defeated by the hook, he would manage to snip through the chain. ...
— Seven Icelandic Short Stories • Various
... of half a mile, could pierce a cuirass with their yard-long arrows. Uncultivated land makes coarse wool. The Chesil of to-day resembles in no particular the Chesil of the past, so much has it been disturbed by man and by those furious winds which gnaw the very stones. ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo
... pedantries of many modern so-called "stylists," I rejoice that Dumas was not one of these. He told a plain tale, in the language suited to a plain tale, with abundance of wit and gaiety, as in the reflections of his Chicot, as in all his dialogues. But he did not gnaw the end of his pen in search of some word that nobody had ever used in this or that connection before. The right word came to him, the simple straightforward phrase. Epithet-hunting may be a pretty sport, and the bag of the epithet-hunter may contain some agreeable epigrams and rare specimens ...
— Essays in Little • Andrew Lang
... Diego, brother Jacinto, or brother Raimundo: all monks and friars, proceeding, that is to say, from the monastic orders." "These," he added, "are the orange-trees of heaven, whose fruits are placed on the table of God." Of evil-speakers Rodaja said, that they were like the feathers of the eagle which gnaw, wear away, and reduce to nothing, whatever feathers of other birds are mingled with them in beds or cushions, how good soever those ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... sea, Crushed at the root of Etna's mountain-pile. High on the pinnacles whereof there sits Hephaestus, sweltering at the forge; and thence On some hereafter day shall burst and stream The lava-floods, that shall with ravening fangs Gnaw thy smooth lowlands, fertile Sicily! Such ire shall Typho from his living grave Send seething up, such jets of fiery surge, Hot and unslaked, altho' himself be laid In quaking ashes by Zeus' thunderbolt. But thou dost know ...
— Suppliant Maidens and Other Plays • AEschylus
... are intended to represent the injurious and destructive agencies to which maize and other cultivated plants were subject. Birds and quadrupeds pull up the sprouting seed and pull down and devour the ripening grain; worms gnaw the roots and winds break down the stalks, one out of four escaping injury and giving full return to the planter. The latter is therefore probably the correct interpretation, the only difficult feature being ...
— Day Symbols of the Maya Year • Cyrus Thomas
... mole said, "Let me try, I shall bore through the ground of the sky and gnaw off the ...
— Nature Myths and Stories for Little Children • Flora J. Cooke
... his friends often camped to eat their dinner during their hunting expeditions. Roderick stood close by, lazily cropping the grass, but Marmion was not in sight. The last time his master saw him, he was trying to gnaw his way into a hollow log where a ...
— Frank Among The Rancheros • Harry Castlemon
... how he will eat out his heart, while his friends gnaw their thick fists for that they are deprived of the battle? So ...
— Cyrano de Bergerac • Edmond Rostand
... 'Father Francis! people say that you passed from this life in the vicinity of China; that you were a saint, that your body still remains entire and incorrupt at Goa. Now here am I your sacristan; and I ask is it consistent with your honor that a rat should have the audacity to gnaw the ornaments of your altar? I demand his death at your hand.' On opening the door of the sanctuary the next morning the sacristan found the ...
— Japan • David Murray
... Your day will come, and in due course the graveyard rat will gnaw as calmly at your bump of acquisitiveness as at the mean coat of ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... remember that exhorter that was here last fall, that used to board around with the church people all the week, and talk about Zion and laying up treasures where the moths wouldn't gnaw them, and they wouldn't get rusty, and where thieves wouldn't pry off the hinges. He was the one that used to go home with Ma from prayer meetings, when Pa was down town, and who wanted to pay off the church debt ...
— The Grocery Man And Peck's Bad Boy - Peck's Bad Boy and His Pa, No. 2 - 1883 • George W. Peck
... modern Iguanas which now frequent the tropical woods of America and the West Indies, exhibit many important differences. It appears that they have often been worn by the process of mastication; whereas the existing herbivorous reptiles clip and gnaw off the vegetable productions on which they feed, but do not chew them. Their teeth frequently present an appearance of having been chipped off, but never, like the fossil teeth of the Iguanodon, have a flat ground surface (see Figure 290, b) resembling ...
— The Student's Elements of Geology • Sir Charles Lyell
... spare you what is worth more than a little thing like your life," said the Captain. "We'll spare you some of our good food, to show you that we French do not have to gnaw our finger-nails, like you miserable Boches. Men, take this ...
— Everyman's Land • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... visitations, but they came to do the work of ruin more thoroughly. For not only the crops and fruits, but the foliage of the forest itself, nay, the small twigs and the bark of the trees are the victims of their curious and energetic rapacity. They have been known even to gnaw the door-posts of the houses. Nor do they execute their task in so slovenly a way, that, as they have succeeded other plagues so they may have successors themselves. They take pains to spoil what they leave. Like the Harpies, they smear every thing that they touch with a miserable slime, which ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... where I was twelve years ago. I am twelve years older and have that much less time in which to complete the joy of making good as one of the great American authors. Presently the infirmities of age will begin to gnaw at me, the moths will ruin my flossy collection of goat-feathers, all those who now pat me on the back because they can make use of me free of charge will forget that I am alive, and my executors will shake their heads and say, "Ain't it too bad he ...
— Goat-Feathers • Ellis Parker Butler
... intimations he had received. First, then, he slackened his pace to a walk This was no point of quarrel between him and his rider, who had been considerably discomposed by the rapidity of his former motion, and who now took the opportunity of his abated pace to gnaw a piece of gingerbread, which had been thrust into his hand by his mother in order to reconcile this youthful emissary of the post-office to the discharge of his duty. By and by, the crafty pony availed himself of this surcease of discipline to twitch the rein out of Davies hands, and ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... gods. None heeded the earthquake in all those joyous streets. And down in the deeps of the earth, on the black feet of the abyss, they that would conquer Man mumbled long in the darkness, mumbled and goaded the earthquake to try his strength with that city, to go forth blithely at night and to gnaw its pillars like bones. And down in those grimy deeps the earthquake answered them, and would not do their pleasure and would not stir from thence, for who knew who they were who danced all day where he rumbled, and what if the lords ...
— Fifty-One Tales • Lord Dunsany [Edward J. M. D. Plunkett]
... and a sailor, A tinker and a tailor, Had once a doubtful strife, sir, To make a maid a wife, sir, Whose name was buxom Joan. For now the time was ended, When she no more intended To lick her lips at men, sir, And gnaw the sheets in vain, sir, And lie ...
— Love for Love • William Congreve
... bother of lagging useless material home to her burrow. She was so near that the Child could have touched her by reaching out his hand. But she took no more notice of him than if he had been a rotten stump. Less, in fact, for she might have tried to gnaw into him if he had been a rotten stump, in the hope of finding ...
— Children of the Wild • Charles G. D. Roberts
... arising from the exposure of almost all plants to destruction by animals. The buds are destroyed by birds, the leaves by caterpillars, the seeds by weevils; some insects bore into the trunk, others burrow in the twigs and leaves; slugs devour the young seedlings and the tender shoots, wire-worms gnaw the roots. Herbivorous mammals devour many species bodily, while some uproot and ...
— Darwinism (1889) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... as his weariness had grown with his leaving behind the fog, so now did both hunger and thirst gnaw at Shann, all the sharper for the delay. The Terran wanted to reach that water, could picture it in his mind, putting away the possibility—the probability—that it might be sea-born and salt, and so unfit ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... of the stratum which the Negro occupies, the race is an easy prey to disease that affects the health of the whole nation. The germs of disease have no race prejudice. They do not even draw the line at social equality, but gnaw with equal avidity at the vitals of white and black alike, and pass with the greatest freedom of intercourse from the one to the other. One touch of disease makes the whole world kin, and also kind. ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Vol. I. Jan. 1916 • Various
... descending steps. She lay as one dead, when ten minutes afterwards the cry of one of her babes struck on her ear, and the next moment Ursel stood beside her, laying them down close to her, and saying exultingly, "Safe! safe out at the gate, and down the hillside, and my old lady ready to gnaw off her ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... handicapped but little by his splinted leg; but having eaten he lay down and commenced to gnaw at the bandage. I was sitting some little distance away devouring shellfish, of which, by the way, I was becoming ...
— Pellucidar • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... one of thy inventions for making me hunt every Englishman to death, that thou mayest gnaw their bones." ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... Orleans. But if I make not the better speed, the town will have fallen, or yielded, rescue or no rescue, and of rescue there is no hope at all. The devil fights for the English, who will soon be swarming over the Loire, and that King of Bourges of ours will have to flee, and gnaw horse's fodder, oats and barley, with your ...
— A Monk of Fife • Andrew Lang
... gnaw with white cruel teeth The yellow surf, and the torn billows seethe— When shines the Southern Cross o'er placid isles, The Afric mother sits, and singing, smiles, Unheeding that a dead world's hidden pain Beats wildly rhythmic through ...
— Lilith - The Legend of the First Woman • Ada Langworthy Collier
... were to take a notion to be great singers. Is there any use for me to tell you that if you persist you will succeed? Not a bit of it. You might succeed in ruining the nerves of your teacher. You might easily make those who hear you practise "want to gnaw a file and flee into the wilderness." But you would never learn to sing. There is no hope for some of us till we ...
— Sermons on Biblical Characters • Clovis G. Chappell
... affirmative, Ghansiam Das said: 'Very well, I too am extremely partial to this form of food; here is my hand, eat it and I will eat you'; and at the same time he seized hold of the other's hand and began to gnaw at it. The Aghori on this became much alarmed and begged to be excused. He shortly afterwards left Rewah and was not heard of again, while Ghansiam Das was rewarded ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell
... from some weird possession or suggestion of evil by a stronger mind, Guy Waring began to walk on in a feverish fashion, fast, fast, oh, so fast, not knowing where he went, but conscious only that he must keep moving, lest an accusing conscience should gnaw his ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... to gnaw my heart Before the day was done, For other men's lives had all gone out, Like candles in the sun!— But it seem'd as if I had broke, at last, A thousand ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... middle of the night the witch began to gnaw at Lakhan's bow and he heard her gnawing and called out "What are you munching? Give me at bit," but she answered that it was only a little pulse which she had gleaned from the fields and she had finished ...
— Folklore of the Santal Parganas • Cecil Henry Bompas
... ready to take life from my body. Before me is the sword of death; behind, the sword of sin, ready to accuse me at the tribunal of God. The weapon on the right hand is the devil; and that on the left, is the worms which after death shall gnaw my body. And, considering all these circumstances, how can I rejoice? If you to-day feared me, who am mortal, how much more ought I to dread my Creator and my Redeemer, our Lord Jesus Christ? Go, ...
— Mediaeval Tales • Various
... within. Filthy, half-washed clothes of beggars hang down from the windows, drying in the sun as they flap and flutter against pretentious moulded masks of empty plaster. Miserable children loiter in the high-arched gates, under which smart carriages were meant to drive, and gnaw their dirty fingers, or fight for a cold boiled chestnut one of them has saved. Squalor, misery, ruin and vile stucco, with a sprinkling of half-desperate humanity,—those are the elements of the modern picture,—that is what the 'great development' of modern ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 1 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... through and then try to pull them after him. All night he or his companion seems to have kept up this futile attempt, fumbling and dropping the nut every few minutes. It never occurred to the mouse to gnaw the hole larger, as it would instantly have done had the hole been too small to admit its own body. It could not project its mind thus far; it could not get out of itself sufficiently to regard the nut in its relation to the hole, and it is doubtful if any four-footed animal is capable of ...
— Ways of Nature • John Burroughs
... years," I answered, laconically. A feeling of defiance, of dislike to this bedizened old woman began to gnaw my child's heart. Young as I was, I had learned, with what bitterness I alone could have told, the art of wrapping myself round with a husk of cold reserve, which no one uninitiated in the ways of children could penetrate, ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 1, January, 1891 • Various
... the man, cutting off large pieces of the pudding and passing it across the counter to the boys who took it, without speaking, and began to gnaw at ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... face. "Father, why the forehead so wrinkled? Is pain condescended?" Said Kwaiba—"'Tis the rats; they gnaw and worry at Kwaiba."—"Rats?" replied Kibei in some astonishment. He looked around. The sho[u]ji were tight closed. Kwaiba noted the inspection. He shook his head, and pointed to the rama-sho[u]ji, ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... live in the swamps, and gnaw the bark from trees. I an't afraid of snakes! I'd rather have one near me than ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... he whispered in the winged horse's ear, "thou must help me to slay this insufferable monster; or else thou shalt fly back to thy solitary mountain peak without thy friend Bellerophon. For either the Chimaera dies, or its three mouths shall gnaw this head of mine, which has slumbered ...
— Myths That Every Child Should Know - A Selection Of The Classic Myths Of All Times For Young People • Various
... slain in the chase to be broken, or left carelessly about the encampment. They were collected in heaps, or thrown into the water. Mrs. Eastman observes that even yet the Dakotas deem it an omen of ill luck in the hunt, if the dogs gnaw the bones or a woman inadvertently steps over them; and the Chipeway interpreter, John Tanner, speaks of the same fear among that tribe. The Yurucares of Bolivia carried it to such an inconvenient extent, that they carefully put by even small fish bones, saying that unless ...
— The Myths of the New World - A Treatise on the Symbolism and Mythology of the Red Race of America • Daniel G. Brinton
... can do that. I wonder if Slider can do any tricks?" he asked, when Top had been rewarded for his efforts with a little bone to gnaw. ...
— The Curlytops and Their Pets - or Uncle Toby's Strange Collection • Howard R. Garis
... ane—a Scottish callan! There's ane; come forrit, honest Allan! Thou need na jouk behint the hallan, A chiel sae clever; The teeth o' time may gnaw ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... with the admiral was about as friendly and flattering. Pompey and I were on the poop. I presented him with a piece of hide to gnaw, by way of pastime. The admiral came on the poop, and seeing Pompey thus employed, asked who gave him that piece of hide? The yeoman of the signals said it was me. The admiral shook his long spy-glass at me, and said, "By G——, sir, if ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... "If you call a leaky old ferryboat with the weather so damp that you can't touch the rail without feeling as if you have had a dip in the briny—if that's what you call romantic, then give me a good open fire and plenty of chicken bones to gnaw." ...
— The Outdoor Girls on Pine Island - Or, A Cave and What It Contained • Laura Lee Hope
... her. Those sailors need not curse them! Ships safe in port have their own perils of rot and rust and worms in the wood that gnaw the heart to dust. . . . "That ...
— Browning's Heroines • Ethel Colburn Mayne
... hippophage; glutton &c 957. V. eat, feed, fare, devour, swallow, take; gulp, bolt, snap; fall to; despatch, dispatch; discuss; take down, get down, gulp down; lay in, tuck in [Slang]; lick, pick, peck; gormandize &c 957; bite, champ, munch, cranch^, craunch^, crunch, chew, masticate, nibble, gnaw, mumble. live on; feed upon, batten upon, fatten upon, feast upon; browse, graze, crop, regale; carouse &c (make merry) 840; eat heartily, do justice to, play a good knife and fork, banquet. break bread, break one's fast; breakfast, lunch, dine, take tea, sup. drink in, drink up, drink ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... a granary; it lay fronting on one of the canals. The deep cellars, which were entirely below the level of the canal, were now empty. It was pitch dark down there, and impracticable; the damp air seemed to gnaw at one's vocal cords. They took a light and explored among the pillars, finding here and there places where people had lain on straw. "There is no one here," said the watchman. Pelle called, and heard a ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... whirl it on the floor, and eat it at their leisure as it got cold. In order to prevent this, the top of the boiler was secured by an iron rod passing under its handle of the boiler on each side; but not many days passed ere they discovered that they could gnaw the cords asunder, and displace the rod, and fish out the meat as before. Small chains were then substituted for the cords, and the meat was cooked in safety for nearly a week, when they found that, by rearing themselves on their hind legs, and applying their united strength towards ...
— The Dog - A nineteenth-century dog-lovers' manual, - a combination of the essential and the esoteric. • William Youatt
... his subjects to a bag full of rats.—"If you let them rest," said the warrior, "they will gnaw a hole in it: 324 keep them moving, and no evil will happen." So his subjects, if kept continually occupied, the government went on well; but if left quiet, seditions would quickly arise. This sultan was always in the tented-field: he would say, that he should not ...
— An Account of Timbuctoo and Housa Territories in the Interior of Africa • Abd Salam Shabeeny
... what had happened, his wonder as to what would come next, and the hunger that had begun to gnaw at him, Clare could not sleep. And as he lay awake, thoughts came ...
— A Rough Shaking • George MacDonald
... Equally eager are they to get into the room at night, or at any time when the owner has left them outside. Doors are cleverly opened by them, but when securely locked the dogs sometimes, in their impatience, gnaw holes in the lower part of the door which look like the work of rodents, though none that I saw was large enough to admit a canine of their size. One day a big live pig was brought in from the utan over the shoulder of a strong man, its legs tied together, ...
— Through Central Borneo: - An Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters - Between the Years 1913 and 1917 • Carl Lumholtz
... Thunder strike thee dead for this deceit, immediate lightning blast thee, me, and the whole world! Oh! I could rack myself, play the vulture to my own heart, and gnaw it piecemeal, for not boding ...
— The Comedies of William Congreve - Volume 1 [of 2] • William Congreve
... gave her great comfort, however, to see that Marilla, Rowens had just missed it in her calculations, and she chuckled immensely to find Dudley Veneer devoting himself chiefly to Helen Darley. If the Rowens woman should hook Dudley, she felt as if she should gnaw all her nails off for spite. To think of seeing her barouching about Rockland behind a pair of long-tailed bays and a coachman with a band on his hat, while she, Blanche Creamer, was driving herself about in a one-horse "carriage"! Recovering her spirits by degrees, she began playing her surfaces ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... viewing with painful sensations those irregular desires, those disgusting propensities, by which he is perpetually agitated; seeing the terrible effect of those licentious passions which torment him; of those lasting inquietudes which gnaw his repose; of those stupendous evils, as well physical as moral, which assail him on every side: the contemplator of humanity would be tempted to believe that happiness was not made for this world; that any effort to cure those minds which every thing unites to ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 1 • Baron D'Holbach
... book reminds me very much of making a passage across the Atlantic. At one moment, when the ideas flow, you have the wind aft, and away you scud, with a flowing sheet, and a rapidity which delights you: at other times, when your spirit flags, and you gnaw your pen (I have lately used iron pens, for I'm a devil of a crib-biter), it is like unto a foul wind, tack and tack, requiring a long time to get on a short distance. But still you do go, although but slowly; and in both cases we must take the foul wind with the fair. ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... awakened with his kisses, and she looked upon Othello, and she saw him gnaw his under lip, and roll his eyes, and she knew he was always fatal when he looked so: and he bade her prepare for death, and to say her prayers, for he would not kill her soul. And this innocent wife, as she lay ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles Lamb and Mary Lamb
... skilfully with gold which could not fall out, and gave a beautiful appearance. The men did not glory in their mustaches or beards, but quite the contrary; and consequently they pulled them out on purpose. And just as it is an amusement or custom of some of us to gnaw our finger-nails, they get amusement in pulling out the hairs of the beard with certain little bits of cleft bamboo [canuelas hendidas] or with little shells in the form of pincers. All the women, and in some places ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55 • Francisco Colin
... and thickness, whose scales made a rustling noise as he wound himself along. It swallowed up one of my comrades, notwithstanding his loud cries, and the efforts he made to extricate himself from it; dashing him several times against the ground, it crushed him, and we could hear it gnaw and tear the poor wretch's bones, though we had ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown
... against you," remarked the Colonel with a dry smile. He had recognized Oncle Jazon after a little sharp scrutiny. "I suppose, however, that we can let you gnaw the bones after we've ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson
... rodents, mice are apt to be busy and mischievous infesters of libraries. They are extremely fond of paste, and being in a chronic state of hunger, they watch opportunities of getting at any library receptacle of it. They will gnaw any fresh binding, whether of cloth, board, or leather, to get at the coveted food. They will also gnaw some books, and even pamphlets, without any apparent temptation of a succulent nature. A good library cat or a series of mouse traps, skilfully baited, ...
— A Book for All Readers • Ainsworth Rand Spofford
... to twinkle from awakening farm-houses. The moon paled and a whiter light began to steal over the icy fields. Here was the place where he and the old mare had seen for the first time a railroad train. Hunger began to gnaw within him when he saw the smoke rising from a negro cabin down a little lane, and he left the road and moved toward it. At the bars which let into a little barnyard an old negro was milking a cow, and when, at the boy's low cry of "Hello!" he rose to his feet, a ruse carne ...
— The Heart Of The Hills • John Fox, Jr.
... my brain, beginning, as I may say, to gnaw uncertainly. I went to my room for a few minutes to collect myself, and ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... noiselessly from him, dropping through a wedding ring into the clutching fingers of a new-born heir. And when it struck him that the beautiful vision he had feasted his eyes upon last evening was, undoubtedly, the fair destroyer of his every hope, a conflict of violent feelings began to gnaw at his poor heart, making a genuine picture of woeful misery out of the laughing face of a moment before, but he battled against his moral foes, at least—he must not show his uncle that any selfishness of his could mar ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera
... of the behaviour of beavers who gnaw the base of a tree with their chisel-edged teeth till only a narrow core is left—to snap in the first gale, bringing the useful branches down to the ground? What is to be said of the harvest-mouse constructing its nest, or of the squirrel making cache after cache of nuts? These and many similar ...
— The Outline of Science, Vol. 1 (of 4) - A Plain Story Simply Told • J. Arthur Thomson
... "if there be fresh-baked bread in the regimental ovens yonder, fetch a loaf, in God's name. I could gnaw black-birch and reindeer moss, so famished am I—and the Sagamore, too, no doubt, could rattle a ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... us hope that there, at least, he is free to profess the truth he had found, and to be one of the instances—very rare indeed they are—of a consistent and steady Protestant, who had for years before been thoroughly imbued with those doctrines which gnaw at the very vitals of mental perception, and obliterate the sense of fairness, and which very seldom leave enough alive in the mind to hold even ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... they rallied enough support to increase their number in Congress by thirty-three. Had not the moment been so tragic, nothing could have been more amusing than the helpless wrath of the Jacobins caught in their own trap, compelled to gnaw their tongues in silence, while the Democrats, paraphrasing their own arguments, ...
— Lincoln • Nathaniel Wright Stephenson
... his black eyes burned with the spirit of rebellion, "I'd rather be a short-grass cay-use nippin' th' scatterin' feed on th' north hills an' be free to snort an' raise hell when I blamed please than have my belly stuffed with alfalfa hay three times a day an' have to gnaw th' iron of some damned man's bit in my mouth or carry his saddle on ...
— The Ramblin' Kid • Earl Wayland Bowman
... to the cage, Skirrl began to gnaw at the boxes, trying with all his might to tear them to pieces. After some thirty minutes of such effort, interrupted by wanderings about the cage and attempts to get at the other monkeys, he suddenly went to the largest box of all, set ...
— The Mental Life of Monkeys and Apes - A Study of Ideational Behavior • Robert M. Yerkes
... J. Hinton Knowles' Folk-Tales of Kashmir a merchant gives his stupid son a small coin with which he is to purchase something to eat, something to drink, something to gnaw, something to sow in the garden, and some food for the cow. A clever young girl advises him to buy a water-melon, which would answer all the purposes ...
— Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers • W. A. Clouston
... with a large army against the son of Kueprili, and the darkness of defeat threatens to obscure the sun-like radiance of the Ottoman arms. Most puissant Padishah! suffer not the tooth of disaster to gnaw away at thy glory! The Grand Vizier and I have already gathered together thy host on the shores of the Bosphorus. They are ready, at a moment's notice, to embark in the ships prepared for them. Money and provisions ...
— Halil the Pedlar - A Tale of Old Stambul • Mr Jkai
... and trivial flattery, his foully pimpled face within a foot of hers, and she shrinking before him, very white and mute and frightened. Her father looked on with darkling brows, and Giuliana began to gnaw her lip and look less lazy, whilst in the courtly background there was a respectful murmuring babble, supplying a sycophantic chorus to the Duke's ...
— The Strolling Saint • Raphael Sabatini
... plain, And laughter-loving childhood roams Unmoved by care or pain; Let famine gaunt and grim despair Behind you stalk along, And pestilence taint all the air With victims from the strong Let dogs from mangled beauty's cheeks The flesh and sinews tear, And craunch the bones around for weeks, And gnaw the skulls till bare Let vultures gather round the heaps Made up of man and beast, And, while the widowed mother weeps, Indulge their horrid feast, Till, startled by wild piteous groans, On dreary wings they rise, To come again, mid dying moans, And tear out glazing eyes Tho' widows' tears, ...
— American Scenes, and Christian Slavery - A Recent Tour of Four Thousand Miles in the United States • Ebenezer Davies
... abandon'd to Ambition's sway, I sought for glory in the paths of guile; And fawn'd and smiled, to plunder and betray, Myself betray'd and plunder'd all the while; So gnaw'd the viper the corroding file; But now with pangs of keen remorse, I rue Those years of trouble and debasement vile. Yet why should I this cruel theme pursue? Fly, fly, detested thoughts, for ever ...
— The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer - With Lives, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Rev. George Gilfillan [Ed.]
... might be attacked at once, he had made his battalion stand to arms on the shore. He walked to and fro all the length of the room, stopping sometimes to gnaw the finger-tips of his right hand with a lurid sideways glare fixed on the floor; then, with a sullen, repelling glance all round, he would resume his tramping in savage aloofness. His hat, horsewhip, ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... of his ministers. But, during the four or five days that the journey continued, they incessantly tormented him; and did not give him a fourth part of what was necessary for his support, so that the unfortunate man was frequently obliged to gnaw the bones which the Moors had thrown away; they also forced him to make the whole journey on foot; it was pretty long; for these gentlemen, on their arrival at St. Louis, estimated it at a hundred and forty leagues at the least, because the Moors made them go so much ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to Senegal in 1816 • J. B. Henry Savigny and Alexander Correard
... Deer a black locust twig, of which rabbits gnaw the young shoots, which he had shaved off as well as a ...
— Myths and Legends of the Great Plains • Unknown
... Black Cat to climb a tree, and when he needed help to call out for him. Night coming on, water began to rise about the base of the tree, and the Giant Beaver came and began to gnaw at its base. The friendly ants[16] tried to keep the tree upright, but the water continued to rise and the Beaver kept on gnawing. Then the Black Cat in his sore dilemma called out, "Grandpa, come!" The grandfather responded, "I am coming; wait till I get my moccasins." The water ...
— Contribution to Passamaquoddy Folk-Lore • J. Walter Fewkes
... what us does now. Most times it was meat and bread wid turnip greens, lye hominy, milk, and butter. All our cookin' was done on open fireplaces. Oh! I was fond of 'possums, sprinkled wid butter and pepper, and baked down 'til de gravy was good and brown. You was lucky if you got to eat 'possum and gnaw de bones atter my Ma done ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - Volume II. Arkansas Narratives. Part I • Work Projects Administration
... If we do not know how they retard germination, we know at all events how they render it impossible at this later stage. It is the young plant which absorbs the glucose, and which must therefore be destroyed; they cut off the radicle with their mandibles, and gnaw the stalk; the germ is thus suppressed. They have not yet finished their manipulations, which must enable them to preserve without further alteration the provisions which they have already rendered palatable. They bring out all their provisions to the sun, ...
— The Industries of Animals • Frederic Houssay
... at first its rage dissemble may, 'Twill soon upon thee as a lion prey; 'Twill roar, 'twill rend, 'twill tear, 'twill kill out- right, Its living death will gnaw thee day and night: Thy pleasures now to paws and teeth it turns, In thee its tickling lusts, like brimstone burns. Wherefore beware, and keep it out of door, Lest it should on thee as a ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... sort, At Whitehall and Westminster he stood guard, Reading men's faces with most anxious eye. There the lords swarmed, some waspish and some bland, But none would pause at plucking of the sleeve To hearken to him, and the lad had died On London stones for lack of crust to gnaw But that he caught the age's malady, The something magical that was in air, And made men poets, heroes, demi-gods— Made Shakespeare, Rawleigh, Grenvile, Oxenham, And set them stars in the fore-front of Time. In fine, young Darrell drew of that same air A valiant breath, and shipped with Francis ...
— Wyndham Towers • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... said James, "he could not gnaw any thing on his own neck." Rollo thought so too, and they both tried to bite their own collar ribands, by way of showing ...
— Rollo at Play - Safe Amusements • Jacob Abbott
... at once to beautify it with her rich and luxuriant verdure. For example, as soon as the fires went out over the clearing, she began, with her sun and rain, to blanch the blackened stumps, and to gnaw at their foundations with her tooth of decay. If Albert made a road or a path she rounded its angles, softened away all the roughness that his plow or hoe had left in it, and fringed it with grass and flowers. The solitary and slender trees which had been left standing here and ...
— Mary Erskine • Jacob Abbott
... passage, the pollen-mass upon its back necessarily comes first into contact with the viscid stigma,' which takes up the pollen; and this is how that orchid is fertilised. Or take this other case of the Catasetum 'Bees visit these flowers in order to gnaw the labellum; in doing this they inevitably touch a long, tapering, sensitive projection. This, when touched, transmits a sensation or vibration to a certain membrane, which is instantly ruptured, setting free a spring, by which the pollen-mass is shot forth like an arrow in the right ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... rolled in new snow like an animal; paid no heed to the firing of a gun, but became alert at the cracking of a nut; sometimes grew wildly angry; all his powers were then enlarged; was delighted with hills and woods, and always tried to escape after being taken to them; when angry would gnaw clothing and hurl furniture about; feared to look from a height, and Itard cured him of spasms of rage by holding his head out of a window; met all efforts to teach him with apathy, and learned but ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... saplings of a species unknown to me had been gnawed fully ten feet from the ground. This puzzled me. Squirrels could not have done it, nor rabbits, nor birds. Presently I hit upon the solution. The bark and boughs of this particular sapling were food for deer, and to gnaw so high the deer must have stood upon six ...
— The Young Forester • Zane Grey
... outside the door, and I was beginning to gnaw the lean limbs of the Normandy chicken, to drink the clear cider and to munch the hunk of white bread, which was ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... water; cattle, no, not any fish nor fowl can penetrate them. Old stalks succumb slowly; the bed soil is quagmire, settling with the weight as it fills and fills. Too slowly for counting they raise little islands from the bog and reclaim the land. The waters pushed out cut deeper channels, gnaw off the edges of ...
— The Land of Little Rain • Mary Austin
... Let him gnaw, forsooth, with his freezing tooth, On our roof-tiles, till he tire; But we care not a whit, as we jovial sit Before our ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 3 (of 4) • Various
... will be feasting in the lodges of the Iroquois, And scalps will hang on the high ridge pole, But wolves will roam where the Yengees dwelt And will gnaw the bones of them all, Of the man, the woman, and the child. Victory and glory Aieroski gives to his children, The Mighty Six ...
— The Scouts of the Valley • Joseph A. Altsheler
... eyes, the good things of others, she hates them for their possessions, longs to possess them herself, lets her covetousness gnaw hourly at her very vitals, and yet, in conversation with others, slays with slander, vile innuendo, and falsehood, the reputation of those whose ...
— Quit Your Worrying! • George Wharton James
... to weep, oh let my fate Move your compassion—it is horrible! I am—say, rather was—a prince. I might Have been most happy, had I only curb'd The impatience of my passionate desires: But envy gnaw'd my heart—I saw the youth Of mine own cousin Leopold endow'd With honor, and enrich'd with broad domains, The while myself, of equal age with him, In abject slavish nonage was ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. III • Kuno Francke (Editor-in-Chief)
... extraordinary fashion. When the black leader ran off, you remember, his harness was still on him. He must have met Kotuko the dog, and played or fought with him, for his shoulder-loop had caught in the plaited copper wire of Kotuko's collar, and had drawn tight, so that neither could get at the trace to gnaw it apart, but each was fastened sidelong to his neighbour's neck. That, with the freedom of hunting on their own account, must have helped to cure their ...
— The Second Jungle Book • Rudyard Kipling
... sea dwellers could supply the water they needed. But lacking net, line, or hooks, how did one fish? Yesterday, using his stunner, he had brought down a bird, to discover the carcass so rank even the wolverines, never dainty eaters, refused to gnaw it. ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... not immoderate in their grief. The deception might have been deeper, and the loss more alarming and great. And then what was their grief at that hour, compared with the misery that must gnaw at the hearts of the deceivers, as inseparable from their guilt. What gift in the wide world would tempt them to exchange places with the wretched creatures? What a thorny road of perdition must their way of life be! How they must whiten and ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee
... the squirrels have known this and the stripped spindles lie by the score under the big pasture pines where these have left them after eating the seeds. It seems much work for small pay for the squirrel. He must climb venturesomely to the very tip of the slippery limb, gnaw the cone from its hold, then run down the tree and gnaw it to pieces for the tiny seeds within. So light are these seeds, wing and all, that it takes twenty to thirty thousand of them to weigh a pound and it is probably fortunate that ...
— Old Plymouth Trails • Winthrop Packard
... Dagaeoga. I am thinking of them all the time. I confess to you that I am so hungry I could gnaw the inside of the fresh bark upon a tree, and if I were turned loose upon a deer, slain and cooked, I could eat him all from the tip of his nose to the ...
— The Masters of the Peaks - A Story of the Great North Woods • Joseph A. Altsheler
... steal into your brain and colour your thoughts, and you will become for a moment what he was who wrote it; nay, not for a moment only, but for many barren moonlit nights and sunless sterile days will a despair that is not your own make its dwelling within you, and the misery of another gnaw your heart away. Read the whole book, suffer it to tell even one of its secrets to your soul, and your soul will grow eager to know more, and will feed upon poisonous honey, and seek to repent of strange crimes of which it is guiltless, and to make atonement for terrible ...
— Intentions • Oscar Wilde
... Sandy declared that he was not hungry. He went to the window and, pulling back the curtain, stared out into the night. Was all the rest of life going to be like this? Was that restless, nervous, intolerable pain going to gnaw at his heart forever? ...
— Sandy • Alice Hegan Rice
... scripture hath a body with out/ and within a soule/ sprite & life. It hath [with] out a barke/ a shell and as it were an hard bone for [the] fleshly mynded to gnaw vppon. And within it hath pith/ cornell/ mary & all swetnesse for Gods electe which he hath chosen to geve them his spirite/ & to write his law & [the] faith of his sonne in ...
— The prophete Ionas with an introduccion • William Tyndale
... thinking of her he heard a mouse gnawing under the boards, and every night after the mouse came to gnaw. 'The teeth of regret are the same; my life is being gnawed away. Never shall I see her.' It seemed impossible that life would close on him without his seeing her face or hearing her voice again, and he began to think how it would be if they were to meet on the other ...
— The Lake • George Moore
... rheumatism. Tough guys- -frontiersmen—Pah!" He spat out the exclamation with disgust, then closed his eyes again and sank back against his burden. "Coyotes! That's what they are! They'd rob a carcass, they'd gnaw each other's bones to get through ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach
... eaten,' said I, 'these weeks ago, just as far as ever it will get; and that's as far as a rat can gnaw into a marlinespike. . . . Come out of this into fresh air,' said I with another look round on our images repeated in the mirrors. 'There are too many Farrells and Foes here. When I ran the game, at Versailles that ...
— Foe-Farrell • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... on the top of a broad, flat rock. And sitting down right in the center of it, he began to gnaw at the chestnut. He was so busy and so interested in what he was doing that before he knew it the rock began to move. It moved so slowly that it was not until it started to climb a little hummock, and nearly tipped Frisky over ...
— The Tale of Frisky Squirrel • Arthur Scott Bailey
... Dulness with transport eyes the lively dunce, Remembering she herself was pertness once. Now (shame to Fortune![261]) an ill run at play Blank'd his bold visage, and a thin third day; Swearing and supperless the hero sate, Blasphemed his gods, the dice, and damn'd his fate. Then gnaw'd his pen, then dash'd it on the ground, Sinking from thought to thought, a vast profound! Plunged for his sense, but found no bottom there, Yet wrote and floundered on, in mere despair. 120 Round him much embryo, much abortion lay, Much future ode, and abdicated play; Nonsense ...
— Poetical Works of Pope, Vol. II • Alexander Pope
... Him more. They don't trust God; they trust money. Yet I tell you it will work. Go ahead—do your work in the world, and you won't starve nor your children beg in the streets.'" McHurdie stopped a moment to gnaw his plug of tobacco. "The general's gitting kind of a crank—and I told ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... till the sun went down, or life went out. The smaller red champion had fastened himself like a vise to his adversary's front, and through all the tumblings on that field never for an instant ceased to gnaw at one of his feelers near the root, having already caused the other to go by the board; while the stronger black one dashed him from side to side, and, as I saw on looking nearer, had already divested him of several of his members. They fought with more pertinacity than bulldogs. ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... string up dere next de door step lookin up in dey eyes. Old Missus would say, 'Ain' I got a pretty crop of little niggers comin on?' De lady, she look so please like. Den Miss Ross say, 'Do my little niggers want some bread to gnaw on?' En us chillun say, 'Yes'um, yes'um, we do.' Den she would go in de pantry en see could she find some cook bread to hand us. She had a heap of fine little niggers, too, cause de yard would be ...
— Slave Narratives Vol. XIV. South Carolina, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... against the stones, And now they pick the bishop's bones; They gnaw'd the flesh from every limb, For they were sent to do judgment ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various
... Indians were summoned to his aid. He spoke courteously to Tandakora, but, as his words were in the Ojibway dialect, Robert did not understand them. The Indian made a guttural reply and continued to gnaw fiercely at the bone of the deer. De Courcelles still took no offense, and spoke again, his words smooth and his face smiling. Then Tandakora, in his deep guttural, spoke rapidly and with heat. When he had finished de Courcelles turned to his ...
— The Hunters of the Hills • Joseph Altsheler
... groans with shame and plate, Still fawning to the sham-crowned head That hopes front brazen turneth fate! Drink till the comer last is full, And never hear in revels' lull, Grim Vengeance forging arrows fleet, Whilst I gnaw at the crust Of Exile in the dust— But Honor ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo
... gone by it had been a stable, and had a double loft over it that was only to be reached by a ladder in the last stage of dilapidation. Bunty scrambled up, sat down in an unhappy little heap among some straw, and began thoughtfully to gnaw an apple. ...
— Seven Little Australians • Ethel Sybil Turner
... was a buzz of conversation going on—there always is; but at last, when the Rev. Mr. Burgess rose and laid his hand on the sack, he could hear his microbes gnaw, the place was so still. He related the curious history of the sack, then went on to speak in warm terms of Hadleyburg's old and well-earned reputation for spotless honesty, and of the town's just pride in this reputation. He said that this reputation was ...
— The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg • Mark Twain
... men that night, and in the tumult to steal Hugues away; whereafter, as Adhelmar pointed out, Hugues might readily take ship for England, and leave the marshal to blaspheme Fortune in Normandy, and the French King to gnaw at his chains in Bordeaux, while Hugues toasts his shins in comfort at London. Adhelmar admitted that the plan was a mad one, but added, reasonably enough, that needs must when the devil drives. And so firm was his confidence, so cheery his laugh—he managed to laugh somehow, though it was ...
— The Line of Love - Dizain des Mariages • James Branch Cabell
... And he'd gnaw thro' a rope in the night-time, He'd eat thro' a wall or a door, He'd shwim thro' a lough in the winther, To be wid ...
— The Dog's Book of Verse • Various
... wretched and miserable. I shall ne'er recover of this disease: hot Iron gnaw their fists! they have struck a Fever into my shoulder, which I shall ne'er shake out again, I fear me, till with a true Habeas Corpus the Sexton remove me. Oh, if I take prison once, I shall be pressed to death with Actions, but not so happy as speedily; perhaps I may be forty year ...
— The Puritain Widow • William Shakespeare [Apocrypha]
... may not be amiss to give D'Alembert's theory of book-worms: "I believe," he says, "that a little beetle lays her eggs in books in August, thence is hatched a mite, like the cheese-mite, which devours books merely because it is compelled to gnaw its way out into the air." Book-worms like the paste which binders employ, but D'Alembert adds that they cannot endure absinthe. Mr. Blades finds too that they disdain to devour our ...
— The Library • Andrew Lang
... the masts. They climbed everywhere, up or down, on a sail or its leach, a single rope or a backstay. The mate and myself, with the steward, could shut the doors of our rooms and keep them out until they chose to gnaw through, but the poor devils forward had no such refuge. Their forecastles and the galley and carpenter shop were wide open. Man after man was nipped, awake or asleep, on deck or below, or up aloft in the dark, when, reaching for another ...
— The Grain Ship • Morgan Robertson
... the rat, 'gnaw your own tail;' and off he went laughing at the joke. The miserable weasel cried and sniffed, and sniffed and cried, till by-and-by he heard the rat come back and begin to scratch outside. Presently the rat stopped, and was going away again, when the weasel begged and prayed ...
— Wood Magic - A Fable • Richard Jefferies
... like worms in the bud would gnaw at his peace. The first was conscience: if the Syndic did not know he had reason to suspect that Basterga bore the Grand Duke's commission, and was in Geneva to further his master's ends. The second source of his uneasiness he did not acknowledge even ...
— The Long Night • Stanley Weyman
... are not without war Thy living ones, and one doth gnaw the other Of those whom one wall ...
— Dante's Purgatory • Dante
... and she met a rat. So she said: "Rat! rat! gnaw rope; rope won't hang butcher; butcher won't kill ox; ox won't drink water; water won't quench fire; fire won't burn stick; stick won't beat dog; dog won't bite pig; piggy won't get over the stile; and I shan't get home tonight." But ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... know that many evil things are done in the wide world. The fierce robbers come down from the mountains, and carry off the little children, and sell them to the Moors. The lions lie in wait for the caravans, and leap upon the camels. The wild boar roots up the corn in the valley, and the foxes gnaw the vines upon the hill. The pirates lay waste the sea-coast and burn the ships of the fishermen, and take their nets from them. In the salt-marshes live the lepers; they have houses of wattled reeds, and none may come nigh them. ...
— A House of Pomegranates • Oscar Wilde
... leg with his left hind foot for a minute and said, "I can gnaw pegs with my sharp teeth and I can put them in with my paws." "Good," said the Sheep and the Pig, "you may come with us!" Then they met a gray Goose who could pull moss and stuff it in cracks, and a Cock who ...
— A Study of Fairy Tales • Laura F. Kready
... Love and Truth that in my plays abide Shall teach the lesson of equal justice; Nothing that's wrong can prosper on this earth, And though your crime-secret be hid in mounts Of adamant, kissing, loftiest sky, The worm of detection and exposure Shall gnaw its way through rugged, granite ribs And blow your foul wickedness around the world. Men, states and empires, rise and flash like bubbles On the rolling ocean of existence, And then like the false, shimmering vision Of a dream, pass into nameless oblivion. The hours, days, years and ...
— Shakspere, Personal Recollections • John A. Joyce |
