"Insecurely" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... its blower: as it now stands, "one fiddle" among many, the faulty individual will, I hope, escape detection. The story of the flying play-bill is calculated to expose a practice much too common, of pinning play- bills to the cushions insecurely, and frequently, I fear, not pinning them at all, if these lines save one play-bill only front the fate I have recorded, I shall not deem my labour ill employed. The concluding episode of Patrick Jennings glances at the boorish fashion of wearing the hat ...
— Rejected Addresses: or, The New Theatrum Poetarum • James and Horace Smith
... idiom to me, and expressing itself by shouts, clangour, trumpeting, gesticulations, and rhythmic pacings that stun and dismay my nerves, I find, the same object sought, release from self, and the same end, the end of identification with the immortal, successfully if perhaps rather insecurely achieved. I see God indubitably present in these excitements, and I see personalities I could easily have misjudged as too base or too dense for spiritual understandings, lit by the manifest reflection of divinity. One may be led into the absurdest underestimates of religious possibilities ...
— God The Invisible King • Herbert George Wells
... have slipped from her as she fell," remarked the latter, after a cursory examination of the glittering trinket. "The pin by which she attached it to her dress must have been insecurely fastened." Then quickly and with a sharp look at Miss Tuttle: "Do you know if this was ...
— The Filigree Ball • Anna Katharine Green
... in a few years, and in a most prosaic business way, became the head of a society of ruffians. Mixing with fast clerks and unsuspecting middle-class profligates, he found out particulars of houses ill guarded, and shops insecurely fastened, and "put up" Blicks's ready ruffians to the more dangerous work. In his various disguises, and under his many names, he found his way into those upper circles of "fast" society, where animals turn into birds, where a wolf becomes ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... again disappeared. Henry VII. sat too insecurely on his throne to venture on a resolute reform, even if his feelings had inclined him towards it, which they did not. Morton durst not resolutely grapple with the evil. He rebuked and remonstrated; but punishment would have caused a public scandal. He would not invite the inspection of the laity into ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude
... muttered "non, nons" of dissuasion in the crowd, but nobody claimed the "job," and Villate was but too glad to get a man to go. In a moment the young man had stripped to his shirt and red drawers, taken his axe and stepped to the basket, but it was found to be insecurely attached; and afterward several better modes of handling the line were suggested, in all causing a delay of ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 10 • Various
... adhered to this programme. Every time he was thus awakened he drove back the wolves with flying brands, replenished the fire, and rearranged the pine-knot on his hand. All worked well, but there came a time when he fastened the pine- knot insecurely. As his eyes closed it fell away from ...
— White Fang • Jack London
... now he was nearly out of his depth, too buoyed up to walk and apparently nearly helpless,—Mr. Polly, fortunately for them both, could not reach him. Uncle Jim made the clumsy gestures of those who struggle insecurely in the water. "Keep out," said Mr. Polly. Uncle Jim with a great effort got a footing, emerged until his arm-pits were out of water, until his waistcoat buttons showed, one by one, till scarcely two remained, and made for ...
— The History of Mr. Polly • H. G. Wells
... seventy-two hundred tickets. Then for thirty-seven days he conducted an auction-sale of the treasures at Fonthill, charging a half-guinea admission. He ultimately sold the estate for $1,750,000. In 1825 the tower, which had been insecurely built, fell with a great crash, and so frightened the new owner, who was an invalid, that, though unhurt by the disaster, he died soon afterwards. The estate was again sold and the abbey taken down, so that now only the foundations can ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... relapsed into moody silence. Down the stairs, and on the street he preceded her, contemptuously letting her trail behind. He carried her suitcase, however, and once, being insecurely fastened, it opened and bits of untidy apparel littered the pavement. He dropped the suitcase and stood by while she filled it again. The softness of that moment, when, lured by her bare arms he had ...
— Dangerous Days • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... so with the question of the cost of drainage. If the work is insecurely done, and is liable, in five years or in fifty, to become worthless; the increase of the crops resulting from it, must not only cover the yearly interest on the cost, but the yearly depreciation as well. Therefore what may seem at the time of doing the ...
— Draining for Profit, and Draining for Health • George E. Waring
... once more as the Centre of the World, emerging so, in the experience of this good Quaker, through the Stygian mud-vortexes and general Mother of Dead Dogs, whereon, for the present, all swags and insecurely hovers, as ...
— Past and Present - Thomas Carlyle's Collected Works, Vol. XIII. • Thomas Carlyle
... continues our eloquent Professor, 'Man is a Tool-using Animal (Handthierendes Thier). Weak in himself, and of small stature, he stands on a basis, at most for the flattest-soled, of some half-square foot, insecurely enough; has to straddle out his legs, lest the very wind supplant him. Feeblest of bipeds! Three quintals are a crushing load for him; the steer of the meadow tosses him aloft, like a waste rag. Nevertheless he can use Tools, can devise Tools: ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... "And a half," he said, tentatively, as an angler who feels the mouth of the fish that he fears may be insecurely hooked. ...
— The Gates of Chance • Van Tassel Sutphen
... of an intensely modern Gobelin sofa, studied her cousin as he balanced himself insecurely on one of the small gilt chairs which always look ...
— Madame de Treymes • Edith Wharton
... At last the ford was complete. Ida stepped daintily over the bridge she had made, and jumped triumphantly on to the big stone. Alas! for trusting to appearances. The stone that looked so firm, was insecurely balanced below, and at the first shock one side went down with a splash, and Ida went with it. What a triumph for the shrimps! She scrambled to the bank, however, made up a charming bunch of primroses, ...
— Mrs. Overtheway's Remembrances • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... having to grip rope and line hard enough to keep a little check upon my descent. I followed the edge of the sail right away out over the sea, to where it was secured to the large horizontal projecting boom, and here my feet rested as I held on and looked inboard from where I insecurely stood, faintly making out the figure of Bob Hampton, who was in perfect ignorance of my descent, though how it was he did not hear the rustling I cannot make out, unless he was asleep—though he never would own ...
— Sail Ho! - A Boy at Sea • George Manville Fenn
... was undergoing that peculiar form of feminine torture known as a "fitting"; but insecurely basted, pinned, and tucked as she was, she came flying down to the gate to ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach
... hand, the intoxicating liquor. Tu-Kila-Kila took the bowl, and drank a second time, for he had drunk of it once with his dinner already. It was seldom he allowed himself the luxury of a second draught of that very stupefying native intoxicant, for he knew too well the danger of insecurely guarding his sacred tree; but on this particular occasion, as on so many others in the collective life of humanity, "the woman tempted him," and he acted as she told him. He drank it off deep. "Ha, ha! that is good!" he cried, ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen
... from theoretic premises, (as in Knox's "Races of Man,") clever generalizations from fortuitous analogies and coincidences insufficiently weighed, (as in Pococke's "India in Greece,") or, to take a philologic example, speculations suggestive of thought, it may be, but too insecurely based on positive data, (as in Rapp's "Physiologie der Sprache,") we shall vainly seek for such originality in Mr. Mueller's Lectures. But if we take it to mean, as we certainly prefer to do, safety of conclusion founded on thorough knowledge ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... other things were packed in large covered baskets insecurely fastened with padlocks. As time went on, covers became loose and padlocks were knocked off by projecting rocks, but nothing was ever lost or stolen. To keep out wet or vermin I had the baskets lined with ...
— A Wayfarer in China - Impressions of a trip across West China and Mongolia • Elizabeth Kendall
... never been a pair. He sat upon a rickety, straw-bottomed chair under an improvised awning which was made up of four poles and a bit of sacking. He had a table in front of him—a table partially and very insecurely propped up by a bundle of old papers and books, since no two of its four legs were completely whole—and on the table there was a neckless bottle half-filled with ink, a few sheets of paper and a couple of ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... the wagon where she now slept, she saw the three men standing in a group, rage on Courant's face, disgust on Daddy John's, and on David's an abstraction of aghast dismay that was not unlike despair. To her question Daddy John gave a short answer. David's horses, insecurely picketed, had pulled up their stakes in the night and gone. A memory of the young man's exhaustion the evening before, told the girl the story; David had forgotten to picket them and immediately after supper had fallen ...
— The Emigrant Trail • Geraldine Bonner
... coming was awaited. The gown, made like a wrapper to show the line of a white bosom, was of pearl-gray moire with large open sleeves, from which issued the arms covered with a second sleeve of puffed tulle, divided by straps and trimmed with lace at the wrists. The beautiful hair, which the comb held insecurely, escaped from a cap ...
— Beatrix • Honore de Balzac
... later one of the Persians saw close by one of the towers the mouth of an old underground passage, which was insecurely concealed with some few small stones. In the night he came there alone, and, making trial of the entrance, got inside the circuit-wall; then at daybreak he reported the whole matter to Cabades. The king himself on the following night came to the spot with a few men, bringing ...
— History of the Wars, Books I and II (of 8) - The Persian War • Procopius
... stabbed his groin, as though he had been stuck by a penknife; each time he bent his ankle in the recover the mal de raquette twisted his calves, and stretched his ankle tendons until he felt that his very feet were insecurely attached and would drop off. During the evening he sat quiet, but after he had fallen asleep from the mere exhaustion of the day's toil, he doubled up, straightened out, groaned aloud, and spoke ...
— The Silent Places • Stewart Edward White
... launch, various modes of landing are required by the vagaries of the tide, the outlying reefs, and the position of the ports. A wobbling erection of crossed oars, a plank insecurely poised on the shoulders of two men, a rocking bloto, and an occasional wade to shore, with shoes and stockings in hand, vary the monotony of the proceedings. Landing at Batjan is accomplished in a chair, borne aloft ...
— Through the Malay Archipelago • Emily Richings
... relatives; on the contrary, he is a citizen of every country, and can fearlessly look down upon the troublesome accidents of fortune. But he who thinks himself entrenched in defences not of learning but of luck, moves in slippery paths, struggling through life unsteadily and insecurely." ...
— Ten Books on Architecture • Vitruvius
... one of the most unmitigated young imps that ever ate taro as handsome "as a picture," and a most notorious scandalmonger and spy. He was only thirteen years of age, and was of rebel blood, and, child as he was, he knew that his head stood very insecurely upon his shoulders, and that it would be promptly removed therefrom if any of King Malietoa's troops could catch him spying in flagrante delicto. Two years before, he had attached himself to me, and had ...
— The Call Of The South - 1908 • Louis Becke
... the wind, striking the sea like flails, came momentary pauses or long silences. In one of these the woman raised her arms, she the while unheeding the cold tide wash about her feet, where she stood insecurely on the ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker
... been called to go to the druggist's for some medicine, and he came out of the house in such haste, calling to Joe to follow him, that nothing more was thought of the insecurely prisoned monkey. ...
— Mr. Stubbs's Brother - A Sequel to 'Toby Tyler' • James Otis
... cabin to escape this downpour. But they were fearful that at any moment the flying machine, resting so insecurely upon the shelf of ice, would be washed into ...
— On a Torn-Away World • Roy Rockwood
... cheers] which goes by the name of the British Empire was supposed to be so insecurely founded, and so loosely knit together, that at the first touch of serious menace from without it would fall to pieces and ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War from the Beginning to March 1915, Vol 1, No. 2 - Who Began the War, and Why? • Various
... plenty of attention until frost commences its havocs; shoots will need thinning, and the branches must be secured to stout stakes firmly placed in the earth; autumnal winds wreak great destruction among such branches as are insecurely made fast, and a number of handsome blooms are thus destroyed without coming to perfection. Insects are very fond of infesting dahlias, and their depredations must be guarded against. Hollyhocks, if entirely free from disease, will still be handsome ...
— Little Folks (Septemeber 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... failure of Nicaraguan justice. An American citizen named Wilson, residing at Rama, in the Mosquito territory, was murdered by one Argueello, the acting governor of the town. After some delay the murderer was arrested, but so insecurely confined or guarded that he escaped, and notwithstanding our repeated demands it is claimed that his recapture has been impossible by reason of his flight beyond ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Volume 8, Section 2 (of 2): Grover Cleveland • Grover Cleveland
... strangely-fashioned vases were scattered around. One of the latter, in particular, attracted his attention; it was of crystal, and fine figures were cut thereon. He lifted it up and turned it on all sides; but, oh horror! he had not observed that it had a lid, which was but insecurely fastened on: it fell to the floor, and ...
— The Oriental Story Book - A Collection of Tales • Wilhelm Hauff
... time they in the ships were at their wits end, hearing nothing from us ashore, and not knowing well what to do. They rode very insecurely in an open anchorage, the wind blowing continually hard at S.S.E. inclosed all round with shoals, and their water beginning to fail, as we had started fifty tons in our large ship to lighten her when we got aground. While in this perplexity, an honest true-hearted ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr
... old Dutch striking-clock that never went correctly and always caused confusion, all at once found itself hanging on a branch of the pear tree, brightly illuminated by the beams of the May sun, while under it stood insecurely the round worm-eaten dining-table which, when there happened to be very little on it, had so often elicited from us the wish that we could have everything that had ever been eaten off it. However, the whole affair was also, quite naturally, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various
... wolf was at the door. The "Saints" held daily meetings, and the people had time enough to attend them. Winter proved how insecurely the town was established, how feeble were its roots; it was not here as it was up in the country, where a man could enjoy himself in the knowledge that the earth was working for him. Here people made themselves as small and ate as little as possible, in order to win through ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo |
