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Nail   Listen
verb
Nail  v. t.  (past & past part. nailed; pres. part. nailing)  
1.
To fasten with a nail or nails; to close up or secure by means of nails; as, to nail boards to the beams. "He is now dead, and nailed in his chest."
2.
To stud or boss with nails, or as with nails. "The rivets of your arms were nailed with gold."
3.
To fasten, as with a nail; to bind or hold, as to a bargain or to acquiescence in an argument or assertion; hence, to catch; to trap. "When they came to talk of places in town, you saw at once how I nailed them."
4.
To spike, as a cannon. (Obs.)
To nail an assertion or To nail a lie, etc., to detect and expose it, so as to put a stop to its currency; an expression probably derived from the former practice of shopkeepers, who were accustomed to nail bad or counterfeit pieces of money to the counter.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Nail" Quotes from Famous Books



... played out for the simple reason that they were not well fitted out. The country east of Grand River was "very broken and flinty and their ponies unshod." It has been claimed, although maybe with some exaggeration, that not "a single horse-shoe or nail" had been provided for ...
— The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War • Annie Heloise Abel

... who will pay the two cents," laughed Betty. "I will, and then you can give me half a one-cent lead pencil to make change. Papa always has such a joke about a man in one of Mr. Lowell's poems who used to change a board nail for a shingle nail so as to make the ...
— Betty Leicester - A Story For Girls • Sarah Orne Jewett

... prayer or litany wailed Such grief and loss: Our weak thought may not enfold Nor thee behold As thou wert when He was nailed Upon the Cross. 98 For to thee, O lovely face, Wherein Heaven's beauty shone, What woe was given When the Cross on high they place And thereupon Nail['e]d the Son of Heaven, Even thy Son! 99 Over the crowd's heads on high He who was ever thy delight Came to thy sight, To the Cross nail['e]d cruelly, Thou standing by, Thou the mother of Him who died There crucified! 100 O frail Queen of Holiness, ...
— Four Plays of Gil Vicente • Gil Vicente

... of artistic hands, to the ring of Polycrates, for instance, with its early specimen of engraved smaragdus, as to the mythical necklace of Harmonia. Pheidon of Argos first makes coined money, and the obelisci—the old nail-shaped iron money, now disused- -are hung up in the temple of Here; for, even thus early, the temples are in the way of becoming museums. Names like those of Eucheir and Eugrammus, who were said to have taken the art of baking clay vases from Samos to Etruria, have still a legendary ...
— Greek Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater

... all poisonous substances should be carefully labelled, and kept out of children's reach. If by accident a child should have taken poison administer an antidote (see Poisoning). Should a child swallow a nail, button or some such hard substance, do not give any purgative medicine. It will pass out more safely when embedded in solid faeces. Examine the stools carefully so that anxiety may be allayed when the ...
— Papers on Health • John Kirk

... married wife, upstood like a fury long-thwarted, and, in lieu of her husband, already fled, flung herself tooth and nail on Azalea. ...
— On the Makaloa Mat/Island Tales • Jack London

... mind, decide the innocence or guilt of the accused, and if he thought the accusation sustained, order the culprit to punishment. He did not imitate his Mussulman prototypes to the extent of bowstringing or decapitating the condemned, nor did he cut any thief's hands off, nor yet nail his ears to a doorpost, but he introduced a modification of the bastinado that made those who were punished by it even wish they were dead. The instrument used was what is called in the South a "shake" —a split shingle, ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy

... fifty persons in the same company who could do the same thing; that there was not one who could not 'plug nineteen bullets out of twenty,' as they termed it, within an inch of the head of a ten-penny nail. ...
— American Prisoners of the Revolution • Danske Dandridge

... on some happy-message. In fact, I found my heart on the point of corruption, by indulging in what I had set down in my vocabulary as the lust of the eye, and had some faint surmise that I was plunging into obduracy. I accordingly made a private mark with the nail of my thumb, on the "act of contrition" in my prayer-book, and another on the Salve Regina, that I might remember to confess for these devilish wanderings. But what all my personal piety could not effect, a lucky turn in the road accomplished, by bringing ...
— The Station; The Party Fight And Funeral; The Lough Derg Pilgrim • William Carleton

... back to the fly-leaf and began to nail the last fallacy a little tighter to the cross. The girl regarded him, first with amused impatience, then with a vexed frown, finally with a wistful regret. He was so very old for his age, she thought; he could not be much beyond thirty; his hair was thick and ...
— Comedies of Courtship • Anthony Hope

... the duchess, "but the cardinal enrages me with his half-measures. Mon Dieu! are these eternal waverings worthy of a man? For myself, I do not ask a sword, I do not ask a dagger; give me but a nail, and I, a woman, and almost a dwarf, will go, like a new Jael, and drive it into the temple of this other Sisera. Then all will be finished; and, if I fail, no one ...
— The Conspirators - The Chevalier d'Harmental • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)

... after one terrified glance, and then she dragged Mary-Clare to the couch; ran for water; took a towel from a nail and bathed the white, stained face. During this Noreen's sobs grew less and less, she became quieter and was able, presently, to ...
— At the Crossroads • Harriet T. Comstock

... dear hero-brother Amos. Ah! I see he wants to stop me, but, dear Aunt Kate, you must use your royal authority and back me up; and when I have done, you can put in what notes and comments and addenda and corrigenda you like, and tell me if I have not just hit the right nail ...
— Amos Huntingdon • T.P. Wilson

... hellion is going to nail us, now!" bellowed Captain Wass. In his panic and his fury he leaped up and down, pulling ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day

... property to the extent of half a million, the interruption of the employment of 7000 people, and the loss of 100 lives, has been the consequence. Surely there never was a more striking illustration of the Old Richard proverb: 'For want of a nail the shoe was lost, for want of a shoe the horse was ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 440 - Volume 17, New Series, June 5, 1852 • Various

... she turned the reluctant bolts of the lock, and pushed open the nail-studded door. She slowly advanced along the uneven floor of the aisle, and had just reached the chancel arch, when something suddenly stirred, making her start violently. It was still, and after a pause she again advanced, but her heart gave a sudden ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge

... raft just in time to save Binney, who he thought was Winn, from being dropped overboard by Plater, the "river-trader." The old negro attacked the big man so furiously with tooth and nail that the latter gave the lad in his arms a fling to one side, sending him crashing with stunning force against the "shanty," and devoted his entire attention to this new assailant. He had just stretched Solon on the deck with a vicious blow of ...
— Raftmates - A Story of the Great River • Kirk Munroe

... right combination nation for me, to give real distinction to my undertaking. I have money, but they ain't the sort you can buy with money. There must be an incentive. If I get what they want, perhaps I can get them.' So I went into the job tooth and nail. Neither you nor Fenton was on the spot. I was—very much on it. Nothing was definitely fixed up between the Government and Fenton for the right to excavate at the Mountain of the Golden Pyramid, as they call the little old molehill, and I scored. Now, if ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson

... now, and therefore had no difficulty in moving about the hut, from whose low roof, after a good deal of trying, I at last obtained a piece of palm-leaf that seemed likely to suit my purpose. This done, my need was a point of some kind—a pin, a nail, the tongue of a buckle, a hard sharp piece of wood, ...
— Bunyip Land - A Story of Adventure in New Guinea • George Manville Fenn

... women to live altogether with men. Now, what I wish is, that the hinder part of the cabin, where you used to stow away your dried birds, should be made over to me. We have oars with which we can make a division, and then nail up seal skins, so that I may have that part of the cabin to myself. Now, do you ...
— The Little Savage • Captain Marryat

... that bad is good if you are only enlightened, and that there is no real difference between being shaved and not being shaved. The difference, they say, is only a difference of degree; everything is evolutionary and relative. Shavedness is immanent in man. Every ten-penny nail is a Potential Razor. The superstitious people of the past (they say) believed that a lot of black bristles standing out at right angles to one's face was a positive affair. But the higher criticism teaches us better. Bristles are merely ...
— Tremendous Trifles • G. K. Chesterton

... affairs that at last the stream of events favored him. With infinite effort he had achieved the astonishing diplomatic feat of inducing the Senate, with only six negative votes, to permit Great Britain to renounce, without equivalent, treaty rights which she had for fifty years defended tooth and nail. This unprecedented triumph in his negotiations with the Senate enabled him to carry one step further his measures for general peace. About England the Senate could make no further effective opposition, for England was won, and ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams

... of three. On that vast frame of bone and muscle, fatigue seemed to leave no trace. Upon that inexorable bestial determination difficulties beyond belief left no mark. Not one of the twelve men under his command fighting the stubborn ice with tooth and nail who was not galvanised with his tremendous energy. It was as though a spur was in their flanks, a lash upon their backs. Their minds, their wills, their efforts, their physical strength to the last ounce and pennyweight belonged indissolubly to him. For the time being they were his slaves, his serfs, ...
— A Man's Woman • Frank Norris

... civilly, and asked him what he wanted. He tried to make a bargain with her but could effect nothing, unless King Charming would consent to marry Troutina. The enchanter found this bride so ugly that he could not advise. Still, the Blue Bird had run so many risks in his cage: the nail it was hung upon had broken, and the king suffered much in the fall; Minetta, the cat, had glowered at him with her green eyes; the attendants had forgotten his hemp-seed and his water-glass, so that he was half dying of hunger and thirst; and a monkey had plucked at his ...
— The Fairy Book - The Best Popular Stories Selected and Rendered Anew • Dinah Maria Mulock (AKA Miss Mulock)

... advises any woman who is struck by a ruffian to strike him again; or if she cannot clench her fists, and he advises all women in these singular times to learn to clench their fists, to go at him with tooth and nail, and not to be afraid of the result, for any fellow who is dastard enough to strike a woman, would allow himself to be beaten by a woman, were she to make at him in self-defence, even if, instead of possessing the stately height and athletic proportions of the aforesaid ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow

... copper properties, I was assailed as fiercely as though I had advocated anarchy or had prepared a scheme of wholesale plundering. In stock affairs innovations are resented and resisted even more fiercely than in other walks of life, and the Boston money crowd fought me tooth and nail. The titles I acquired in those days were varied and startling. For one set I was a "charlatan," "wizard," "fakir," an "unprincipled manipulator"; in another I was a "copper king" or a "prince of plungers." Feeling ran high, and prices rose and fell in the most erratic and extravagant fashion. ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson

... admired; so were the pantry, scullery, coal-hole, dust-hole, &c.; all so nice and clean; so compact; and, as the builder observed, not a nail to drive anywhere. ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat

... me L200 in gold to be paid on the nail if I would let him loose. We must have a dig ...
— The Man From the Clouds • J. Storer Clouston

... group. But Hauptmann was first in the field, and if it was impossible for him to demonstrate that he was right, it was equally impossible for anybody else to prove that he was wrong. So he stood his ground and by dint of continually hitting the same nail on the same head he had so greatly flourished that he was mentioned respectfully as far as the Lombard tongue was known, and at thirty-four had passed from the honourable but unpaid condition of Privat-dozent to ...
— The Collectors • Frank Jewett Mather

... dolt, idiot, against you, against everything! Against Heavy, Hell and punctuation . . . against Life, Death, rhyme and rhythm . . . Persecute me, now, persecute me, curse you, persecute me! Slave that you are . . . what do Marriage, Tooth-brushes, Nail-files, the Decalogue, Handkerchiefs, Newton's Law of Gravity, Capital, Barbers, Property, Publishers, Courts, Rhyming Dictionaries, Clothes, ...
— Hermione and Her Little Group of Serious Thinkers • Don Marquis

... a chance shot on Mr. Wintermuth's part, but it went straight to the mark, and it rankled. O'Connor knew—or felt reasonably sure—that Smith had not mentioned the matter to any one but himself, yet the chief had struck unerringly the nail's head. And all this endeared Smith but little to the man who had never ...
— White Ashes • Sidney R. Kennedy and Alden C. Noble

... the end of the day we shall come to a mountain of black stone, highs the Magnet Mountain;[FN257] for thither the currents carry us willy-nilly. As soon as we are under its lea, the ship's sides will open and every nail in plank will fly out and cleave fast to the mountain; for that Almighty Allah hath gifted the loadstone with a mysterious virtue and a love for iron, by reason whereof all which is iron travelleth towards it; and on this mountain is much iron, how much none knoweth save the Most High, ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... across with the goods," was Oppenheimer's criticism. "My mother believed in spirits. When I was a kid she was always seeing them and talking with them and getting advice from them. But she never come across with any goods from them. The spirits couldn't tell her where the old man could nail a job or find a gold-mine or mark an eight-spot in Chinese lottery. Not on your life. The bunk they told her was that the old man's uncle had had a goitre, or that the old man's grandfather had died of galloping ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London

... long-leaf or Georgia pine is the extreme form. Usually it is stiff, quite strong, of even texture, and more or less resinous. The sapwood is yellowish white; the heartwood orange brown. Pine shrinks moderately, seasons rapidly and without much injury; it works easily, is never too hard to nail (unlike oak or hickory); it is mostly quite durable when in contact with the soil, and if well seasoned is not subject to the attacks of boring insects. The heavier the wood, the darker, stronger, and harder it is, and the more it shrinks ...
— Seasoning of Wood • Joseph B. Wagner

... you can cook your own sausages for supper, my man, and shell out what you owe on the nail. We'll see who ...
— My Friend Smith - A Story of School and City Life • Talbot Baines Reed

... is the only resource of the feeble; and why may we not feel for victorious cunning as strong a sympathy as for the bold, downright, open bearing of the strong? That there may be no mistake in the essayist's meaning, that he may drive the nail home into the English understanding, he takes an illustration which shall be familiar to all of us in the characters of Iago and Othello. To our northern thought, the free and noble nature of the Moor is ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude

... woman rather less capable of aught but shop than the natives themselves! You see, even if I did offer myself as a victim, I couldn't do the thing! Fancy my going on about the six Mosaic days, and Jonah's whale, and Jael's nail, and doing their duty in that state of life where it HAS pleased Heaven ...
— More Bywords • Charlotte M. Yonge

... slowly and thoughtfully, "you 've no idea the trouble that negro is to me. Would you believe it? he actually left my nail-brush behind at Detroit, and not another to be had for love or money this side of Montreal! And only last night he mislaid a box of rouge, and, by Saint Denis! I hardly dare hope there is so much as an ounce of it in ...
— When Wilderness Was King - A Tale of the Illinois Country • Randall Parrish

... straight course, bending forward a little as though to hide in its folds the sacred presence of the future, towards the willow, the pear-tree, or lime whereon the queen has alighted; and round her each rhythmical wave comes to rest, as though on a nail of gold, and suspends its fabric of pearls and ...
— The Life of the Bee • Maurice Maeterlinck

... face. She's like a princess of the Mount Lidang. Her features are like those of Nilagendi, Her heels are like the eggs of hens, and make Her seem a princess of Siam. Her fingers More tapering are than quills of porcupine. And solid is the nail of her left hand. No noble's girl is Bidasari's peer." Now when the princess heard them sing her praise Her soul was wounded as if by a thorn. Her dark eyes flashed. "Ah, speak no more of her," She said, "nor speak abroad what ...
— Malayan Literature • Various Authors

... summons, received his portion with eyes rendered moist by appetite, and withdrawing to his particular stool, fell upon his supper tooth and nail. Johnny was not forgotten, but received his rations on bread, lest he should, in a flush of gravy, trickle any on the baby. He was required, for similar reasons, to keep his pudding, when not on ...
— The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargin • Charles Dickens

... wants—if you have an old shirt at home I could do with it. But I don't want a new one sent. Also a pair of strong laces, a nail brush (stiff)—that's about all, ...
— One Young Man • Sir John Ernest Hodder-Williams

... there was a descent into another room; and therefore, thinking to conceal his fault either wholly or in part, he threw himself into the opening, telling the lady to go and open the door. But his hope did not turn out as he expected; for the hem of a mantle which he had on caught upon a nail, and the lady opening the door meantime, in the belief that all would be well by reason of Polo's not being there, Gianciotto caught sight of Polo as he was detained by the hem of the mantle, and straightway ran with his dagger in his hand to kill ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Volume 1 • Leigh Hunt

... the devil lent, Much wondering what St. Dunstan meant This preluding to follow. But the first nail from hammer's stroke Full soon Nick's silent wonder broke, For his shrill scream might then have woke ...
— The True Legend of St. Dunstan and the Devil • Edward G. Flight

... terrible monster stood before me. It was something like a dog and something like a broom, something like being thrown out of the larder by cook—I can't describe it. It caught me up, and in less than a moment it had hung my tabby skin on a nail behind the door. ...
— Pussy and Doggy Tales • Edith Nesbit

... bared His body, as the lords of the law have a malefactor exposed before the eyes of all, so that all may see the flesh that is to be committed to torture. And they flung Him on the cross and stretched Him out and they drove a nail of iron through each of His resistant hands and a nail through His crossed feet. With clubs they struck the nails till they were in to the heads. And they raised upright the cross in a hole in the ground, but it would not stand firm and straight, and they moved it from one side to ...
— Mogens and Other Stories - Mogens; The Plague At Bergamo; There Should Have Been Roses; Mrs. Fonss • Jens Peter Jacobsen

... young farmer who had stolen the bales of cotton and sold them for a drunk. And it was he who suggested that, through her, we get possession of the keys. For, every day, she informed us, she passed them by where they hung on a nail, downstairs, as she swept and ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp

... blue, caiques, seventy-four, Galata, Tophana, Ramazan, Backallum, and so forth, together, in ever so many ways, your imagination will never be able to depict a city out of them. Or, suppose I say the Mosque of St. Sophia is four hundred and seventy-three feet in height, measuring from the middle nail of the gilt crescent surmounting the dome to the ring in the centre stone; the circle of the dome is one hundred and twenty-three feet in diameter, the windows ninety-seven in number—and all this may be true, for anything I know to the ...
— Notes on a Journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo • William Makepeace Thackeray

... Natives is, that it would be better to engage as labourers or sell up than to trek from pillar to post, till all their cattle had died. As to saying that farmers always had power to evict, the interrupting Native hit the nail on the head by his ejaculation: "But ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje

... to your highness, a worthless object; unless the rare beauty of the workmanship should give it some value. The carving is indeed beautiful and most wonderful, when you know that it was done with a common nail, and not even in daylight, but in the gloom and darkness ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach

... I were not right, as we stood in front of the hall-fire before the rest of the party had assembled for dinner, and he told me that I had indeed hit the nail on the head in this instance, though for his own part he never laid much stress himself on such an occurrence, having found it prove misleading in the extreme to draw any conclusion from it. He further informed me that Miss Derrick was the young lady with dark hair who ...
— The Danvers Jewels, and Sir Charles Danvers • Mary Cholmondeley

... be no objection made on the part of his temporary master, Mr. Cruickshanks assured him that Cairnvreckan, a village which they were about to enter, was happy in an excellent blacksmith; 'but as he was a professor, he would drive a nail for no man on the Sabbath or kirk-fast, unless it were in a case of absolute necessity, for which he always charged sixpence each shoe.' The most important part of this communication, in the opinion of the speaker, made a very ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott

... each other, and were extremely intimate. Kneller had a very fine garden, and as the doctor was fond of flowers, he permitted him to have a door into it. Ratcliffe's servants gathering and destroying the flowers, Kneller sent to inform him that he would nail up the door; to which Ratcliffe, in his rough manner, replied, "Tell him, he may do anything but paint it."—"Well," replied Kneller, "he may say what he will, for tell him, I will take ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon

... to sleep beneath the draperies of wealth and luxury, these distinguished men awoke to find themselves within bare walls, full of nail-holes, ...
— A Daughter of Eve • Honore de Balzac

... mind how—she's quite peculiar, you know," said Charlotte, finding her way less clear with each word. "Never mind, Polly; only just fight her if she begins on what is your duty; if she does, then fight her tooth and nail." ...
— Five Little Peppers Grown Up • Margaret Sidney

... case was fought for Mrs. Minchin, tooth and nail indeed, yet perhaps with more asperity than conviction, and certainly at times upon points which were hardly worth the fighting. Yet, on the Friday afternoon, when her counsel at last played his masterstroke, and, taking advantage ...
— The Shadow of the Rope • E. W. Hornung

... The 'cannon bone' answers to the middle bone of the five metacarpal bones which support the palm of the hand in ourselves. The 'pastern,' 'coronary,' and 'coffin' bones of veterinarians answer to the joints of our middle fingers, while the hoof is simply a greatly enlarged and thickened nail. But, if what lies below the horse's 'knee' thus corresponds to the middle finger in ourselves, what has become of the four other fingers or digits? We find in the places of the second and fourth digits only two slender splint-like bones, about two-thirds as long as the cannon bone, which gradually ...
— Thomas Henry Huxley; A Sketch Of His Life And Work • P. Chalmers Mitchell

... giant matting, a kind of cave under them. Dark yew trees and holly trees stand here and there; a yew is completely barked on one side, stripped clean. If you look close you will see scores in the wood as if made with a great nail. Those who know Exmoor will recognise these signs in a moment; it is a fraying-post where the stags rubbed the velvet from their horns last summer. There are herds of red deer in the park. At one time there were said to be almost as many ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies

... more confidence than he felt. A confidence somewhat increased, however, by last evening's success. "Do I begin at the neck or the waist?" he inquired in his most matter-of-fact voice, as if he were about to cord a box, or nail up a crate ...
— The Port of Adventure • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson

... it. Oh, with hot water and then cold, I mean. Nana, don't begin about rouge. Don't be silly. That red stuff in the box on mother's dresser is only nail paste, truly." ...
— The Wishing Moon • Louise Elizabeth Dutton

... accurately. A light hatchet is preferable to a heavy one. It should never be used for nailing purposes, except in emergencies. The pole of the hammer—that part which is generally used to strike the nail with—is required in order to properly balance the hatchet ...
— Carpentry for Boys • J. S. Zerbe

... tool-house at the bottom of the garden, and there, tied to a nail in the wall, was a pretty ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various

... night with a tin spoon and a wire nail, | |Capt. Wilhelm Schuettler dug 100 feet to liberty and| |escaped from the Hallamshire camp sometime ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer

... just some brass filings I made in the forecastle out of an old brass cleat that was hanging on a nail in my room for a clothes hook," and he took from his pocket the piece of metal and displayed the groove he had cut in it with ...
— Isle o' Dreams • Frederick F. Moore

... spirit in the thermometer fell. The wind became a gale, and before midnight a blizzard was howling and sweeping through the Bad Lands such as no one there had ever known before. The snow was like the finest powder, driving through every crack and nail hole, and piling snowdrifts within the houses as ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn

... carriage very noisy; and take it altogether, what a farce life is sometimes! the intercourse of human beings outsides touching outsides, the heart and soul lying to all intents and purposes as dead as a door-nail. Do you ever feel mentally and spiritually alone in the world? Perhaps ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss

... street, lane and hall, "The trail of the serpent was over them all." A poor little child knocked out stiff in the gutter Proclaimed that the scapegoat was bred for a "butter". The billsticker's pail told a sorrowful tale, The scapegoat had licked it as dry as a nail; He raced through their houses, and frightened their spouses, But his latest achievement most anger arouses, For while they were searching, and scratching their craniums, One little Ben Ourbed, who looked in the flower-bed, Discovered ...
— Saltbush Bill, J.P., and Other Verses • A. B. Paterson

... side-fins. This done, a broad, semicircular line is cut round the hole, the hook is inserted, and the main body of the crew striking up a wild chorus, now commence heaving in one dense crowd at the windlass. When instantly, the entire ship careens over on her side; every bolt in her starts like the nail-heads of an old house in frosty weather; she trembles, quivers, and nods her frighted mast-heads to the sky. More and more she leans over to the whale, while every gasping heave of the windlass is answered by a helping heave from the billows; ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville

... honour of his lady. Not the great book of Cervantes, as is commonly believed, held up mediaeval court life to ridicule and destroyed it as an ideal, but the life and exploits of this knight and minnesinger. The same spirit animated Guilhem of Balaun. At the command of his lady he had a finger-nail extracted and sent to her, after which he ...
— The Evolution of Love • Emil Lucka

... chairs ranged along two sides of the room, I saw a dozen or more persons, male and female. All wore the preoccupied air that patients are apt to assume while awaiting their turn to be called by the doctor. One amongst the number made an effort at indifference by drawing out and pushing back a nail in the flooring with the sole of her pretty shoe. It may have been intended for coquetry, and at another time might have bewitched me; now it seemed strangely out of place. The man who was to all appearance ...
— The Bronze Hand - 1897 • Anna Katharine Green (Mrs. Charles Rohlfs)

... and human lineaments essentially alike, can be wrought into such heaven-wide contrast? MAN is he who stands there, lofty and spotless, in bleeding patience! Men also are those brutal soldiers, alike stupidly ready, at the word of command, to drive the nail through quivering flesh or insensate wood. Men are those scowling priests and infuriate Pharisees. Men, also, the shifting figures of the careless rabble, who shout and curse without knowing ...
— The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... you not: By the Lord Harry the World's come to a fine Pass, that we must go to Law for our Children. No wonder the Lawyers are all so rich, yet e're the Law shall have a Limb, a Leg, a Joint or Nail of this same Boy, ...
— The City Bride (1696) - Or The Merry Cuckold • Joseph Harris

... shoulder, while she gave her a look that seemed to freeze the very marrow in her bones. "You know a secret about the Lady of Beaumanoir, Fanchon, and one about me too! If you ever speak of either to man or woman, or even to yourself, I will cut the tongue out of your mouth and nail it to that door-post! Mind my words, Fanchon! I never fail to do ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby

... 'plainin ob de misery in his back; can't stan' up straight no how: an' Hannah's baby got a mighty bad cold, can't hardly draw its breff; 'twas took dat way in de night; an' Silvy's boy tore his foot on a nail." ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley

... quaint titles, such as—"Heaven ravished"—"The Blacksmith, a sermon preached at Whitehall before the King," 1606. Beloe, in his Anecdotes of Literature, vol. 6, has recorded many of these quaint titles, among them the following:—"The Nail hit on the head, and driven into the city and cathedral wall of Norwich. By John Carter, 1644." "The Wheel turned by a voice from the throne of glory. By John Carter, 1647." "Two Sticks made one, or ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... looking nag. As he approached the tavern and saw Paul and the guard at the door, he shouted loudly to the crowd to separate, as though wishing to show Paul the blood in his favorite mare. He punched her with a little stick from which the sharp point of a nail protruded and by a dexterous movement dodged the flying hind feet that were aimed at ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton

... held vertically or horizontally, always kept in a vertical plane, that is, either straight up and down, or across at right angles to the line of your vision. If these things are not carefully observed, your comparisons will not be true. The method employed is to run the thumb-nail up the needle until the distance from the point so reached to the top exactly corresponds with the distance on the object you wish to measure. Having this carefully noted on your needle, without moving the position of your eye, you ...
— The Practice and Science Of Drawing • Harold Speed

... he saw her. His color rose and he began to mark up the table with his thumb nail. I could see he felt his fix. The girl—Indian right through—showed no surprise at seeing him there, but that did not mean she would keep her mouth shut about it next day, Tom was ...
— The Moccasin Maker • E. Pauline Johnson

... of using all his immense influence for Grant, had opposed him tooth and nail, he could not have been treated with more scornful neglect. The pretence for this was that Forney had defaulted $40,000! I know every detail of the story, and it is this:—While Forney was in Europe, an agent to whom he had confided his affairs did take money to that ...
— Memoirs • Charles Godfrey Leland

... and the year as well as the day was in its morning. The watch which young Carl Bristoll drew from his pocket was very thin and exquisite, and he did not look at its face. Instead he touched a delicate spring with his finger-nail and listened to the tinkle of its low, silvery chime. This watch might have spoken the hour to a blind man as well as to eyes as clear and engaging as those ...
— Destiny • Charles Neville Buck

... one the boys returned; each one as he came in hung his instrument on a nail above his bed. Those who were not musicians, but simply exhibitors of trained animals, put their mice and guinea pigs ...
— Nobody's Boy - Sans Famille • Hector Malot

... grimy hands, and pointed to the front breadth of her wrapper, which had been torn to ribbons on a lurking nail. ...
— Cicely and Other Stories • Annie Fellows Johnston

... make the foundations, the men seized four of the thickest logs, laid them in place, and notched and grooved and hammered them into as close a clinch as if they had grown so. The wood must grip by its own substance alone to hold up the pioneer's dwelling, for there was not an iron nail to be had in the whole of the Back Country. Logs laid upon the foundation logs and notched into each other at the four corners formed the walls; and, when these stood at seven feet, the builders laid parallel timbers and puncheons to make both flooring and ...
— Pioneers of the Old Southwest - A Chronicle of the Dark and Bloody Ground • Constance Lindsay Skinner

... interestin' to reflect," he goes on, "that if all the finger-nail parin's of the human race for one year was to be collected and subjected to hydraulic pressure it would equal in size the pyramid ...
— Arizona Nights • Stewart Edward White

... playing with a shilling, polishing the coin upon his sleeve—it is the identical one said to have been put in the plate by Captain de Camp, and given by Mr. Flyntflayer (the gentleman who held the gothic platter) to Mrs. Strap, the pue-opener, advising her at the same time to nail it to the counter—a counterfeit to deter "smashers." But, somehow, the coin seemed doomed to remain unholy, for no orifice or artifice could have rendered it a lucky one; it was shown to Mr. Spohf, who thought it bad, and that it might have gotten into the plate by ...
— Christmas Comes but Once A Year - Showing What Mr. Brown Did, Thought, and Intended to Do, - during that Festive Season. • Luke Limner

... scrawled another, immediately followed by a portrait of the "vultis instantis tyranni," who had, if we may judge by the chain suspended from his neck, once been a famous Grand Master. On one part of the wall might be deciphered a whole romance scrawled with an old nail, in which the prisoner had arrived at such excellence, that the letters were like the most admirable type. It was a long, and doubtless melancholy tale; so much so, that the kind guardians of the place had scratched it with their knives to prevent its ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. 1, No. 2, July 8, 1850 • Various

... Tired as he was, and wild and dangerous as the attempt might be, he did not dare to leave her to perish. Choosing his time in a lull, he struck out to the bush, and reached it just as her ebbing strength gave way. He took her in his sturdy arms, and, clinging with tooth and nail, stayed them both to their strange anchorage. Faint, half conscious, disrobed as she was, in the sweet, delicate features, the curve of the lip, and the raven tresses clothed in seaweed, he recognized the Creole belle ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 28. July, 1873. • Various

... from the finger. With a handkerchief, wrap one of the fingers of the left hand from the knuckle down to the first joint. Bend this joint and give it a sharp prick with the point of a sterilized 'needle just above the root of the nail. Pressure applied to the under side of the finger will force plenty of blood through a very small opening. (To prevent any possibility of blood poisoning the needle should be sterilized. This may ...
— Physiology and Hygiene for Secondary Schools • Francis M. Walters, A.M.

... Conservatism of the Paleolithic, Neolithic, and other unpronounceable ages, has, in this 19th century, produced a distinct paling of the stars, with an opaline tint in the east. And, as a penny for the first nail, twopence for the second, fourpence for the third, and so on, amounts to something like a million sterling for the set of horse-shoes, so the faint suggestion of dawn observable in our day cannot do otherwise than multiply itself into sunshine ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy

... not the place to preach the theory of direct inspiration,' said the Nilghai, returning Torpenhow's large and workmanlike bellows to their nail on the wall. 'We believe in cobblers' wax. La!—where you ...
— The Light That Failed • Rudyard Kipling

... some of those natural gifts which are considered the birthright of the New Englander. He had not the mechanical turn of the whittling Yankee. I once questioned him about his manual dexterity, and he told me he could split a shingle four ways with one nail, —which, as the intention is not to split it at all in fastening it to the roof of a house or elsewhere, I took to be a confession of inaptitude for mechanical works. He does not seem to have been ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... longer fashionable. They want payment on the nail there, confound them! Besides, this is nearer the walls and we can hear the Burgundians shouting. It is as good as a relish with ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... whereupon the Moldavian clerk made more signs than before, and yet more unintelligible; as I persisted, however, he flung down his pen, and, putting his thumb into his mouth, moved it rapidly, causing the nail to sound against the lower jaw; whereupon I saw that he was dumb, and hurried away, for I had always entertained a horror of dumb people, having once heard my another say, when I was a child, that dumb people were half demoniacs, ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow

... rush in where angels fear to tread." It was Mrs. O'Shaughnessy who was the real help. She is a woman of great courage and decision and of splendid sense and judgment. A few days ago a man she had working for her got his finger-nail mashed off and neglected to care for it. Mrs. O'Shaughnessy examined it and found that gangrene had set in. She didn't tell him, but made various preparations and then told him she had heard that if there was danger of blood-poisoning it would show if the finger was placed on wood ...
— Letters of a Woman Homesteader • Elinore Pruitt Stewart

... gold with filigree, mirrors, pictures, images, commodes, chiffoniers, and endless crockery and jingle: amid steady popular cheers, absolutely without theft; for there goes a cry, "He shall be hanged that steals a nail!" It is a Plebiscitum, or informal iconoclastic Decree of the Common People, in the course of being executed!—The Municipality sit tremulous; deliberating whether they will hang out the Drapeau Rouge and Martial Law: National Assembly, part ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle

... stratified in perforated cans in the open ground with fairly good results. Last fall, we tried the method used and described by Dr. Crane and Dr. McKay in the 1946 report of this Association. Crimp top cans were used with nail holes in the top and bottom. Instead of using regular storage facilities, the cans were stored in a concrete block storage pit built below the floor of the garage. This proved very successful. Not only were the nuts in excellent ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the 41st Annual Meeting • Various

... goin' ter ha' some fallin' weather in er day er two; sky looks ruther hazy, 'n' I heerd er rain-crow ter-day, 'n' ther's er circle roun' th' moon," observed Father Tyler as he entered, and hanging his hat on a convenient nail in a post, seated himself in ...
— Southern Lights and Shadows • Edited by William Dean Howells & Henry Mills Alden

... the soft run of new grass beneath his soles, or longer need beware the chance nail or sharp stone in the way. On the morrow, presumably to be a day inviting to bare feet as had all the other days of his summers, remembered and forgotten, he would, when he rose, put on stockings and stout shoes; and he would put them on world without end through all the new mornings of his ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson

... nothin' to a time I had in a brig off Hatteras," observed Teddy, who had somewhat recovered his composure; "we had to cut away both masts, you persave, and to scud under a scupper nail driv into the deck, wid a man ready to drive it further as ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various

... gentleman prepared the food. Taking one of the auks, he twisted off its head, put his forefinger under the integuments of the neck, drew the skin down backwards, and the bird was skinned. Then he ran his long thumb-nail down the breast and sliced off a lump, which he presented to the lady with the off-hand air of one who should say, "If you don't want it you may let ...
— The Giant of the North - Pokings Round the Pole • R.M. Ballantyne

... found) With those he pierced them and with clinchers bound. Long and capacious as a shipwright forms Some bark's broad bottom to out-ride the storms, So large he built the raft; then ribb'd it strong From space to space, and nail'd the planks along; These form'd the sides: the deck he fashion'd last; Then o'er the vessel raised the taper mast, With crossing sail-yards dancing in the wind; And to the helm the guiding rudder join'd (With yielding osiers ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer, translated by Alexander Pope

... blanket with long nap, the longer and rougher it is the finer will be the effect produced; stretch it on a frame of sufficient size, and suspend the frame at the centre of the upper end by a string fastened to a nail in the ceiling, from three to five feet back of the sitter. Having arranged this, fasten another string to the side of the frame, and while the operation is going on in the camera, swing the back-ground from right to left, continuing this during the whole time of sitting, and you have a ...
— American Handbook of the Daguerrotype • Samuel D. Humphrey

... was standing full on its bench beside the door, sent another critical glance around the room, and tiptoed over to the dish cupboard and let down the flowered calico curtain that had been looped up over a nail for convenience. The sun sent a bright, wide bar of yellow light across the room to rest on the shelf behind the stove where stood the salt can, the soda, the teapot, a box of matches and two pepper cans, one empty and the other full. Brit always meant to throw out that empty pepper can ...
— The Quirt • B.M. Bower

... her chin like bristles grow. The virtues we must not let pass Of Celia's magnifying glass; When frighted Strephon cast his eye on't, It shew'd the visage of a giant: A glass that can to sight disclose The smallest worm in Celia's nose, And faithfully direct her nail To squeeze it out from head to tail; For, catch it nicely by the head, It must come out, alive or dead. Why, Strephon, will you tell the rest? And must you needs describe the chest? That careless wench! no creature warn her To move it out from yonder corner! But leave ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift

... went over it word for word they found no more. Either he had been interrupted, or he had been afraid that his casual thumb nail pressures might arouse the suspicion of his guards if ...
— Crooked Trails and Straight • William MacLeod Raine

... brandy, which had been thrown overboard, and was taken up by us. We also took up an old chest, which stood us in good stead, for having but one oar, and our ship's handspikes, and a hatchet being by chance in the boat, we could split the chest, and nail it to the handspikes, which were our oars. Nails we had only, by drawing them from different parts of the boat; and the rest of the chest was used to kindle a fire. It also happened that our main tarpaulin, which had been ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous

... man," he said, "when I feel a spell of oratory coming on, you will have to be the audience." He took his dressing gown from a nail behind the door, and commenced to put it on. Then he took it off again and wrapped ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... a nail, the shoe was lost; For want of the shoe, the horse was lost; For want of the horse, the rider was lost; For want of the rider, the battle was lost; For want of the battle, the kingdom was lost; And all from the want ...
— Pinafore Palace • Various

... well. And if there is a God, and we can meet Him only by dying, then why in the name of common sense all this hullabaloo about death? Why, in that case, death is the grandest thing in life! And I'm for committing suicide right away! But you preacher fellows fight death tooth and nail. You're scared stiff when you contemplate it. You make Christianity just a grand preparation for death. Yet it isn't the gateway to life to you, and you know it! Then why, if you are honest, do you tell such rubbish to ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking

... mere fancy to place them there, as it was a whim to hang upon that nail yonder, the uniform coat with its stars and braid, which Stuart wore on his famous ride around McClellan in 1862. Under the swords hang portraits of Lee, Jackson, and Stuart. Jackson wears his old coat, and his brow is raised as though he were looking out from beneath his yellow old ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke

... do. Both the hair and the nails are really parts of the outer skin, which is curiously changed and hardened. The nails lie upon the surface of the true skin and grow from the under side as well as from the little fold of skin at the root of the nail. They are made to give firmness and protection to the ends of the fingers and toes. The nails of the fingers are also useful in picking up small objects ...
— First Book in Physiology and Hygiene • J.H. Kellogg

... have been ever so foolish. Just now I can hear Daddy and Mr. Barnett saying good night, and I know that they have been fighting tooth and nail over that chess board. And I hear Mr. Barnett thanking Daddy, in a voice that is all choked up with emotion. I am so glad to think the dear little man is happy. Isn't it too bad, Aunt Jennie, that we can't all be ...
— Sweetapple Cove • George van Schaick

... much as I will," grunted Pete, keeping the men before him covered with the Mexican's pistol. The part of this speech referring to the machine guns was a mere guess of the shrewd cow-puncher. But, as the reader knows, he had struck the nail on the head. "But see here, Ramon," he went on, dropping his tone, "we ain't here to molest you. We come out here with a scientific gent, to measure the mesa. We was going back home ter-night, an' was takin' a last look around when you come along. I'll give you my word—and ...
— The Border Boys Across the Frontier • Fremont B. Deering

... shape. Sitting on the grass he could see right into one of the flower-tubes, and presently he noticed a little, old, grey, shrivelled woman in it, very, very small, for she was not longer than the nail of his little finger. She wore a grey shawl that dragged behind her, and kept getting under her feet and tripping her up. She was most active, whisking about this way and that inside the flower; and at intervals she turned to stare at Martin, who kept getting nearer and nearer to watch ...
— A Little Boy Lost • Hudson, W. H.

... that approached him, demanding in a near-scream, "What happened? What have you done? What did you DO to Project Hot Rod? No one should have tampered with it without my direct order! Captain, if that mechanism has been ruined, I'll have them nail your hide to ...
— Where I Wasn't Going • Walt Richmond

... up to his room over the wood-shed, and got in at the garret window, and brought out the pumpkin-glory. Only he began to slip when he was coming down the roof, and he'd have slipped clear off if he hadn't caught his trousers on a shingle-nail, and stuck. It made a pretty bad tear, but the other boys pinned it up so that it wouldn't show, and the pumpkin-glory wasn't hurt a bit. They all said that it was about the best jack-o'-lantern they almost ever saw, on account of the long neck there was to it; and they made a plan to ...
— Christmas Every Day and Other Stories • W. D. Howells

... drew a paper from his pocket, and crossed to the desk. He sat down, and took up a quill. "You can prove this, of course?" he said, testing the point of his quill upon his thumb-nail. ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini

... forthwith became her slave. She set him to draw up the fire while she got the tea, and then, without taking any notice of David, she marched John upstairs to help her hang her curtains, lay her carpet, and nail up the coloured fashion plates and newspaper prints of royalties or beauties with which she was adorning the ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... work, and denouncing me to the world as a fugitive from my public duties, I shall not feel myself called upon to contradict him. As often as he nails me with the charge of being a skulker from work in meditatione fugae, I shall turn round and nail him with the charge of harbouring an intense admiration for me, and putting a most hyperbolical value upon my services; or else why should he give himself so much trouble, after so many months are gone by, in pursuing and recapturing me? On this ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey—Vol. 1 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey

... Abimelech. These bad people are mentioned in the Bible, not only as warnings, but because there were sometimes flashes of good conduct in their lives worthy of imitation. God sometimes drives a very straight nail with a ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage

... away as a memento of the place. Apart from old shoes, a modern kerosene-lamp of glass, a dirty blanket or two, and a cot-bed, there seemed to be nothing worth confiscating except a couple of Spanish newspapers hanging against the right-hand wall on a nail. One was "El Imparcial," a sheet as large as the New York "Sun"; and the other, "La Saeta," an illustrated comic paper about the size of "Punch." They had no intrinsic value, of course, and as "relics" they were not particularly characteristic; ...
— Campaigning in Cuba • George Kennan

... are in the stall, the better for our pouches. And so I hope we shall hear no more about it, until I get a ware of my own, when the more of ye that like to talk of such matters the better ye will be welcome,—always provided ye be civil customers, who pay on the nail, for as the saw saith, 'Ell and tell makes the crypt swell.' For the rest, thanks are due to this brave gentleman, Marmaduke Nevile, who, though the son of a knight-banneret who never furnished less to the battle-field than fifty men-at-arms, has condescended to take ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... Lord!" the sexton roared, awakening suddenly, "If this be dream, yet doth it seem most dreadful so to die. Oh, cast my body in the sea! or hurl it on the shore! But nail me not in coffin fast—no grave will ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth

... intervening weeks I will say little, but my admiration and sympathy went out unfeignedly to Mary Cavendish. She ranged herself passionately on her husband's side, scorning the mere idea of his guilt, and fought for him tooth and nail. ...
— The Mysterious Affair at Styles • Agatha Christie

... Scotia treat it like a hired house, they won't keep it in repair; they neither paint it to preserve the boards, nor stop a leak to keep the frame from rottin'; but let it go to wrack sooner than drive a nail or put in a pane of glass. 'It will sarve ...
— The Clockmaker • Thomas Chandler Haliburton

... touches shore. For years you have had peace. The memory of your sins are there (for though God when he forgives forgets them, you cannot). Like David, perhaps, you cry, "My sin is ever before me!" The sin marks are there as the nail holes in the wall, but you have been able to look at them and have peace because you have said to yourself, "I am not an unwhipped of justice, my sins have been punished in my substitute; they have been fully answered for ...
— Christ, Christianity and the Bible • I. M. Haldeman

... should not carry them out of the temple but dedicate them then and there to the god. There was a man then of Halicarnassos, whose name was Agasicles, who being a victor paid no regard to this rule, but carried away the tripod to his own house and hung it up there upon a nail. On this ground the other five cities, Lindos, Ialysos and Cameiros, Cos and Cnidos, excluded the sixth city Halicarnassos from ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 1(of 2) • Herodotus

... Turn in, my lord, fear not. And he said to her, When any man doth inquire, Is there any man here? thou shalt say, No. Then Jael took a nail, and smote the nail into his temple.' Jael," says Scott, "is not said to have promised Sisera that she would deny his being there; she would give him shelter and refreshment, but not utter a falsehood ...
— Apologia pro Vita Sua • John Henry Newman

... nail-making is one of the most ancient among us; we may safely charge its antiquity with ...
— An History of Birmingham (1783) • William Hutton

... here polemics nail you, Armed with all rubbish they can rake up; Prices and Texts at once assail you— From Daniel ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al

... Bible, about Jael, and the sun standing still, and the walls falling at the blowing of horns? A. "They may be legends, myths, poems, or what they will, but they are not the Word of God. So I say again, it was not the God and Father of us all who inspired the woman to drive that nail crashing through the king's temple after she had given him that bowl of milk and bid him sleep in safety, but a very mean Devil of hatred and revenge that I should hardly expect to find in a squaw on the plains. ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll, Volume I • Robert Green Ingersoll

... designed most probably to represent the "Vita Nuova," for the "Comedia" was not yet composed, and to all appearance from thirty to thirty-five years of age. The face was in profile and in excellent preservation, excepting that at some former period a nail had unfortunately been driven into the eye. The outline of the eyelid was perfect, so that the injury could easily be remedied. The countenance was extremely handsome, yet bore a strong resemblance to the portraits of the poet taken ...
— The Crayon Papers • Washington Irving

... who was all a-fume with rage, dealt it such a push with her hands that she sent it flying, and entering, saw Niccolosa astride of Calandrino. The former, seeing the lady, started up in haste and taking to flight, made off to join Filippo, whilst Dame Tessa fell tooth and nail upon Calandrino, who was still on his back, and clawed all his face; then, clutching him by the hair and haling him hither and thither, 'Thou sorry shitten cur,' quoth she, 'dost thou then use me thus? Besotted dotard that thou art, accursed be the weal ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio

... by a common dynamometer (Fig. 38), which the patient is requested to grasp with all his might. Compressive strength is tested by compressing the oval. In order to test tractive strength, the dynamometer is fastened to a nail at the point C, and the patient pulls with all his strength at D. The effort is registered on a graduated scale and is of importance for detecting left-handedness and measuring the extraordinary force that is displayed ...
— Criminal Man - According to the Classification of Cesare Lombroso • Gina Lombroso-Ferrero

... "And you disapprove—tooth and nail?" she queried gently. "I hoped you were different. You don't know how tired we are of eternal disapproval from people who ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver

... cried out in bitter rage. "He seems to give his master nothing but eggs. But I know what I'll do," she said to herself, eagerly seeking for a key, which she discovered, as of old, on a rusty nail. Next she repaired to the cellar where she quickly found what she was after; the bottle stood in sore need of cleaning, however, as did everything else she touched. Then she set about beating two eggs, adding a glass of the strengthening ...
— Maezli - A Story of the Swiss Valleys • Johanna Spyri

... functions of the intelligence. That people differ enormously in this skill, that it is not necessarily associated with other phases of intelligence are commonplaces. The dealer in abstract ideas of great value to the race may be unable to drive a nail straight, while the man who can build the most intricate mechanism out of crude iron, wood and metal may be unable to express any but the commonplaces of existence. Intelligence, acting through skill, has evolved machinery ...
— The Foundations of Personality • Abraham Myerson

... remember how I first discovered that they could be evoked in this way, but I can clearly recollect many of my efforts to arouse this pleasurable excitement by abusing the dog or the cats, or by prodding the calves with a nail set in the end of a broom handle. I seldom manipulated my genitals at this time, and when I did it was for the purpose of causing sexual excitement ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 5 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... well-meant manner. You, as a learned man, certainly know how strange nature is. Some persons cannot bear to touch grey paper, or they become ill; others shiver in every limb if one rub a pane of glass with a nail: I have just such a feeling on hearing you say thou to me; I feel myself as if pressed to the earth in my first situation with you. You see that it is a feeling; that it is not pride: I cannot allow you to say ...
— Andersen's Fairy Tales • Hans Christian Andersen

... writing up ledgers inside. I was soon being initiated into Ordnance accounts, which are things of the most diabolical complexity. Ordnance comprises practically everything; from a gun-carriage to a nail; from a tent, a waggon, a binocular, a blanket, a saddle, to an ounce of grease and all the thousand constituents which go to make up everything. These are tabulated in a book which is a nightmare of subsections, and makes you dizzy ...
— In the Ranks of the C.I.V. • Erskine Childers

... that thumb again anywhere. It was flat like the head of a snake, and the nail was no larger than a pea—a thumb that had evidently been cruelly smashed at one time. The owner of the thumb might have been a common burglar, but in the light of recent events David was not inclined ...
— The Crimson Blind • Fred M. White

... served at table sliced in its crude state. It is principally grown for pickling: for which purpose it should be plucked when about half grown, or while the skin is tender, and can be easily broken by the nail. As the season of maturity approaches, the rind gradually hardens, and the fruit becomes worthless. In all stages of its growth, the flesh is comparatively spongy; and, in the process of pickling, absorbs ...
— The Field and Garden Vegetables of America • Fearing Burr

... by childless wives, who tie shreds of their clothing to the lattice-work of a marble window as an earnest of their maternal worthiness. It is visited also by the devout for various purposes, among others by those whose horses are sick and who nail votive horseshoes to the great gate. According to tradition the mother of Jahangir was a Christian named Miriam, and her house and garden may be seen, the house having the traces of a fresco which by those who greatly wish it can be believed ...
— Roving East and Roving West • E.V. Lucas

... bothering me!" said Kalle, turning round with a disconsolate laugh. "For they ought, of course. But if the cork's once drawn, you know how it disappears." He reached out slowly for the corkscrew which hung on a nail. ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo

... Italy are still subject to barbarism. Legal studies sink daily from bad to worse. The Roman Curia opposes every branch of learning which savors of polite literature, while it defends its barbarism with tooth and nail. How can it do otherwise? Abolish those books on Papal Supremacy, and where shall they find that the Pope is another God, that he is almighty, that all rights and laws are closed within the cabinet of his breast, that he ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds

... method of measuring the deflection should be such that any compression at the points of support or at the application of the load will not affect the reading. This may be accomplished by driving a small nail near each end of the beam, the exact location being on the neutral plane and vertically above each knife-edge support. Between these nails a fine wire is stretched free of the beam and kept taut by means of a rubber band or coiled ...
— The Mechanical Properties of Wood • Samuel J. Record

... will find him hanging on a nail. It seems to me that he is made of very dry wood and I am sure that if he were thrown on the fire he would make a beautiful blaze for ...
— Pinocchio - The Tale of a Puppet • C. Collodi

... fuss like this over cases hopelessly moribund from the start, what in thunder are you going to do some fine day when out of a perfectly clear and clean sky Security itself turns septic and you lose the President of the United States—or a mother of nine children—with a hang-nail?" ...
— The White Linen Nurse • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott

... what belonged to it." And this necessity results from the principles of human nature, as was said above in this article. But if we speak of necessity of constraint, as repugnant to the bodily nature, thus again was Christ's body in its own natural condition subject to necessity in regard to the nail that pierced and the scourge that struck. Yet inasmuch as such necessity is repugnant to the will, it is clear that in Christ these defects were not of necessity as regards either the Divine will, or the human will of Christ considered absolutely, as following ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas

... returned with a sufficient supply to form a mould, hoping to be able to make it of a proper shape with a stem to fit into the shaft. By boring a hole into the stem he was able to secure it with wire firmly to the wood. To give the bolt a sharp point he fixed a large nail ground fine, in the centre of the lead, thus obtaining sufficient weight and sharpness for his object. Although this bolt might be blunted should it strike a bone, yet it was well calculated to pierce the thin skin of a deer, which, from the size of the island, should it only ...
— The Rival Crusoes • W.H.G. Kingston

... completed, and as many as fifty men had come to live at the new fort, to which the name Victoria was finally given. Victoria became the headquarters of the Hudson's Bay Company on the Pacific. It was unique as a fortified post, in that it was built without the driving of a single nail, wooden pegs ...
— Pioneers of the Pacific Coast - A Chronicle of Sea Rovers and Fur Hunters • Agnes C. Laut

... all the good performed by Thee, O Christ, the Hebrews deemed it meet To bear Thee from the judgment-seat And nail Thee to the cruel tree; They gave Thee vinegar and gall— But render justice to ...
— Hymns of the Greek Church - Translated with Introduction and Notes • John Brownlie

... holding in his hand the small pair of nail scissors with which he had snipped asunder her necklace; with the other he was in the act of taking out something from the ...
— The Chink in the Armour • Marie Belloc Lowndes

... turn of the chamber-maids; but they succeeded no better. Then, when everyone else had tried, the Prince asked for the kitchen-maids, the scullions, and the sheep-girls. They were all brought to the palace, but their coarse red, short, fingers would hardly go through the golden hoop as far as the nail. ...
— The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault • Charles Perrault

... Watson said, "The thing we don't understand is how you managed to bring so much equipment. The exact things you needed—right down to the last nail." ...
— The Invaders • Benjamin Ferris

... small darky followers. Shoes were taken off the first of April. For a time a pair of old woolen stockings were worn, but these soon disappeared, leaving the feet bare for the summer. One of their dreads was the possibility of sticking a rusty nail into the foot, as this was liable to cause lockjaw, a malady regarded with awe and terror. They knew what lockjaw was—Uncle John Quarles's black man, Dan, was subject to it. Sometimes when he opened his mouth to its utmost capacity he felt the joints ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... much in your power as powdering your hair is; and will you let the want of them obscure (as it certainly will do) that shining prospect which presents itself to you. I am sure you will not. They are the sharp end, the point of the nail that you are driving, which must make way first for the larger and more solid parts to enter. Supposing your moral character as pure, and your knowledge as sound, as I really believe them both to be; you ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield

... truss, bandage, braid, splice, swathe, gird, tether, moor, picket, harness, chain; fetter &c. (restrain) 751; lock, latch, belay, brace, hook, grapple, leash, couple, accouple[obs3], link, yoke, bracket; marry &c. (wed) 903; bridge over, span. braze; pin, nail, bolt, hasp, clasp, clamp, crimp, screw, rivet; impact, solder, set; weld together, fuse together; wedge, rabbet, mortise, miter, jam, dovetail, enchase[obs3]; graft, ingraft[obs3], inosculate[obs3]; entwine, intwine[obs3]; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget

... something belonging the realm of confessional torture as depicted by the Hogans, Murphys, and Maria Monk showmen, and which the officials had forgot to put by in some of their secret drawers. It was hung upon a nail, had a semi- circular, half viperish look, and was cupped at each end as if intended for some curious business of incision or absorption. We were relieved on getting nearer it and on being informed that it was merely an ear trumpet through ...
— Our Churches and Chapels • Atticus

... you now, and I say unto you, men of both parties, you will have driven the last nail in the coffin of this amendment and banished all hope of carrying it at the ballot-box if you do not incorporate woman suffrage in your platforms. I know what the party managers will say, I have talked with and heard from ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 2 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper



Words linked to "Nail" :   clout, seize, sixpenny nail, tooth and nail, clinch, dactyl, half-moon, locate, sweep through, peg, digit, holdfast, breeze through, fastening, cop, turn up, complete, fourpenny nail, pass with flying colors, nail varnish, nab, lunule, make it, boom, linear measure, prehend, fingernail, wiggle nail, hit, toenail, stem, lunula, doornail, clout nail, sail through, nail-biting, pick up, brad, nail pulling, football, win, nail hole, blast, eightpenny nail, pinpoint, play, arrest, nail down, spike, nail-tailed wallaby, tenpenny nail, apprehend, football game



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