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Prick   Listen
verb
Prick  v. t.  (past & past part. pricked; pres. part. pricking)  
1.
To pierce slightly with a sharp-pointed instrument or substance; to make a puncture in, or to make by puncturing; to drive a fine point into; as, to prick one with a pin, needle, etc.; to prick a card; to prick holes in paper.
2.
To fix by the point; to attach or hang by puncturing; as, to prick a knife into a board. "The cooks prick it (a slice) on a prong of iron."
3.
To mark or denote by a puncture; to designate by pricking; to choose; to mark; sometimes with off. "Some who are pricked for sheriffs." "Let the soldiers for duty be carefully pricked off." "Those many, then, shall die: their names are pricked."
4.
To mark the outline of by puncturing; to trace or form by pricking; to mark by punctured dots; as, to prick a pattern for embroidery; to prick the notes of a musical composition.
5.
To ride or guide with spurs; to spur; to goad; to incite; to urge on; sometimes with on, or off. "Who pricketh his blind horse over the fallows." "The season pricketh every gentle heart." "My duty pricks me on to utter that."
6.
To affect with sharp pain; to sting, as with remorse. "I was pricked with some reproof." "Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart."
7.
To make sharp; to erect into a point; to raise, as something pointed; said especially of the ears of an animal, as a horse or dog; and usually followed by up; hence, to prick up the ears, to listen sharply; to have the attention and interest strongly engaged. "The courser... pricks up his ears."
8.
To render acid or pungent. (Obs.)
9.
To dress; to prink; usually with up. (Obs.)
10.
(Naut)
(a)
To run a middle seam through, as the cloth of a sail.
(b)
To trace on a chart, as a ship's course.
11.
(Far.)
(a)
To drive a nail into (a horse's foot), so as to cause lameness.
(b)
To nick.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Prick" Quotes from Famous Books



... Spurs!" he exclaimed. "No," he added in a disappointed tone—"too blunt. There's no water to rouse him nearer than the lake; and if there was, it would be too bad to let him go about drenched. What shall I do? Samson, get up; I want you. I'll prick you with my sword, if you ...
— Crown and Sceptre - A West Country Story • George Manville Fenn

... great poker-players. They are continually talking about the game, when they ought to be talking politics for the benefit of foreigners. You hear this sort of thing, "Well, you couldn't beat my full house," at which the diplomats prick up their ears, thinking that there will be something wonderful in Congress the next day, and ...
— The Sunny Side of Diplomatic Life, 1875-1912 • Lillie DeHegermann-Lindencrone

... resembles certain passages in the Upanishads, and the resemblance is particularly strong in such statements as that the Buddha nature reveals itself in dreams, or that it is so great that it embraces the universe and so small that the point of a needle cannot prick it. The doctrine of Maya is clearly indicated, even if the word was not used in the original, for it is expressly said that all phenomena are unreal. Thus the teaching of Bodhidharma is an anticipation of Sankara's monism, but it is formulated ...
— Hinduism and Buddhism, An Historical Sketch, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Charles Eliot

... there is some more of our food," and rushed upon them. The people did not run. They began to shoot at the buffalo with the bows and arrows that had been given them, and the buffalo began to fall. They say that when the first buffalo hit with an arrow felt it prick him, he called out to his fellows, "Oh, my friends, a great ...
— Blackfeet Indian Stories • George Bird Grinnell

... himself of a habit he had of shrugging up his shoulders, and making himself appear hump-backed, he hung up a sword over his back, so that it might prick him, with its sharp point, ...
— Parker's Second Reader • Richard G. Parker

... such romance! The young star and idol of them all in those days was this man here, [Nods toward DORN] Doctor Eugene Dorn. He is fascinating now, but he was irresistible then. But my conscience is beginning to prick me. Why did I hurt my poor boy? I am uneasy about ...
— The Sea-Gull • Anton Checkov

... all things so in thy mind that they may be as a Goad in thy sides, to prick thee forward in the way thou must go. Then Christian began to gird up his loins, and address himself to his Journey. Then said the Interpreter, The Comforter be always with thee, good Christian, to guide thee ...
— The Junior Classics, V5 • Edited by William Patten

... in increasing his excitement on that subject. He told him he had once seen a prairie-dog standing sentinel at the entrance-hole of their habitations. He made a picture of the creature with charcoal on the shed-door, and proposed to prick a copy of it into Willie's arm with India-ink, which was joyfully agreed to. The likeness, when completed, was very much like a squash upon two sticks, but it was eminently satisfactory to the boys. There was no end to Willie's inquiries. How to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 65, March, 1863 • Various

... his surplus kit. If the skin is tender, or the feet perspire, wash with warm salt water or alum water, but do not soak the feet a long time, as this, although very comforting at the time, tends to keep them soft. Should blister's appear on the feet, prick and evacuate them by pricking at the lower edge with a pin which has been passed through the flame of a match and cover them with zinc oxide plaster applied hot. This plaster can be obtained on request at the regimental infirmary. If serious ...
— Manual for Noncommissioned Officers and Privates of Infantry • War Department

... sword-prick had goaded Cantemir to an anger that was 'suaged neither by good old wine nor the council of the monk. He fretted for an opportunity to thrust his assailant in the back—anywhere. "Surely," said he, "the day is not far when I shall kill that ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne

... intervals. They are hideous in face, but exquisitely shaped—very, very small though. One of the men was drunk, poor wretch, and looked the picture of misery. You can see the fineness of their senses by the way in which they dart their glances and prick their ears. Every one agrees that, when tamed, they make the best of servants—gentle, clever, and honest; but the penny-a-glass wine they can't resist, unless when caught and tamed young. They work in the fields, or did so as long as any were left; but even here, I was told, it was ...
— Letters from the Cape • Lady Duff Gordon

... ears and tremble in every limb when they were torturing your father-in-law—well, that's your look out. As for me, if only I can unmask a downright lie, I am quite content to look death itself between the eyes immediately after. Ever since you fainted at the prick of a leech, and were not ashamed to burst into tears when I cut out one of your warts, I knew you to be a coward. Yes, a coward you are, and a very poor creature to boot; but whatever else I am, I am not that. Twice have I broken the bone of my own leg because it was improperly set, and I am ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai

... could not manage it, for the creature lashed about so furiously that, although he made repeated attempts, he failed to do more than prick its tough sides and render it still more savage. Buzzby, too, made several daring efforts to lance it, but failed, and nearly slipped into the hole in his recklessness. It was a wild scene of confusion—the spray was dashed over the ice round the hole, and the men, as they ran about in extreme ...
— The World of Ice • Robert Michael Ballantyne

... of white glue in three ounces of water until it is well softened. Cook in a double boiler until the whole mass is smooth. Remove from the fire and add six ounces of glycerine. Mix well, re-heat, skim, and pour into a shallow pan or on a slate. Prick the bubbles as soon as they show. Allow the mixture to stand for twenty-four hours, and it is then ready ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Household Science in Rural Schools • Ministry of Education Ontario

... with its back turned to me was an extraordinary figure—a thing with a man's body and an animal's head—a dark, shaggy head with unmistakable prick ears. I gazed at it aghast. What was it? What was it doing? As I stared it bent down, lapped the water, and raising its head, uttered the same harrowing sound that had brought me thither. I then saw, with a fresh start of wonder, that its hands, which shone ...
— Werwolves • Elliott O'Donnell

... masterful temper, he haughtily disregarded the growing demand for an advance. On the other hand the politicians, always eager to minister to the gratification of the people, began to be importunate; they harried the President, and went out to camp to prick their civilian spurs into the general himself. But McClellan had a soldierly contempt for such intermeddling in matters military, and was wholly unimpressible. When Senator Wade said that an unsuccessful battle was preferable ...
— Abraham Lincoln, Vol. I. • John T. Morse

... a little penknife, That was both long and sharp, And betwixt the short ribs and the long, Prick'd fair Ellinor ...
— The Children's Garland from the Best Poets • Various

... of Hainault, accustomed to prick his heavy Flemish war-horse over the Belgian undulating plains, that Nature would seem to have designed for fair battle-fields, was no match for the light horsemen of the Scots, trained to wild, desultory warfare. He and his young King ...
— Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II • Charlotte Mary Yonge

... matters of opinion; but every man to go or come, to speak or remain silent, as God's commands, by direct inner revelation, might be laid upon him. And it appeared that God had laid his command upon many to go among the unregenerate bearing testimony, and with sharp-tongued reproach and reviling to prick as with thorns the seared conscience of a perverse and stiff-necked generation. Persecution they welcomed as the martyr's portion, the sure evidence of well-doing. "Where they are most of all suffered to declare themselves, there they least of all desire to come." ...
— Beginnings of the American People • Carl Lotus Becker

... imagined. A good seed-bed in an open spot is absolutely necessary. It is usual to draw direct from the seed-bed for planting out as opportunities occur, and this method answers fairly well. But when large enough it is better practice to prick out as a preparation for the final planting, because a stouter and handsomer plant is thereby secured. If it is intended to follow the rough and ready plan, the seed drills should be nine inches apart; but for pricking ...
— The Culture of Vegetables and Flowers From Seeds and Roots, 16th Edition • Sutton and Sons

... o' your deil's play-books for me,' said Lucky Dods; 'it's an ill world since sic prick-my-dainty doings came into fashion. It's a poor tongue that canna tell its ain name, and I'll hae nane o' your scarts ...
— The Proverbs of Scotland • Alexander Hislop

... sake, teach me no more. I know all as well —'Slid, if I did not, why was I nominated? why did you choose me? why did the ladies prick out me? I am sure there were other gallants. But me of all the rest! By that light, and, as I am a courtier, would I might never stir, but 'tis strange. Would to the lord the ...
— Cynthia's Revels • Ben Jonson

... hardly whispered, let alone talked, and he was going now where it would shout. Wanted to know what was the use of being a nob if a fellow wasn't the nobbiest sort of a nob. Said he'd bought a house on Beacon Hill, in Boston, and that if I'd prick up my ears occasionally I'd hear something drop into the Back Bay. Handed me his new card four times and explained that it was the rawest sort of dog to carry a brace of names in your card holster; ...
— Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son • George Horace Lorimer

... said, "prick off the ship's position as it was a quarter of an hour ago. There is Point du Raz. Very well: when I came below it bore exactly North 3 quarters East by compass, distant, say, seven miles. Mark off that bearing and ...
— A Middy of the King - A Romance of the Old British Navy • Harry Collingwood

... Ebenezer assured him. "To be sure, a careless blacksmith could prick you. But Farmer Green always takes us to the best one he ...
— The Tale of Pony Twinkleheels • Arthur Scott Bailey

... is there one infraction of law that is not followed by pain. As sharp guards are placed at the side of the bridge over the chasm to hold men back from the abyss, so nature's laws are planted on either side of the way of life to prick and scourge erring feet back into the divine way. At length through much smiting of the body nature forces the youth into a knowledge of the world in which he lives. Man learns to carry himself safely ...
— A Man's Value to Society - Studies in Self Culture and Character • Newell Dwight Hillis

... front of him, and took the neck of his shirt deftly between her left finger and thumb, and began to stitch. And Martin looking down on the top of her smooth little head, which was all he could see of her, said anxiously, "You won't prick me, will you?" and Jane answered, "I'll try not to, but it is very awkward." Because to get behind the button she had to lean her right elbow on his shoulder and stand a little on tiptoe. So that Martin had ...
— Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard • Eleanor Farjeon

... whispering and speculating behind him, pointing him out to each other, wondering what notable he might be; as Craddock started down the platform away from there, the voice of the conductor warning all to clamber aboard, the waiting cowboy tightened the reins a little, causing his horse to prick up its ears and start with a thrill of expectancy which the rider could feel ripple over its smooth hide under the pressure of ...
— Trail's End • George W. Ogden

... that they must fly from the company of men, and not permit them to embrace, nor even touch them. Look on the rose; it has a delightful odour; it embalms the place in which it is placed; but if you grasp it underneath, it will prick you till the blood issues. The beauty of the rose is the beauty of the girl. The beauty and perfume of the first invite to smell and to handle it, but when it is touched underneath it pricks sharply; the beauty of a girl ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... a mark on the skin that will be permanent, you have to prick the colors into it so deeply that they will go through the basement layer and reach cells which will not grow toward the surface. This "pricking-in" operation is known as tattooing; and it is as foolish as it is painful, ...
— A Handbook of Health • Woods Hutchinson

... business, and when he is put into a patch of corn and told to "hunt them up" he makes a thorough search, and will not be misled by any other scent. You hear him rattling through the corn, hither and yon, with great speed. The coons prick up their ears, and leave on the opposite side of the field. In the stillness you may sometimes hear a single stone rattle on the wall as they hurry toward the woods. If the dog finds nothing, he comes back to his master in a short time, and says in his dumb way, "No ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs

... night, as I war comin' from Swampville, 'bout this time—only 'twar as dark as a pot o' pitch—I war jest ridin' out into this very gleed, when all o' a suddint my ole hoss gin a jump forrard, an I feeled somethin' prick me from behind. 'Twar the stab o' some sort o' a knife, that cut me a leetle above the hip, an' made me bleed like a buck. I know'd who did it; tho' not that night—for it war so dark among the bushes, I couldn't ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid

... us have seen the ordinary cactus. We have been very careful, however, not to touch it as the spines are sure to prick us. It is interesting to know that the cactus is a desert plant—that, though millions of acres of arid land in the West can produce little else, they can produce enormous quantities of cactus. Unfortunately, these plants have always been useless as neither man nor beast would eat them. True, cattle ...
— Modern Americans - A Biographical School Reader for the Upper Grades • Chester Sanford

... facing his misfortune and wanted only to get away from the place. He loped his horse half-way up the hill, which was not merciful riding. The half-starved cat yowled in his arms, and struck her claws through his coat till he felt the prick of them, and he swore; at the cat, nominally, but really at the trick fate had ...
— Lonesome Land • B. M. Bower

... I give thee, now that thou art about to return to thy country? I am about to reveal to thee, Gilgames, a secret, and the judgment of the gods I am about to tell it thee. There is a plant similar to the hawthorn in its flower, and whose thorns prick like the viper. If thy hand can lay hold of that plant without being torn, break from it a branch, and bear it with thee; it will secure for thee an eternal youth.'Gilgames gathers the branch, and in his joy plans with Arad-Ea future enterprises: ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 3 (of 12) • G. Maspero

... is the element of success; it is made as follows: Slice off a clean, white pork rind, four or five inches long by an inch and a half wide; lay it on a board and with a sharp knife cut it as nearly to the shape of a frog as your ingenuity permits. Prick a slight gash in the head to admit the lip hook, which should be an inch and a half above the second one and see that the back of the bait rests securely in the ...
— Woodcraft • George W. Sears

... hole in the rock. It was quite small—I could only just get my hand in, but it went a long way back. I took the oilskin packet from round my neck and shoved it right in as far as I could. Then I tore off a bit of gorse—My! but it did prick—and plugged the hole with it so that you'd never guess there was a crevice of any kind there. Then I marked the place carefully in my own mind, so that I'd find it again. There was a queer boulder in the ...
— The Secret Adversary • Agatha Christie

... to the heart like a pin prick. It opened his wounds, already bleeding overmuch, it recalled the shameful memory which he wished to drive away, and which ...
— The Grip of Desire • Hector France

... to the extent of one-half she must have the satisfaction of being right. And yet, even with these tight limits to the misery of a boundless discretion, permit me, Liege Lady, with all loyalty, to submit that now and then you prick with your pin the wrong man. But the poor child from Domremy, shrinking under the gaze of a dazzling court—not because dazzling (for in visions she had seen those that were more so), but because some of them wore a scoffing smile on their features—how should she throw her line into ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey

... pricks me on. Yea, but how if honour prick me off when I come on,—how then? Can honour set to a leg? no: or an arm? no: or take away the grief of a wound? no. Honour hath no skill in surgery, then? no. What is honour? a word. What is in that word honour; what is that honour? air. ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett

... to manhandle that atrocious scoundrel, and smoke him along to the quarter-deck. At intervals, he ran close up to the revolving border of the confusion, and prying into the heart of it with his pike, sought to prick out the object of his resentment. But Steelkilt and his desperadoes were too much for them all; they succeeded in gaining the forecastle deck, where, hastily slewing about three or four large casks in a line with ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville

... trigger; stop, if only to witness what follows. See the roebuck prick their ears; they turn to the wind; they appear uneasy; call one to the other, assemble; danger is near, they feel it, hear it coming; they would fly, but find it is too late; terrified, they are chained to the spot. For the last half hour the wolves and wolverines, which ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle

... beast of burden slow, Toil'd onward, prick'd with goads and stings; Here play'd, a tiger, rolling to and fro The heads and crowns of ...
— The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Tennyson

... about half past four. On that spot a hut had been built of lumps of ice, so as to shelter us somewhat from the trying wind which precedes daybreak, a wind so cold as to tear the flesh like a saw, cut it like the blade of a knife, prick it like a poisoned sting, twist it like a pair of pincers, and ...
— Selected Writings of Guy de Maupassant • Guy de Maupassant

... these operations and occurrences. In its cradle, it sees D'Alembert go, Lord Marischal go; Helvetius come, Lord Marischal come; in its boyhood or maturity, the Excise, and French RATS-DE-CAVE, spring up; Crown-Prince Friedrich Wilhelm prick his hand for a fit kind of ink; Friedrich Wilhelm's Divorced Wife give her Douanier two slaps in the face, by way of payment. Nay, the same Friedrich Wilhelm, become "Friedrich Wilhelm II., or DER DICKE," ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... Tintinnabulis—that is, of little Bells, the Language Latin, but pen'd by a Dutchman, being a Discourse of striking tunes on little Bells with traps under the feet, with several Books on several Instruments of Music, and Tunes prick't for the same; Then considering that the Well-wishers to either of them, took great pains to make plain the use of them, I thought it worth a Dayes labour, to write something on this Art or Science, that the Rules thereof might ...
— Tintinnalogia, or, the Art of Ringing - Wherein is laid down plain and easie Rules for Ringing all - sorts of Plain Changes • Richard Duckworth and Fabian Stedman

... for skilful or intelligent. "He is a knowing artist." "See him prick up his ears; ...
— Slips of Speech • John H. Bechtel

... Deadwood Dick, outlaw, road-agent and outcast, read the notice, and then a wild sardonic laugh burst from beneath his mask—a terrible, blood-curdling laugh, that made even the powerful animal he bestrode start and prick up ...
— Deadwood Dick, The Prince of the Road - or, The Black Rider of the Black Hills • Edward L. Wheeler

... streptococcus pyogenes—into the cellular connective tissue of the integument, intermuscular septa, tendon sheaths, or other structures. Infection always takes place through a breach of the surface, although this may be superficial and insignificant, such as a pin-prick, a scratch, or a crack under a nail, and the wound may have been healed for some time before the inflammation becomes manifest. The cellulitis, also, may develop at some distance from the seat of inoculation, the organisms having travelled by ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles

... "Mrs. Gray's eyes are so sharp, why, they're so sharp they almost prick! And it's no use for Katie to go ...
— Dotty Dimple at Her Grandmother's • Sophie May

... at him with a grin. "Well," he remarked oracularly, "it's easy to acquire an inflated notion of one's own importance, though it's quite often a little difficult to keep it. Something's very apt to come along and prick you, and you collapse flat when it lets the inflation out. In some cases one never quite gets one's self-sufficiency back. The scar the prick made is always there, but it's different with Waynefleet. He is made of self-closing jelly, and when you take the knife out ...
— The Greater Power • Harold Bindloss

... all. On the table in the middle of the room there was a little group on which Mrs. Ascher had been at work earlier in the day. A female figure stood with its right foot on the neck of a very disagreeable beast, something like a pig, but prick-eared and hairy. It had one horn in the middle of its forehead. The female figure was rather well conceived. It was appealing, with a sort of triumphant confidence, to some power above, heaven perhaps. The ...
— Gossamer - 1915 • George A. Birmingham

... the neck. The finger introduced into the mouth, and carried over the tongue to the back of the throat, feels there a swelling which projects over the top of the windpipe, and causes the difficulty both in swallowing and breathing. This swelling is the abscess; a prick with the surgeon's lancet lets out the ...
— The Mother's Manual of Children's Diseases • Charles West, M.D.

... can make 'em run," he replied, "by licking 'em or scaring 'em or anything else, I'll see you get a medal. Why, Bess here is twenty-three years old." He struck the animal a resounding smack upon the flank which demonstration caused Bess to prick one ear reflectively. "Her frisky days are over," continued Joe, "and Nat ain't much better. A baby ...
— Peggy Raymond's Vacation - or Friendly Terrace Transplanted • Harriet L. (Harriet Lummis) Smith

... a question of mere brute strength, and neither of us had had the advantage of surprise. I could feel the sharp prick of my own knife as he hugged me to him, but I dare not reach for it, and I held his arms so tightly that he lay panting and struggling as if in a vise. It was an odd fight, as we turned and tossed, writhed and twisted ...
— When Wilderness Was King - A Tale of the Illinois Country • Randall Parrish

... the better in the argument as not to be disturbed in his manner of life; and he was, as has been before said, the owner of a stall in Salisbury Cathedral. His lines had certainly fallen to him in very pleasant places. As to that living in the fens, there was not much to prick his conscience, as he gave up the parsonage house and two-thirds of the income to his curate, expending the other third on local charities. Perhaps the argument which had most weight in silencing the bishop was contained in a short postscript to one of his letters. ...
— The Vicar of Bullhampton • Anthony Trollope

... here," said the doctor; "I could prick it with a pin without causing any sensation of pain." Then, again placing his hand upon Marsa's forehead, he tried to rouse some memory in the ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... picking out from a page of a book, all the letters he has learned, naming them, and if necessary describing them to a companion or a sub-monitor as they occur. Or he may be set down by himself, with a waste leaf from an old book, or pamphlet, or newspaper, to prick with a pin the new letter or letters last taught him; or, as an introduction to his writing, he may be made to score them gently with ink from a fine tipped pen. In these exercises, and all others which are in their ...
— A Practical Enquiry into the Philosophy of Education • James Gall

... her a sharp prick. Could it be her doing that trouble was coming upon the old house? What a punishment for ...
— The Cuckoo Clock • Mrs. Molesworth

... There was no change in the outer performance of the hours, but Mata remained alert, disturbed, and the girl tranquilly oblivious. The old face searching with keen eyes the young noted with troubled frown the frequent smile, the intervals of listless dreaming, the sudden starts, as by the prick of memory still new, and dipped in honey. There seemed to be in Ume-ko a gentle yearning for a human presence, though, to speak truly, Mata could not be certain that she was either heard or seen ...
— The Dragon Painter • Mary McNeil Fenollosa

... cloudy fantasy, so near akin to nothingness, give valid evidence against him at the day of judgment? Be that the case or not, there is reason to believe that one truly penitential tear would have washed away each hateful picture and left the canvas white as snow. But Mr. Smith, at a prick of Conscience too keen to be endured, bellowed aloud with impatient agony, and suddenly discovered that his three guests were gone. There he sat alone, a silver-haired and highly-venerated old man, in the rich gloom of the crimsoned-curtained ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... was of a Virgin born, And He was prick'd by a thorn, And it did never throb nor swell, And I trust in ...
— Roger Trewinion • Joseph Hocking

... where are they, by the end of the day, With dancing and jumping and leaps by the sea? For wintry weather They won't hold together, Seal-skins and bear-skins all dropping round, Off from our shoulders down to the ground. The thorns, the tiresome thorns, will prick, But none of them ever consented to stick! Oh, won't the men let us this new thing use? If we mend their clothes, they can't refuse. Ah, to sew up a seam for them to see,— What a treat, a delightful treat, 't ...
— The Last of the Peterkins - With Others of Their Kin • Lucretia P. Hale

... And folded his wings till the Fay was gone, And the wily beetle dropped his head, And fell on the ground as if he were dead; They crouched them close in the darksome shade, They quaked all o'er with awe and fear, For they had felt the blue-bent blade, And writhed at the prick of the elfin spear; Many a time on a summer's night, When the sky was clear and the moon was bright, They had been roused from the haunted ground, By the yelp and bay of the fairy hound; They had heard the tiny bugle horn, They had heard of twang of the maize-silk ...
— The Culprit Fay - and Other Poems • Joseph Rodman Drake

... injury done to it. Upon these transplanted pieces were tattooed the letters of the alphabet; so that, when a communication was to be made, either of the persons, though the wide Atlantic rolled between them, had only to prick his arm with a magnetic needle, and straightway his friend received intimation that the telegraph was at work. Whatever letter he pricked on his own arm pained the same letter on the arm of his correspondent. ["Foreign Quarterly Review," vol. xii. p. 417.] Who knows ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay

... had report of him," Pilate went on. "He is not political. There is no doubt of that. But trust Caiaphas, and Hanan behind Caiaphas, to make of this fisherman a political thorn with which to prick Rome and ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London

... fine-stepping cock into another hall, spacious, and clouded with heavy scents and perfumes burning in censers and urns, musk, myrrh, ambergris, and livelier odours, gladdening the nostril like wine, making the soul reel as with a draught of the forbidden drink. Here, before a feast that would prick the dead with appetite, were shapes of beasts with heads of men, asses, elephants, bulls, horses, swine, foxes, river-horses, dromedaries; and they ate and drank as do the famished with munch and gurgle, ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... the surface of the Satellite, glowed the pin-prick of a camp-fire. When the ships were some fifteen thousand feet up, Judd's orders caused long light-rays to shaft out from the Star Devil and finger the ground. They rested on the ranch house and then passed on to douse with white the figures of three men standing by the fire. Through ...
— Hawk Carse • Anthony Gilmore

... its incongruous accessories. The young girl went to her desk, but presently moved and turned towards the window thoughtfully. The last gleam had died from the steel-blue sky; a few lights like star points began to prick out the lower valley. The expression of monotonous restraint and endurance had not yet ...
— A Sappho of Green Springs • Bret Harte

... said with an accent we will for want of a better word call dry, Sweetwater, hardy as he was, flushed to his ears. But then any prick from Mr. Gryce went very ...
— The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow • Anna Katharine Green

... fine pair of creams in front of them. And, as if this were not enough, the friendship they enjoy and the handsome treatment they receive is made good to them with a substantial salary. They sow not, they plough not; yet all things grow for their use.' How I have seen you prick up your ears at such words as these! How wide your mouth has opened ...
— Works, V2 • Lucian of Samosata

... anything, always had money in it. This box he never locked, having learned that he need fear no robbery by once leaving his cloak for two days under a bush and then finding it again. "This world," he exclaimed, "is too good: it will not last." Among his pets were a porcupine trained to prick the legs of his guests under the table "so that they drew them in quickly"; a raven that spoke like a human being; an eagle, and many snakes. He also studied necromancy, the better to frighten his apprentices. He left Florence in 1528, after the Medici ...
— A Wanderer in Florence • E. V. Lucas

... lady. "Yas, sar; gib um sleep-drop to make buckra massa hol' still twell we could tote 'im froo de window an' 'roun' de house an' up de sta'r. Soljah gyards watch um mighty close dat night; yes, sar!" And thus this nightmare thought of mine was turned into another thorn to prick me on the self-accusing side. 'Twas her keen woman's wit, and no cold-blooded plan to cheat the gallows, that made her give me the sleeping draft. Having the object-lesson of my late surrender before her, she had no ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde

... hostess to murmur some depreciatory remarks upon the pretty young fellow, unfortunately so much disfigured by his mother's nose. He made merry over his duel, his wound, and his reputation in the fencing-room, the kind of bubble which bursts at the first prick of a real sword. He added, not knowing how near he was to the truth, 'The quarrel at cards was of course a mere pretext; there was a woman at ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet

... write to you, so much have I forsaken Persian, and even all good Books of late. There is no one now to 'prick the Sides of my Intent'; Vaulting Ambition having long failed to do so! I took my Omar from Fraser [? Parker], as I saw he didn't care for it; and also I want to enlarge it to near as much again, of such Matter as he would not dare to put in Fraser. ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald in Two Volumes - Vol. II • Edward FitzGerald

... and on—far, far over mountain and dale, over sand-hills and moor. Then Dapplegrim began to prick up his ears again, and at last he asked the lad if ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various

... prick up his ears. He quickly closed the door, blew out his candle and hid behind a stack of empty wine-cases. After a few seconds, he noticed that one of the iron bins was turning slowly on a pivot, carrying ...
— The Blonde Lady - Being a Record of the Duel of Wits between Arsne Lupin and the English Detective • Maurice Leblanc

... presumptuousness of the man in venturing to think of falling in love, as if he were actually one of the beneficed clergy! What are deacons coming to, I wonder! And yet, hath not a deacon eyes; hath not a deacon hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? And if you show us a little Miss Butterfly, beautiful to the finger-ends, do we not fall in love with her at least as unaffectedly as if we were canons residentiary or rural deans? Fancy little ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen

... I prick up my ears and listen intently. But I did not suffer my awakened interest to betray itself in look or ...
— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell

... M. le Capitaine,' the Lieutenant answered. 'Prick him in the back if he falters. I will warrant,' the brute added with a chuckle, 'he has a tender ...
— Under the Red Robe • Stanley Weyman

... admiration of a plant, whose stem was about two feet high, and which had a round, shining, pale purple, beautiful flower, the waggoner, with a look of extreme scorn, exclaimed, 'Help thee, lad, does not thee know 'tis a common thistle? Didst thee not know that a thistle would prick thee?' continued he, laughing at the face I made when I touched the prickly leaves; 'why my horse Dobbin has more sense by half! he is not like ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth

... allowed to distribute itself in a thin layer. In this manner one can recognise the difference between the colour of anaemic and of healthy blood more clearly than in the drop as it comes from the finger prick. After a few trials one can in this way draw conclusions as to the degree of the existing anaemia. Could this simple method which is so convenient, which can be carried out at the time of consultation, come more into vogue, it alone would contribute to ...
— Histology of the Blood - Normal and Pathological • Paul Ehrlich

... cut off the King of Moroccos Head. Among several other Figures, he was very well pleased to see the Statesman Cecil upon his Knees; and, concluding them all to be great Men, was conducted to the Figure which represents that Martyr to good Housewifry, who died by the prick of a Needle. Upon our Interpreters telling us, that she was a Maid of Honour to Queen Elizabeth, the Knight was very inquisitive into her Name and Family; and after having regarded her Finger for some time, I wonder, says he, that Sir Richard Baker has said nothing ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele

... worshippers look in different directions and smile rather slyly when he is budding and blossoming in his own peculiar style; but they never make much ado about the business, and swallow all that comes very quietly and good-naturedly. Strangers prick their ears directly, and would laugh right out sometimes if they durst. There are not many collections at the chapel, but those which are made are out of the ordinary run. Two were made on the Sunday we ...
— Our Churches and Chapels • Atticus

... the rain should not have begun to descend upon Avignon I would repair to the head-spring of the Sorgues. When the critical moment arrived the clouds were hanging over Avignon like distended water-bags, which only needed a prick to empty themselves. The prick was not given, however; all nature was too much occupied in following the aberrations of the Rhone to think of playing tricks elsewhere. Accordingly I started for the station in a spirit which, for a tourist who sometimes had prided ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James

... an instrument in his hand, and McGuire felt the prick of a needle plunged into his arm. He tried to move his head and found himself powerless. And now, in the darkness of the room where all lights were again extinguished, the helpless man was fighting the most horrible of battles, and the battleground was within his own mind. He was ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, December 1930 • Various

... where the fern fronds tall Fashion a lace-work over your head, Hemming you in with a high, green wall; Then, when the thrush calls once, stop dead. Ask of the old grey wallaby there— Him prick-eared by the woollybutt tree— How to encounter a Glug, and where The country of Gosh, famed ...
— The Glugs of Gosh • C. J. Dennis

... the first horse, already a hundred feet away. He said nothing to groom nor horse, but Mutineer understood the sudden change in the reins, even before he felt that maddening prick of the spurs. There was a moment's wild grinding of horse's feet on the slippery road and then Mutineer had settled to his ...
— The Honorable Peter Stirling and What People Thought of Him • Paul Leicester Ford

... opprobrious phrase which, worse than the accusation of a crime, cannot be refuted, for it is the king of the question-beggars,—"bad taste" is responsible for half the reticence that marks current writing, for the failure to prick the bladders of every species that bloat themselves all around us. "Good taste" is the staunchest ally of hypocrisy, and corruption is the obverse side of civilisation. I do not believe in these general truths that rule the market. What is "true for all" is false for each. It ...
— Without Prejudice • Israel Zangwill

... dizzying experience of release. "Earth-bound" my jealousy relentlessly kept me. Though my two dear ones had forsworn each other, I could not trust them, for theirs seemed to me an affectation of a more than mortal magnanimity. Without a ghostly sentinel to prick them with sharp fears and recollections, who could believe that they would keep to it? Of the efficacy of my own vigilance, so long as I might choose to exercise it, I could have no doubt, for I had by this time come ...
— Famous Modern Ghost Stories • Various

... the stone with the point in the white side there will come on such a hailstorm that no one will be able to look at it. If you want to stop the shower you have only to prick on the yellow part, and there will come so much sunshine that the hail will melt away. If you prick the red side then there will come out of it such fire, with sparks and crackling, that no one will be able to look at it. You may also get whatever ...
— Folk-Lore and Legends; Scandinavian • Various

... licensed proprietors napped with one eye open—smiled to each other perhaps, recognizing how the prick of personal injury and injustice will arouse far-reaching rebellion against human wrongs and imperfections in general. But our famous American sense of humor may be worked overtime, and, from a perception of the incongruity and relative importance of things, be insensibly degraded ...
— The Subterranean Brotherhood • Julian Hawthorne

... it is an ancient custom of ours.' She said, 'Thine is a good religion; I will instantly give orders that the governor of the port, together with your wife, shall appear here, and I shall punish that ass in such a manner that he will not act so another time, and all shall prick up their ears and tremble.' She asked her attendants, 'Who is the governor of the port? How dares he take away by force the wife of another man?' They answered, 'He is such a one.' On hearing his name, she told the two boys who were standing near her, 'Take this man along with ...
— Bagh O Bahar, Or Tales of the Four Darweshes • Mir Amman of Dihli

... offers. I saw women distinguished by rank, elegant in person, modest, and even reserved in manner, sitting at the Rouge-et-noir table with their rateaux, or rakes, and marking-cards in their hands;—the former to push forth their bets, and draw in their winnings, the latter to prick down the events of the game. I saw such at different hours through the whole of Sunday. To name these is impossible; but I grieve to say that two ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz

... over the case in that den of his, it suddenly struck him what absolutely damning evidence he could make against McFarlane by using that thumb-mark. It was the simplest thing in the world for him to take a wax impression from the seal, to moisten it in as much blood as he could get from a pin-prick, and to put the mark upon the wall during the night, either with his own hand or with that of his housekeeper. If you examine among those documents which he took with him into his retreat, I will lay you a wager that you find the seal with the ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes • Arthur Conan Doyle

... or the sky so clouded, the mysterious influence of the light, as the sun slowly rises higher on the meridian, sinks into the earth like a magic rain. It enters the hardest bark and the rolled-up bud, so firm that its point will prick the finger like a thorn; it stirs beneath the surface of the ground. A magnetism that is not heat, and for which there is no exact name, works out of sight in answer to the sun. Seen or unseen, clouded or not, every day the sun lifts itself an inch higher, and let the north wind shrivel ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies

... on your under crust, and trim the edge. Fill the dish with the ingredients of which the pie is composed, and lay on the lid, in which you must prick some holes, or cut a small slit in the top. Crimp the edges ...
— Seventy-Five Receipts for Pastry Cakes, and Sweetmeats • Miss Leslie

... league, of which I have become the first member, imposes on me the duty of living and working in its service. I was unable to strike the tyrant with my dagger; well, then, we must try to kill him gradually by means of pin-pricks. Such a pin- prick is the manuscript which Gentz has intrusted to me in order to have it published and circulated throughout Germany. Somewhere a printing-office will be found to set up this manuscript with its types; I will seek for it, and pay the weight of ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach

... to his mission, never wholly faded from his purview, or ceased to enlist his active interest. He wrote again in 1539 against usury, much as he had written at an earlier period, remarking to his friends that his book would prick the consciences of petty usurers, but that the big swindlers would only laugh at him in their sleeves. And in publishing his Schmalkaldic Articles he briefly refers again in his preface to the 'countless matters of importance' which a genuine Christian ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin

... his deliverance, and presenting his kneeling image constantly before the public eye on bags and needle-books, card-racks, pen-wipers, pin-cushions, &c. Even the children of the north are inscribing on their handy work, "May the points of our needles prick the slaveholder's conscience." Some of the reports of these Societies exhibit not only considerable talent, but a deep sense of religious duty, and a determination to persevere through evil as well as good report, until every scourge, ...
— An Appeal to the Christian Women of the South • Angelina Emily Grimke

... normal thing, the matter inside these big blisters, which rose all down my fingers with only a skin between them, was frozen into ice. To handle the cooking gear or the food bags was agony; to start the primus was worse; and when, one day, I was able to prick six or seven of the blisters after supper and let the liquid matter out, the relief was very great. Every night after that I treated such others as were ready in the same way until they gradually disappeared. Sometimes it was difficult not ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard

... let go his hold and retired, but returned in a moment, with a spear in one hand and a dagger in the other; and his countrymen had much ado to restrain him from trying his prowess with the soldier. This fray was occasioned by the latter's having given the man a slight prick with his bayonet, in order to make him keep ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr

... topping insolence, had he not supposed himself supported by a mutinous spirit from without. It was a dangerous spirit which, if inflamed by indulgence, would become a deadly boil to poison the whole body politic. Prick therefore the imposthume at once, and, like wise surgeons, let out the offensive matter. He was not surprised at the indignation of the worthy Deputy. It was a zeal unto godliness, and devoutly did he wish, that himself, ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams

... and accurate weapon is Miss Hamilton's pen; and in this work she uses it with delicious dexterity to prick bubbles, to slice off masks, cut veils and bandages, and ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman

... dimensions, senses, affections, passions? fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same Winter and Summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die? and if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? if we are like you in the rest, we ...
— Community Civics and Rural Life • Arthur W. Dunn

... marry Shirley for the sake of her money, and she refused me scornfully; you needn't prick your fingers with your needle, that is the plain truth—and I had not an emotion of ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books - Vol. II: Fiction • Arthur Mee, J. A. Hammerton, Eds.

... are thorns in the flesh, I can quite suppose. I should think Mother Gaillarde was, and that her being a nun was a mercy to some man, so that she was told off to prick us and not him. But is every body so? and are we all called to be thorns in the flesh to somebody? I should not fancy being looked on by my relations (if I were in the world) as nothing but ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt

... in the brief space of their individual history, the stages they missed on their way out of the black past. With me, for example, it actually comes to this: that I have to recapitulate in my own experience all the slow steps of the progress of the race. I seem to learn nothing except by the prick of life on my own skin. I am saved from living in ignorance and dying in darkness only by the sensitiveness of my skin. Some men learn through borrowed experience. Shut them up in a glass tower, with an unobstructed ...
— The Promised Land • Mary Antin

... he said, "you have seen that before. It does not hurt a pin-prick. But what does it show? The capacity for pain is not needed in the muscle, and it is not placed there,—is but little needed in the skin, and only here and there over the thigh is a spot capable of feeling pain. ...
— The Island of Doctor Moreau • H. G. Wells

... against the awful defiles of the Montenegrin and Albanian Mountains, a country through which no organized army could pass in a body, and through which only the strongest of the noncombatants could hope to escape alive. And for a time it seemed as though the French would prick a hole through this net, through which, by rending it into a wide gap, the Serbians could have been saved. But with the retirement of Colonel Vassitch from Babuna Pass that last chance was gone; Serbia was left ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)

... all there is the melinite and the shrapnel. To be sure they give us the only pin-prick of interest to be had in Ladysmith. It is something novel to live in ...
— From Capetown to Ladysmith - An Unfinished Record of the South African War • G. W. Steevens

... great blunt forehead coming down on us like a steamboat, I felt that we could not escape. I was mistaken. The captain received him on the point of his lance, and the whale has such a dislike to pain, that even a small prick will ...
— Fighting the Whales • R. M. Ballantyne

... once remove the Dragon-fly. She is dead, really and truly dead. Laid upon my table and left alone for twenty-four hours, she makes not the slightest movement. A prick of which my lens cannot see the marks, so sharp-pointed are the Epeira's weapons, was enough, with a little insistence, to kill the powerful animal. Proportionately, the Rattlesnake, the Horned Viper, the Trigonocephalus and other ill-famed serpents produce less ...
— The Wonders of Instinct • J. H. Fabre

... to fiddle most melodiously, And sings, 'twould make your ears prick up, to hear him Gent. Shortly she'l make him spin: and 'tis thought He will prove an admirable maker of Bonelace, And what a rare gift will that be in ...
— The False One • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... scrub the potatoes until perfectly free from dirt and mould, bake them, and when done prick with a fork to allow the steam to escape, then wipe with a cloth to remove any charred skin, etc. Have ready a good-sized saucepan (enamelled for preference) in which the milk and butter have been heated, halve the potatoes and squeeze them into it, add salt and pepper (the latter should ...
— New Vegetarian Dishes • Mrs. Bowdich

... the mingling of two differing Chymical saline liquors, by which means the parts become swell'd, hard, and very painfull; for thereby the nervous and sensible parts are not onely stretch'd and strain'd beyond their natural tone, but are also prick'd, perhaps, or corroded by the pungent and incongruous parts ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke

... and hard one for Dave, and long before it came to an end he was ready to sink into a faint from exhaustion. Every time he reeled in the saddle one of the red men would shove him up roughly, or prick him with the end of a ...
— On the Trail of Pontiac • Edward Stratemeyer

... of a prick. This was not the way to steady the march of twenty thousand. All the sand has left some clay and more chance than enough is that and the season has any number ...
— Matisse Picasso and Gertrude Stein - With Two Shorter Stories • Gertrude Stein

... jackal roosted in ut, as well we knew in the mornin'. I put ut to you, sorr, is an elegint palanquin, fit for the princess, the natural abidin' place av all the vermin in cantonmints? We brought ut to you, afther dhark, and put ut in your shtable. Do not let your conscience prick. Think av the rejoicin' men in the pay-shed yonder— lookin' at Dearsley wid his head tied up in a towel—an' well knowin' that they can dhraw their pay ivry month widout stoppages for riffles. Indirectly, sorr, you have rescued from ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling

... ruin us," said Raeburn, "but, after all, the evil has a way of helping out the good." He put his arm round her and kissed her. "You have taught me, little one, how powerless and weak are these petty persecutions. They can only prick and sting us! Nothing can really hurt us while we love the truth and love ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall

... the trembling girl to Craig's side, and with a prick of his sword in their backs made them go forward. The American was too bewildered to think evenly. Why, the god Aten was the Sun God!—the divinity Egypt worshipped in five hundred B.C.? How had these warm-blooded people come to the far north? Where ...
— Astounding Stories, July, 1931 • Various

... Doll said she would. Then the Bold Tin Soldier, with the same sword that had pricked the dog, cut some grass, and it was bound on the dog's paw. The sword prick was not a very deep one, and would soon heal. Then, limping on three legs, the dog ran away, and the toys were left to ...
— The Story of a Bold Tin Soldier • Laura Lee Hope

... had intended to start for Jerusalem that morning with his goods. But the riding mule he had bought proved to be lame from a prick in the hoof, nor were all his hired camels come down from the mountains, so that he must wait a few days, ...
— The Brethren • H. Rider Haggard

... know it would take me so long," said Fleda drawing a long breath;—"but I couldn't help it. I had those celery plants to prick out,—and then I was helping Philetus to plant ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner

... the turning them you must take Care there be no little Bladders in them, for if there be, you must prick them with a Point of a Pen-knife, and squeeze them out, otherwise they will blow ...
— The Art of Confectionary • Edward Lambert

... a rather hasty though warm embrace (she was terribly afraid that his conscience would prick him and that he would take the second note away again), and flew out of the window faster than she had come in. The clock was striking a quarter past one, and she had to scamper down to Chapman's to buy ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde

... want it?" Dade scowled absent-mindedly at the wall, felt the prick of an unpleasant thought, ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower

... where the other used to be. Thus he may look at mine, as I at his, And think of me, if he perchance forgot. The footstool bring me hither; I am Queen, And I shall fasten to the chair this King. They say that witches who compel to love Stick needles, thus, in images of wax, And every prick goes to a human heart To hinder or to quicken ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... roused by the pang of hunger from his intellectual slumber; the natural philosopher, dismembering the solar system, accompanying through immeasurable space the wanderings of the planets, is restored by the prick of a needle to his mother earth; the philosopher who unfolds the nature of the Deity, and fancies himself to have broken through the fetters of mortality, returns to himself and everyday life when the bleak north ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... her presence ignored even by a village lad, determined to arouse him. 'Moreover, I have heard Priest Stephens speak of you to my father,' she went on, with a little pin-prick of emphasis on each word, though addressing her remarks apparently to no one in particular, and with her dainty ...
— A Book of Quaker Saints • Lucy Violet Hodgkin

... them, bore a hole through them, & put them into a Pail of water, then take as much Sugar as they do weigh, and put to it as much water as will make a Syrup to cover them, and boil them as fast as you can, so that you keep them from breaking, until they be tender, that you may prick a Rush through them: let them be a soaking till they be almost ...
— A Queens Delight • Anonymous

... took up the challenge with all his natural eagerness, and the conversation resolved itself into a discussion of Christian evidences. Or rather Robert held forth, and Langham kept him going by an occasional remark which acted like the prick of a spur. The tutor's psychological curiosity was soon satisfied. He declared to himself that the intellect had precious little to do with Elsmere's Christianity. He had got hold of all the stock ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... seconds later. It may be that corns have an especial constitution, but otherwise the time assigned before feeling pain is far too long. Helmholtz made 1850 measurements which proved that the nervous current moves 90 feet a second. If, then, you prick your finger, you feel it a thirtieth of a second later. The easiest experiments which may be made in that regard are insufficient to establish anything definite. We can only say that the perception of a peripheral pain occurs an observable period after the shock, i. e., about a third of ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden

... accounts were brought to the chateau daily. The occurrence was too complicated for her, and everything connected with it smelt too much of the unclean. Only when the name of Bastide Grammont was first mentioned did she prick up her ears, follow the affair, and have her father or the servants report to her the supposed course of events, ...
— The German Classics, v. 20 - Masterpieces of German Literature • Various

... There was just a touch of ridicule in Bud's voice. He knew Walter, and he had not counted amiss when he used this little goad to prick a skin so sensitive. "Brother Sodom" was the nickname given by scoffers to the preacher—Mr. Soden—whose manner of preaching had so aroused Bud's combativeness, and whose saddle-stirrups Bud had helped to amputate. For reasons of his own, Bud thought best to subject young Johnson to the heat ...
— The Hoosier Schoolmaster - A Story of Backwoods Life in Indiana • Edward Eggleston

... rather say, monsieur, a great defect in what is always a great people. You are certainly the most highly-civilised nation on the earth; you suffer a little from the fact. If I were an English preacher my desire would be to prick the heart ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... valves of one's own veins may be shown; the movements of respiration may be observed; while the wonderful phenomena of sensation afford an endless field for curious and interesting self-study. The prick of a needle will yield, in a drop of one's own blood, material for microscopic observation of phenomena which lie at the foundation of all biological conceptions; and a cold, with its concomitant ...
— Science & Education • Thomas H. Huxley

... minutes. (A little more flour may be required while kneading, as some brands of meal do not absorb so much water as others, but do not add more than is absolutely necessary to prevent the fingers sticking.) Put the dough on to a floured board and divide into four round loaves. Prick with a fork ...
— The Healthy Life Cook Book, 2d ed. • Florence Daniel

... hoarse, excited tone of voice began condemning the horrors that were taking place, saying that everything was now in readiness for them to start, that none but cowards could hold back, that a certain amount of violence was just as necessary as the prick of the lancet to the abscess, however ripe it might be! The lancet simile was not original, but one that he had heard somewhere. He seemed to like it, and made use of it on ...
— Virgin Soil • Ivan S. Turgenev

... the dignified, the measured march of poetical conception. No wonder, when superstition steps in to prick on imagination, that all should vividly team with spirit life. Or that on Walpurgis' night, bush and streamlet and hill bustle and hurry, with unequal pace, towards the haunted Brocken: the heavy ones lag, indeed, a little, and are ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847 • Various

... premeditated intention of antagonizing the man. He meant no more to her than dozens of other grooms, for after all he was merely an upper servant, but her quick eyes had instantly made some discoveries which hurt her as a physical needle prick would have hurt her. Peggy had employed too many men at Severndale under Shelby's wonderful judgment and experience of both men and animals, not to judge pretty accurately, and most intuitively, the type of man mounted upon big, gray "Duke." Duke's very ears ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson

... Queen) was forc'd to speak, or burst. And is not mine, my friend, a sorer case, When ev'ry coxcomb perks them in my face? A. Good friend, forbear! you deal in dang'rous things. 75 I'd never name Queens, Ministers, or Kings; Keep close to Ears, and those let asses prick; 'Tis nothing—P. Nothing? if they bite and kick? Out with it, DUNCIAD! let the secret pass, That secret to each fool, that he's an Ass: 80 The truth once told (and wherefore should we lie?) The Queen of Midas slept, and ...
— The Rape of the Lock and Other Poems • Alexander Pope

... Mr. Broussard is living in luxury himself just now," said Mrs. Fortescue. And Mrs. McGillicuddy's kind heart, being touched with remorse for having given Broussard a pin prick, hastened to say: ...
— Betty at Fort Blizzard • Molly Elliot Seawell

... feel to be this way—after a further great endeavour and endurance on our part, a further great striving towards Him, He will awaken and prick to new life the soul and fill us with Holy Love. This is the second baptism, the baptism of the Spirit of Love. This is the entry to the Kingdom, and immediately we taste of the Godhead. What this is, what this ravishment ...
— The Prodigal Returns • Lilian Staveley

... the summons. I noticed that my mother needed my help in seating the younger children at the table and attending to their wants, and I gave her my assistance. Somehow the meal seemed to pass off more pleasantly than usual, and I felt my conscience prick me that I had so often given my mother trouble by loitering and delaying at meal-time. I resolved that henceforth I would be promptly on hand to help her. From that time there was a marked change for the better in the ease with which our family ...
— Letters to a Daughter and A Little Sermon to School Girls • Helen Ekin Starrett

... several long peon villages, mere grass huts on the bare earth floors of which the inhabitants lay rolled up in their blankets. I had not been supplied with spurs, essential to all horsemanship in Mexico, and was compelled at thirty second intervals to prick up the jade between my legs with the point of a lead pencil, the only weapon at hand, or be left behind entirely. As the stars dimmed and the horizon ahead took on a thin gray streak, peons wrapped in their sarapes passed now and then noiselessly in their soft leather huarachas close beside ...
— Tramping Through Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras - Being the Random Notes of an Incurable Vagabond • Harry A. Franck

... my ideas are very hazy thus far, you must understand, for at the present moment I do not know where the ship is, and I shall be unable to discover her position until I can take the requisite sights. Then we will have out the chart, prick off our position, and discuss ...
— The Strange Adventures of Eric Blackburn • Harry Collingwood

... he introduces the narrative of the rejection of Jesus as the reason why the message has now come to them his hearers away in Antioch. It is 'sent forth' 'to us,' Asiatic Jews, for the people in the sacred city would not have it. Paul does not prick his hearers' consciences, as Peter did, by charging home the guilt of the rejection of Jesus on them. They had no share in that initial crime. There is a faint purpose of dissociating himself and his hearers ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren

... blinking the truth. I shall need all my courage and all my resolution to meet it, and I shall meet it as manfully as I can. Yet the thought of meeting it thus has no inspiration in it. My only desire is that the frozen mind may melt at the touch of some genial ray, and that the buds may prick and unfold upon ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson

... one of those barbarians dies, they do not bury him for many days, for, as they say, they pass one month, during which period they amass quantities of food about the deceased, to whom they give his share as well as the others. Then they continue to prick the body, and, as they say, they draw off or suck out the humors until the body is left dry. When that time comes they wrap it in their blankets, and fasten buyos and other things about the waist for the journey. Some are buried ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XX, 1621-1624 • Various

... almost exclusive way; but to-day he was distracted by one of those slight but persistent preoccupations, one of those petty anxieties which are so small we ought not to allow ourselves to be troubled by them, but which, in spite of all we do or say, prick through our thoughts like an invisible thorn buried ...
— Strong as Death • Guy de Maupassant

... Yet it was almost well so transcendent a moment should have its pin prick of annoyance. With a "No" of ineffable scorn, Jim—or Christopher—the name was immaterial to him—clambered up into the high carriage and wedged himself between the elderly gentleman and the inquisitive driver, who had regained his seat and ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant

... well as in Belgium. Further, it is only necessary to remark that the Schipperke is a dog of quality, of distinct characteristics, cobby in appearance, not long in the back, nor high on the leg; the muzzle must not be weak and thin, nor short and blunt; and, finally, he is not a prick-eared, black wire-haired terrier. ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton



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