"Spread-eagle" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... SPREAD-EAGLE. A punishment inflicted by seizing the offender by his arms and legs to the shrouds, and there leaving him for ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... twenty-four hours a day, in mud and blizzard, trying my damnedest to heal everybody, rich or poor. You—that 're always spieling about how scientists ought to rule the world, instead of a bunch of spread-eagle politicians—can't you see that I'm all the science there is here? And I can stand the cold and the bumpy roads and the lonely rides at night. All I need is to have you here at home to welcome me. I don't expect you to be passionate—not any ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... (1644-1717), known as Le Grand, a talented and docile pupil of Lebrun, whose four large compositions executed for the church of St. Martin des Champs, 432-435, are hung in this room. 434, R. wall, Resurrection of Lazarus, is perhaps the best. His works are a connecting link between the pompous spread-eagle manner of the Siecle de Louis XIV. and the gay abandonment and heartless frivolity of the reign of Louis XV. We pass from this room to the Collection of ...
— The Story of Paris • Thomas Okey
... which we reached about eight in the evening. I was much pleased with what I had seen and learnt, but it took me a long time to get the smell of the Vardis out of my head. The next morning I went to see the cheetahs and found that they had been tied spread-eagle fashion on the carts, and with their hoods firmly tied. They were a pair, and in all probability the parents of the two smaller ones. Women and children are told off to sit all day long close to the animals, ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... impossible for a false doctrine to stand on its own feet that the spread-eagle advertisement of this school contradicts itself long before it gets to the "Sign here and mail to-day" coupon. "The first time you try to swim," shouts the advertisement, "for instance, you sink; and the first time you try to ride a bicycle ...
— The Book of Business Etiquette • Nella Henney
... bedstead was a marvel in size and massiveness, and the heavy mahogany posts nearly black with age, and carved like the twisted strands of a rope, supported a tester lined with turkey-red pleatings, held in the centre by the talons of a gilt spread-eagle. So tall was the bed, that three steps were required to ascend it, and the space thus left between the mahogany and the floor, was hidden by a valance of white dimity, garnished with wide cotton fringe. Over this spacious place ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... Graves assisted him to a place in the studio of an artist, whose own works have proved, no less than those of many who have gathered their most precious lessons from him, that he is truly a master of his art. But what are masters, teachers, to a scholar? It's very fine boarding at the Spread-Eagle Hotel; but even after you have feed the waiter, you have to chew your own dinner, and are benefited, not by the amount you pay for it, but only by so much of all that with which the bounteous mahogany is covered as you can thoroughly masticate, easily contain, and healthily ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... tower of the new Babel will rise to the clouds, and be seen in all its glory throughout the earth and sea. No Fourth of July orator ever exaggerated the future destinies of America in a material point of view. No "spread-eagle" politician even conceived what will ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VI • John Lord
... (A spread-eagle toast.) The Boundaries of Our Country: East, by the Rising Sun; north, by the North Pole; west, by all Creation; and south, ...
— Toasts - and Forms of Public Address for Those Who Wish to Say - the Right Thing in the Right Way • William Pittenger
... deer, too, with a quick folding motion of the legs, drawn up and turned to one side with a sidelong twist of the body. I remembered the sprawling spread-eagle way in which some of the fellows used to come over the line—and tried to learn the trick. We did not easily catch up ...
— Herland • Charlotte Perkins Stetson Gilman
... organisers of the Tooley Street affair, of which one Taylor, lieutenant to Capt. William Boys of the Royal Sovereign, was the active cause. At the "Spread-Eagle" in Tooley Street he and his gang one evening pressed a privateersman—an insult keenly resented by the master of the ship. He accordingly sent off to the tender, whither the pressed man had been conveyed for security's sake, two wherries filled with armed seamen of the most piratical ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... the fastening of an American shield,—above all, when the dog himself appeared, "dressed in his clothes" (a cane, an all-round white collar and a natty little tie, a pair of three-dollar tasselled kid-gloves dangling from his left paw, and a small monitor hat with a big spread-eagle stuck above the brim,—the remaining details of costume being of no consequence),—when he stood "reading the news" from a huge bulletin,—"LATEST BY CABLE FROM EUROPE,"—nobody could mistake the personification ...
— Junior Classics, V6 • Various
... Zook for particulars. He is the last man in the ranks to be exaggerative or sensational, and as for his captain,—well, this despatch is simply characteristic of Terry. He has a horror of anything 'spread-eagle,' as he calls it, and will never praise officers or men; says that it must be considered as a matter of course that they behaved well and did their duty. Otherwise he would be sure to prefer charges. Now, Dr. Bayard, if you will kindly send for Dr. Weeks I will give him his instructions, and, meantime, ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King
... small pay they had been getting from Government and private speculators, saying, "What's thirty cents a day in these times for a man who has to maintain himself and his family?" (Great sensation among negroes, and a buzz, with mutterings of "that's so," etc.). Then a paymaster made a spread-eagle speech. Then Colonel Ellwell was called out by Mr. French. Then Judge Smith mounted the pulpit and explained to the negroes the meaning of preemption, how it was formed of two Latin words. Colonel Ellwell contrived to ...
— Letters from Port Royal - Written at the Time of the Civil War (1862-1868) • Various
... anticipating the Mardi Gras and were masquerading a little, didn't realise that every one was standing. I remained sitting for a moment (much to the horror of one of the English secretaries who was with us and who thought we were going to make a spread-eagle American demonstration and remain sitting when royalty appeared). However, by some sort of instinct, we rose too (perhaps to see what was going on), just as the princes passed. Princess Marguerite looked charming, dressed in white, ...
— My First Years As A Frenchwoman, 1876-1879 • Mary King Waddington |
