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Spurt   Listen
noun
Spurt  n.  A sudden and energetic effort, as in an emergency; an increased exertion for a brief space. "The long, steady sweep of the so-called "paddle" tried him almost as much as the breathless strain of the spurt."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Spurt" Quotes from Famous Books



... performance ended. Then the bones being swept from the table, a huge skin of wine is set before Don Lopez, and he serves us each with about a quart in an odd-shaped vessel with a spout, which Don Sanchez and his countrymen use by holding it above their heads and letting the wine spurt into their mouths; but we, being unused to this fashion, preferred rather to suck it out of the spout, which seemed to them as odd a mode as theirs was to us. However, better wine, drink it how ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett

... There was a spurt of flame, a puff of smoke and before the crack of the report snapped out the dirty, greasy hat of Paz went spinning from ...
— The Boy Ranchers Among the Indians - or, Trailing the Yaquis • Willard F. Baker

... fast nor far, in that first spurt, pausing shortly to turn face towards the rear, a low, musical ...
— The Lost City • Joseph E. Badger, Jr.

... haggard eyes, half turned on her saddle, and leaning on the pommel, shuddering, but pitiless, had not turned her head away from this terrible spectacle. However, when she saw the blood spurt out from the wound, she fell from her horse as though ...
— The Forty-Five Guardsmen • Alexandre Dumas

... tightened its grasp of Betty's arm. "Are you game for one last spurt?" he asked her. "We may ...
— The Outdoor Girls on Pine Island - Or, A Cave and What It Contained • Laura Lee Hope

... if you begin with such a spurt," she assured them. "Alpine climbing has to be like the ...
— For the Sake of the School • Angela Brazil

... endeavour have been good: the days Racing in cutters for the comrade's praise. The day they led my cutter at the turn, Yet could not keep the lead, and dropped astern; The moment in the spurt when both boats' oars Dipped in each other's wash, and throats grew hoarse, And teeth ground into teeth, and both strokes quickened Lashing the sea, and gasps came, and hearts sickened, And coxswains damned us, ...
— Georgian Poetry 1911-12 • Various

... thief, and an outrageous robber, but you can go, my four-footed monument to a blasted rogue's perfidy. Five hundred good dollars—now, at it for a final spurt." ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum

... purpose in his mind of reaching the winning-post. He studiously avoids taking his eyes off the goal, which he has carefully located in advance, and takes pains to note the moment when he is nearing it, so as to run no risks of making his spurt too soon. ...
— Poise: How to Attain It • D. Starke

... almost overcorrected! With infinite care he straightened out again, just as the plane was air-borne. Eyes riveted on the horizon, he felt for the switch that pulled up the landing gear and felt the plane spurt ahead as the drag of wheels and struts ...
— The Scarlet Lake Mystery • Harold Leland Goodwin

... should dare to announce through the usual authentic channels that he was to be heard of at the bar below, and that he was perfectly prepared to accommodate Mr. James Mace if he meant business. Nevertheless, he could recollect that he had turned out for a spurt a few years ago on the River Thames with an occasional Secretary, who should be nameless, and some other Eton boys, and that he could hold his own against them. More recently still, the last time that he rowed down ...
— Speeches: Literary and Social • Charles Dickens

... beginning, and had scored two goals before the visitors began to "find" themselves. This would never do, Hugh determined. He gave his players a signal that called for a spurt, and himself led the way by capturing the puck, and shooting it into the cage of their opponents amidst loud footings of great joy from the loyal ...
— The Chums of Scranton High at Ice Hockey • Donald Ferguson

... tremblingly up the stairs everything assumed gigantic and menacing shapes—the clock, the pot-pourri bowls, the window-curtains, and the brass rods on the stairs. In the room there was that grey half-light that seemed so terrible, and the spurt and crackle of the fire seemed to fill the place with sounds. He scarcely saw his grandfather. In the centre of the bed, something was lying; the eyes gleamed for a moment in the light of the fire, the lips seemed to move. But he did not realise that those things were his grandfather ...
— The Wooden Horse • Hugh Walpole

... crouching on the fender trying to get some warmth at the little fire extracted from Reb Shemuel's half-crown. December continued gray; the room was dim and a spurt of flame played on her pale earnest face. It was a face that never lost a certain ardency of color even at its palest: the hair was dark and abundant, the eyes were large and thoughtful, the nose slightly aquiline and the whole cast ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... did I, and with no small concern, until I read of his adventures (and our own) in the newspapers. It seemed that he had made a gallant spurt into the road, and there paid the penalty of his rashness by a sudden incapacity to move another inch. It had eventually taken him twenty minutes to creep back to locked doors, and another ten to ring up the inmates. His description of my personal appearance, ...
— A Thief in the Night • E. W. Hornung

... those Mountebancks that are commonly call'd Water-drinkers. For though not only the vulgar, but ev'n many persons that are far above that Rank, have so much admir'd to see, a man after having drunk a great deal of fair water, to spurt it out again in the form of Claret Wine, Sack, and Milk, that they have suspected the intervening of Magick, or some forbidden means to effect what they conceived above the power of Art; yet having once by chance had occasion to oblige a Wanderer that made profession ...
— Experiments and Considerations Touching Colours (1664) • Robert Boyle

... so of these disappointments, and then learned not to look up. This was only after we had risen above timber line to the smooth, rounded rock-and-grass shoulder of the mountain. Then three times we made what we thought was a last spurt, only to find ourselves on a "false summit." After a while we grew resigned, we realized that we were never going to get anywhere, but were to go on forever, without ultimate purpose and without hope, pushing with tired legs, gasping with inadequate lungs. ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White

... failed to notice a dark form which, after creeping noiselessly up the slope, had started edging across the little plateau. Now this form suddenly straightened up and leaped forward. Frank cried out in alarm and jumped sideways, just as a spurt of flame split the darkness. The bullet sped by, leaving him unharmed. Stone, who was closer and stood with back turned, whirled about. The charging form cannoned into him, ...
— The Radio Boys on the Mexican Border • Gerald Breckenridge

... and my saddle were riddled, but I was not wounded nor was my mare. She continued her rapid course, and went through the three ranks of the battalion as easily as a snake through a hedge. But this last spurt had exhausted Lisette's strength; she had lost much blood, for one of the large veins in her thigh had been divided, and the poor animal collapsed suddenly and fell on one side, rolling me over on ...
— The Red True Story Book • Various

... Geoffrey's prodigious powers of endurance. How long he should "wait on" the man? Whereabouts it would be safe to "pick the man up?" How near the end to calculate the man's exhaustion to a nicety, and "put on the spurt," and pass him? These were nice points to decide. The deliberations of a pedestrian-privy-council would be required to help him under this heavy responsibility. What men could he trust? He could trust A. and B.—both of them authorities: both of them stanch. ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins

... parry and lunge followed in lightning succession; the laboured breaths went up in gusts of steam on the morning air. There was murder in two pairs of eyes, a resolve as grim as death itself in the stern set faces of their opponents. Soon the blood began to spurt and ooze from a dozen wounds; the Duke was wounded in both legs; his adversary in the groin and arm. Faces, swords, the very ground, became crimson. Colonel Hamilton had at last disarmed his opponent, but the others ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall

... make a spurt for that time," he said coolly, and began to walk slowly but steadily on. Only his face, which was white and set, and the convulsive grip of his hand on her arm, betrayed the effort. At the end of ten minutes she stopped. They stood before the splintered, lightning-scarred shaft in the ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte

... since sun-up, just this side of Warwick; but it's a fine day, and I did hope we might hang on a little while further, so as to cut down our last day's hike a few miles. It's always the hardest part of the whole thing, the finishing spurt. But of course, if any of you feel played out we can call it off ...
— Boy Scouts on a Long Hike - Or, To the Rescue in the Black Water Swamps • Archibald Lee Fletcher

... Suddenly a spurt of flame shot out above him and was followed by a fusillade of shots in the direction of up river. Had they spotted Mungongo or were they merely letting drive at a bush or the spirits in general? The latter was most probable. The water swirled near to him. All his will power was required not ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle

... of rocks. She had a savage antipathy to the weasel tribe, whose blood-lust menaces all the lesser wood-folk, and whose teeth delight to kill, after hunger is sated, for the mere relish of a taste of quivering brain or a spurt of warm blood. The raccoon carried more scars from the victory over the weasels than she had to remind her of the scuffle with the dogs. But she had the nerve that takes punishment without complaint, and the scars troubled ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts

... But is he strong enough?" she added wistfully. Strong enough, she meant, to bear agitation and surprise. But Falloden reported that Sorell knew everything that was intended, and approved. Otto had been very listless and depressed in town; a reaction no doubt from his spurt of work before the musical exam. Sorell thought the pleasure of the gift might rouse him, and gild ...
— Lady Connie • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... but put my fingers to her cunt, at a place where she wished me to rub her, she meanwhile frigging away at my prick. But I wanted more than this, and just as it was too late, she let me put my prick in. At the first spurt of my spunk, she by a twist threw my prick out, and caught hold of it with her fingers, letting me spend over her thighs and linen, but squeezing and frigging at my doodle until it had shrunk ...
— My Secret Life, Volumes I. to III. - 1888 Edition • Anonymous

... noticed it, and immediately explored the creek clear to its source—a spurt of water springing from the roof of a grotto in the cliff. Such a supply, evidently from the rocky heart of the range itself, ...
— Overland Red - A Romance of the Moonstone Canon Trail • Henry Herbert Knibbs

... morning he plunged again into a stress of work with his old swing and intensity, as if single-handed at one spurt he was to make his way to the close of his labors. He ate his hurried meals at a little restaurant near the laboratory, and came back to his rooms late at night, unexhausted, ...
— The Man Who Wins • Robert Herrick

... The little spurt of fistcuffs was brief, but it gave Mershone, who stood in the shadow of the door-way near by, time to whisper to a police officer, who promptly seized the disputants and held them both in ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in Society • Edith Van Dyne

... perhaps a hundred feet when the building they had just left seemed to be lifted bodily from the ground by a great spurt of flame which tore through its center, then collapsed like a thing of cards. The prince, unmoved, glanced around at Miss Thorne; she lay in a ...
— Elusive Isabel • Jacques Futrelle

... I gain the cove with pushing prow. And quench its speed i' the slushy sand. Then a mile of warm sea-scented beach; Three fields to cross till a farm appears; A tap at the pane, the quick sharp scratch And blue spurt of a lighted match, And a voice less loud, through its joys and fears. Than the two hearts beating each ...
— The Poetry Of Robert Browning • Stopford A. Brooke

... soundlessly. Then, while one hand groped waveringly upward to rest upon his daughter's head, Sandy, bending low, caught three syllables, repeated over and over, desperately, mere ghosts of words, taxing cruelly the last breath of the wheezing lungs beneath the battered ribs, the final spurt ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn

... awaken confidence in the enemy; Which yet's the only way to peace: for if War intermit not during war, how then And whence can peace come? Your own plagues fall on you! Even as I love what's virtuous, hate I you. And here I make this vow, here pledge myself, My blood shall spurt out for this Wallenstein, And my heart drain off, drop by drop, ere ye Shall revel and dance jubilee o'er his ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... advance of our actual circumstances. If this golden rim were quenched, if life were no longer circled by an illusion (but was it an illusion after all?), then it would be too dismal an affair to carry to an end; so he wrote with a sudden spurt of conviction which made clear way for a space and left at least one sentence standing whole. Making every allowance for other desires, on the whole this conclusion appeared to him to justify their ...
— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf

... quiet and peace in the United Kingdom, and in the world at large, when the honeymoon began for that august but simple-hearted pair of lovers, Victoria and Albert; or, as she would have preferred to write it, Albert and Victoria. The fiery little spurt of revolt in Canada, called rather ambitiously, "The Canadian Rebellion," had ended in smoke, and the outburst of Chartism, from the spontaneous combustion of sullen and long-smothered discontent among ...
— Queen Victoria, her girlhood and womanhood • Grace Greenwood

... throat, the other the wrist that lifted the quivering death; white limbs wrapped about the hidden ones, I saw the golden head bend, the hand that held the Keth swept up with a vicious jerk; saw Lakla's teeth sink into the wrist—the blood spurt forth and heard the priestess shriek. The cone fell, bounded toward me; with all my strength I wrenched free the hand that held my pistol, thrust it against the pressing breast ...
— The Moon Pool • A. Merritt

... work with one of his own nation, earning an honest livelihood. A Judge of Probate, Boston born and Boston bred, a man in easy circumstances, a Professor in Harvard College, was sitting in his office, and with a single spurt of his pen he dashes off the liberty of a man—a citizen of Massachusetts. He kidnaps a man endowed by his Creator with the unalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. He leaves the writ with the Marshal, and goes home to his family, caresses his children, and ...
— The Trial of Theodore Parker • Theodore Parker

... other tack, coming from the north-east, were two great ugly lugger-like craft, with one high mast each, and a big square brown sail. A prettier sight one would not wish than to see the three craft dipping along upon so fair a day. But of a sudden there came a spurt of flame and a whirl of blue smoke from one lugger, then the same from the second, and a rap, rap, rap, from the ship. In a twinkling hell had elbowed out heaven, and there on the waters was hatred and savagery ...
— The Great Shadow and Other Napoleonic Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle

... hoards of cigarettes, Is void of matches as he's full of veins. So here's a good match in a naughty world, And what to do with it I do not know, Save that somehow, when all the place is still, It shall explode and spurt and flame and burn Slowly away, not having thus achieved The lighting of a pipe or any act Of usefulness, but having spent itself In lonely grandeur as befits the last Of all the varied matches ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Nov. 28, 1917 • Various

... "The Rocket" was subjected to the regular test. Its assigned load was thirteen and a half tons which it drew back and forth over the two-mile track the full stent of forty times, making a spurt at times as high as twenty-nine miles, about three times what had been declared possible by the judges! Finally, to show how fast the engine could go and still keep the track, Mr. Stephenson ran it alone at the astonishing rate ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6 of 8 • Various

... the six went on, with Bill Dozier's long-striding chestnut setting the pace. He made no effort toward a spurt now. Andrew Lanning led them by a full hour's riding on a comparatively fresh horse, and, unless he were foolish enough to indulge in another wild spurt, they could not wear him down in this first stage of the journey. There was only ...
— Way of the Lawless • Max Brand

... Fu. He rode on a white mule, which carried him thousands of miles in a day, and which, when the journey was finished, he folded up like a sheet of paper and put away in his wallet. When he again required its services, he had only to spurt water upon the packet from his mouth and the animal at once assumed its proper shape. At all times he performed wonderful feats of necromancy, and declared that he had been Grand Minister to the Emperor Yao (2357-2255 ...
— Myths and Legends of China • E. T. C. Werner

... into peals of unquenchable merriment. This way of taking a revoke was new to Tilling, for the right thing was for the revoker's partner to sulk and be sarcastic for at least twenty minutes after. The Contessa's laughter continued to spurt out at intervals during the rest of the rubber, and it was all very pleasant; but at the end she said she was not up to Tilling standards at all, and refused to play any more. Miss Mapp, in the highest good-humour, urged her ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson

... a sudden spurt of assurance. "What about that kid up there, Doc? Nobody's letting him by, are ...
— Rescue Squad • Thomas J. O'Hara

... nearly exhausted when at last he found himself in shallow water; so, putting on a desperate spurt, he managed to reach a sandy creek where a landing could be easily made. But as he staggered up from the water, thanking God in his heart, a sudden weakness overpowered him, and he fell senseless on the sand. Pirate had reached land before his master, and was shaking ...
— Viking Boys • Jessie Margaret Edmondston Saxby

... rather tedious except to the personage to whom they are addressed. As to poetry, it is very common to find it in love-letters, especially in those that have no love in them. The letters of bigamists and polygamists are rich in poetical extracts. Occasionally, an original spurt in rhyme adds variety to an otherwise monotonous performance. I don't think there is much passion in men's poetry addressed to women. I agree with The Dictator that poetry is little more than the ashes of passion; still it may show that the flame has had its ...
— Over the Teacups • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... take that for it!" And before the brute of a youth could ward off the blow he received Tom's fist in his right eye. Then he got one in the other eye and another in the nose that made the blood spurt freely. He tried to defend himself, but Tom was "fighting mad," and his blows came so rapidly that Koswell was knocked around like a tenpin and sent bumping, first into Flockley, then into Larkspur, and then into some bushes, where he lay, panting ...
— The Rover Boys at College • Edward Stratemeyer

... with sinister meaning. This dark hint conveyed absolutely no enlightenment to the mind of Mrs. Temperley, from sheer lack of familiarity, on her part, with the rumours of the district. Dodge applied himself with a spurt to ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird

... us the crestline this morning. Birdie said he could have cried, and is not quite sure he didn't cry, when the bombardment stopped dead and minute after minute passed away, from one minute to twenty, without a sign of Baldwin and his column who had been booked to spurt for the top on the heels of the last shell. Unaided, the 6th Gurkhas got well astride the ridge, but had to fall back owing to the lack of his support. None the less, these Anzac Generals are in great form. They are sure they will have the whip hand ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume 2 • Ian Hamilton

... posterity. And, sitting idly in the sunshine, I think at times of the unborn people who will, to some small extent, be indebted to me. Remember me kindly, ye future men and women! When I am dead, the juice of my apples will foam and spurt in your cider-presses, my plums will gather for you their misty bloom; and that any of your youngsters should be choked by one of my ...
— Dreamthorp - A Book of Essays Written in the Country • Alexander Smith

... in the country of the Ho-He. That is Assiniboine," he explained, following it with a strong grunt of disgust which ran all around the circle as the Dog Chief struck out with his foot and started a little spurt of dust with his toe, throwing dirt on the name of his enemy. "They are called Assiniboine, stone cookers, because they cook in holes in the ground with hot stones, but to us they were the Ho-He. The first time we met we fought them. That was in the old time, before we had guns or bows either, ...
— The Trail Book • Mary Austin et al

... click of a spring, the flash of the falling knife, a spurt of blood, a dull groan from ten thousand breasts, and the head rolled into ...
— Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre

... their glasses every foot of parapet, every yard of ground, every tree or bush, hayrick or broken building that looked a likely spot to make cover for a sniper on the other side. If their eye caught the flash of a rifle, the instantly vanishing spurt of haze or hot air—too thin and filmy to be called smoke—that spot was marked down, long and careful search made for the hidden sniper, and a sort of Bisley 'disappearing target' shoot commenced, until the opponent was either ...
— Between the Lines • Boyd Cable

... rule of a legalised Eight Hours Day!" So shouts Labour's Lilliput—that is its voice, And the modern PROCRUSTES thereat must rejoice. "No giants, no dwarfs!" So say BROWNING and BURT, But to "raise the whole race" can't be done in a spurt, And while Nature provides us with genius and clown, There is nought to be gained by mere levelling down. So the plan of PROCRUSTES, my boys, will not work, Or will benefit none save the sluggard or shirk. Oh yes, the bold bully ...
— Punch, Volume 101, September 19, 1891 • Francis Burnand

... these tears. Rather more than a year before, while the Clarion was still enjoying a first spurt of success and notoriety, he had, with a certain recklessness which belonged to his character, invested in new and costly machinery, and had transferred the paper to larger offices. All this had been done on ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... shore. There, fifty yards away on bank, gazing at them, was a deer. Stock still he stood like a red statue, for he was yet in the red coat. With three or four strong strokes, Quonab gave a long and mighty forward spurt; then reached for his gun. But the deer's white flag went up. It turned and bounded away, the white flag the last thing to disappear. Rolf sat spellbound. It was so sudden; so easy; it soon melted into the woods again. He ...
— Rolf In The Woods • Ernest Thompson Seton

... elder-bush blow it's five corners to mow, To get to that burdock's green lug— So he put on a spurt till the sweat blacked his shirt, And he mowed his ...
— The Masques of Ottawa • Domino

... dropped rifle. His lips were pressed tight; his eyes full of grim determination. Why didn't Dupont fire? Could it be he was unarmed? Or was he hoping by delay to gain a closer shot? Keen-eyed, resolute, the Sergeant determined to take no chances. The rifle came to a level,—a spurt of flame, a sharp report, and the pony staggered to its knees, and sank, bearing its helpless burden with it. Dupont let go his grip on the rein, and stood upright, clearly outlined against the white hillside, staring back toward ...
— Molly McDonald - A Tale of the Old Frontier • Randall Parrish

... now temporarily in eclipse through over caution in radical utterance, is gathering himself for a fresh spurt that will doubtless place him at the front in politics again. He has never married. The belief in Remsen City is that he is a victim of disappointed love for Jane Hastings. But the truth is that he is unable to take his mind off himself long enough to be come sufficiently ...
— The Conflict • David Graham Phillips

... there has been some deviation from the methods of dealing with the sewage, a change from which we believe that some of the officials concerned with the early improvements very strongly dissented, that has to some extent retarded the advance of the fish. But in 1895 a sudden "spurt" took place in their return. Whitebait became so plentiful that during the whole of the winter and spring the results were obvious, not only to naturalists, but on the London market. Whitebait shoals swarmed in the Lower Thames and the ...
— The Naturalist on the Thames • C. J. Cornish

... then you are the more unwise: You may have a spurt amongst them now and then; Why should not you, as ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Robert Dodsley

... sharply deafening in the confined space of the corridor. With a spurt of flame the leaden pellet struck over my ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science April 1930 • Various

... down somewhere in a town, and get in touch with Bloomsbury Headquarters. The Chief as much as promised that he'd leave word there to put us wise to anything that had been learned by way of the telephone, from other places. And given a clue in that way, we might take a fresh spurt, you know." ...
— The Aeroplane Boys Flight - A Hydroplane Roundup • John Luther Langworthy

... bullet-swept plain once more. It was with a great effort that he even dragged himself along. He felt himself growing weaker with the moments. Every few yards he was compelled to lie over on his back for rest and to gain fresh strength for the next spurt. It required the most heroic courage for one in Rene's condition to go on. But he grimly stuck to ...
— The Children of France • Ruth Royce

... slackened its speed, as it approached the tree, and then sailed by it at a moderate rate. When it was opposite the flag a spurt of flame came from the pistol of the man in it, and ...
— The Forest of Swords - A Story of Paris and the Marne • Joseph A. Altsheler

... sharply; "but he don't lie down under 'em." Then, with aside-spurt of steam, exactly like a tough spitting: "There ain't more than fifteen thousand dollars' worth o' freight behind her anyway, and she goes on as if 't were a hundred thousand—same as the Mogul's. Excuse me, madam, but ...
— The Day's Work, Volume 1 • Rudyard Kipling

... and Sandy and I began our work, not rowing as we meant to later. The Arrow was to hug the Wilsons' shore, and we our bank. I heard a cheer for the Arrow, and knew she was ahead. It was a strong temptation to look round and see how far ahead she was, and by a spurt bring our boat up with her if possible. I didn't, though, and just rowed away as well as I could, ...
— Harper's Young People, May 11, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... a spurt of flame from the woodwork behind the stove, and Shad slammed the door to, and ran ...
— Kit of Greenacre Farm • Izola Forrester

... close-set black eyes peered down upon the two. Tarzan was a dozen yards ahead of Numa when he reached the wall. There was no time to stop and institute a search for sturdy stems and safe handholds. His fate was in the hands of chance and with the realization he gave a final spurt and running catlike up the side of the wall among the vines, sought with his hands for something that would sustain his weight. Below him Numa ...
— Tarzan the Untamed • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... Approved an out-spoken cable from my Ordnance to the War Office. Heaven knows we have been close-fisted with our meagre stocks, but when the Turks are coming right on to the assault it is not possible to prevent a spurt of rapid fire from men who feel the knife at their throat. "Ammunition is becoming a very serious matter, owing to the ceaseless fighting since April 25th. The Junia has not turned up and has but a small supply when she does. 18 pr. ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume I • Ian Hamilton

... was a spurt of low-running horses with a white cloud of dust behind, and Corson laughed aloud in his glee. Every one of the group in the lead was a range horse; the Coles mares were hanging in the rear and last of all, obscured by ...
— Alcatraz • Max Brand

... the climax, and the last exhausted spurt of work. For the concluding twelve hours there was no sleep or rest for anyone; and at the end a breathless, haggard tension held them as Dr. Ku Sui, a shell of his former self, reviewed the results of the nine days' ordeal. ...
— The Passing of Ku Sui • Anthony Gilmore

... Islands every single village has its flowers and aromatic herbs.[971] But it is in Fiji that native island agriculture seems to culminate. Here a race of dark, frizzly haired savages, addicted to cannibalism, have in the art of tillage taken a spurt forward in civilization, till in this respect they stand abreast of the average European. The German asparagus bed is not cultivated more carefully than the yam plants of Fiji; these also are grown ...
— Influences of Geographic Environment - On the Basis of Ratzel's System of Anthropo-Geography • Ellen Churchill Semple

... figure, prone upon the tawny sand, was just visible, lean and snakish, slightly oscillating as it worked. And I took careful aim, and fired, and saw the spurt from the bullet. ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin

... rebel against the entire situation, and the expressions of revolt roughly divide themselves into three classes. The first, resulting in idleness, may be illustrated from many a sad story of a boy or a girl who has spent in the first spurt of premature and uninteresting work, all the energy which should have carried them through years ...
— The Spirit of Youth and the City Streets • Jane Addams

... was making his fortune in the East, a spurt of insurrectionary fire had broken out in Italy. The agrarian laws and Sylla's proscriptions and confiscations had restored the numbers of the small proprietors, but the statesmen who had been so eager ...
— Caesar: A Sketch • James Anthony Froude

... After a little spurt, mademoiselle relaxed the pace of her own accord, and even went slower than before. There was an awkward silence. Edouard eyed the park boundary, and thought, "Now what I have to say I must say before we get to you;" and being thus impressed with the ...
— White Lies • Charles Reade

... cut in crisply. "I don't mind a little grumbling at the right time, and I often do a bit myself, but not when I'm as rushed as I am to-night. There's the dock ahead, men—-a little faster spurt now!" ...
— The Young Engineers on the Gulf - The Dread Mystery of the Million Dollar Breakwater • H. Irving Hancock

... dash and spurt and rally; with a swing and drive and rattle, Both the boats went flashing faster as they cleft the swelling stream; And the old familiar places, scenes of many a sacred battle, Just were seen for half a moment and went by ...
— The Vagabond and Other Poems from Punch • R. C. Lehmann

... girls who had come over, in a white, linen-starched wagon load, from Fairfield, gave me my last spurt. Expecting every moment to hear my antagonist grind past me, on the cinders, I ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp

... a second. 'Separate! separate!' he shouted, and as we did so, the bear chose me for his meat. I ran downhill as fast as I could, but he was gaining. 'Dodge around a tree!' screamed Young-Man-Afraid. I took a deep breath and made a last spurt, desperately circling the first tree I came to. As the ground was steep just there, I turned a somersault one way and the bear the other. I picked myself up in time to climb the tree, and was fairly out of reach when he gathered himself ...
— Indian Heroes and Great Chieftains • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman

... one of these that our only route to the khan lay—and yet we felt that in such contracted quarters, and in such an excited mob as had gathered around us, disaster was sure to follow. Our only salvation was to keep ahead of the jam, and get through as soon as possible. We started on the spurt; and the race began. The unsuspecting merchants and their customers were suddenly distracted from their thoughts of gain as we whirled by; the crowd close behind sweeping everything before it. The falling ...
— Across Asia on a Bicycle • Thomas Gaskell Allen and William Lewis Sachtleben

... leaps up with a spurt of high life. In the window of a hotel dining room a gentleman sat eating his lunch, stevedoring a buttered roll with such gusto that one felt tempted to applaud. There are the white pillars of a bank and the battleship gray of the Salvation Army headquarters. Beyond ...
— Pipefuls • Christopher Morley

... Gedge. "The sight of our lads below there seems to ha' woke me up. I'm ready to die game; but I want to make one spurt ...
— Fix Bay'nets - The Regiment in the Hills • George Manville Fenn

... spurt of life from the engine as it back-fired, and Stewart sprang away holding her wrist with the other hand. The lieutenant, the brigadier, and a driver from a car near by crowded ...
— The Happy Foreigner • Enid Bagnold

... by the reports of the United States Commissioner of Education, in rank one—among the sixteen best women's colleges in the United States. It hasn't risen to that rank by any quick, money-spurred spurt. It brings with it out of its far past all the traditions of that early struggle for the higher education which, by friction, kindled among women so flaming an enthusiasm for pure knowledge. It remains "collegiate" in the old sense, quiet, cloistral, inhabiting ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine

... a-slant, bounced shoulders against the opened door, caught their bearings and hell was out for noon. Buregarde caught the first with a slash at the throat; they went down in a mad whirl of dog and thug, paws, tail, arms, legs and a spurt of blood. The second flicked his pencil-ray at Peter, its capsule charge faded to a mere sting before it cut into him. The third aimed a kick at the struggling dog. Vanessa Lewis snatched a box from the bureau and hurled ...
— History Repeats • George Oliver Smith

... Jacques sat opposite, and the vicomte sat at his side. As they left the table to circle round the fire in the living-room, Victor forgot his cloak, and the vicomte threw it around his own shoulders, intending to follow the poet and join him in a game of dominoes. A spurt of flame crimson-hued his face and flashed over ...
— The Grey Cloak • Harold MacGrath

... a man sought his life, as the savages of old sought the hunter. Another glance showed him that pursuer had closed up half the distance between them, and, snatching one of the pistols from his belt, he fired. He knew that he had missed, as he saw the water spurt up beside the boat, but he thought that his bullet and the probability of more might delay the pursuit. Nevertheless the man came on as boldly and as fast as ever. If he fired a third time he could scarcely ...
— The Shades of the Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler

... two days, mostly off-duty time, visiting and working on the asteroid he had adopted, his two miles of irregular monstrosity. In his spurt of activity to install the drive unit, he had over-calculated a charge of explosives and blown out too much of the end section of the asteroid. That caused him some concern for a little while. In a flash of what he probably considered ...
— Jack of No Trades • Charles Cottrell

... there listening, but fly to the aid of my master. Though, indeed, by this time there can be little need, for the giant must be dead already, and will trouble the world no more. For I saw his blood spurt and run all over the floor, and his head is cut off and fallen ...
— The Red Romance Book • Various

... news stories I could tell no less than the full truth, which was that the grass, after remaining patriotically dormant throughout the war except for the spurt northward to destroy the remnants of the invading host, had once more set out upon the march. The loss of color I had pointed out to Joe was less apparent each day of our stay as the old vividness revived with its renewed ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore

... veil floated in front of them, and everything looked blurred and dim. He made one more brave effort, and, with a spasmodic jerk, half lifted his body; but the exertion made the stream of blood, which was oozing out of his side, spurt out in quick, sharp rushes, and with a pathetic sigh and a convulsive movement of the beautiful form, which had been so full of life and activity only a few short minutes before, Chaffer let his handsome head fall back for ...
— Rataplan • Ellen Velvin

... length, Sir Galahad second. King Agrippa third! At the half! Sir Galahad first, Panchito second, King Agrippa third! At the three-quarter pole! King Agrippa first, Panchito second, Polly P. third. Galahad's out of it. Polly P's making her spurt, but she can't last. Into the stretch with Panchito on the rail and coming like he'd been sent for and delayed. Oh, Lord, Jim, that's a horse—and we thought he was a goat! Look at him come! He's an open length in front of Agrippa and the cholo hasn't used his willow switch. ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne

... went to its knees. But the man leaping clear took the ground on his feet and instantly set off at a run for the line of brush in the draw some seventy or eighty paces away. A last spurt Weir's pony made, bringing his rider to within thirty yards of the cattleman, who glancing over his shoulder halted, swung about, fired a shot ...
— In the Shadow of the Hills • George C. Shedd

... the French. If I'd asked an Englishman, he'd have pulled the communication-cord, but this fellow never so much as stared. He just released a little spurt of good-will and then started in, as if his future happiness depended on putting me straight. 'But I was meaning the fleas. Oh, indubitably. Animals most gross. Only last November he himself....' It took quite a lot of persuasion to get him off fleas. Then he offered me lice. ...
— Jonah and Co. • Dornford Yates

... I sthrolled out on the beach again, but saw little. A heavy fog was rowlin' from the nor'ard and the breeze before it was chill and damp as a widow's bed. I walked for me health for an hour and then ran to kape war-rm. At the ind of my spurt I was amazed to find mesilf exactly at the hotel steps. I wint in and laid me down be the fire and slept. I woke ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Stories • Various

... cord do their worst, now my head struggles first! That tug my last spurt has expended— Nose to nose! lip to lip! from the sound of the whip He ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon

... closes its front door by retracting until the disc presses immovably against the circumference of the tube, the retraction being so sudden that a frail spurt betrays the whereabouts of an otherwise secret dwelling-place. In the centre of the disc is the first segment, from which the frontal fringe is extended in the form of an array of keen bristles as a defensive weapon. With the lid at one end and the ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield

... Andy glue his eyes on the other aeroplane, and for a brief time he seemed to almost hold his breath as he watched to see whether they would leave it behind, with Percy desperately endeavoring to copy their spurt. ...
— The Airplane Boys among the Clouds - or, Young Aviators in a Wreck • John Luther Langworthy

... right behind the gills. He gave a quick spurt that brought the line humming from its spool. Scotty followed quickly, caught the shaft, then sped ...
— The Wailing Octopus • Harold Leland Goodwin

... evening. We could see the spurt of flame from the mouth of the gun as the shell departed to the ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various

... a spat, and a little spurt of red dust rolled lazily upward. Then another hum followed. There was a scurry of men, a squeak of leather, the light clashing of rifles snatched from the stack; and the ...
— On the Firing Line • Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller

... Whether it is the tiny ripple that dies along the curving sands, or the merry, rustling, crested surf that hurries on to wanton in the rocky pools, or the storm billow that rushes wildly against an iron-bound coast to spurt aloft its sheets of spray or to hurl its threatening mass on the trembling strand—in each and every form the wave is a moving miracle. Through every change of contour and interplay of curves, its ...
— Nature Mysticism • J. Edward Mercer

... would each concussion be followed by a spurt of gunfire from behind the closed door of the shack showing that Oswald was alive to the situation and must be enjoying his share in the strange engagement quite as much as the fun-loving ...
— Eagles of the Sky - With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes • Ambrose Newcomb

... himself in good earnest. His bicycle flew. He resolved that after all he would go to Guadalajara. He crossed the bridge over the irrigating ditch with a brusque spurt of hollow sound, and shot forward down the last stretch of the Lower Road that yet intervened between Hooven's and the town. He was on the fourth division of the ranch now, the only one whereon ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris

... hand. Lapierre spoke no word; seconds passed, the silence grew intense. The hand that gripped the paddle shook suddenly; and then, looking straight into the man's eyes, Lapierre drew his revolver and fired. There was a quick spurt of red flame—the sound of the shot rang sharp, and rang again as the opposite bank of the river hurled back the sound. The Indian pitched heavily forward and fell across his paddle, snapping ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx

... seemed to come into his life, or rather the old possibilities were seen in a new light shed by the womanly sympathy which up to now he had never known. He came away from each visit with some fresh spurt of purpose, some new impulse to achievement. Lady Gore, on her side, had been more favourably impressed by Rendel than by any of the young men she had seen, until she realised that here at last was ...
— The Arbiter - A Novel • Lady F. E. E. Bell

... and ruin all but the greatest men. It was probably owing to this, certainly not on account of any care or anxiety for such a result, that he was successful in his art, successful by a seemingly sudden spurt, which carried him at one bound over the ...
— The Well-Beloved • Thomas Hardy

... gleam of success. They were both nearly spent. Hoopdriver, indeed, was quite spent, and only a feeling of shame prolonged the liquidation of his bankrupt physique. From that point the tandem grained upon them steadily. At the Rufus Stone, it was scarcely a hundred yards behind. Then one desperate spurt, and they found themselves upon a steady downhill stretch among thick pine woods. Downhill nothing can beat a highly geared tandem bicycle. Automatically Mr. Hoopdriver put up his feet, and Jessie slackened her pace. In another moment they heard the swish of the ...
— The Wheels of Chance - A Bicycling Idyll • H. G. Wells

... navigation on the Mississippi, the river captains, it is said, had the playful habit, when pressed for time or enjoying a “spurt” with a rival, of running their engines with a darky seated on ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory

... out of my way as he sees me come bowling briskly down the road. The bovine, pampered and treated with the greatest deference and consideration from her earliest calfhood, resents this treatment by making a short but determined spurt after me as I sweep past. Whether the sacred cows of India are spoiled by generations of overindulgence, or whether the variety is constitutionally evil-tempered does not appear, but they one and all take pugnacious exception to the ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens

... women, tooth and nail. Nobody interfered. He was driven back against the wall, where he leant, just contriving to keep his adversaries at arm's length with his fists, and feeling, now that the first spurt of wrath had left him, that within three minutes he must ...
— The Blue Pavilions • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... swift gleam of light across the water, on a line with his eyes, betrayed the lightning swift course of a torpedo. It struck the ship, and at the same moment the Zeppelin dropped an accurate bomb. There was a terrific explosion as the torpedo struck amidships, a spurt of flame as the bomb scattered its inflammable gases over the decks, and fire burst out everywhere. Another torpedo tore into the ship. Zaidos' eyes bulged as he watched, the monster ship flaming and roaring with repeated explosions, her own guns ...
— Shelled by an Unseen Foe • James Fiske

... corner I was able to put on a spurt. He crossed the roadway by the Albert Gate, and by the time he reached the Park railings the old distance separated us once more. Half-way up the slope he came to a halt, by the stone drinking-trough: and flattening myself against the railings, ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... sledges at the Little Razorback. At any time over this stretch we could have run away from his team, and once they got our sledge they started that game on us. We expected it, and never had I stepped out so hard before. We had been marching hard for nearly 12 hours and now we had two miles' spurt to do, and we should have stuck it, bad runners and all, had we had smooth ice. As it was we struck a belt of rough ice, and in the dark we all stumbled and I went down a whack, that nearly knocked me out. This ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard

... her face away. Fred went on impetuously. "Oh, you can turn it away from me, Thea; you can take it away from me! All the same—" his spurt died and he fell back. "How can you turn on me so, ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather

... very good style it is! I should like to know that man; I would thank him for it.—Your General von Ried, then, had got the devil in him, that time at Eilenburg [spurt of fight there, in the Meissen regions, I think in Year 1758, when the D'Ahremberg Dragoons got so cut up], to let those brave Dragoons, who so long bore your Name with glory, advance between Three of my Columns?'—He had asked me ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... Mencius, "that water will flow indifferently to the east or to the west. But it will not flow indifferently up or down; it can only flow down. The tendency of human nature is towards what is good, as that of water is to flow downwards. One may, indeed, by splashing water, make it spurt upwards, but that is forcing it against its true character. Even so, when a man becomes prone to what is evil it is because his Heaven-implanted nature has been diverted from its ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books, Volume XIII. - Religion and Philosophy • Various

... for long. Suddenly the "Very" lights went up from the German side, literally in hundreds, illuminating the top of the ridge and the sky behind with a thin greenish white flare. Then came a deep rumble that shook the ground, and a dull boom. A spurt of blood-red flame squirted up from the near side of the hill, and a rolling ...
— A Yankee in the Trenches • R. Derby Holmes

... followed by a fainter streak. Nevill must have lit the little lamp on the table by the window. (Oh, dear! He was going to sit up, then.) She heard him go into the dining-room beyond and stumble against things; then came the spurt of a match, followed by the clinking of glasses. (He was only going to have a smoke and a drink.) She waited a little while longer, then she called to him. There was no answer; he must be dozing on the couch in the dining-room. ...
— The Tysons - (Mr. and Mrs. Nevill Tyson) • May Sinclair

... stand screamed; but Patsy smiled as he lay low over his horse's neck. He saw that Essex had made her best spurt. His only fear was for Mosquito, who hugged and hugged his flank. They were nearing the three-quarter post, and he was tightening his grip on the black. Essex fell back; his spurt was over. The whip fell unheeded on his sides. The spurs dug him ...
— The Strength of Gideon and Other Stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar

... Greedy, you mean. Hansom drivers never refused to take you because they were hungry. It's monstrous. Bless the War, anyway. (Looking at his watch) I say, we must put a spurt on. You ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 152, Feb. 7, 1917 • Various

... She could see some miles ahead of her, and as far as she could see the road was filled with wagons moving toward Nashville. A sharp spurt of firing on the left attracted her attention, and she saw a long wave of horsemen ride out of the woods, and charge the wagon-guards, who made a sharp resistence, but at length fled before overwhelming ...
— The Red Acorn • John McElroy

... all he could do to keep track of it. All at once, Walter lunged forward to return a particularly difficult shot which Don had placed close to the net. Biff! he just caught it and gave it a swift cut which sent it whizzing past Don's extended racket to the base line, where it raised a little spurt of dust. ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Geological Survey • Robert Shaler

... came rushing aft and threw out the buoy in our direction. One more cry to my mates that we must put our last strength into the work. There were only a few boat lengths to cover; we bent to our oars with a will. Now there were three boat lengths. Another desperate spurt. Now there were two and a half boat lengths—presently two—then only one! A few more frantic pulls, and there was a little less. "Now, boys, one or two more hard pulls and it's over! Hard! hard!! Keep to it! Now another! Don't give up! One more! There, we have it!!!" And one joyful ...
— Farthest North - Being the Record of a Voyage of Exploration of the Ship 'Fram' 1893-1896 • Fridtjof Nansen

... chill drive; bare-footed children playing at tares by the wayside; an old man in a plaid, smoking a pipe and turning on the new arrivals a kindly, weather-beaten face,—these were the impressions left on Margot's mind as the horses put on an extra spurt, knowing full well that rest and food were ...
— Big Game - A Story for Girls • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... shrub, twisting and doubling in and out of inaccessible places, but he was beginning to show signs of fatigue, and we saw he could not make much fight when once the dogs got hold. The latter were in fierce excitement, having lost their prey so often. After a final spurt of half a mile they pulled him down, and he was ...
— Five Years in New Zealand - 1859 to 1864 • Robert B. Booth

... sent a comfort-seeking glance that way, sent up a spurt of grayish black smoke with a vicious suddenness that made him jump. With bulging eyes he watched it mount higher and higher until he held his breath in fear that it would never stop. He saw the column halt and ...
— The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower

... the mouth Sermaise struck him, splitting the lower lip through. Francois felt the piercing cold of the steel, the tingling of it against his teeth, then the warm grateful spurt of blood; through a red mist, he saw Gilles and Ysabeau run screaming down ...
— The Line of Love - Dizain des Mariages • James Branch Cabell

... her care. Harry was kind—oh, ever so much kinder than in the old days when they had been together—more considerate, more thoughtful. But the skies of passion are stormily red, and so effulgent that one walks in gold. Consideration, thoughtfulness—what were these pale things worth against one spurt of fire? Besides, there was the ball to-night. He would dance with her, would seek the dim open spaces of the lawns, the dark shadows of the great elms, with ...
— The Summons • A.E.W. Mason

... other Hun aviator had taken advantage of the thrilling moment to dart in and deliver a hot fire. Jack could see the spurt of the machine-gun as it blazed away furiously, the two planes passing one another. He felt his heart in his throat for fear that Tom might be caught napping, for the distance was too great to make sure of ...
— Air Service Boys Flying for Victory - or, Bombing the Last German Stronghold • Charles Amory Beach

... just how it is that I throw my feet up behind me. And be very particular to note that I keep my hands and arms in just this position all the way. Now, then, when you strike at a ball, and expect to hit it, have your lungs inflated ready for the first bound of the spurt. Now—-watching, all of you?" ...
— The High School Pitcher - Dick & Co. on the Gridley Diamond • H. Irving Hancock

... burst into a loud laugh, while Joe, suddenly recovering, went crashing into a Scotch reel with energy so great that time and tune were both sacrificed. As if by mutual impulse, Ruby and Dove began to dance! But this was merely a spurt of feeling, more than half-involuntary. In the middle of a bar Joe flung down the fiddle, and, springing up, seized Ruby round the neck and hugged him, an act which made him aware of the fact that he was ...
— The Lighthouse • Robert Ballantyne

... and ever closer they came, snapping and snarling. Ranald could see them over his shoulder. A hundred yards more and he would reach his own back lane. The leader of the pack seemed to feel that his chances were slipping swiftly away. With a spurt he gained upon Lizette, reached the saddle-girths, gathered himself in two short jumps, and sprang for the colt's throat. Instinctively Ranald stood up in his stirrups, and kicking his foot free, caught the wolf ...
— The Man From Glengarry - A Tale Of The Ottawa • Ralph Connor

... scene was changed. The Yankee ensign had hardly reached her peak, when down came the beguiling signal from the Alabama's flagstaff, and the white folds of the Confederate ensign unfurled themselves in its stead. A flash, a spurt of white smoke, curling for a moment from the cruiser's lee-bow, and vanishing in snowy wreaths upon the wind, and the loud report of a gun from the Alabama, summoned the luckless Yankee to heave to. In a moment all was in confusion on board the merchantman. Sheets and ...
— The Cruise of the Alabama and the Sumter • Raphael Semmes



Words linked to "Spurt" :   spout, locomote, discharge, pump, run, whoosh, move, blow, spray, outpouring, travel



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