"Standstill" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... however, was effective although the breeze might veer several points from either of the locations mentioned. It was found that there were rather less than one-fourth of the points of the compass, the winds from which would bring the wheel to a standstill or cause it to swing ineffectively, but as these were the directions in which the wind least frequently blew it might safely be reckoned that not one-eighth of the possible working hours of a swivel-windmill were really ...
— Twentieth Century Inventions - A Forecast • George Sutherland
... do now? Nobody seemed to know. It was an embarrassing situation for the moment—merely, of course, because matters had taken such a sudden and unexpected turn that these unpractised minds were not prepared for it, and had come to a standstill, like a stopped clock, under the shock. But after a little the machinery began to work again, tentatively, and by twos and threes the men put their heads together and privately buzzed over this and that and the other proposition. One of these ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... we were both pretty well spent—he with age and I with faintness from my long fast, and we came presently to a standstill. ...
— Gulliver of Mars • Edwin L. Arnold
... on. They were less than a hundred yards behind. In a few moments they were directly behind. Then the man lazily turned his head. For some moments he stared stupidly at the three uniformed figures who had descended upon him. Then he suddenly sat up and brought his horses to a standstill. The ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... challenged each The ordeal, or to handle red-hot iron, Or pass through fire, affirming on our oath Our innocence—we neither did the deed Ourselves, nor know who did or compassed it. Our quest was at a standstill, when one spake And bowed us all to earth like quivering reeds, For there was no gainsaying him nor way To escape perdition: Yeareboundtotell TheKing,yecannothideit; so he spake. And he convinced ...
— The Oedipus Trilogy • Sophocles
... is so close that the funeral procession of Mrs. Knobbe's baby has been brought to a standstill. They won't even let the little coffin and the horrid fellow from the burial society who is carrying it go ...
— The Dramatic Works of Gerhart Hauptmann - Volume II • Gerhart Hauptmann
... wondered, as the train gradually slackened speed and came to a standstill. Everybody who was going in to town to the theatre or opera, began to look ...
— Five Little Peppers at School • Margaret Sidney
... as the cab, after proceeding a couple of yards, came to a standstill in a block of the traffic. "A dull, flat bore of a world, in which nothing happens or ever will happen. Even when you take a cab it just sticks and ...
— A Damsel in Distress • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... round, open eyes and shaking curls of her audience brought Rebecca once more to a standstill. Evidently some further explanation of this unwonted state of things would be expected. To gain time for further invention, Rebecca rose and carried her knitting to the window as though to pick up a stitch. Mechanically she glanced down into the court-yard, ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... decisions of the Children's Courts might be usefully made explicit in the Child Welfare Act. We agree also that it might be well to provide for the right of appeal against the Superintendent in certain circumstances. If the system is to be workable and not brought to a standstill by a mass of frivolous appeals, it will be necessary to restrict the right of appeal. If an appeal were to lie every time the Superintendent shifted a ward of State, the proceedings would be endless. The only appeal, we think, should be one to have a child discharged from the care ...
— Report of the Juvenile Delinquency Committee • Ronald Macmillan Algie
... knights that followed him, none ever saw or heard sign of him save one; and his horse came to a standstill in "the aforesaid wood," which the chronicler says was Somersham; and he rolled off his horse, and lay breathless under a tree, looking up at his horse's heaving flanks and wagging tail, and wondering how he should get out of that place before the English found ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... more difficult one—is also used; the bringing of every mental effort, to a standstill. The suppression of thought, when sufficiently complete, brings the brain into a state of calm, allows of the soul concentrating on the astral body whose memory is keen and only slightly subject to obstruction, ...
— Reincarnation - A Study in Human Evolution • Th. Pascal
... new cart, "and David and all Israel played before God with all their might: even with songs, and with harps, and with psalteries, and with timbrels, and with cymbals, and with trumpets." An accident leading to serious consequences brought the procession to a standstill; the oxen stumbled, and their sacred burden threatened to fall: Uzzah, putting forth his hand to hold the ark, was smitten by the Lord, "and there he died before the Lord." David was disturbed at this, feeling some insecurity in dealing with a Deity who had thus ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 6 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... waiting for the chimes to ring, then brings his arms down, lays the gift on the altar, turns back to the kneeling figure, and raises his hand in blessing. The person then rises, and steps back to his appointed place to the left or right of the altar, coming to a standstill just as the music ends. As the next verse begins, the next person enters the chancel. The movements should be made with deliberation and dignity and so thoroughly rehearsed that keeping time to the music becomes ...
— Why the Chimes Rang: A Play in One Act • Elizabeth Apthorp McFadden
... got to the Bank." He shuddered as he thought of the dangers he had escaped. "As it is, they're off the track for half an hour at least, while they're rummaging among Auntie Phemie's scones." At the thought he laughed heartily, and when he brought the taxi-cab to a standstill by rapping on the front window, he left it with a temper apparently restored. Obviously he had no grudge against the driver, who to his immense surprise was ...
— Huntingtower • John Buchan
... off the rushing main current into the quiet water. These whirl among the eddies and rush backwards and forwards as though they were still mad with wild haste, until, finding no current to take them down, they drift away into the landlocked bays, where they come to a standstill as if they were bewildered and lost and were trying to remember where they were going to and whence they had come; the foam of which they are composed is yellowish-white, with a spongy sort of solidity about it. In a little bay we pass we see eight native women, Fans clearly, by their ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... M. de Monaco had been sent as ambassador to Rome. He claimed to be addressed by the title of "Highness," and persisted in it with so much obstinacy that he isolated, himself from almost everybody, and brought the affairs of his embassy nearly to a standstill by the fetters he imposed upon them in the most necessary transactions. Tired at last of the resistance he met with, he determined to refuse the title of "Excellence," although it might fairly belong to them, to all who refused ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... base-born peasants!" shouted a horseman who had just rounded the sharp angle taken by the narrow bridle path, and was brought almost to a standstill by the tall figures of the two stalwart youths, which took up the whole of the open way between the trees and their thick undergrowth. "Stand aside, ye idle loons! Know ye not how to make way for your betters? Then, in sooth, I will teach you a lesson;" and a thick hide lash came whirling through ...
— In the Days of Chivalry • Evelyn Everett-Green
... not seen it since the day when the last ton of Aberfoyle coal had been emptied into railway trucks to be sent to Glasgow. Agricultural life had now taken the place of the more stirring, active, industrial life. The contrast was all the greater because, during winter, field work is at a standstill. But formerly, at whatever season, the mining population, above and below ground, filled the scene with animation. Great wagons of coal used to be passing night and day. The rails, with their rotten sleepers, now disused, were then constantly ground by the weight ...
— The Underground City • Jules Verne
... matter up and establish a series of observations, to be continued during the next few years. Such a combination of favourable circumstances may not occur again for years; and when the whole subject is at a standstill for want of facts, the present occasion ought not to go ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... attractive enough to the practical Roman, was at a standstill. So far as it existed it was Greek. The Greeks had done almost all that could be done by sheer brain-power and acumen. They could hardly proceed further without those finer instruments which we possess, but which they did not. Though they knew of certain magnifying glasses, ...
— Life in the Roman World of Nero and St. Paul • T. G. Tucker
... missed Mr. Pike by twenty feet and nearly impaled Possum, who, afraid of firearms, was wildly rushing and ki- yi-ing aft. It so happened that the sharp point of the marlin-spike struck the wooden floor of the bridge, and it penetrated the planking with such force that after it had fetched to a standstill it vibrated violently for ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London
... cruelly grabbed her attention. Old Ben, who had seemed to slow down obligingly upon the girls' greeting of Raymond, had refused to heed Tess's tugging effort to bring him to a standstill. To be sure, he moved more slowly, but move he did, and determinedly; till—merciful heaven!—he came to a dead and purposeful halt in front of the saloon. Not "a ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin
... gone. The High School boys had played their usual game of football with a neighboring school and whipped them to a standstill, David had played on the team and covered himself with glory by making a sensational touchdown. The girl chums had worn his colors and shrieked themselves hoarse with joy over ...
— Grace Harlowe's Sophomore Year at High School • Jessie Graham Flower
... insecurity, for the coach was approaching at a furious speed, and it seemed impossible that the postilion could draw up in time to prevent the horses from dashing themselves against the barrier. He accomplished that feat, however, and the leading horse came to a standstill within little more than a foot of me; I could feel its hot breath on my hand. Like the other two, it was covered with foam, and their sides were heaving like ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang
... in the general run on them. The electric light was fully restored in the evening of the next day. This fire recalls an occasion when at St. Martin's-le-Grand, the gas supply failed, and the largest Post Office business of the world was placed at a standstill. The officials, however, were equal to the emergency, and cartloads of candles were quickly obtained. The staff of carpenters employed on the building improvised receptacles, and the postal work was proceeded with, candles as they burnt ...
— The King's Post • R. C. Tombs
... been walking for some time slowly side by side, and we came now to a standstill. Louis held up his hand and ...
— The Lost Ambassador - The Search For The Missing Delora • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... being bare of sail we were now scudding along to the southward at a great pace. But every once in a while huge gray-black waves would arise from under the ship's side like nightmare monsters, swell and climb, then crash down upon us, pressing us into the sea; and the poor Curlew would come to a standstill, half under water, ...
— The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle • Hugh Lofting
... what she called a childish game of it. Every day on the ride home, Sabre ceased pedalling at precisely the same point on the slope down into Penny Green and coasted until the machine came to a standstill within a few yards of his own gate. This point of cessation was never twice in a week at the same spot; and Sabre found great interest in seeing every day exactly where it would be, and by intense wriggling ...
— If Winter Comes • A.S.M. Hutchinson
... progression; as much so as the growth and development of a tree. If the evolutionary impulse fails on one line, it picks itself up and tries on another, it experiments endlessly like an inventor, but always improves on its last attempts. Chance would have kept things at a standstill; the principle of chance, give it time enough, must end where it began. Chance is a man lost in the woods; he never arrives; he wanders aimlessly. If evolution pursued a course equally fortuitous, would it not still be wandering in the wilderness of ...
— The Breath of Life • John Burroughs
... me to have to confess that I have most awkwardly come to a standstill with the transcription of the Beethoven Quartets. After several attempts the result was either absolutely unplayable—or insipid stuff. Nevertheless I shall not give up my project, and shall make ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated
... felt himself letting go altogether: solid walls slipping harshly past him in the darkness, he fell; and came headlong, crashed and bruised, to a standstill. ...
— The Blue Moon • Laurence Housman
... Having refreshed my memory by a glance at the catalogue, I was about to try and diminish the large and ever-increasing circle of my non-readers when I became aware of a calamity that brought me to a standstill, and indeed bids fair, so far as I can see at present, to put an end to ...
— The Humour of Homer and Other Essays • Samuel Butler
... keeping a very sharp look out, as it happened to be his first trip on the line in question, descried the trunks while yet they were at a considerable distance from him. The breaks were then put on, and when the locomotive had approached within a couple of feet of the trunks it was brought to a standstill. Then, instantaneously, like Roderick Dhu's clansmen starting from the heather, natives, previously invisible, swarmed up on all sides, and, crowding into the carriages, began to pillage and plunder everything ...
— Railway Adventures and Anecdotes - extending over more than fifty years • Various
... which ten or twelve women are hoeing. By and by a pedlar or a van comes slowly along the turnpike road which runs past the field. At the first sound of footsteps or wheels all the bent backs are straight in an instant, and all the work is at a standstill. They stand staring at the van or tramp for five or six minutes, till the object of attention has passed out of sight. Then there is a little hoeing for three or four consecutive minutes. By that time one of ...
— The Toilers of the Field • Richard Jefferies
... hurry," was his quite needless command, for she was ready to take her place the instant the car drew to a standstill, and the delay she made him ...
— Mrs. Red Pepper • Grace S. Richmond
... wall, cannoned to the other, brought up with a crash against the door, and, perforce at a standstill, swore from his heart. ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance
... drop under the church: again the patient halts at the loops, waiting for the outcoming car: so on and on, for two long hours, till at last the city looms beyond the fat gas-works, the narrow factories draw near, we are in the sordid streets of the great town, once more we sidle to a standstill at our terminus, abashed by the great crimson and cream-coloured city cars, but still perky, jaunty, somewhat dare-devil, green as a jaunty sprig of parsley out of a ...
— England, My England • D.H. Lawrence
... expert at his trade, with a jerk of both wrists slid two glasses and a bottle down the bar so that a glass stopped in front of each man and the bottle came to a standstill between them. Racey spun a dollar on the bar. The bartender nonchalantly swept the dollar into the cash drawer and resumed his chit-chat with the tall man. At which Racey's eyes narrowed slightly. ...
— The Heart of the Range • William Patterson White
... had died for the country. When a fast motor-car bearing officers had a German helmet or two displayed, the people stopped to look. A captured German in the flesh on a front seat beside a soldier-chauffeur brought the knots to a standstill. "Voila C'est un Allemand!" ran the exclamation. But Paris soon became used to these stray German prisoners, left-overs from the German retreat coming in from the fields to surrender. The batches went through by train ...
— My Year of the War • Frederick Palmer
... with his hands clasped behind him as though absorbed in deep thought, Sir Adrian comes slowly over the sward until he stands beneath her window. Here he pauses, as though almost unconsciously his spirit has led him thither, and brought him to a standstill where he would most desire ...
— The Haunted Chamber - A Novel • "The Duchess"
... said young Ralph Oddington, with a grin. Then, seized by a sudden impulse for which he afterwards kicked himself, being a decent sort of chap, he drew his cigarette case from his pocket and, as the tug came to a standstill, tossed a cigarette across the intervening space. It struck the man in the back, and as he turned, ...
— Dan Merrithew • Lawrence Perry
... rose and nervously paced the floor. "I'm completely mystified," he admitted. "The whole affair has been a great disappointment to me. I thought I'd sprung a coup, but—I'm at a standstill. ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... life or to help injured persons." There are often accidents in the streets—many avoidable ones—due simply to carelessness. For instance, some boys were careless and threw broken glass bottles into the street, and a passing automobile came to a standstill because of a punctured tire. The man who owned the automobile and was driving it got out and called one of the boys on the street to come over to him. He did not call this particular boy because he thought he had thrown the glass, but because he thought ...
— Boy Scouts Handbook - The First Edition, 1911 • Boy Scouts of America
... along the soft, dusty roads that still had a feel of the veld in them, neither looking nor listing whither he went. It was a soft, plaintive voice that brought him to a standstill, and the realization that he was close to the Wankelo ...
— Blue Aloes - Stories of South Africa • Cynthia Stockley
... to belong to one of the footmen of Lord Mount Severn. The calves alone, cased in their silk stockings, were a sight to be seen; and these calves betook themselves inside the concert room, with a deprecatory bow for permission to the gentlemen they had to steer through—and there they came to a standstill, the cauliflower extending forward and turning itself about ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... his order so quickly that the army was startled and stepped on one another's heels as they came to a standstill. ...
— Sunny Boy in the Big City • Ramy Allison White
... of the years 1903-4 to do; with many intervals of renewed hesitation, lest I should lose myself in the ever-enlarging vistas opening before me as I progressed deeper in my knowledge of the country. Often, also, when I had thought myself to a standstill over the tangled-up affairs of the Republic, I would, figuratively speaking, pack my bag, rush away from Sulaco for a change of air and write a few pages of "The Mirror of the Sea." But generally, as I've said before, my sojourn on the Continent of Latin America, famed for its hospitality, lasted ...
— Notes on My Books • Joseph Conrad
... were at a standstill. From a busy hive of activity, with the women and children showing marked improvement at their tasks, and the men happy in the felling of logs and the whip-sawing of lumber, the settlement had suddenly slumped into a disorganized ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx
... a bear!" exclaimed Jerry, as the three boys came to a standstill on the border of ...
— The Outdoor Chums - The First Tour of the Rod, Gun and Camera Club • Captain Quincy Allen
... ninety-nine years' lease of some cellars under an old convent at the low rental of 30 francs per annum, and to-day this curious document exists amongst the archives of the firm. Rents of wine-cellars were low enough in those days of uncertainty and peril, when commerce was at a standstill and Europe gazed panic-stricken on the course of warlike events; nevertheless, for such a trifle as 30 francs a year of course no very extensive entrept could have been rented. To-day Messrs. ...
— Facts About Champagne and Other Sparkling Wines • Henry Vizetelly
... Surveyor of the Royal Works. He had studied in Italy and was an enthusiastic student of the Italian Renaissance. Unfortunately the public was anything but enthusiastic, and only a small sum was contributed, which went in the purchase of stone. Matters came to a complete standstill; and shortly prior to his assassination the elder Villiers is reported to have stolen part of the stone for a watergate for his new ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of St. Paul - An Account of the Old and New Buildings with a Short Historical Sketch • Arthur Dimock
... incapacitated more than half the colony and interrupted the building operations. The time of those who were well was entirely occupied with the care of those who were sick, and all productive work was at a standstill. The reeking virgin soil had produced crops in an incredibly short time, and the sowings of January were ready for reaping in the beginning of April. But there was no one to reap them, and the further cultivation of the ground had necessarily ...
— Christopher Columbus, Complete • Filson Young
... considerable control over the trade of the place. They also occupy positions of trust in foreign houses, and if there were a strike among them all business, not excepting that of the Post Office, would come to a standstill. I went into the Mercantile Bank and found only Chinese clerks, in the Post Office and only saw the same, and when I went to the "P. and O." office to take my berth for Ceylon, it was still a Chinaman, imperturbable, ...
— The Golden Chersonese and the Way Thither • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs. Bishop)
... did not take a month; but after a hard day's toil so little progress had been made, and Wrench's indoor work had come to such a standstill, that the Doctor gave orders for the gardener to get the assistance of a couple of labouring men, when the water was so much lowered at the end of the next day that unless a great deal filtered in during the coming night there was a fair prospect ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... the front door behind him the exile came to a standstill on the top step and looked about him. Across the park—beyond the trees, close sheltered under the wide protecting roof, lay Kate. All the weary miles out and back had this picture been fixed in his mind. ...
— Kennedy Square • F. Hopkinson Smith
... blast of determined cavalry charging home. And so the great crowd broke, and for four long miles the pursuit continued, till man and horse alike were worn and tired, and arms became too stiff to strike or parry, and steeds yet willing staggered to a standstill. ...
— The Story of the Guides • G. J. Younghusband
... effort Bill succeeded in calming down the excited landscape. He willed the trees to stop dancing, and they came reluctantly to a standstill. The world ceased to swim ...
— Uneasy Money • P.G. Wodehouse
... as if I had been forcibly brought to a standstill. In a few days (the 19th) I shall have reached the milestone: I shall be seventy. Sorosis would have made an occasion of it if I had been in New York. As it is, I feel a little tinge of regret that my annihilation last June was ...
— Memories of Jane Cunningham Croly, "Jenny June" • Various
... to avail as little as the rest; because, although your Majesty has so often commanded it, and we on our part have exercised the greatest possible diligence, it has not been possible to draw out from the royal treasury what was due from it for the said work; and so it has come to a standstill, or so little is done that it never advances. It really is a pity to see a cathedral church, in a city containing so great a concourse of heathen, where divine offices are celebrated in a church of straw, in which, on the coming of a storm, no one can remain. Your Majesty will see what ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, V7, 1588-1591 • Emma Helen Blair
... If I were only a clever book character I'd execute some dramatic coup and confound my enemies—book people always do. But my mind is a blank, my ingenuity is at a complete standstill. I feel perfectly foolish and impotent. To save me, I can't understand how that gold got where it was, for the cashier's cage is made of wire and the door has a spring-lock. I heard it snap back of me when I followed the Count ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach
... see for ourselves that nothing of the sort actually occurs—practically speaking, there are about the same number of cod one year as another. In spite of this enormous birth-rate, therefore, the cod population is not increasing—it is at a standstill. What does that imply? Why, that taking one brood and one year with another, only a pair of cod, roughly speaking, survive to maturity out of each eight or nine million eggs. The mother cod lays its millions, in order that two may arrive at the period of spawning. All the rest get devoured ...
— A Book of Natural History - Young Folks' Library Volume XIV. • Various
... the chest on top of them. By that time they had all begun to giggle, and that made matters worse, for it took away all the strength they had. Audrey's new room was growing quite ship-shape, but every other duty in the house was at a standstill, everything else was forgotten, and time was ...
— Anxious Audrey • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... without fire superiority against a determined defense would result in such losses as to bring the attack to a standstill or to make the ...
— Infantry Drill Regulations, United States Army, 1911 - Corrected to April 15, 1917 (Changes Nos. 1 to 19) • United States War Department
... restoring order to a demoralized population and a disorganized and severely damaged economy. Many of the leaders of the coup were tried and executed in October 1998. In January 1999, the situation had deteriorated even further, with commerce at a standstill, hundreds of thousands of people driven from their homes, and bitter fighting between the AFRC/RUF and ECOMOG troops intensifying ...
— The 1999 CIA Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... acquaintance he may meet. What would become of Paterfamilias, his family, and his friends, if they were deprived of this resource? The whole framework of society would be unhinged, business and pleasure would alike come to a standstill, and the world would again relapse ...
— The Continental Monthly, Volume V. Issue I • Various
... France in 1960 and experienced single-party and military rule until 1991, when Gen. Ali SAIBOU was forced by public pressure to allow multiparty elections, which resulted in a democratic government in 1993. Political infighting brought the government to a standstill and in 1996 led to a coup by Col. Ibrahim BARE. In 1999 BARE was killed in a coup by military officers who promptly restored democratic rule and held elections that brought Mamadou TANDJA to power in December of that year. TANDJA was reelected in 2004. Niger is one of ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States
... brought Egil to a standstill. The contempt in Helga's words was reflected in his face. He sheathed his sword with a ...
— The Thrall of Leif the Lucky • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... Austrian hymn, composed, as we may remember, by not even an Austrian, but a Croatian, pure Slav, composer. Elsa's account of her dream is not dramatic as Wagner, by the time he wrote his next work, would have understood the term—in shape it is an Italian aria, and everything is at a standstill until it is finished—yet it occurs fittingly, and prepares us by ethereal music for the music of a gentleman who is very unethereal. In form the whole scene is as near as may be a regular Italian opera scene. King Henry the ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman
... the way down the valley towards the shore. He had not thought much about it at the time, for at the moment all chasings of smugglers and expeditions in aid of the manning of the fleet were absolutely at a standstill. The Duke's arrival on the Britomart by way of Stranryan had mobilized all the forces of order, as escorts of safety or guards of honour. So there would be no more raids till His Royal Highness was safe across ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett
... fell into the midst of the thoughts and passions of the council. They were at a standstill. Anger and wonder, reverence and joy and confusion surged through the crowd. They knew not which way to move: to resent the intrusion of the stranger as an insult to their gods, or to welcome him as the rescuer of ...
— The Blue Flower, and Others • Henry van Dyke
... into her sweaty face and pass on. But she saw swimming before her a fat, outstretched hand, and behind it a stout blackness of broadcloth, and heard her pursuers halt and cease the beating of their tin cans, and came to a swaying standstill, while above her there boomed, gently and persuasively, Peacey's rich voice. She could not pin her fluttering mind to what it said, because she felt sickish at the oil of service, the grease of butlerhood that floated on it, but phrases came to her. He was asking the village people ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... churned—with a sound as if it were a beach of small shells —under the hoofs of the horses into mire and water. They sometimes slipped and floundered for a mile together, and we were obliged to come to a standstill to rest them. One horse fell three times in this first stage, and trembled so and was so shaken that the driver had to dismount from his saddle ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... will. Everything comes right, everywhere, give it time enough. Now step right up into this loft. There's a bed here that the extry man sleeps on when there is an extry. None now. Real gardenin' comes to a standstill when Dennis has the chills. You can put the baby down there an' let her sleep her sleep out. You might 's well lie down yourself and take a snooze, bein' you're that petered ...
— A Sunny Little Lass • Evelyn Raymond
... his. The line of retreat, predetermined by the enemy, placed him in the fortunate position that the further he marched the more food he got, the softer bed, more ammunition, and the moral comfort of his big naval guns that he fought to a standstill and then abandoned. Heavy artillery meant hundreds of native porters or dove-coloured humped oxen of the country to drag them; and heavy roads defied the most powerful machinery to ...
— Sketches of the East Africa Campaign • Robert Valentine Dolbey
... dreamed of it, she heard the tram-car grinding round a bend, rumbling dully, she saw it draw into sight, and hum nearer. It sidled round the loop at the terminus, and came to a standstill, looming above her. Some shadowy grey people stepped from the far end, the conductor was walking in the puddles, ...
— The Rainbow • D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence
... their feet. Two minutes before Miss Agnes Farnsworth appeared at the fork of the road the driver of the blacks could at any moment have pulled them with a powerful hand back upon their haunches and brought them to a quick-breathing standstill. Two minutes afterward neither he nor any other ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... described to us a very cunning wife and a very stupid husband," said Hircan. "Having advanced so far, he ought not to have come to a standstill and stopped on ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. V. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... Zurawna troops under General Linsingen brought the Russian counter-attack to a standstill. Further to the south fighting is in progress for possession of the hills to the east of Kalusz and west ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... up and down the room. She suddenly came to a standstill. "If I don't stop him, the rogue will sell the feather-bed from under my daughter! But he shall have a little of my mind! He has provoked me long enough. Pay it! I'll take my money's worth out ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet
... annuities by the government, they had money in bales, and we could get it all, if we had horses that were any good, and money to back them. His idea was to give out that owing to some accident we could not give an afternoon performance, and just get out the horses and bet the Indians to a standstill, and win all their money, and give a free evening show as a sort of consolation ...
— Peck's Bad Boy at the Circus • George W. Peck
... he was seated a little stiffly, for his limbs were numbed with the cold and exhaustion. The morning had broken with a grey and uncertain light. A vaporous veil of mist seemed to have taken the place of the darkness. Even from the top of the hill where the car had come to a standstill, there was ...
— The Vanished Messenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... elevator, and other like subjects; but he had been warned not to take up much of Tuvvy's time, so he unwillingly started home with Maisie, clutching his piece of wood under his arm. Until they reached the village, he was so lost in thought that he did not utter a word, but then, coming to a sudden standstill, he exclaimed: "Why shouldn't we paint the ...
— Black, White and Gray - A Story of Three Homes • Amy Walton
... championships at the Olympia. He remembers, too, that when another woman's horse bolted with her a few weeks previously, Miss Rostrevor easily outdistanced him in pursuit of the runaway, brought the startled animal to a standstill, and rode off without waiting for a word of thanks ...
— Bandit Love • Juanita Savage
... goddess with disease in all parts of her body. The disease expresses the same idea as the removal of the ornaments,—decay of strength. There follows a description of the desolation on earth during Ishtar's sojourn with Allatu. Productivity comes to a standstill. ...
— The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria • Morris Jastrow
... time. An' he's got th' thrue jollyer's way iv provin' to ye that he's ye'er frind alone an' th' deadly inimy iv all others. He's got th' Czar iv Rooshya hypnotized, th' King iv England hugged to a standstill, an' th' Impror iv Chiny in tears. An' he's made thim all think th' first thing annywan knows, he'll haul off an' swing on wan ...
— Observations by Mr. Dooley • Finley Peter Dunne
... said that he had gone away two days before, no one knew whither. This was corroborated by his landlord, who had received by messenger the key of the house together with the rent due, in English money. This had been between ten and eleven o'clock last night. We were at a standstill again. ...
— Dracula • Bram Stoker
... and come on in paroxysms. The pains are mostly in the legs, but also occur in the arms, head, loins, back, and trunk. Then the sense of touch is partially lost. The prick of a pin may not be felt until a few seconds after being applied. This stage may last for years and remain at a "standstill;" but it is usually progressive, and ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... belligerents overseas, they suffered from the ravages of the struggle more perhaps than other lands outside of Europe. Negotiations for prospective loans were dropped. Industries were suspended, work on public improvements was checked, and commerce brought almost to a standstill. As the revenues fell off and ready money became scarce, drastic measures had to be devised to meet the financial strain. For the protection of credit, bank holidays were declared, stock exchanges were ...
— The Hispanic Nations of the New World - Volume 50 in The Chronicles Of America Series • William R. Shepherd
... were well founded. The theory, carried to its logical conclusion, would have prohibited a great variety of transactions theretofore deemed reasonable and proper, and would have brought large business to a standstill. As a matter of fact, it was never carried to its logical conclusion, and six years later it was expressly repudiated by Justice Brewer; one of the five, in the course of his concurring opinion in the Northern Securities case.[2] Justice ...
— Our Changing Constitution • Charles Pierson
... went down, there was an uneasy screeching as they gripped the wheels, and the long train jarred to a standstill. ...
— Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil - The Farm That Was Worth a Fortune • Alice B. Emerson
... to see the outlines even of the houses across the street, and the only evidence that he was not in some desert spot lay in the fact of a few twinkling lights, looking incredibly remote, from the windows opposite and the gas-lamps below. Traffic seemed to be at a standstill; the accustomed roar from Piccadilly was dumb, and he looked out on to a silent and vapour-swathed world. This isolation from all his fellows and from the chances of being disturbed, it may be added, gave him a sense of extreme satisfaction. ...
— Michael • E. F. Benson
... scarcely better clothed than the blacks, his body being tattooed all over with strange devices, while his long carroty hair hung down over his shoulders. No one attempted to interfere with him; even the chief came to a standstill, while he bounded backwards and forwards in front of the horde of savages, shouting and gesticulating in the most vehement manner conceivable. Having thus succeeded in stopping the advance of the blacks, he turned ...
— The Three Commanders • W.H.G. Kingston
... caused my hair to lift—why couldn't the brute respect the silence? The wind stirred uneasily, doors banged about me. The uncanny spell of the place overcame my last shred of courage—my feet started down the road of their own volition. I found myself breathing hard, running fast. I jerked to a standstill, laughing sheepishly at my fears—ashamed. Then I ...
— A Mountain Boyhood • Joe Mills
... dangerously near the house before, in response to the boy's frantic efforts, the car slackened and finally, under Holmes's reiterated directions, ran to a standstill. ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... have decided; but there must have been a reason for it of some description. Julian Hawthorne states that his father had a plan at this time of writing another romance, of a more cheerful tone than "The Blithedale Romance," but the full current of his poetic activity was suddenly brought to a standstill by an event that nobody would ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns
... the gates which opened out on to the highroad, and as though by mutual consent both came to a standstill. ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie
... our merry boys and girls were almost lost in the confusion of bright colors, the ceaseless motion, and the gleaming of skates flashing back the sunlight. We might have known no more of them had not the whole party suddenly come to a standstill and, grouping themselves out of the way of the passersby, all talked at once to a pretty little maiden, whom they had drawn from the tide of people flowing toward ...
— Hans Brinker - or The Silver Skates • Mary Mapes Dodge
... This happened when, after a long period of retardation, or, perhaps, entire cessation of his inner life, he suddenly became aware of it, and proceeded to cleanse his soul of all the accumulated filth that caused this standstill. ...
— The Awakening - The Resurrection • Leo Nikoleyevich Tolstoy
... period of my life, my musical development had not been entirely at a standstill; on the contrary, it daily became plainer that music was the only direction towards which my mental tendencies had a marked bent. Only I had got quite out of the habit of musical study. Even now it seems incredible that I managed to find time in those days ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... Egingwah spied a moving speck on the slope of the mountain to our left. "Tooktoo," he cried, and the party came to an instant standstill. Knowing that the successful pursuit of a single buck reindeer might mean a long run, I made no attempt to go after him myself; but I told Egingwah and Ooblooyah, my two stalwart, long-legged youngsters, to take the 40-82 Winchesters ...
— The North Pole - Its Discovery in 1909 under the auspices of the Peary Arctic Club • Robert E. Peary
... stairs, Henry, the chauffeur, close at his heels. Without moving, Whitney stared stupidly at the two servants, and it was Henry who laid a trembling finger on the elevator button. As they heard the automatic car come to a standstill on the other side of the closed mahogany door there was a second's pause; then Miss Kiametia, summoning all her fortitude, laid her hand on the door knob and pulled it open. A horrified exclamation escaped her as her eyes fell upon Kathleen, whose bloodless face ...
— I Spy • Natalie Sumner Lincoln
... soundings to be taken right across the river, but the result was always the same; the stream had suddenly shallowed, and it was at first supposed to be a bar; but sounding higher up proved that the shoal water was continuous, and though the lighter-draft junks had gone on, they had now come to a standstill, which suggested that they ...
— Blue Jackets - The Log of the Teaser • George Manville Fenn
... at a time, we reduced the speed of the stones gradually, and then suddenly piling in a peck or more slowed it down till it fairly came to a standstill, glutted with cobs. The water-wheel had stopped, although the water was still pouring down upon it; and in that condition we left it, with the miller boys peeping about the flume and the millstones and exclaiming to each other, "What'll ...
— When Life Was Young - At the Old Farm in Maine • C. A. Stephens
... a standstill, anyway," was the reply. "I'll have the crews draw the scrapers and plows off at one side where we can get at them. I had a spare horse tent put at the disposal of the Mexicans, and have had men in both camps piling baled hay all evening around the big tents for windbreaks. We'll issue extra blankets ...
— The Iron Furrow • George C. Shedd
... waggon at a standstill and Master Trueman watching me with a scowl the while his plump fingers toyed lovingly with his whip-stock; but as I roused, this hand crept up to finger ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... approaching Third Peace Conference. Should she refuse to go to arbitration in her present dispute with Great Britain, the whole movement for arbitration would, for a generation at least, be discredited and come to a standstill. For if the leader of the movement is false to all his declarations and aspirations in the past, the movement itself must be damaged and its opponents must be victorious. Prominent Americans are alive to this indubitable fact, and it would seem to be appropriate to conclude ...
— The Panama Canal Conflict between Great Britain and the United States of America - A Study • Lassa Oppenheim
... Conversation was at a standstill in the atmosphere charged with Bertha's disapproval. Only Porcupine Jim, quite unconscious, unabashed, heaped his plate and ate with all the loud abandon of a Berkshire Red. Emboldened by the pangs ...
— The Man from the Bitter Roots • Caroline Lockhart
... off at Plymouth?" he asked, when they finally came to a standstill beside their own ...
— A Woman's Will • Anne Warner
... her). The Receiver's men are here. The books and papers at the Brewery have been seized. Work is at a standstill—and the same thing ...
— Three Dramas - The Editor—The Bankrupt—The King • Bjornstjerne M. Bjornson
... that for a few minutes, then over the bridge to the Virginia side, in the dilapidated little city of Alexandria. The car did not slacken its speed, but wound in and out through dingy streets, past tumble-down negro huts, for half an hour before it came to a standstill in front of an old ...
— Elusive Isabel • Jacques Futrelle
... the cliffs of the coast in the distance, when suddenly just before us I saw some pale lights, like those from gigantic glow-worms, rising out of the ground. The dogs came to a standstill; and voices of welcome rising from the interior, showed me that we had arrived at the village, now covered to the roofs of the huts by snow. The lights I saw were emitted through the ice windows in them. I walked on to our own house, ...
— Peter the Whaler • W.H.G. Kingston
... could not realise the fact, the sun had crossed the meridian and was slowly beginning to descend, when there was a sudden arousing from the torpor-like state, brought about by the mule coming to a standstill with its legs spread-out widely, hanging its head, while its drooping ears and starting eyes told plainly enough that it was suffering acutely from heat and exhaustion, its eyes seeming ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... a standstill at the international boundary, where two sentries, Canadian and American, face each other, and where there was another big crowd, this time all American, to give him ...
— Westward with the Prince of Wales • W. Douglas Newton
... which had left Cyrus at a standstill had developed his daughter from a girl into a woman. She spoke with the manner of one who realizes that she holds the situation in her hands, and he yielded to this assumption of strength as he would have ...
— Virginia • Ellen Glasgow
... of that piping, childish treble calling his name in so unexpected a place the officer at the head of the troop threw up his gauntleted hand and brought the detachment to a standstill ...
— The Littlest Rebel • Edward Peple
... of some mad supernatural monster, the engine sped on its way alone, shooting back as it went a great flaming trail of sparks, and was lost in the darkness. We stood together on the footboard, watching in silence the gradual slackening of the speed. When at length the train had come to a standstill, we cried to the passengers, "Saved! Saved!" and then amid the confusion of opening the doors and descending and eager talking, my dream ended, leaving me shattered and palpitating with the horror of it. ...
— Dreams and Dream Stories • Anna (Bonus) Kingsford
... food. During the long sleep the temperature of the bear's blood is reduced to almost that of the surrounding air. The power of will over the muscles seems to be suspended, respiration is hardly noticeable, and most of the vital functions are at a complete standstill—the entire body sleeping, as it were. The male grizzly bear never hibernates. The young and the females, however, build nests, one of which measured ten feet high, five feet long, and six ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 324, March 18, 1882 • Various
... stubborn, and when Bideabout stretched his legs out to the furthest possible extent apart that was possible, and then brought them together with a sudden contraction so as to dig his heels into the horse's ribs, that brought Clutch to an absolute standstill. ...
— The Broom-Squire • S. (Sabine) Baring-Gould
... in an oven fed by a wood fire. It was a few days before Passover. The Matzoth were coarse, and had none of the little holes with which we are familiar. So through streets within streets, dirt within dirt, room over room, in hopeless intricacy. Then we were brought to a standstill, a man was coming down the street with a bundle of wood, and we had to wait till he had gone by, the streets being too narrow for two persons to pass each other. Another street was impassable for a different reason, there was quite a river of flowing mud, ...
— The Book of Delight and Other Papers • Israel Abrahams
... Whitley brought the horse to a standstill, and jumping out of the buggy, began to unhitch. Against the dark sky, Frank could see the shadowy outlines of a ...
— That Printer of Udell's • Harold Bell Wright
... practice as in theory. The Czar, though free theoretically to choose his Ministers as he pleases, must choose such men as can obtain a working majority in the Assembly; otherwise, the whole parliamentary machinery comes to a standstill. Such a deadlock actually occurred in the First Duma. Smarting under the humiliation of the Japanese war, attributing the defeats to the incurable incapacity of the Supreme Government, and believing that the old system had become too weak to withstand a vigorous assault, the majority ...
— The New York Times Current History: the European War, February, 1915 • Various
... country has passed into the hands of the mortgagees and bondholders who have neither toiled or spun. The discouragement this state of things produces is intense. After it has gone on for several years, a kind of hopelessness oppresses the commercial community, all enterprise comes to a standstill, many works are closed, labor is thrown out of employment, and great distress is felt, both among laborers and the humbler middle class. Indeed, it strikes higher than this; for multitudes of people who were once prosperous traders have now become ...
— If Not Silver, What? • John W. Bookwalter
... banks in Cuba, all are shaky, so to speak; several have lately failed, and the others might as well do so. It is not long since the president of the Havana Savings Bank placed a pistol at his temple and blew his brains out. Mercantile credit may be said to be dead, and business nearly at a standstill. Commercial honesty is hardly to be expected from a bankrupt community, where the people seem only to be engaged in the sale and purchase of lottery tickets, a habit participated ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou
... he was talking at home, but certainly in his public delivery; this is a want much to be deplored in a speaker. The fact is, that during the course of his lectures at the Johannum, the Professor often came to a complete standstill; he fought with wilful words that refused to pass his struggling lips, such words as resist and distend the cheeks, and at last break out into the unasked-for shape of a round and most unscientific oath: then his fury would ...
— A Journey to the Interior of the Earth • Jules Verne
... his horse was a red-and-white skewbald and jingled bells on its bridle. A small bandy-legged man was George, wi' a jolly face and a squint, and as he drives up he toots on a tin trumpet wi' red tassels on it. Didn't it bring the crowd running! and didn't the crowd bring HIM to a standstill, some holding old Scarlet Runner by the bridle, and others standing on the very axles. And the hubbub, young man! It was Where's my six yards of dimity?' from one, and Have you my coral necklace?' from another. Where's my bag of comfits? where's my ...
— Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard • Eleanor Farjeon
... Shashai. Robin, halt! Steady!" and Jean Paul's mount came to a standstill with Jean Paul sitting upon its haunches, and Jean Paul's eyes snapping, and Jean Paul's teeth biting his tongue to keep from uttering words "unbecoming an officer and a gentleman;" for "being overhauled by a girl" after he had "made a confounded fool of himself trying ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... prolonged grinding of the brakes and an unnecessary amount of fuss in the way of letting off steam, the afternoon train from London came to a standstill in the station at Detton Magna. An elderly porter, putting on his coat as he came, issued, with the dogged aid of one bound by custom to perform a hopeless mission, from the small, redbrick lamp ...
— The Cinema Murder • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... restraining his temper the following day at tea. Never had he seen his stepfather in so bad a humor. Had he known that things had gone wrong at the mill that day, that the new machine had broken one of its working parts and had brought everything to a standstill till it could be repaired, he would have been able to make allowances for Mr. Mulready's ...
— Through the Fray - A Tale of the Luddite Riots • G. A. Henty
... front, while they themselves bound back and separate as far as their chains will let them: the next four trucks will do the same, and so a kind of wave of crowded trucks passes on to the end of the train, and they bump to and fro till the whole comes to a standstill. Try to imagine a movement like this going on in the line of air- atoms, the drum of your ear being at the end. Those which are crowded together at that end will hit on the drum of your ear and ...
— The Fairy-Land of Science • Arabella B. Buckley
... gave an unexpected lurch to one side, and after much groaning and creaking of axles and springs it came to a standstill, and the citizen agent was heard cursing loudly and then scrambling ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy
... on this morning the Union soldiers drove the Confederates away from Culp's Hill and held the whole ridge. Now again, as at Malvern Hill (p. 321), Lee had fought the Army of the Potomac to a standstill. But he would not admit failure. Led by Pickett of Virginia, thirteen thousand men charged across the valley between the two armies directly at the Union center. Some of them even penetrated the Union lines. But there the line stopped. Slowly it began to waver. Then back the Confederates ...
— A Short History of the United States • Edward Channing
... that French influence, as shown in its art in which its political history was reflected, permeated into the workshops of England. Then came the popularity of the designs of the Adam Brothers and Sheraton. During the Revolution in France art was at a standstill, but as soon as Napoleon had established his Empire artistic France began again, and we see its influence in the Empire ornament of furniture and curios. Perhaps one of the most striking instances of change in style was that in our own country when the Prince of ...
— Chats on Household Curios • Fred W. Burgess
... engrossed with the vicinity of safety that not one of us realized our chauffeur had forgotten to light up. All I remember is that we seemed suddenly to swoop down on a crowd, the peremptory "Halt!" rang out sharp and clear, and we came to a sudden standstill. The car was besieged by officials of every kind, and we all felt the genuine hostility in the air. A man in plain clothes was chief spokesman. I handed him the Minden pass, confident of its efficacy, and to our dismay, he put ...
— An Account of Our Arresting Experiences • Conway Evans
... we're going to do next," Patricia told him. And once back on the main road, she came to a standstill. She couldn't take her protege home; even less could she desert him. She sat down by the roadside to consider the matter—to consider various other matters, as well. Even with Patricias there comes ...
— Patricia • Emilia Elliott
... followed the flying enemy through the swamp, Major Belthorpe being satisfied his horses could go wherever the Confederates found a footing. As the enemy was now brought to a standstill, he was caught between two fires, and there was nothing left for him to do but to surrender. The captain being killed, the second in command, a tough-looking specimen of the "swamp angel," threw up his hands, in one of which ...
— An Undivided Union • Oliver Optic
... Jerry and Tim to be careful when using the took. He was especially anxious about the auger. "If that goes we shall be brought pretty well to a standstill, for I doubt if I can replace it," he remarked. At last he determined not to let it out of his own hands, and to bore ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston
... was also in turn separated into smaller distinct glaciers, and these again into still smaller ones, while at the same time all were growing shorter and shallower, though fluctuations of the climate now and then occurred that brought their receding ends to a standstill, or even enabled them to advance for a few tens or hundreds ...
— The Yosemite • John Muir |
