"Stroke" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... grotesquely irrelevant and profane—though she does her bit. On the other hand, she is more active and less repetitive. When, the good fairy endowing her with beauty, she appeared as DORIS KEANE in Romance, that was an applauded stroke. And when she lied beneath the tree of truth and the chestnuts fell each time truth was mishandled, thickest of all when it was asserted that a certain Scotch comedian had refused his salary, this was also very well received. On the whole, then, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, January 3, 1917 • Various
... almost decrepit, wearing big cloaks and carrying staffs and heavy iron lanterns with a tallow candle alight inside. But what a pleasure it was to lie awake at night and listen to their voices calling the hours! The calls began at the stroke of eleven, and then from beneath the window would come the wonderful long drawling call of Las on—ce han da—do y se—re—no, which means eleven of the clock and all serene, but if clouded the concluding word ...
— Far Away and Long Ago • W. H. Hudson
... was built into the wall he was building." (This statement is confirmed by John Windus, the English traveller who visited the court of Moulay-Ismael in the Sultan's old age.) Many Europeans must have succumbed quickly to the heat and the lash, for the wall-builders were obliged to make each stroke in time with their neighbors, and were bastinadoed mercilessly if they broke the rhythm; and there is little doubt that the expert artisans of France, Italy and Spain were even dearer to the old architectural madman than the friendship of the palace-building ...
— In Morocco • Edith Wharton
... females, either because they fear that the latter would render them effeminate or that they consider the sin to be less. Some only eat animals killed by the method of jatka or severing the head with one stroke of the sword or knife. They will not eat animals killed in the Muhammadan fashion by cutting the throat. They abstain from the flesh of the nilgai or blue bull as being an animal of the cow tribe. Among ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell
... later on for one bushel the price of four? What is a threadbare soldier who robs thee of thy clothes at the swords' point when compared with the lawyer who despoils thee of thy whole estate with the stroke of a quill, and against whom thou canst claim no recompense or remedy? What is a pickpocket who steals a five- pound in comparison to a dice-sharper who robs thee of a hundred pounds in the third part of a night? And what the swindler that deceives thee in a worthless ...
— The Visions of the Sleeping Bard • Ellis Wynne
... manage it. She struggled through the first verse, but in the second she quite broke down, and burst into a fresh flood of tears. Her poor mother tried to soothe her, but was too weak and weary to do more than stroke the child's face with her thin, wasted hand, and whisper in her ear ...
— A Peep Behind the Scenes • Mrs. O. F. Walton
... half time and many of the employes had been turned away for lack of work. In consequence worry and uncertainty hung over everybody. Who would be the next to go, they speculated. One never could predict where the axe would fall, or be sure he might not be the victim elected to meet its merciless stroke. ...
— Carl and the Cotton Gin • Sara Ware Bassett
... and there, to our horror, were the five rogues busy about her, getting off her jacket, as they called the stout tarpaulin cover under which she sailed. Not only that, but it flashed into my mind at the same moment that the round-shot and the powder for the gun had been left behind, and a stroke with an axe would put it all into the possession of the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... The stroke given by their Greek guide with the metal knocker on the house-door was answered at once by a slave. As the master was at the market, the strangers were led by the steward, an old servant grown grey in the service of Theopompus, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... going to let you do any more shoemaking. The time has come when you must retire, and devote all your undivided energies to the constant study of modern criticism. Whether you come to Oxford or stop in London, I've made up my mind that you shan't do another stroke of work as long as you live. Look here, dear old Daddy, I'm getting to be a perfect millionaire, I assure you. Do you see this fiver? well, I got that for knocking out that last trashy little song for Fradelli; and it cost me no more trouble to ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... first stroke of the descending whip a howl went up—a merciless howl, a howl of fierce exultation. Joe McCaskey rocked forward upon the balls of his feet; his frame was racked by a spasm of agony; he strained at his thongs until his shoulder muscles swelled. The flesh of his back knotted ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach
... intended victim of their malice mounted upon one of the fleetest horses upon the plantation, and Mr. Fuller all ready to mount another. He was but waiting to give additional orders to this unruly gang. This being done, each equestrian gave a slight stroke of the whip, and the horses galloped away from a ...
— Hubert's Wife - A Story for You • Minnie Mary Lee
... place, they had wormed admittance through a fraud to Hildreth and me ... the woman falsely pretended that she was a friend of Hildreth's mother ... a great stroke of journalistic enterprise. ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... managed stroke, and it left the young officer simply paralyzed. All he could do was to stare into the muzzle ...
— A Prisoner of Morro - In the Hands of the Enemy • Upton Sinclair
... glare of its lamps. To the right, the fairyland of the Champs-Elysees, the trees tossing under the sudden blast; in front, the black trench of the river. On, on—let him see it all—gather it all into his accusing heart and brain, and then at a stroke blot out the inward and the outward vision, and 'cease upon the ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... he had received a pledge he came by night into his conqueror's camp and was on the following day led before the latter who was seated on a platform. Bato asked nothing for himself, even holding his head forward to await the stroke, but in behalf of the rest he made a long defence. Being again asked by Tiberius: "Why has it pleased you to revolt and to war against us so long a time?" he made the same answer as before: "You are responsible for this; for you send as guardians ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol. 4 • Cassius Dio
... Mounteney property was the crowning stroke of Mr. Stapylton Toad's professional celebrity. His Lordship was not under the necessity of quitting England, and found himself in the course of five years in the receipt of a clear rental of five-and-twenty ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield
... earthly Kings: Who seem'd to be much pleased with the sight, As one ordayn'd t'accomplish mighty things; Who to the Field came in such brau'ry dight: As to the English boades succesfull luck Before one stroke, on ...
— The Battaile of Agincourt • Michael Drayton
... in regard to the place where the pottery would occur, and often the first indication of its presence was the stroke of a shovel on the fragile edge of a vase or bowl. Having once found a skeleton, or discolored sand which indicated the former presence of human remains, the probability that burial objects were near by was almost a certainty, although in several instances ...
— Archeological Expedition to Arizona in 1895 • Jesse Walter Fewkes
... stroke of luck." Jerry told the story of his night's wandering, a recital as interesting to himself as to Lucy, for as yet he had hardly had time to formulate the record of what had happened. Before they had exhausted the fascinating theme there were sounds overhead ...
— Peggy Raymond's Vacation - or Friendly Terrace Transplanted • Harriet L. (Harriet Lummis) Smith
... perspective Shakspeare is the greatest master I know: a single word frequently opens to view an almost interminable vista of antecedent states of mind. Confined within the narrow limits of time, the poet is in many subjects obliged to mutilate the action, by beginning close to the last decisive stroke, or else he is under the necessity of unsuitably hurrying on its progress: on either supposition he must reduce within petty dimensions the grand picture of a strong purpose, which is no momentary ebullition, ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel
... sire. M. de Bruhl's men are six or seven, the Provost has eight or nine; but the former are the wilder blades, and if M. de Bruhl find your Majesty in my lodging, and infer his own defeat, he will be capable of any desperate stroke. Your person would hardly be safe in his company through the streets. And there is another consideration,' I went on, observing with joy that the king listened, and was gradually regaining his composure. 'That is, the secrecy you desired to preserve, ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman
... a simple operation. The essential organs of the grape-flower are covered by a small cap; this in some grapes must be removed before the anthers can be reached. In many native grapes, however, the cap and the anthers may be removed at one stroke by the operator. The best tool for this is a small pair of forceps. Each of the blades of the forceps in working with native grapes should have a sharp cutting surface, but with Vinifera sorts, where the cap must be removed before the anthers can be reached, ...
— Manual of American Grape-Growing • U. P. Hedrick
... place; and in the dusk, and their settled order, the machines looked multitudinous. An eerie sense of discomfort came over him as he gazed, and he lifted his violin to dispel the strange unpleasant feeling that grew upon him. But at the first long stroke across the strings, an awful sound arose in the further room; a sound that made him all but drop the bow, and cling to his violin. It went on. It was the old, all but forgotten whirr of bobbins, mingled with the gentle groans of the revolving horizontal wheel, but magnified in the silence ...
— Robert Falconer • George MacDonald
... by his daughter for the first victim. At one blow she would free herself from the inconvenience of his rigid censorship, and by inheriting his goods would repair her own fortune, which had been almost dissipated by her husband. But in trying such a bold stroke one must be very sure of results, so the marquise decided to experiment beforehand on another person. Accordingly, when one day after luncheon her maid, Francoise Roussel, came into her room, she gave her a slice of mutton and ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... tried she was. Luckily for the pacification of the public mind, she had rushed headlong into redressing her own grievances (as women will), when she discovered that her husband had cut her down from a legacy of fifty thousand pounds to a legacy of five thousand by a stroke of his pen. The day before the inquest a locked drawer in Mr. Waldron's dressing-room table, which contained some valuable jewelry, was discovered to have been opened and emptied; and when the prisoner was committed by the magistrates, the precious stones were found torn out of their settings ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... give you a stroke with a good, strong oaken or beechen stick, and may the punishment teach ...
— The Hero of Ticonderoga - or Ethan Allen and his Green Mountain Boys • John de Morgan
... (what I was careful not to tell my friend), that Madame Blumenthal cared for him a trifle more than he supposed; second, that he cares for her more than ever; third, that the performance was a master-stroke, and that her allowing him to force an interview upon her again is only ...
— Eugene Pickering • Henry James
... three days hence; only given once every ten years—for hundreds and hundreds of years. Could strangers see it? What should strangers want to see it for? But could they see it? Gewiss. This was indeed a stroke of luck. I had always rather wanted to see the Passion play, but the thought of the fashionable Ober-Ammergau made me sick. Would I like to be vorgestellt? Rather! It was not ten minutes after this introduction before I had settled to stay ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... induction of particulars, as concisely as we could, to point out existing opposition to our Covenanted Reformation, by various parties who assail the British Covenants directly, or by a first assault upon the Auchensaugh Bond, would reach a fatal stroke at the Covenants themselves. We believe with our predecessors that those who reject the Auchensaugh Renovation, by logical necessity will ...
— The Auchensaugh Renovation of the National Covenant and • The Reformed Presbytery
... stormy events that had led up to this final stroke by which he hoped to defeat the cowmen and save his own fortune; and as he did so ...
— The Free Range • Francis William Sullivan
... collection for an object which had not his approbation. 'I silently resolved he should get nothing from me. I had in my pocket a handful of copper money, three or four silver dollars, and five pistoles in gold. As he proceeded I began to soften, and concluded to give the copper. Another stroke of his oratory made me ashamed of that, and determined me to give the silver; and he finished so admirably that I emptied my pocket wholly into the ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell
... middle-aged man with a sour countenance, who did not present the appearance of one who had sustained any injury at all, "very hard this. I shall miss meeting with a friend, and perhaps lose doin' a good stroke of business to-night." ...
— The Iron Horse • R.M. Ballantyne
... thriving in this little place, to-day, but for the Sabbath stillness which broods over everything with almost an excess of calm. Even the smoke ascends more faintly than usual from the chimneys of these abundant log-huts and scanty framed houses, and since three o'clock yesterday afternoon not a stroke of this world's work has been done. Last night a preparatory lecture was held, and now comes the consummation of the whole week's life, in the solemn act of worship. In which settlement of the Massachusetts ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. September, 1863, No. LXXI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... would have taken me away to dinner with him, but the Duke thought that would alarm the Duchess too abruptly, and she is not to know it yet: with her very low spirits it is likely to make a deep impression. It is a heavy stroke too for her father, poor old Lord Godolphin, who is eighty-six. For the Duke, his spirits, under so many mortifications and calamities, are surprising: the only effect they and his years seem to ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole
... I must dare nor tremble, To meet those looks no more!—Oh, heavy stroke! Sweet brother of my soul! can I dissemble The agony of this thought?'—As thus she spoke The gathered sobs her quivering accents broke, 1085 And in my arms she hid her beating breast. I remained still for tears—sudden she woke As one ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... doubtful centre of the allies, separated their wings from each other, and wheeling, with a rapid effort, to the left, directed their whole force against the Visigoths. As Theodoric rode along the ranks to animate his troops, he received a mortal stroke from the javelin of Andages, a noble Ostrogoth, and immediately fell from his horse. The wounded King was oppressed in the general disorder and trampled under the feet of his own cavalry; and this important ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... native. The moment Brisson had uttered his true name he had pronounced his own death warrant. Felini followed him up to the first landing—my rooms were on the second floor—and there placed his sign manual on the unfortunate man, which was the swift downward stroke of a long, narrow, sharp poniard, entering the body below the shoulders, and piercing the heart. The advantage presented by this terrible blow is that the victim sinks instantly in a heap at the feet of his slayer, without uttering a moan. The wound left is a scarcely ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr
... it the tanner who has barked it, or he who has boxed it for turpentine, whom posterity will fable to have been changed into a pine at last? No! no! it is the poet; he it is who makes the truest use of the pine,—who does not fondle it with an axe, nor tickle it with a saw, nor stroke it with a plane,—who knows whether its heart is false without cutting into it,—who has not bought the stumpage of the township on which it stands. All the pines shudder and heave a sigh when that man steps on the forest floor. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Number 9, July, 1858 • Various
... much, that my ardour for the chase began to give way to anxiety for my own safety. I perceived a large hole in the stern of the canoe, now almost level with the surface of the lake, through which the water gushed with every stroke of the paddle. The fore-part appearing free from injury, I immediately inverted my position,—a movement necessarily effected with much difficulty in so small a craft; and having thus placed myself, ...
— Service in the Hudson's Bay Territory • John M'lean
... say little for futurity, but from reason; whereby the noblest mind fell often upon doubtful deaths, and melancholy dissolutions: with these hopes Socrates warmed his doubtful spirits against the cold potion; and Cato, before he durst give the fatal stroke, spent part of the night in reading the immortality of Plato, thereby confirming his wavering hand unto the ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 6 - Reviews, Political Tracts, and Lives of Eminent Persons • Samuel Johnson
... swim by striking out their legs and both arms at the same time, keeping their breasts straight against the water; but the Indian strikes out with one arm only, turning himself on his side every stroke, first on one side and then on the other, so that, instead of his broad chest breasting the water in front, he cuts through it sideways, finding less resistance in that way than the other. Much may be ...
— History, Manners, and Customs of the North American Indians • George Mogridge
... Opportunely enough, a small theatre on the boulevard happened to be for sale, as a result of the failure of its manager. Delobelle mentioned it to Risler, at first very vaguely, in a wholly hypothetical form—"There would be a good chance to make a fine stroke." Risler listened with his usual phlegm, saying, "Indeed, it would be a good thing for you." And to a more direct suggestion, not daring to answer, "No," he took refuge behind such phrases as "I will see"—"Perhaps later"—"I don't say no"—and finally uttered ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... that made a dashing stroke in Gallipoli necessary. Sir Ian Hamilton prepared for it with great skill. A point called Suvla Bay, north of the base established by the Australian and New Zealand troops at Anzac Cove, was selected for the point of ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... The Stroke he quickened to thirty-four (In the first half-minute struck seventeen) Some clocks returned it a trifle more, Which wasn't so good as ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, March 24, 1920. • Various
... reproachfully spoken of the idea of neutrality as existing in some of the border States. He said: "To prevent the Union forces passing one way, or the disunion the other, over their soil, would be disunion completed.... At a stroke it would take all the trouble off the hands of secession, except only what ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... disturbed with so potent a rival? O heavens! How cruel and strange is my destiny! It is but a moment since I esteemed myself the most fortunate lover in the world, and at this instant I feel a death stroke to my heart. I cannot resist it, my dear Ebn Thaher; my patience is exhausted, my disorder overwhelms me, and my courage fails." While he was speaking, he saw something pass in the garden, which obliged him to be silent and to turn all his attention ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... that moment an exquisite sauntered towards the mouth, dropped a solitary little letter down the slope where whole cataracts had been flowing, and turned away. He was almost carried off his legs by two youths from a lawyer's office, who rushed up just as the first stroke of six o'clock rang out on the night air. Slowly and grandly it tolled from St. Paul's, whose mighty dome was visible above the house-tops from the colonnade. During these fleeting moments a few dozens of late ones posted some hundreds ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne
... I look from the isle, o'er its billows of green To the billows of foam-crested blue, Yon bark, that afar in the distance is seen, Half dreaming, my eyes will pursue: Now dark in the shadow, she scatters the spray As the chaff in the stroke of the flail; Now white as the sea-gull, she flies on her way, The sun gleaming ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... the Indians at discovering they had been understood, and hearing themselves addressed in their own tongue. But only an expressive hugh! and an involuntary stroke of the paddle, which sent the canoe dancing over the water, betrayed their surprise. Holden stood for a moment gazing after them, then turning, directed his steps towards the hut. We will not follow him, ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... him with a worried expression. Then he observed that the hand that carried her reticule was making strange purposeless curves in the air, and her rosy face went the colour of cream, as though it had been painted with one stroke of an unseen brush. Matthew ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... allowed the boats to drift down to leeward, with their oil-bags towing astern, and with only two oars out, to keep them stern-on to the sea; and so accurately had our distance been calculated that when the Manilla came up abreast of us we only needed to pull a stroke or two to get comfortably under her lee. We boarded her by way of the lee channels, fore, main, and mizzen simultaneously; and that, let me tell you, was the most difficult part of our work, for the ship rolled so heavily that it was with the utmost difficulty we avoided staving or swamping the boats. ...
— The Log of a Privateersman • Harry Collingwood
... parents oppressed by poverty, in many cases some article of value or a supply of PADI being given in exchange. Not infrequently the parents wish to have the child returned to them when their affairs take a turn for the better, owing to a good harvest or some stroke of luck, and this is a frequent cause of dissensions. Usually the adopted child takes in every way the position of a ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... The flowers and figures starting fresh to view. Others rub hard large masses, and essay To polish into white what they misdeem The growing green of many trackless years. Far off at intervals the axe resounds With regular strong stroke, and nearer home Dull falls the mallet with long labour fringed. Here arches are discovered, there huge beams Resist the hatchet, but in fresher air Soon drop away: there spreads a marble squared And smoothened; some high pillar for its base Chose ...
— Gebir • Walter Savage Landor
... well as the world. For the flapper is au naturale below the neck. Above the neck she is the most artificially and entertainingly painted creature that has graced society since Queen Elizabeth. With one bold stroke of a passionately red lip stick, she has painted out Elaine the Fair and the later-day noble Christie Girl and painted in an exotic young person, meet to compete alike with a Ziegfield show girl, with a heaven-born ...
— Nonsenseorship • G. G. Putnam
... was the 'noisy creature!' Katie's troubles all vanished at a stroke; and before Clare and Janet could ask what was the matter, she was sobbing out all about the silly mistake ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... he died; the scene that morning had exhausted his remaining strength, and on the stroke of midnight I arrived with Daddy Gobseck. The house was in confusion, and under cover of it we walked up into the little salon adjoining the death-chamber. The three children were there in tears, with two priests, ...
— Gobseck • Honore de Balzac
... resounds the woodman's stroke, When, lo! a voice breaks from the groaning oak, 'Spare, spare my life! a trembling virgin spare! Oh, listen to the Hamadryad's prayer! No longer let that fearful axe resound; Preserve the tree to which my life is bound. See, from the ...
— The Folk-lore of Plants • T. F. Thiselton-Dyer
... the drill his companion held. His face was damp with sweat and the hammer slipped in his hands, but he did not miss a stroke. He had promised the girl his help, and when the hole was sunk he chose the best spot for the next with fastidious care. He meant to play a straight game, although it would cost him much to let her win. By and by the miner picked up some ...
— The Lure of the North • Harold Bindloss
... stroke dies away, the Muse, Mademoiselle Rabuteau, enters and declaims the salutation addressed by Louis Gallet to the City of Béziers. At ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory
... to reflecting that this marriage would be an extraordinary stroke of luck for the family. Here they were at the last gasp, mortgaged up the eyes, when suddenly fortune, in the shape of an, on the whole, perfectly unobjectionable young man, appears, takes up the mortgages, ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard
... larger sweep, a saner method. He is never eccentric, and he has a dignity that is Iberian, though he is French rather than Spanish on his aesthetic side, and at times is as conservative as Rousseau—without, however, reaching Rousseau's lofty simplicity except in an occasional happy stroke. Both he and Dupre are primarily colorists. Dupre sees nature through a prism. Diaz's groups of dames and gallants have a jewel-like aspect; they leave the same impression as a tangle of ribbons, a bunch ...
— French Art - Classic and Contemporary Painting and Sculpture • W. C. Brownell
... gentlemen are short-sighted at times. The very idea of your hunting all over the lake for us when we were here fairly before your eyes! Look out that you're not so careless as to lose us again. Remember it will be the winning stroke for us." ...
— The Meadow-Brook Girls Afloat • Janet Aldridge
... to point out the position of rocks, etc., beneath the water. 4. Surge, a large wave. 6. Joy'ance, gayety. 11. Scoured, roved over, ranged about. Store, that which is massed together. 14. Me-thinks', it seems to me. 17. Fiends (pro. fends). evil spirits. Knell (pro. nel), the stroke of a bell rung at a funeral or at the ...
— McGuffey's Fourth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... you poking about down there for?" he said, pushing his ugly old face into mine as he spoke. "You fool! if you had fallen you would have been drowned. No one could swim a stroke in that mill-race. And then there would have been another death, and all the old fuss over again! Look here, sir, will you have the goodness to get out of the place? I don't want ...
— A Master of Mysteries • L. T. Meade
... was a stroke of diplomacy," replied her brother. "Stewart has got good stuff in him. He was down and out. Well, he's made a game fight, and it looks as if he'd win. Trusting him, giving him responsibility, relying upon him, was the surest way to strengthen his hold upon himself. Then that little touch of ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey
... saw a remarkable sight. On the stroke of twelve, loud toasts to Der Tag were suddenly lifted high in air as the orchestra broke forth with the Wacht am Rhein. An uproar seized the assembly. "Gott scourge England! Down with France! Deutschland ueber Alles!" In a twinkling it was a crowd mad for war. Beer mugs were smashed, various ...
— Villa Elsa - A Story of German Family Life • Stuart Henry
... there came the faint, irregular stroke that foretold the stopping of the bell, and the boys moved quickly towards the entrance, and began to jostle one another in their haste. On reaching the door, however, much ...
— Jack of Both Sides - The Story of a School War • Florence Coombe
... in mind and body, and having not room to exert themselves, and thought it an advantage to be killed, and a misery to survive; so at the first onset there fell about seven thousand of them, after which stroke they let all the courage they had put on before fall, and stood amazed at Herod's warlike spirit under his own calamities; so for the future they yielded, and made him ruler of their nation; whereupon he was greatly elevated at so seasonable a success, ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... hear him so gladly, the habit of forcing theory to the test of fact. For quick as he was, perhaps quicker than any recorded man, at the tierce and quart of theoretical argument, he commonly used the bludgeon stroke of practice to give his opponent the final blow. We are vaguely distrustful of our reasoning powers, but every man thinks he can understand facts and figures. The quickness of Johnson in applying arithmetical tests to careless statements ...
— Dr. Johnson and His Circle • John Bailey
... scrambled out of the khor when, as his horse was nearly stopping, an Arab seized his bridle. He struck at the man with his sword, but did not prevent him cutting his off-rein. The officer's bridle-hand, unexpectedly released, flew out, and, as it did so, a swordsman at a single stroke nearly severed it from his body. Then they cut at him from all sides. One blow sheared through his helmet and grazed his head. Another inflicted a deep wound in his right leg. A third, intercepted by his shoulder-chains, paralysed his right arm. Two more, missing him narrowly, cut right ...
— The River War • Winston S. Churchill
... large one; and the fact that we should have been committed to it without the knowledge of Parliament, without discussion, without warning, without any sort of appeal to public opinion or democratic sanction, by a stroke of Sir Edward Grey's pen within five weeks of his having committed us in the same fashion to an appalling European war, shews how completely the Foreign Office has thrown away all pretence of being any less absolute than the Kaiser himself. It simply offers carte blanche to the armies ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... orders, but didnt dare to, because his father had a weak heart and habitually threatened to drop dead if anybody hurt his feelings. You may have noticed that people with weak hearts are the tyrants of English family life. So poor Soames had to become a solicitor. When his father died— by a curious stroke of poetic justice he died of scarlet fever, and was found to have had a perfectly sound heart—I ordained Soames and made him my chaplain. He is now quite happy. He is a celibate; fasts strictly on Fridays and throughout Lent; ...
— Getting Married • George Bernard Shaw
... and lays it down in a heap for binding. This operation is called "bagging." It does not do the work so neatly as the sickle, and is apt to pull up many stalks by the roots with the earth attaching to them, especially at the last, outside stroke. ...
— A Walk from London to John O'Groat's • Elihu Burritt
... so uncanny as when a man accidentally sees his own face by moonlight in a mirror. At the same instant there struck a deep-booming, yawning bell, and that so slowly and wearily that after the twelfth stroke I firmly believed that twelve full hours must have passed and that it would begin to strike twelve all over again. Between the last and next to the last tones, there struck in very abruptly, as if irritated and scolding, another bell, which was apparently out of patience with the slowness of its ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... know the light in which they present themselves to me. We three, you and Francis and I, were left to earn our own living at a somewhat early age. Francis became a banker's clerk, and you took to literature and governessing and general popularity. By a very clever stroke you managed to induce Professor Romaine to marry you. He was fifty and you were twenty-four. You did very well for yourself—twisted him round your little finger, and got him to leave you all his money; but really I do not see how this could be said ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... I scaled the craggie oke All to dislodge the raven of her nest? How have I wearied, with many a stroke, The stately walnut-tree, the while the rest, Under the tree fell all for nuttes at strife? For like to me was ...
— A Biography of Edmund Spenser • John W. Hales
... him to keep all his men employed and to let the improvement show itself wholly as a means of increasing the output. He may secure a machine which will do what twenty men formerly did. If it were possible to cut the uppers of a dozen shoes by the quick stroke of a single die, the machine that carried this armature would do the work of perhaps twelve knives handled by that number of skillful workmen. If the original number of men were retained in the cutting department, and if each of them ...
— Essentials of Economic Theory - As Applied to Modern Problems of Industry and Public Policy • John Bates Clark
... and Austria. The troops of the Germans and Austrians began joyously to pillage both Russia and the Ukraine, hunting for the food that was so scarce in the central empires. However, for a whole year hardly anybody in Russia had been willing to do a stroke of work. The fields had gone untilled while the peasants, drunk with their new freedom, and without a care for the morrow, lived off the grain that had been saved up during the past years. As a result, whatever grain the enemy found proved spoiled and mouldy, hardly ...
— The World War and What was Behind It - The Story of the Map of Europe • Louis P. Benezet
... trouble in her strong black eye; A remnant of uneasy light, A flash of something over-bright! And soon she made this matter plain; And told me, in a thoughtful strain, 70 That she had borne a heavy yoke, Been stricken by a twofold stroke; Ill health of body; and had pin'd Beneath ...
— Poems In Two Volumes, Vol. 2 • William Wordsworth
... tell you where the breaker stood. They are proud to have labored there in other years. They will speak to you of that time with pleasant memories. It was thought to be a stroke of fortune to obtain work at Burnham Breaker. It was just beyond the suburbs of the city as they then were, and near to the homes of all the workmen. The vein of coal at this point was of more than ordinary thickness, and of excellent quality, and these were ...
— Burnham Breaker • Homer Greene
... o'clock, young Bernenstein, very admirably and smartly accoutred, took his stand outside the main entrance of the castle. He wore a confident air that became almost a swagger as he strolled to and fro past the motionless sentries. He had not long to wait. On the stroke of eight a gentleman, well-horsed but entirely unattended, rode up the carriage drive. Bernenstein, crying "Ah, it is the count!" ran to meet him. Rischenheim dismounted, holding out his ...
— Rupert of Hentzau - From The Memoirs of Fritz Von Tarlenheim: The Sequel to - The Prisoner of Zenda • Anthony Hope
... knelt Before him on the hearth and loosed his belt, And threw back his green cassock and his hood, To give his foe the fairest mark he could. Then thus to Gawayne: "Ready! But remember To come the twenty-fifth of next December, And take from me the self-same stroke again!" "And where," asked Gawayne, "may I find you then?" "We'll speak of that, please, when you've struck your blow; For if I can't speak, then you need not go!" He chuckled softly to himself; then turned And waited ...
— Gawayne And The Green Knight - A Fairy Tale • Charlton Miner Lewis
... houses, ships and the like from being damaged by lightning, by erecting pointed rods that should rise some feet above the most elevated part, and descend some feet into the ground or water. The effect of these he concluded would be either to prevent a stroke by repelling the cloud beyond the striking distance or by drawing off the electrical fire which it contained; or, if they could not effect this they would at least conduct the electrical matter to the earth without any ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: - Invention and Discovery • Various
... need a jolt, but we'll let it go. I want to watch Dick's game; he's been playing well and using a new stroke." ...
— Partners of the Out-Trail • Harold Bindloss
... never will, you miserable object," says the beggarman. "You're going to die now, and I'll give you your choice to die either by a hard squeeze of wrestling, or a stroke ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various
... tone The lovely starling dead and gone! Weep, ye Loves! and Venus, weep The lovely starling fall'n asleep! Venus see with tearful eyes— In her lap the starling lies, While the Loves all in a ring Softly stroke the stiffen'd wing. ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge
... humourist than for his purposes as a sentimentalist. Nay, it is on the rare occasions when he deliberately sentimentalizes with Captain Shandy that the Captain is the least delightful; it is then that the hand loses its cunning, and the stroke strays; it is then, and only then, that the benevolence of the good soldier seems to verge, though ever so little, upon affectation. It is a pity, for instance, that Sterne should, in illustration of Captain Shandy's kindness of heart, have plagiarized (as he is said to have done) ...
— Sterne • H.D. Traill
... I am tempted to believe that it did not. I can even prove it by a logical stroke worthy of the very greatest philosophers. Granted that the Past is that which no longer has any existence, only the Present could ever be real now; as the Present and the Past cannot co-exist, the Past evidently never existed at all; unless, indeed, we call in the aid of ...
— Hortus Vitae - Essays on the Gardening of Life • Violet Paget, AKA Vernon Lee
... silver wings. And Bhimasena, the son of Pandu, having penetrated that elephant division, began to wander over the field, crushing those beasts around him like Indra himself crushing the mountains. And we beheld elephants slain in that battle by Bhimasena, each with only one stroke (of his mace), like hills riven by thunder. And many elephants, huge as hills, were slain there, having their tusks broken or temples, or bones, or backs, or frontal globes. And others, O king, deprived of life, lay there with foaming mouths. And many mighty elephants, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... Baudru. The latter was asleep on the bench, his head rolling from side to side, his mouth half-opened, and an incredible expression of stupidity on his blotched face. No, such an adversary was incapable of deceiving old Ganimard. It was a stroke of luck—nothing more. ...
— The Extraordinary Adventures of Arsene Lupin, Gentleman-Burglar • Maurice Leblanc
... has—in the words of one intergovernmental commission—made the Federal Government "more pervasive, more intrusive, more unmanageable, more ineffective and costly, and above all, more (un) accountable." Let's solve this problem with a single, bold stroke: the return of some $47 billion in Federal programs to State and local government, together with the means to finance them and a transition period of nearly 10 years to ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Ronald Reagan • Ronald Reagan
... fully conscious of the delicate nature of such assertions, but it would be a magnificent stroke of policy if we could, without surrendering principle or a foot of ground, arouse the latent ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... His little stroke of humor pleased the Colonel, and, further, he felt slightly ashamed of the language he had been using. The Second-in-Command worried him again, and the two sat talking ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling
... taking his handkerchief out of his pocket, he that I desired his son might be pardoned. The father complied, and the lad took his seat again, whereupon I went to him, and kissed his hand, which my master took, and made him stroke me gently ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... the bell to stop her, as soon as the boat came near, and the party came on board. The two men seated themselves on the rail as though they never intended to do another stroke of work, for they had been using the oars most of the ...
— Taken by the Enemy • Oliver Optic
... Marcion are unmistakable. The way in which he attempted to sever Christianity from the Old Testament was a bold stroke which demanded the sacrifice of the dearest possession of Christianity as a religion, viz., the belief that the God of creation is also the God of redemption. And yet this innovation was partly caused by a religious conviction, the origin of which must be sought ...
— History of Dogma, Volume 1 (of 7) • Adolph Harnack
... There would be unpleasantnesses because there was no denying that the trades-people had been played tricks with. Mrs. Gareth-Lawless was only one of a lot of pretty daughters whose father was a poor country doctor in Jersey. He had had "a stroke" himself and his widow would have nothing to live on when he died. That was what Mrs. Lawless had to look to. As to Lord Lawdor Edward had learned from those who DID know that he had never approved of his nephew and that he'd said he was ...
— The Head of the House of Coombe • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... raving, slapped her on the face, and the servant, to be even with her, returned the compliment and ran away. The doctor left me there, saying that I could not enter his school unless I was sent to him as clean as the other boys. The result for me was a very sharp rebuke, with the threat, as a finishing stroke, that if I ever caused such a broil again, I would be ignominiously turned ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... stroke of his hoe clanked upon the baking soil, and later on he paused to fill and light his pipe. He had just cut the flakes of tobacco from his plug, and was rolling them in the palms of his hands, when the thought occurred to him to glance at the time. ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... none shall keep the crown but Tamburlaine: Thee do I make my regent of Persia, And general-lieutenant of my armies.— Meander, you, that were our brother's guide, And chiefest [104] counsellor in all his acts, Since he is yielded to the stroke of war, On your submission we with thanks excuse, And give you equal place ...
— Tamburlaine the Great, Part I. • Christopher Marlowe
... and disappears, leaving the sky perfectly clear and bright, every dust-particle wiped and washed out of it. Everything is refreshed and invigorated, a steam of fragrance rises, and the storm is finished—one cloud, one lightning-stroke, and one dash of rain. This is the Sierra mid-summer thunder-storm reduced to its lowest terms. But some of them attain much larger proportions, and assume a grandeur and energy of expression hardly surpassed by those bred in the depths of winter, producing those sudden ...
— The Mountains of California • John Muir
... 7, and 8 now jump out of the boat, and, with Nos. 3 and 4, divide to each skid; not standing between them, but keeping outside of them. The Stroke Oarsmen wheel the piece up to the gunwale by the spokes, the Quarter Gunner guiding the trail by the trail-handspike, and the rest of the crew take hold of the drag-rope to ease the gun down from the bow, the Quarter Gunner still guiding it down ...
— Ordnance Instructions for the United States Navy. - 1866. Fourth edition. • Bureau of Ordnance, USN
... give it up as a bad job, my lad. That stroke of yours finished him, and he come up just in time for us to get you into the boat and pump the wind into you again—leastwise ...
— Bunyip Land - A Story of Adventure in New Guinea • George Manville Fenn
... however, where the possibility of doing so ceased, without treachery to oneself, one's order, and the country. And to the argument which he was quite shrewd enough to put to himself, sooner than have it put by anyone else, that it was disproportionate for a single man by a stroke of the pen to be able to dispose of the livelihood of hundreds whose senses and feelings were similar to his own—he had answered: "If I didn't, some plutocrat or company would—or, worse still, the State!" Cooperative ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... is now ignited, and expels the air with which the cylinder is filled through a shifting valve, and, after the products of combustion have cooled, a partial vacuum takes place and the atmospheric pressure forces down the piston to the bottom of its stroke, during which ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 484, April 11, 1885 • Various
... felt that he could not take another stroke and that the end was at hand, one foot touched something. Then, all four feet touched. A second later he had found solid footing and was standing with the water only up to his knees. He had found a little sand ...
— The Adventures of Lightfoot the Deer • Thornton W. Burgess
... extemporized handspike, easing the pressure and listening to her husband's groans, while Malemute Kid attacked the tree with his ax. The steel rang merrily as it bit into the frozen trunk, each stroke being accompanied by a forced, audible respiration, the 'Huh!' 'Huh!' ...
— The Son of the Wolf • Jack London
... after spending two months in the hope that he might find some more work to do in Africa, planned a daring stroke in Europe. Islam still owned in Spain the kingdom of Granada, too weak to reconquer the old Western Caliphate, but too strong, as the last refuge of a conquered and once imperial race, to be an easy prey of the Spanish kingdoms. And in that kingdom, Gibraltar, the rock of Tarik, was the most ...
— Prince Henry the Navigator, the Hero of Portugal and of Modern Discovery, 1394-1460 A.D. • C. Raymond Beazley
... came up in such a manner that it reared and threw its rider. Another instant, and the horns of the infuriated animal would have been plunged into the body of the king, if Herne had not flung himself between the prostrate monarch and his assailant, and received the stroke intended for him. Though desperately wounded, the young hunter contrived slightly to raise himself, and plunged his knife into the hart's throat, while ...
— Windsor Castle • William Harrison Ainsworth
... last moments had come. He, however, eyed his captors boldly, and tried to nerve himself for the expected stroke. A short time before, some villains of the same character as those into whose power he had fallen had murdered a young midshipman, whom they had found on board a prize they had retaken, and he knew that they ...
— The Three Midshipmen • W.H.G. Kingston
... God, as if to put the finishing stroke to so important a work, permitted that the Prince of Conde, who had just left the Catholic religion, should be misled on this subject by those of his new communion. He sent for the poor woman, and also the Canon d'Espinois, who had never forsaken her during all ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet
... up to town at once. Father has had a stroke of paralysis. Shall expect you by the seven ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard
... very man who had bowled us out at a fatal return match some years ago at S—, our neighbours south-by-east, had luckily, in a remove of a quarter of a mile last Lady Day, crossed the boundaries of his old parish and actually belonged to us. Here was a stroke of good fortune! Our captain applied to him instantly, and he agreed at a word. We felt we had half gained the match when we had secured him. Then James Brown, a journeyman blacksmith and a native, who, being of a ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VI. • Various
... that at the hour his trains were to enter from the east, a jacal should be set on fire over in the western suburb. Fires occur but rarely in Monterey, and when one does occur all the town flocks to see it: it is better than a fiesta. It was a stroke of genius on Pepe's part to think of this diversion; and the man who owned the doomed jacal—one of Pepe's band who himself had a share in the venture—was eager to put so brilliant a plan into execution. Indeed, to insure success a dozen jacals might have ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 10 • Various
... copy, while the master walked about. This was a quieter time; for he would come and look over the writer's shoulder, and tell him mildly to observe how such a letter was turned in such a copy on the wall, praise such an up-stroke here and such a down-stroke there, and bid him take it for his model. Then he would stop and tell them what the sick child had said last night, and how he had longed to be among them once again; and such ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... upon a stroke, and some new note in his voice sent so sudden a thrill to her heart that she caught her breath with a painful kind of joy. The hammer dropped upon the anvil, and, in a moment, she stood in the doorway ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... the awkward triangle as soon as possible. He must leave Marjory free, and Peter would look after the rest. No doubt a divorce on the grounds of desertion could be easily arranged; and thus, by that one stroke, they two would be made happy, and he—well, what the devil was ...
— The Triflers • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... believed himself safe at last from the wiles of Ahenobarbus and his Greek coadjutors, there was still a great dread which would steal over Drusus lest at any moment a stroke might fall. Those were days when children murdered parents, wives husbands, for whim or passion, and very little came to punish their guilt. The scramble for money was universal. Drusus looked forth into the world, and saw little in it that ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... the lance, and began to stroke it lovingly. To Jurgen she said: "Now may you be fervent of soul and body! May the endless Serpent be your crown, and the fertile flame of the ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell
... of this nature is in some ways arbitrary, the arbitrariness is always in the interest of simplicity. The book does have simplicity, permits instant reference, and provides an adequate drill which may be assigned at the stroke of ...
— The Century Handbook of Writing • Garland Greever
... centers can provide the most advanced diagnosis and treatment for heart disease and cancer and stroke ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... the place had been crashed out; all desire to explore the wonders of this old city of the past had died away on the instant. As for the boys, their adventures in the desert came back, and clearly standing out were the creeping and writhing poisonous reptiles whose stroke meant a horrible death, lurking ready for them wherever they turned: and a shudder ran through them as if they had just been swept by some ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... be there to lay their young squire in his grave, nor to support his father, who, poor old man, had tottered, and been so like to swoon as he passed the hall door, that Sir Gilbert and old Diggory could but, help him back again, fearing lest he, too, might have a stroke. ...
— Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Cospatric's tastes was one I could chime in with more readily. He did not flaunt it, by any means. On the contrary, he kept the thing hidden, and I stumbled across it only by accident. Moreover, it was a stroke of luck for me that I did so, as my want of knowledge had been a bar to any intimacy; whereas, once in his confidence upon this point, we got on together swimmingly, and I had ...
— The Recipe for Diamonds • Charles John Cutcliffe Wright Hyne
... "But his master-stroke—and this was pure genius, for it was almost inconceivable—was when he traced the development of his 'nontelepathic civilization' to the point where he predicted criminals, criminal and moral codes of unbelievable complexity, ...
— The Short Life • Francis Donovan
... opportunity a man could ask, and if I cannot develop her plainly manifested interest into something more decisive by such companionship, I may as well despair;" and he determined to avail himself of every advantage within his reach in making the most of what he deemed a rare stroke of fortune. His greatly increased salary enabled him to dress with that taste and even elegance so pleasing to a lady's eye, and he had withal acquired that ease and grace of manner which familiarity with the best ...
— Barriers Burned Away • E. P. Roe
... their own consciences. It was a very successful example of the malign humour of Fate that Miss Coppinger's ward should belong to the other Church, that exacts not only obedience, but passion, and it was a master-stroke that Frederica's sense of duty should compel her to enforce her nephew ...
— Mount Music • E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross
... getting out an oar. Klaus clambered in, and the white-straked four-oar surged across the bay, rocking a little as the boys pulled out of stroke. Martin was rowing at the bow, his eyes fixed on Peer, who sat in the stern in command with his eyes dancing, full of great things to be done. Martin, poor fellow, was half afraid already; he never could understand ...
— The Great Hunger • Johan Bojer
... stroke Your head for it. Good lad! come nearer, Syrus! I'll do thee some good turn for this. I will, I ...
— The Comedies of Terence • Publius Terentius Afer
... her of her tears, When I did speak of some distressful stroke That my youth suffer'd. My story being done, She gave me for my pains a world of sighs; She swore, in faith, 't was strange, 't was passing strange. 'T was pitiful, 't was wondrous pitiful; She ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... were times when Marx himself momentarily lapsed into the error of Blanqui and the older school of Utopian, conspiratory Socialists who believed that they could find a short cut to social democracy; that by a surprise stroke, carefully prepared and daringly executed, a small and desperate minority could overthrow the existing social order and bring about Socialism. As Jaures has pointed out,[50] the mind of Marx sometimes harked back to the dramatic side of the French Revolution, and ...
— Bolshevism - The Enemy of Political and Industrial Democracy • John Spargo
... the queen, Anne of Austria, gave birth to a son after twenty years of marriage, he was deprived of his dignities and possessions and interned at Blois. The Marquis of Cinq-Mars, and the last Duke of Montmorency, son and grandson of two High Constables of France, felt the stroke of the headsman's axe. ...
— The Story of Paris • Thomas Okey
... cruising, and made a vigorous stroke, as if to cross the pond. James put up his hand to his mouth and shouted at the top of his voice: "Come right back, ...
— Herbert Carter's Legacy • Horatio Alger
... the whole matter was considered. Two things shaped themselves from the first: there must be absolute fairness and justice; and, what was of no less importance, there must never be any trace of loss of temper in what had to be done, however trying the case might be. To show anger, to give an extra stroke when the stick was up, to be hasty for an instant, would be to fail ignominiously, to the mutual unhappiness ...
— 'Murphy' - A Message to Dog Lovers • Major Gambier-Parry
... Mohawk, from a sexless savage with tangled hair and blotchy features, she had, by a stroke of the wand, become metamorphosed into a remarkably attractive young woman." And with the change came ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... over the misspelled words softly as he would stroke a dead face. Then he came out, putting out the candle, and buttoning the Bible inside ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 60, October 1862 • Various
... the book. His left was between Roma's hands, lying blue-veined in her lap. She was looking out on the sunlit city as if taking a last farewell of it. He stopped to stroke her glossy black hair and she reached up to his lips and kissed them. Then she closed her eyes to listen. His voice rose and swelled with the ocean of his love, and he felt as if he were pouring his life ...
— The Eternal City • Hall Caine
... and dispute this matter, I pray you cut all these knotty objections with the sword of his commandment. You use to go about to loose them by particular answers and untie them at leisure with art and skill, but truly it would be a readier and wiser course to cut them in pieces at one stroke, by this piercing and pungent precept. If your reasons and scruples be weighty, and you cannot get answers to overbalance them, I pray you put this weighty seal of divine authority into the balance, and sure I am it ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning |
