"Taut" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... waited within reach of its friendly protection. It was much more reassuring than to stand poised in a narrow trail with no possibility of sidestepping a charge. We waited at the crossing for further sounds of the elephants—waited for some time with rifles ready and then gradually relaxed our taut nerves. A line of porters with their burdens were huddled in one of the trails awaiting developments. I took a picture of the situation and had stood my rifle against the tree, and sat down to whisper the situation over. All immediate danger ...
— In Africa - Hunting Adventures in the Big Game Country • John T. McCutcheon
... and refilled his glass, and held it steadily before him. His voice, when he spoke, was gentle, and, like his face, strung taut with pain. ...
— The Unspeakable Gentleman • John P. Marquand
... supposed, but two harmless merchant-vessels lying on either side of the channel, the young earl bade his rowers pull between the two. Suddenly there is a stir on the quiet merchant-vessels. The capstan bars are manned; the sunken cable is drawn taut. Up goes the stern of Earl Hakon's entrapped warship; down plunges her prow into the waves, and the water pours into the doomed boat. A loud shout is heard; the quiet merchant-vessels swarm with mail-clad men, and the air is filled with a shower of stones, and spears, ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... yourself. You shouldn't want to fling yourself all loose into a woman's lap. You should stand by yourself and learn to be by yourself. Why don't you be more like the Japanese you talk about? Quiet, aloof little devils. They don't bother about being loved. They keep themselves taut in their own selves—there, at the bottom of the spine—the devil's own ...
— Aaron's Rod • D. H. Lawrence
... when we get there—and so I bid you agin lay me alone,—just keep your toe in your pump. Shure I'm here at the helm, and a weight on my mind, and it's fitther for you, Jim, to mind your own business and lay me to mind mine; away wid you there and be handy, haul taut that foresheet there, we must run close on the wind; be handy, boys; make ...
— Stories of Comedy • Various
... a-soak, but in the snug cabin of the sloop dry blankets and a dry bunk were mine; and we lay and smoked and yarned of old days, while overhead the wind screamed through the rigging and taut ...
— John Barleycorn • Jack London
... hollow and is considerably higher in the middle than at the sides. The neater this work is done, the more comfortable will be your ride home. When the rope tire is complete, pry up the side lap and force the free end of the rope diagonally under it until it comes out on the other side. Draw it taut and cut off the end flush with the outer wrapping. Now pour water all over the rope until it is thoroughly wet; this will cause it to shrink and become firm ...
— Healthful Sports for Boys • Alfred Rochefort
... in either place, was impossible. Sometimes the rain beat down upon the decked over portion of the boat with the sound of a drumstick beaten upon taut calfskin. Again the wind blew in such sharp gusts that the rain seemed to be swept over the face of the sea and then, if I chanced to glance over my shoulder, the drops stung ...
— Swept Out to Sea - Clint Webb Among the Whalers • W. Bertram Foster
... pale lips unbent. At that moment, the face of her father seemed floating on the sunbeams that gilded the pulpit, and the tones of her mother's voice rang in her ears. The terrible tension of many days and nights of torture gave way suddenly, like a silver thread long taut, which snaps with one last ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... canvas to the wind; I saw them all go down as I lashed myself to the jib." He groaned deeply; but speedily assuming a gayer tone, requested a quid and a quiet hammock. "My lights are nearly stove in,—my head hangs as loose as a Dutchman's shrouds; a night's sleep will make all taut again." ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... top deck at that end. The wind is blowing a perfect gale and almost drives us off our feet; it catches the side of the ship and makes it far harder work for the gallant grimy tugs, which are pulling and straining at the taut ropes till they look like bars of iron lying between us and them. They churn the water to a fury, and pour forth volumes of black smoke; inch by inch we feel the ship moving out; her stern is dragged ...
— Round the Wonderful World • G. E. Mitton
... promptly trussed the other in the bridle reins. Out of a pillowcase folded hard he made a gag and tied it into the mouth of the man. Then he ran his hands over the straps; they were drawn taut. ...
— Way of the Lawless • Max Brand
... was at hand, and Aziel saw a little wreath of smoke rise in the still air and bade his wretched servant close his eyes. Then came the end. Suddenly the taut rope, eaten through by the sun's fire, flew back and the cage with the soldier in it vanished from his sight, while, from far below, rose the sound of a heavy fall, and from the tomb of Baaltis rang the echo ...
— Elissa • H. Rider Haggard
... similes, which arrest the attention and stimulate the imagination. "His voice sounded hoarse and awkward, like a rusty lock." "I saw her sway, like something stricken by the wind." "His laugh rang false, like a cracked bell." "His voice shook like a taut rope." "My mind flying like a weaver's shuttle." "His blows resounded on the grave as thick as sobs." "The private guilty considerations I would continually observe to peep forth in the man's talk like rabbits from a hill." Nothing could be more effective than these ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... the room. He thought he had frightened her. But in a moment she was back with some whiskey, hot, in a glass. The colonel wanted to order her off and swear his nerves would be as taut without it. But how could he? There was the same traitorous trembling in his legs, and he put out his hand and took the glass, and thanked her. The thanks sounded like the courteous, kind father she knew; but when she had carried the glass into the kitchen she stood ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... But the act was enough to bring him back. A moment gone the room had grown misty. Something had made his throat ache. He felt taut with a great unexpressed yearning. He became conscious of his breakfast again. He sipped ...
— The Seventh Noon • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... degradation of the clog shoes, the cotton shirt, the striped suit, the reputation of a convict, permanent and not to be laid aside. He drew himself quickly away from her, turned his back, clinched his hands, drew his muscles taut; but it was too late. He was crying, and he ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... the wrong thing. The Mentorian's mouth was taut, forbidding. "Try again. I happen to know that David ...
— The Colors of Space • Marion Zimmer Bradley
... ear just a shade too reasonable. It had been thought out as an excuse. Because it wasn't for the Turkish bath nor the extra hour's sleep that he was staying away from home. It was herself he was staying away from. He wanted his mind to stay cold and taut, and he was afraid to face the temptation of her eyes and her soft white arms. And in the mood of that hour, it pleased her that this should be so—that the ascetic in him should pay her the tribute ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... meant, at the time, but I at least kept up with him. We went floundering through one end of a slough until the blanket was wet and heavy and I could hardly hold it. But I hung on for dear life. Then we swung off across the dry grass toward that advancing semicircle of fire, as far apart as the taut reins would let us ride. Dinky-Dunk took the windward side. Then on we rushed, along that wavering frontier of flame, neck to neck, dragging the wet blanket along its orange-tinted crest, flattening it down and wiping it out as we went. We made the full circle, ...
— The Prairie Wife • Arthur Stringer
... Phoenicians, preserved by Sanchoniathon, tell us that Taautos, or Taut, was the inventor of the alphabet and of the art ...
— The Antediluvian World • Ignatius Donnelly
... son stood there, erect and taut with life, gleaming in his blondness. The gleaming blondness of his strange, imminent being put the father into a fever of fretful irritation. He could not bear to meet the uncanny, downward look of Gerald's blue eyes. But it was only for a moment. Each on the brink of departure, the father ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence
... huntsman was I? See how taut My bow was bent! Strongest was he by whom such bolt were sent— Woe now! That arrow is with peril fraught, Perilous as none.—Have yon ...
— Beyond Good and Evil • Friedrich Nietzsche
... had now settled down thick and dark, and, as the banks on either side of the river were very high, Harry felt as if they were in a black canyon. He could see but dimly the surface of the river. All else was lost in the heavy gloom. But the boat had been built so well and the canvas cover was so taut and tight that not a drop entered. His sense of comfort increased, and the regular, even, musical thresh of the ...
— The Guns of Bull Run - A Story of the Civil War's Eve • Joseph A. Altsheler
... precision of temperatures. There were gleaming metal racks with calibrated slide-rods and spring dials to denote just what pull was being exerted on whatever unhappy creature might be stretched taut on them. There were tiny cones of metal whose warped, baked appearance testified that they were little portable furnaces that could be placed on any desired portion of the anatomy, to slowly bake the selected disk of ...
— The Red Hell of Jupiter • Paul Ernst
... some taut cable and looked out into all this uncontrollable exuberance. An exultation winged its way upward within him, and it seemed to him powerful enough to drown out both tempest and flood. A song to the sea, inspired by love, rang out within him. Wild comrade of ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... him, jumping from star to star in the thrilling blue sky. As it was she stood on one foot, as if poised for flight with a sort of spring in her movements that his softer muscles had never experienced. He caught at her hand, and felt it taut, ...
— Captivity • M. Leonora Eyles
... laugh maddened Holman. He clutched the rope and started to climb rapidly upward. I couldn't see him, but I felt his shoes as he wriggled away into the darkness above me, and I held my breath, I gripped the rope and kept it taut so that Leith and Soma might not ...
— The White Waterfall • James Francis Dwyer
... to the dinghy, and they rowed him away through the fog. It was a touchy job, picking his way through that murk. He stood up, leaning forward holding to his taut tiller-ropes, and more by ears than his eyes directed his course. A few of the anchored craft, knowing that they were in the harbor roadway, clanged their bells lazily once in a while. Yacht tenders were making their rounds, carrying ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... the same lovely weather continued, and the sea lay as smooth as oil in the bright sunshine. An English lobster-cutter was in the offing, with sails flapping against the mast, and the slack in the taut rigging could be seen as the craft heaved lazily to and fro on the gentle swell. Madeleine sat by the window; she did not care to go out. Her eye followed the lobster-cutter, which she knew well: it was the Flying Fish, ...
— Garman and Worse - A Norwegian Novel • Alexander Lange Kielland
... like a sharp knife cutting a taut cord. The tense muscles relaxed and Keith gave a sudden laugh. True, it was a short laugh, and a bitter one; but it ...
— Dawn • Eleanor H. Porter
... to me, pointed to a bird in the trunk of a cedar. Raising the bow, it bent taut under his firm, cautious pull. "Whiz," went the arrow, and there, pinned to the tree with the iron spike, fluttered a hairy woodpecker. To my wondering child-mind it was a great feat—my inherent instinct for hunting ...
— Ohio Arbor Day 1913: Arbor and Bird Day Manual - Issued for the Benefit of the Schools of our State • Various
... forehead. Eyebrows she had none, having long since shed them. Her eyes, of pin-hole tininess, were blackest black. She was shockingly cadaverous. Her shrivelled forearm, exposed by the loose sleeve, possessed no more of muscle than several taut bowstrings stretched across meagre bone under yellow, parchment-like skin. Along this mummy arm jade bracelets shot up and down ...
— On the Makaloa Mat/Island Tales • Jack London
... feet, save when they dipped and lifted to the uneven currents over the mountains. The Thunder Bird seemed alive, glorying in her native element. The earth slid away like a map unrolled endlessly beneath them. Desert and little towns on the railroad like broken beads strung loosely on a taut wire. Salton Sea was cool and tempting, though the air shimmered all around it with heat. They flew the full length of it and on up the valley. Then they climbed higher and so breasted the currents ...
— The Thunder Bird • B. M. Bower
... was beyond me. It was as if the controlling powers were flitting, invisible, just above my head, just beyond my grasp. There was obviously something vibrating; some cord, somewhere, stretched very taut and quivering. But I could think of no better solution than: "You must have done with him." It seemed obvious, too, that that was impossible, was outside the range of things that could be done—but I had to do my best. "It's ...
— The Inheritors • Joseph Conrad
... different matter. In an episode like this, a woman's imagination, given the darkness such as usually fills a carriage at night, becomes a round of terrors. Every moment is freighted with death or disfigurement. Her nerves are like the taut strings of a harp in a wintry wind, ready to snap at any moment; and then, hysteria. With man the play, and only the play, ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath
... the commencement of 13', the legs in elevation; 12' being a front view. An ordinary band, made by several turns of a small rope, is lapped round them and hauled taut, and then interlaced at the ends. This done, the legs are shifted into the shape of a St. Andrew's cross. Thus the lashing is tightened, and, for further security, we pass the line several times over the tie and between the spars, knotting ...
— Scientific American, Volume XXIV., No. 12, March 18, 1871 • Various
... beaver hat and the silk vest, but what struck me most, was the wearer, a slim youth, hardly out of his teens. In the distance, the New York pilot-boat, a build rendered famous by the achievements of the "America," at Cowes, lay on the water like a duck, with her canvas white as snow, and taut as a deal board. The perfect ease and nonchalance of the young pilot amused me immensely, and all went on smoothly enough till the shades of evening closed in upon us; at which time, entering the Narrows, the satin-vested youth felt himself ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... house, vanish into space, and then, a few minutes after, will come smiling around the nearest street corner. Or, if that is not wonderful enough, they will take an ordinary rope, whirl it around their head, toss it into the air, and it will stand upright, as if fastened to some invisible bar, so taut and firm that a ...
— Modern India • William Eleroy Curtis
... sailors would come ashore and raid fruit orchards. Once some of them stole a sheep and took it out to the schooner. The owner of the sheep came after the sailors with a search warrant but the mischievous sailors pulled the anchor chain up taut and tied the sheep to the chain and lowered away until the sheep, which they had butchered, was under water and the search warrant even could ...
— My Boyhood • John Burroughs
... directly over the boat again was a help to me. Across it, running fore and aft, I stretched a heavy wire rope on which I had placed a big block for a traveller, and carrying the end of the rope forward to the capstan I fell to work with the hand-bars and got it strained so taut that it was like a bar of iron. Then to the traveller block I made fast my hoisting tackle—and so was able to swing up the heavy pieces from where they were stowed, and to run them along the taut rope until they were clear of the boat ...
— In the Sargasso Sea - A Novel • Thomas A. Janvier
... you by the evil one. That's where you came from!' - a walk up and down the pulpit: 'and where are you going' - stopping abruptly: 'where are you going? Aloft!' - very softly, and pointing upward: 'Aloft!' - louder: 'aloft!' - louder still: 'That's where you are going - with a fair wind, - all taut and trim, steering direct for Heaven in its glory, where there are no storms or foul weather, and where the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are at rest.' - Another walk: 'That's where you're going to, my friends. ...
— American Notes for General Circulation • Charles Dickens
... strong and taut, The weaker lashed to port, On we sailed, two by two— That if either a bolt should feel Crash through caldron or wheel, Fin of bronze or sinew of steel, Her ...
— Poems of American Patriotism • Brander Matthews (Editor)
... Baree had sensed it. His muscles grew taut as pieces of stretched rope as he stood up in the moonlight, facing the direction from which floated the mystery and thrill of the sound. They could hear him whining softly; and Pierrot, bending down so that ...
— Baree, Son of Kazan • James Oliver Curwood
... engaged in picking oakum, spinning yarns (not such yarns as those amiable gentlemen, the naval novelists, talk so much about, but rope-yarns, by the aid of spinning-winches), platting sinnet, preparing chafing-gear, bowsing slack rigging taut, painting boats and bulwarks, scraping yards and masts, fitting new running-rigging, overhauling the spare sails, and fifty other things—doing, in fact, everything but idling. And, mind, no conversation ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 431 - Volume 17, New Series, April 3, 1852 • Various
... Theuth, Thoth, Taut, Taautes, are the same title diversified; and belong to the chief god of Egypt. Eusebius speaks of him as the same as Hermes. [41][Greek: Hon Aiguptioi men ekalesan Thouth, Alexandreis de Thoth, Hermen de Hellenes metephrasan.] From Theuth the ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume I. • Jacob Bryant
... ground of the stoot, cast your line well out from the boat with a small howitzer. You wait anxiously for the first bite; suddenly the hawser runs taut and there is a scream from the reel. But do not be afraid of the reel screaming. In the circumstances it is a very good sign. Plant the butt of your rod or pole firmly in the socket fitted for the purpose in all motor-stooter boats and let the fish run for ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, September 8th, 1920 • Various
... and he stood a moment absolutely still, every nerve in his slim young body taut as wire, every muscle rigid. For along the passage—not so very far in front of them, from where it seemed to terminate—came the thud of men's feet upon the soft clayey ground. The torch went out in an instant. In another, Cleek had caught Dollops's arm and ...
— The Riddle of the Frozen Flame • Mary E. Hanshew
... that time there came on a squall with rain, which almost blinded us; the sail was taken in very neatly, the clew-lines, chock-a-block, bunt-lines and leech-lines well up, reef-tackles overhauled, rolling-tackles taut, and all as it should be. The men lied out on the yard, the squall wore worse and worse, but they were handing in the leech of the sail, when snap went one bunt-line, then the other; the sail flapped and flagged, till away ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat
... are become hyenas. Behold, I gather together the charm [from every place where] it is, and from every man with whom it is, swifter than greyhounds and quicker than light. Hail, thou who towest along the Makhent boat of Ra, the stays of thy sails and of thy rudder are taut in the wind as thou sailest up the Pool of Fire in the underworld. Behold, thou gatherest together the charm from every place where it is, and from every man with whom it is, swifter than greyhounds and quicker than light, [the charm] which created the forms of being from the ...
— Egyptian Literature
... we are and the island ahead is a stretch of roaring water dangerous enough looking. We have learned ere this, however, to sit tight and watch for events. The careless Indians have straightened into keen-eyed, responsible voyageurs, each muscle taut, every sense alert. Our boat goes first, one half-breed with huge pole braces himself as bowsman, the most able man takes the stern sweep, the others stand at the oars. Fifteen minutes of good head-work brings us to the island and we step out with relief. The other boats ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron
... I could have sworn we were dashing through, the water at the rate of twenty knots an hour. (Prue has a great, but a little ignorant, admiration of my technical knowledge of nautical affairs and phrases.) I looked aloft and saw the sails taut with a stiff breeze, and. I heard a faint whistling of the wind in the rigging, but very faint, and rather, it seemed to me, as if it came from the creak of cordage in the ships of Crusaders; or of quaint old craft upon the Spanish main, ...
— Prue and I • George William Curtis
... squared to the satisfaction of the boatswain, the ropes were hauled taut, and coiled down, and the men sent below to their dinners. Newton walked aft, and the first person he met was the dubash who had attended the Bombay Castle. The cheeks of Newton flushed, and his heart throbbed quick, and his lips quivered, as he asked intelligence ...
— Newton Forster - The Merchant Service • Captain Frederick Marryat
... homeward, one of the party noticed a black cloud drifting in from the sea, which grew and spread and thickened until it covered the whole sky. The wind rose, and the waves chopped angrily at unseen barriers. Our little boat confronted the gale fearlessly; with sails spread and ropes taut, she seemed to sit upon the wind. Now she swirled in the billows, now she spring upward on a gigantic wave, only to be driven down with angry howl and hiss. Down came the mainsail. Tacking and jibbing, we wrestled with opposing winds that drove us from ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller
... at the yellow, singing gaslight. Soon he walked to the bed and began to tear the sheets into strips. With the blade of his knife he drove them tightly into every crevice around windows and door. When all was snug and taut he turned out the light, turned the gas full on again and laid himself ...
— The Four Million • O. Henry
... are subject to similar changes. A metal ball which when cool will just slip through a ring (Fig. 2) will, when heated, be too large to slip through the ring. Telegraph and telephone wires which in winter are stretched taut from pole to pole, sag in hot weather and are much too long. In summer they are exposed to the fierce rays of the sun, become strongly heated, and expand sufficiently to sag. If the wires were stretched taut in the summer, there would not ...
— General Science • Bertha M. Clark
... for her, found herself in the arms of a masterful expert, a man who danced better than she did, and suddenly there came to her a feeling that was almost gratitude, a miraculous slackening of her taut nerves, a delicious peace. Soothed and contented, she yielded herself with eyes half closed to the rhythm of the melody, finding it now robbed in some mysterious manner of all its stale cheapness, and in that moment her whole attitude towards Bruce ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... resembled a beautifully curved sheet of steel, stiff and unyielding. Both sails were snow-white, semi-transparent and supple in movement, like the ivory sails on the model ships in Rosenborg Palace. The mast seemed to bend slightly and the stays were as taut as fiddle-strings. The boat quivered like a leaf. The waves pounded hard against the thin strakes of the boat's side. I could feel them on my cheek, though their dampness never penetrated; but in between these hammer blows their little pats were wonderfully ...
— Seven Icelandic Short Stories • Various
... somehow he was clinging at last like a limpet to the very end of the gaff, his legs already dangling over the fatal edge, and with nothing to keep him from the clutch of death beyond it but his grip of the floating spar. To this he must cling until the mocking boat should again come taut on the line and possibly run within his reach. The next second out of the darkness what seemed to the man in the sail a mountain of blackness rushed hissing at him from the chaos beyond, actually swept ...
— Labrador Days - Tales of the Sea Toilers • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... his empurpled face, and my madness came back on me like a rush of fire through my veins—and I shut down on his throat again until I could feel the cords draw under my fingers like taut ropes. ...
— Vandemark's Folly • Herbert Quick
... laughter as Paula nodded to the grooms to release the horses' heads, took the feel of the four mouths on her hands, and shortened and slipped the reins to adjustment of four horses into the collars and taut on the traces. ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London
... stiffness in the muscles of mastication, notably the masseter, so that he has difficulty in opening the mouth—hence the popular name "lock-jaw." The muscles of expression soon share in the rigidity, and the face assumes a taut, mask-like aspect. The angles of the mouth may be retracted, producing a grinning expression known ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles
... Spanish, eked out by signs, to bid Suarez hold the siren cord taut for a minute. While the Kansas was still trumpeting forth her loud blare of defiance, he ran down the bridge companion. Mr. Boyle and the tiny garrison of the port promenade deck received him jubilantly; they had escaped without ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... desperate effort to dismiss the image of the girl before he again reached Leila. She was still sitting there, with her arms crossed, in the stillness of one whose every nerve and fibre was stretched taut. ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... and twisted and bent half double in the pangs of a fearful tummy-ache, and at every paroxysm the car lurched in sympathy, only to be brought up short by the pull of the taut cable; so that we two, wedged in together as we were, nevertheless jostled each other violently. I am a poor sailor, both by instinct and training. By rights and by precedents I should have been violently ill on the instant; but I did not have ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... planes drove in from beyond. Formations were blocking space above.... Every branch of the service was there, Thurston exulted, the army, Marine Corps, the Navy. He gripped hard at the dry ground in a paralysis of taut nerves. The battle was on, and in the balance hung the fate of ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science February 1930 • Various
... others crowded around, each eager for the last word, he turned away and busied himself with his tiller-rope, sick at heart. At last the good-bys were all said; Morton had taken his seat at the rudder, and Molly was nestled with baby on a cushion in the bottom of the taut little boat, when, just as Jasper was holding out a hand to help Sara aboard, she turned and gave a last, long, lingering look over the quaint little town in its radiant setting ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry
... be those of an ocean steamer, and the great leviathan, with its precious freight of human souls, plowed past the taut little yacht distant only ...
— The Dock Rats of New York • "Old Sleuth"
... the range-riders had thrown a coat over the head of the stallion, and while he stood quivering with helpless rage they flung a saddle on and drew the cinches taut. ...
— Trailin'! • Max Brand
... sing, his eyes dwelt on her. She was the most vital thing he had ever seen. The tendrils of burnished hair about her forehead and ears curled and shone with life; her eyes danced with life; her body was taut as a slim arrow ready to ...
— Gone to Earth • Mary Webb
... my answer to suit myself. I study hard work and honesty, but never was known to carry a grammar in my pocket. But, my taut friend, I should know'd I was in South Carolina if you hadn't said a word about it, for no other nation under the sky would a dragged a poor cast-away sailor to prison because he had the misfortune to have a tawny hide. It's a ten-to-one, my hearty, if you ...
— Manuel Pereira • F. C. Adams
... you feel anything, Javo?" Strain was apparent in every line of Tula's taut, bare ...
— Masters of Space • Edward Elmer Smith
... the types of men who have to do with horses—huntsmen, trainers, jockeys, riding masters and the rest, but the Australian bush-rider is a product by itself. She liked this son of the gum forest-tanned face, taut nerves, alert eyes piercing long distances—a man, vital, shrewd, simple as a child, cunning as an animal. And the way he sat in his saddle, the poise of the lean, lanky muscular frame! No wonder the first stockman seemed to the wild blacks a new sort of beast with four legs and two ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed
... count again; and so, tense, watching with eager-burning eyes and taut muscles, the man and woman made their way of ...
— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England
... aside. Foyle smiled, and although his whole body was taut in anticipation of any fresh attempt at violence, he quietly struck a match and ...
— The Grell Mystery • Frank Froest
... buttoned across the front of the buggy, extending from the dashboard to just below the level of the driver's eyes. The lawyer clambered in behind it, the captain followed, the end of the reins was passed through a slit in the boot, Mr. Shattuck, after inquiring if they were "all taut," gave the command, "Gid-dap!" and horse and buggy moved around the corner of the station, out ...
— Cap'n Warren's Wards • Joseph C. Lincoln
... is not serious," Saunders said. "I have seen him break down before. He is too intense, too strenuous; whatever he does he does with every nerve in his body drawn as taut as ...
— The Desired Woman • Will N. Harben
... adjusted weights at W or W{2}, an exact equilibrium of forces and conditions cannot be obtained. Or, again, if, as in Fig. 5, the face, P Q, is sheeted and rodded back to the surface, keying the rods taut, there is undoubtedly a stable condition and one which could not fail in theory or practice, nor can anyone, looking at Fig. 5, doubt that the top timbers are stressed more heavily than those at the bottom. The ...
— Pressure, Resistance, and Stability of Earth • J. C. Meem
... thought, this is certainly going too far. I opened my mouth to voice the angry words but a look at her stopped me. I couldnt help but feel her imperviousness was fragile, that harsh speech might shatter a calm too taut to be anything but hysterical. I drove on without speaking until the hummocks gave way again to smooth desert. "We'll soon be in Yuma," I announced. "Arent you going ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... shoving, and pulling at the rope, the nuggar was floated once more at last, and on they went again, and by-and-by the river widened, and the current was not so strong, and so long as they kept the rope pretty taut the boat came along without any ...
— For Fortune and Glory - A Story of the Soudan War • Lewis Hough
... lucky stroke of the oar, he failed to see a long length of grapevine floating like a brown snake of the water below. In the excitement they heeded not the barking of Mose. Nor did they see the grapevine straighten and become taut just as they drifted upon it; but they felt the raft strike and hold on some submerged object. It creaked and groaned and the foamy water surged, gurgling, ...
— The Spirit of the Border - A Romance of the Early Settlers in the Ohio Valley • Zane Grey
... listen cautiously for the trombone, the bassoon and the bull fiddle. They have a liaison with the umpah umps—the feet. Long ago they danced only to the umpah umps. There were no cadenzas, glissandos, arpeggios then. There was only the thumping of cedar wood on cedar wood, on ebony or taut deerskin. ...
— A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago • Ben Hecht
... had a taut way of putting on even a silk kimono, and she could not have been sloppy had she tried; her lines ...
— Married Life - The True Romance • May Edginton
... holding the rope taut, the middle was attached by similar knots to Dale's waist, and Melchior walked on, and on reaching his end ...
— The Crystal Hunters - A Boy's Adventures in the Higher Alps • George Manville Fenn
... Quick as thought the lee braces are slacked off, and those on the weather side made taut. Still she is not checked. Strange, too, for the breeze is stiff. Anderson feels she is in the stream of a ...
— Stories by English Authors: The Sea • Various
... of agony. Alongside the baskets lay the bigger fish, broad-tailed sea-bass, their circular jaws wide open, showing the white, round tongues and the dark throats, while their bodies were stretched backward, taut in the contraction of death; and flat, enormously wide skates, their fins spread out on the ground like kites of brown cloth, slimy and viscous to ...
— Mayflower (Flor de mayo) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... generous hearts would condemn that. He would keep every inch of the deck scoured, every piece of metal polished like a mirror, the sails set full and clean, and, with shining muzzles out, ropes hauled taut in their blocks, and every man at his post, he would sweep towards the reef, and go down into the sea firing a farewell salute of honor to the sun, his flag flying above him ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... is of bark from the white birch-tree, A butterfly's wing is my sail, And twisted grasses my cordage be, Stretched taut by ...
— Cap and Gown - A Treasury of College Verse • Selected by Frederic Knowles
... went below at the same time as Job Howland, thus keeping out of the way of Daggs, the man with the broken nose. As Howland was in the port watch, on deck from sunset to midnight, Jeremy often took comfort in the sight of his loved stars wheeling westward through the taut shrouds. He would stand there with a lump in his throat as he thought of his father's anguish on returning to the island to find the sheep uncared for and the young shepherd vanished. In a region desolate as that, he knew that there was but one conclusion for them ...
— The Black Buccaneer • Stephen W. Meader
... while from either side of his bed, from the ceiling above, from the headboard behind him, and from the footboard, strong lights played full and flary upon his twitching, aching eyelids; and finally, towards dawn, with every nerve behind his eyes taut with pain and strain, awakening unrefreshed to consciousness of that nimbus of unrelieved false glare which encircled him, and the stench of melted tallow and the stale reek of burned kerosene foul in his nose. That, ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... Maria—and so these fellows, who seemed to be in two lots, some at the top and some at the bottom of the plankway, were entirely out of my sight as yet, though I had a good view of their sliding-plane. But presently the ropes began to strain and creak, drawn taut—as our fishermen express it—either from the upper or the lower end, and I saw three barrels come sliding down—sliding, not rolling (you must understand), and not as a brewer delivers beer into a cellar. These passed by me; and after a little while ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... you blind old mole! I am bent on to a bight of the whip falls," I answered, with a chuckle. "Keep the other end of the rope taut, old chap, and I'll be able to climb up back into the port without anybody being the wiser but ourselves, my hearty, and so we'll all ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... what a heavy task it has proved to render verse in verse, particularly verse so varied and unfamiliar, and to do this from a writer not merely so remote in time, and withal a tragedian, but also marvellously concise, taut and unadorned, in whom there is nothing otiose, nothing which it would not be a crime to alter or remove; and besides, one who treats rhetorical topics so frequently and so acutely that he appears to be everywhere declaiming. ...
— Erasmus and the Age of Reformation • Johan Huizinga
... breeze stiffened. The sea became choppy, and white-caps danced fitfully over the greenish stretches, growing wilder and wilder under the whip of a flouting wind. The two patchwork sails on the lumbering Doraine flapped noisily for awhile, as if shaking off their tor-por, then suddenly grew taut and fat with prosperity. The twisted, half-jammed rudder,—far from worthy despite the efforts of its repairers,—whiningly obeyed the man at the wheel, and once more the ship felt the caress of the deep ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon
... stood there with taut drawn bow Tarzan recognized him not so much the NEGRO as the ARCHER ...
— Tarzan of the Apes • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... him, braced against the strain she knew was coming. The taut lariat hummed, it bruised into Sandy's thigh. Behind, the bay snorted, struggling gallantly. They were poised on the brink of death for a moment, two—three—and then the mare began to move slowly forward, neck curved, ears cocked to her master's ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn
... Things went lovely for ever so long, and though, after a spell, we had our ups and downs, as is but natural to human creeters, we never come to such a pass agin. Both on us tried real hard; whenever I felt my temper risin' or discontent comin' on I remembered them days and kep' a taut rein; and as for Lisha he never said a raspin' word, or got sulky, but what he'd bust out laughin' after it and say: 'Bless you, Cynthy, it warn't ...
— Work: A Story of Experience • Louisa May Alcott
... think we might manage to knock together a contrivance of this sort. There would be two of them, you understand, one on each side of the ship. This represents a stout timber frame, which would be secured in place by short lengths of chain bowsed taut by tackles, so that it would remain rigidly in position. It would reach from the rail down to about three feet below the surface of the water. This outrigger arrangement, which should be about nine feet long, will serve as ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood
... fold. Courage came back. Now she had let go of O'Reilly's window frame. She had passed on beyond hope of return, and yet she had no firm grasp upon the curtain. Before it could give the support a rope gives a climber, she must slowly, patiently, draw it toward her inch by inch until she had it taut. ...
— The Lion's Mouse • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... passenger that was one of three who, slow in collecting their luggage, were just descending. A second look convinced him, and he not only let out a bloodcurdling yell of welcome, but inadvertently slackened the lines that had been taut as fiddle strings over the backs of the horses. The leaders jumped over "the Innocent Bystander" before he had time to use his pickhandle, reared and fell on their backs, where they lay kicking ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... more triumph by bringing Rollitt up to the scratch, and so completing as sound and taut a team as Yorke had ever ...
— The Cock-House at Fellsgarth • Talbot Baines Reed
... themselves astride. He then gave orders to the people on the shore to hold fast to the end of the rope which was tied to the log, and leaving his rope in the tree he turned the log adrift, and the force of the current acting against the taut rope swung the log around against the bank, and all 'on board' were saved. The excited people, who had watched the dangerous experiment with alternate hope and fear, now broke into cheers for Abe Lincoln and praises for his brave act. This adventure made ...
— McClure's Magazine December, 1895 • Edited by Ida M. Tarbell
... were no broken masts or tattered sails or ropes dangling from the yards. On the contrary, the masts were straight and sound; such of the yards as had not been lowered were squared, and all the ropes were trim and taut. ...
— The Walrus Hunters - A Romance of the Realms of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... the Speedwell was fairly before the wind, the sails were hauled taut, the boys seated themselves on the windward gunwale, and the race began in earnest. But they soon found that it would be much longer than they had imagined. Instead of the slow, straining motion which they had expected, the Speedwell flew through ...
— Frank, the Young Naturalist • Harry Castlemon
... dancing about the deck with excitement; and, then he banged his fist down on the brass rail with a thump that almost doubled it in two, while his wiry billy-goat beard bristled out and wagged to and fro. "Brace up yer yards sharp, an' keep them bowlin's taut! Lay her ez near due north ez she'll fetch, an' we'll fix her on a bee-line fur 'Frisco. An', ...
— The Island Treasure • John Conroy Hutcheson
... sound there is But his motion's gentle hiss, Till one fluent arm and hand Suddenly circles, and the wand Taps a bough far overhead, "Crack," and then all noise is dead. For he halts, and for a space Stands erect with upward face, Taut and tense to the white ...
— When Winter Comes to Main Street • Grant Martin Overton
... saw the feathers erect, vibrating. I saw the spread claws outstretched, and I struck furiously at them, crying to Daisy to run into the iron shelter. Backing, swinging my clubbed rifle, I retreated, but I tripped across one of the taut pallium wires, and in an instant the hideous birds were on me, and the bone in my forearm snapped like a pipe-stem at a blow from their wings. Twice I struggled to my knees, blinded with blood, confused, almost fainting; then I fell again, rolling into the mouth ...
— In Search of the Unknown • Robert W. Chambers
... half-breeds, had let slip his lasso, which fell squarely over the head of the grizzly; then drawing it "taut," he kept it so while he slowly walked his horse around the tree, binding ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... have gone there anyway," said Lois, still all a-quiver, and shivering close to my shoulder. I put my arm around her; every muscle of her body was rigid, taut, yet trembling, as a smooth and finely turned pointer trembles with eagerness and ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... from the street broke the tense silence that had followed the mayor's soliloquy. He turned from the window quickly and strode back to his desk and the suggestion of weariness dropped from him like a cloak and he emerged, alert, taut, energetic, ...
— Spring Street - A Story of Los Angeles • James H. Richardson
... example, towns. The fairest and most beautiful towns are those which have built themselves—those in which each man has built to suit his own exclusive circumstances and needs; whereas towns which men have constructed on regular, string-taut lines are no better than collections of barracks. Put beauty aside, and look ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... hand is first placed in position, either at the keyboard or on a table; the fingers are taught to start with up movements, as the lifting muscles need special attention. A muscle or a finger, is either taut, flabby or stiff; it is the taut condition I strive for—to make the finger responsive, like a ...
— Piano Mastery - Talks with Master Pianists and Teachers • Harriette Brower
... The tree had begun to lean, and two of the guides were straining taut. He wondered. He wondered if the men at the guides were used to the work. Now, for the first time, he realized that the crest of the tree had a vast overhang of foliage on one side, and mighty misshapen ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... girl, who was crouching in real dismay, he leaned against the wall, his hands behind him, every muscle strained and taut. ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... sitting-room. He was not the bent, deferential old gardener, nor was he the Feller changed to youth as he thought of himself at the head of a battery. His features were hard-set, a fighting rage burning in his eyes, his sinews taut as if about to spring upon an adversary. When he recognized the intruders he turned limp, his head dropped, hiding his face with his hat brim, and he steadied himself by resting a hand on the ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer
... facing her father, every nerve taut with protest. "You don't mean to tell me, dad, that you and Frank Johnson and Lone Morgan and—everybody in the country are cowards, ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower
... on duty till the next morning, and after the first bustle, which always takes place on board when settling down in harbor—(boats to lower, booms to swing out, running rigging to make taut)—we had nothing more to do but to look on. We said to one another: "Where are we in reality?—In the United States?—In some English Colony in Australia, or ...
— Madame Chrysantheme • Pierre Loti
... stood up, tall and slim. The rawhide rope in his hand strung taut. A moment later he secured the end of it by the simple process of resting a small boulder upon its ...
— The Triumph of John Kars - A Story of the Yukon • Ridgwell Cullum
... Drew was taut inside. To say the wrong thing, to admit the line of that breeding, might be a bad slip. Yet he could only evade, not ...
— Rebel Spurs • Andre Norton
... his steps, and Lord Douglas immediately after him. All this was the work of a moment. Immediately we heard Croz's exclamation, old Peter and I planted ourselves as firmly as the rocks would permit; the rope was taut between us, and the jerk came on us both as on one man. We held; but the rope broke midway between Taugwalder and Lord Francis Douglas. For a few seconds we saw our unfortunate companions sliding downward on their backs, and ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... friends are certain little toy-boat builders, who bestow upon me from time to time boats fashioned by their knives; vessels which would not, it is true, encounter stormy seas, and therefore are not fitted for use, but which look taut and trim as they lie in the quiet harbour of bracket or slab amongst other choice ornaments. A rowing-boat, a yacht, a schooner, a man-of-war—all these varieties are somewhat commonplace. The construction of them requires skill ...
— Little Folks (Septemeber 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... not even turn his head to look. He's gone without a word. Here comes another, A different kind of craft on a taut bow-line,— Deacon Giles Firmin the apothecary, A pious and a ponderous citizen, Looking as rubicund and round and splendid As the great bottle in ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... not slow to assert itself. Moreover, Ramon was now caught in the inevitable reaction from a purpose which had gathered and concentrated his energies with passionate intensity for almost four months. During that time he had lived with taut nerves for a single hope; he had turned away from a dozen alluring by-paths; he had known that absorbed singleness of purpose which belongs only to lovers, ...
— The Blood of the Conquerors • Harvey Fergusson
... hand, the man in advance stood stock-still, his whole figure taut, poised, alert, in an attitude of listening. All at once he wheeled about, discovering the man close behind him. He sprang at once for his pursuer. The latter took to his heels, dashing around the corner, ...
— The Apartment Next Door • William Andrew Johnston
... minds, of equal natural strength, may be fully employed during a given period and yet show a wide difference in the quality and quantity of the results. The one may be busy all the while but slouch through the minutes. The other may be taut and intensive, working at white heat, and the output will be more extensive and of better quality. The mind that ambles through the period shows forth results that are both meager and mediocre; but the mind whose impact is both forceful and incisive produces results that serve to magnify the ...
— The Vitalized School • Francis B. Pearson
... water, and I after her; for you must know, children, I was so anxious to see the boat launched properly that as she struck the water I ran to the open gangway, and not noticing the boat's warp, which the steward had taken the precaution to fasten taut to the ship's rail, was struck by it and ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... anything her fancy had ever pictured. She liked best the cities through which they passed, their life, the bustle and confusion, the hurrying throngs, the rushing automobiles, the gleaming railroad tracks like taut bands of silver, the smoke-screened factories with their belching stacks, the rows upon rows of houses, snuggling in friendly ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott
... worked willingly, and yet with a silent decorum which showed what their feelings were. Never were the decks better cleaned, never were the ropes more carefully flemished down; the hammocks were stowed in their white cloths, the yards carefully squared, and the ropes hauled taut. At eight o'clock, the colours and pennant were hoisted half-mast high. The men were then ordered down to breakfast, and to clean themselves. During the time that the men were at breakfast, all the officers went into the cabin to take a last farewell look at our gallant ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat
... shoulder and exhibited a momentous piece of paper. The captain took an observation and hauled down his colors as a free man. He was a prisoner and put himself promptly in tow. After a short run and a few tackings they ran into Ludlow Harbor, and all was made taut for ...
— Danger! A True History of a Great City's Wiles and Temptations • William Howe
... favorite amusement was cutting down hammocks. Dark forms might be seen on all fours making their way on the greasy and slippery deck in the direction of selected victims. The sharp blade of a knife would be drawn across the taut cord that supported the hammock. Then an uproar that awakened the entire steerage would take place. If the one who was cut down happened to be an Irishman, he would loudly challenge all the passengers to come up and fight him, not caring whether they came in ones or ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... Michael away, and after several minutes returned along the deck, Michael stretched out ahead on the taut rope seeking Steward. ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London
... in shining bronze come crying Into a silver sky, Piercing and jubilant is the shape of their flying, Their beaks are pointed with delight, Curved sharply with desire, The passionate direction of their flight, Clear and high, Stretches their bodies taut like humming wire. The cold wind blows into angry patterns the jet-bright Feathers of their wings, Their claws curl loosely, safely, about nothingness, They clasp no things. Direction and desire they possess By which in sharp, ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Marjorie Allen Seiffert
... a peculiar sternness in Wayne Shandon's voice that made his cousin start in a way which, to Shandon's taut nerves, seemed instantly a sign of guilt. Conway finished the work he was doing, snapped the heavy padlock into the log chain, which fastened the double doors of the small building where odds and ends were stored during the winter, and came on through the snow, smiting his hands ...
— The Short Cut • Jackson Gregory
... reef-tackles lead to the slings of the yard, there is no impediment in swinging the yard when the reef-tackles are taut ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 829, November 21, 1891 • Various
... close to thee draw nigh, How often have my glances pierced the taut, Straight fold of thine austerest drapery, Fast at the end about ...
— Enamels and Cameos and other Poems • Theophile Gautier
... all peril unharmed, it reaches him harmless at last, And to its proven strength he lashes his weakness fast. Now, for the shore! But steady, steady, my men, and slow; Taut, now, the quivering lines; now slack; and so, let her go! Thronging the shores around stand the pitying multitude; Wan as his own are their looks, and a nightmare seems to brood Heavy upon them, and heavy the silence ...
— Poems • William D. Howells |
