"Trap" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... mouse is capable of lending a hand to a fellow in distress; at least, the following incident looks like it. One season they overran my cabin in the woods, and gave me a good deal of annoyance; so much so that I tried trapping them, using the ordinary circular trap with four or five holes and wire springs. One night I heard the trap spring in the attic over my head, followed by the kicking and straggling of the mouse. This continued for a few moments, when all was still. "There," I said, ...
— Squirrels and Other Fur-Bearers • John Burroughs
... get in and then out again that way alive—much less with a helpless girl. Yet something must be done. The tank was practically submerged inside, as I estimated quickly. Blows had no effect on the huge iron trap which had been built to resist ...
— The Exploits of Elaine • Arthur B. Reeve
... the leaves during the noonday heat. Coal ashes mixed with the manure in the hill, is claimed to be a preventative. Another is to plant some early squash between the hills prepared for the winter crop, and not to plant the latter until as late as possible. The early squash vines, which act as a trap, are pulled and burned. ...
— Home Vegetable Gardening • F. F. Rockwell
... heights, being that which forms its source of support. This is afforded by the decomposition of a species of claystone (slightly phosphoritic) which is found irregularly disposed in company with a few pieces of trap-rocks, amongst which, on approaching Sana from the southward, basalt is found to preponderate. The clay stone is only found in the more elevated districts, but the debris finds a ready way into the lower country by the numerous and steep gorges which are conspicuous in every ...
— The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom • P. L. Simmonds
... clearly that he was unhappy; he could never disguise his feelings; as he waited for the trap to appear he had the same lost and abandoned appearance that he had on my first vision of him at the Petrograd station. The soldier who was to drive us ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... any of them be doing there!" muttered Perkwite. "Viner! What business can he have in this place? It seems—by George, Millwaters," he suddenly exclaimed, "what if this is some infernal plant—trap—something of that sort? Do you know, in spite of what you say, I really think we ought to get hold of the nearest police and ...
— The Middle of Things • J. S. Fletcher
... opened his lips. After struggling for a moment in the hands of his captors, he now stood perfectly motionless, glancing furiously around him as if hoping to discover the coward who had prepared the trap into which he had fallen. For he felt certain that he was the victim of some atrocious conspiracy, though it was impossible for him to divine what motive had actuated his enemies. Suddenly those who were holding him felt him tremble. He raised his head; he fancied he could detect a ray of ...
— The Count's Millions - Volume 1 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau
... a while, and the noise of trap-wheels could be heard across the plain. Major Oldyn, commanding the Horse Battery, was coming back from a dinner in the Civil Lines; was driving after his usual custom— that is to say, as fast ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... be that of the little cellar underground, where the woman kept the liquor. She tried to regain possession of it, but during the struggle Golpin beat her brains out with a bar of iron that was in the room. This deed perpetrated, he opened the trap-door of the cellar, and among the folds of his blanket and that of his companion concealed as many flasks as they could carry. They then shut the street-door and joined ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat
... Why—oh! why had she told such a falsehood? Could anything justify her in a lie? was it not a lie—knowing as she did that she loved him with all her loving heart? But, then, his mother! and the sneers of the world, which would have declared that she had set her trap, and caught the foolish young lord! Her pride would not have submitted to that. Strong as her love was, yet her pride was, perhaps, stronger—stronger at any rate during that interview. But how was she to forgive herself the falsehood she ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope
... Cardinal laid another trap for me that I was not aware of,—by tempting me with the proffer of the Government of Paris; and when I had shown a willingness to accept it, he found means to break off the treaty I was making for that purpose with the Prince de Guemende, who had the reversion of it, and then represented me ...
— The Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Complete • Jean Francois Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz
... a turquoise and the wind a gale. The sun seemed to give out light but not heat—to lavish its splendor but withhold its charity. Moist flesh if it chanced to touch iron froze to it momentarily. So in whiter land the tongue of the ermine freezes to the piece of greased metal used as a trap and is caught and held there until the trapper returns or until it starves—starves with ...
— Bride of the Mistletoe • James Lane Allen
... the plumes won't kill 'em, an' I don't think it hurts 'em much," said the captain, thoughtfully. "Maybe we can rig up some sort of trap that will do the work without killin' 'em. It's time for bed, now, lads, but think it over and, perhaps, we can hit on some scheme. Had we better take turns at ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... act of disloyalty. Her terrible malady had in a way affected her reasoning powers, so that they had become distorted by a monstrous growth of suffering, like her body. She would not give up going about as usual, and was never absent from church. She drove about with her husband in his smart trap. Twice she had gone with Robert to consult the New York specialist, taking times when Norman was away on business. She still would not consent to an operation, and lately the specialist had been lukewarm in advising it. He had indeed been ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... there we found that the only way onto the roof was by a long perpendicular ladder leading to a trap door. We all scrambled up this—all but the Minister of Justice, who remained behind in the ...
— A Journal From Our Legation in Belgium • Hugh Gibson
... alive, of being smothered like rats in a trap, of being caught and done to death by some invisible and merciless force we could not grapple with, rushed into my mind. Then I thought of fire—of suffocation—of being roasted alive. The perspiration began to pour ...
— Three John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... people, who presumably never left them, for in the open we never encountered a solitary human being, nor indeed a single animal or bird, with the exception of a dead ermine which had been caught in a trap and which our Yakute drivers, with characteristic greed, promptly took from the snare and pocketed. Talking of ermine, the district of Sredni-Kolymsk has always been famous as a fruitful breeding-place of this pretty ...
— From Paris to New York by Land • Harry de Windt
... entrancing, but I hope never to see you give so much of yourself to others again." His hand in arranging the reboso touched hers. It lingered, and she stared up at him, helplessly, her eyes wide, her lips parted. She reminded him of a rabbit caught in a trap, and he had a sudden and violent revulsion of feeling. He rose and offered his arm. "I should be a brute if I kept you talking out here. Slip off and go to bed. I shall start the guests, for I am very ...
— Rezanov • Gertrude Atherton
... thing it was. 'Don't make such a mountain of a molehill. It is a very small matter. You can easily give it up when you like.' But when the deed is done, then her mocking laugh rings out, 'I have got you now and you cannot get away.' The prey is seduced into the trap by a carefully prepared bait, and as soon as its hesitating foot steps on to the slippery floor, down falls the door and escape is impossible, We are tempted to sin by the delusion that we are shaking off restraints ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... sight-seeing in their cosy little pony carriage. It is a nice little two-wheeled affair. I believe the orthodox name of it is a croydon. It carries four, who sit back to back, while the back seat turns up when not wanted. It was in quite a different trap that I rode in on my visit to Glenveigh. During my journey there we talked, my guide and I, of what constitutes a good landlord. It was a negative sort of goodness which he expected from the good ...
— The Letters of "Norah" on her Tour Through Ireland • Margaret Dixon McDougall
... tread. Dust and litter covered the entire floor, but having cleared the top of this particular stone, a ring was discovered, lying flat in a circular groove cut to receive it. The blade of a penknife served to raise it from its resting place, and Dr. Cairn, standing astride across the trap, tugged at the ring, and, without great difficulty, raised the stone block from ...
— Brood of the Witch-Queen • Sax Rohmer
... looking for another door to try. The uncommonly deep snow has made him think Of his old song, The Wild Colonial Boy, He always used to sing along the tote-road. He's after an open door to get out-doors. Let's trap him with an open door up attic." Toffile agreed to that, and sure enough, Almost the moment he was given an opening, The steps began to climb the attic stairs. I heard them. Toffile didn't seem to hear them. "Quick!" ...
— American Poetry, 1922 - A Miscellany • Edna St. Vincent Millay
... been shot, and dragged up there, and left by our pioneer for the present. We found, however, upon examination, that the deer had walked up on the dam, probably to take a look at what was below, and on the other side, when his foot slipped down between the poles, and he was caught as in a trap. His leg was badly broken, and nearly severed by his efforts to get loose, and the bark of the poles was worn away within reach of his struggles. He had died where he thus got hung; and there he was, stone dead, but not yet ...
— Wild Northern Scenes - Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod • S. H. Hammond
... some mighty oak-tree to that of another. If these runs are broken down or holes made in them they are generally repaired during the night. The moles do not appear to form mole-hills as in Europe." Jerdon's specimens were dead ones picked up, as the Lepchas do not know how to trap them. ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... brutally; "at any rate, they've got themselves into a trap now—the baggage! They're safe enough. They shall ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... very much excited at meeting the boys. The khaki uniforms seemed to soften their anger to some extent, but one who appeared to be in authority started to scold them for walking so blindly into a trap. ...
— The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields • Lieut. Howard Payson
... infantry, which appeared so suddenly upon their unprotected flank. They therefore retreated, and the Mexican army was cut in two, so that all of it which had been stationed in the pass itself was caught as in a trap, and compelled to surrender. These trapped prisoners were about three thousand in number, and Ned kindly remarked ...
— Ahead of the Army • W. O. Stoddard
... tease, but listened to learn), "now, Dic, you know the adze was only an excuse. You went to see Sukey. You know you did. Why didn't you borrow Kaster's adze? They live much nearer your house." She thought she had him in a trap, and laughed as if ...
— A Forest Hearth: A Romance of Indiana in the Thirties • Charles Major
... in her strange kind of mouse-in-the-trap trance, about that unhappiness. Was there to be no happiness, for her anywhere? Was she always to want more than she got, was all this passion now too late? Was it real at all? Was it not a fever, a phantom, a hallucination? Did she see Morris? Did she ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... time in her life, Mrs. Carr fully comprehended the sensations of a wild animal caught in a trap. In her present painful predicament, she was absolutely helpless, and she realised it. It was Harlan's house, as he had said, but so powerful and penetrating was the personality of the dead man that she felt as though it was still largely ...
— At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern • Myrtle Reed
... woods near Rappahannock Station. Under this fire we advanced some distance toward the river, and then retired slowly with a view of drawing the Rebels across to our side. But they were too wily to be caught in such a trap, and our attempt failed. A stream is a great barrier, between two contending forces, and no careful leader will place his men with a stream behind them, unless he is quite certain of victory. We had a sad lesson of this in ...
— Three Years in the Federal Cavalry • Willard Glazier
... Gallegan, I tried in vain to understand it. I believe, however, that it principally related to witches and witchcraft, as the Estadea was frequently mentioned. After supper I demanded where I could rest: whereupon the host pointed to a trap-door in the roof, saying that above there was a loft where I could sleep by myself, and have clean straw. For curiosity's sake, I asked whether there was such a thing as a bed in ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... along! We cannot recognise the dark tower, to which in the story Childe Roland came, by any description. We must go there ourselves; and not till we feel the teeth of the trap biting into us, do we see that it was exactly in such a place that we had been warned ...
— Where No Fear Was - A Book About Fear • Arthur Christopher Benson
... behind Donnegan, and hearing that whishing sound which the door of a heavy safe will make, he looked down at this, and saw that it was actually inches thick! Once more the sense of being in a trap ...
— Gunman's Reckoning • Max Brand
... tears, he asked the cause of her trouble, and when he heard it he plunged into the well to look for the ring. A party of young sorcerers quickly gathered round, thinking that the mouse was in the trap, and they flung a great millstone after him. But he searched in the mud and water for some time, and presently sprang out of the water with the millstone on his finger, which he offered to the maiden, saying that he had not been able to find anything else in the mud, and that ...
— The Hero of Esthonia and Other Studies in the Romantic Literature of That Country • William Forsell Kirby
... had seen the trap their fellows rushed into, and turning sharp aside had flung themselves into the water where the gorge broke down in steep banks. Their cries of rage and their threats against the "tree-ape" who had brought them to their shame mixed with the yells and ...
— The Second Jungle Book • Rudyard Kipling
... the chief medicine-man of our tribe, who was named Noma. He was old, had one eye only, and was very clever. Of him I learned some tricks and more wisdom, but at last he grew jealous of me and set a trap to catch me. As it chanced, a rich man of a neighbouring tribe had lost some cattle, and came with gifts to Noma praying him to smell them out. Noma tried and could not find them; his vision failed him. Then the headman grew angry and demanded back his gifts; but Noma would ...
— Nada the Lily • H. Rider Haggard
... the left hand side. This you will use as your playground during the six summer months. I have brought with me from York a box which I shall place under the charge of Ripon and the two next senior to him. It contains bats, wickets, and a ball for cricket; a set of quoits; trap bat and ball for the younger boys; leaping bars and some other things. These will give you a start. As they become used up or broken they must be replaced by yourselves; and I hope you will obtain plenty of enjoyment from them. I shall come and play a game of cricket with you ...
— Through the Fray - A Tale of the Luddite Riots • G. A. Henty
... ground, eh? Well, that's only reasonable; and my wife and daughters will want to have their say in the matter—no getting on without pleasing the ladies, hey? Now, let me see. To-morrow's Sunday. Why not come down by the 8.45 a.m. to Lipsfield? I'll have a trap, or a brougham and pair, or something, waiting for you—take you over the ground myself, bring you back to lunch with us at Oriel Court, and talk the whole thing thoroughly over. Then we'll send you up to town in the evening, and you can start work the first thing on Monday. That suit you? ...
— The Brass Bottle • F. Anstey
... proceeded briefly and concisely to explain to him the various plans of incorporation which had been proposed. Ten minutes later he almost groaned, as a trap, drawn by a pair of handsome buckskin horses, driven by Princeman and containing Miss Josephine, crunched upon the gravel driveway in front of the porch. Miss Stevens greeted Mr. Turner very heartily indeed, Princeman stopping for that purpose. ...
— The Early Bird - A Business Man's Love Story • George Randolph Chester
... versatility, and in an interesting manner combines the occupation of a detective with the profession of an evangelist. It was not, however, he who worked the old panel game—much as a black paramour might work it down in the Tenderloin—on certain councilmen, led them into a trap, and then exposed them—an achievement in confused morals that has not been permitted to go unapplauded. There are those, of course, in every city who could think fondly and smugly of themselves as doing, in this way, ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine
... love to play chuck-farthing with the wise purposes of men, the theory of the eternal laughter having a root of truth in it, as it would seem, after all! And there ahead of him, under the shifting, dappled shadow of the overarching firs, Dr. Knott's broad, cumbersome back, and high, two-wheeled trap blocked the road, while Timothy, the old groom,—stiff-kneed now and none too active,—slowly pushed open the heavy, white gate of the ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... lips, as trembled and worked in spite of her. She struggled fierce and wild for nigh a solid minute to clear herself from him, while her beautiful eyes moved about like I've seen a wild animal's caught in a trap. Then, when she felt her strength wasn't no account against his, she gave one piercing, terrible scream, so long and unnatural-like in the tone of it that it curdled ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood
... said Hemstead, warmly, and falling blindly into her trap. "If I had skipped all the chapters which treat of woman's heroism, in doing and suffering, I should, indeed, know little of history. She has proved herself the equal, and at times the superior ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe
... James I. Shire Lane was christened Rogues' Lane, and, in spite of all the dukes and lords of the Kit-Kat, it never grew very respectable. In 1724 that incomparable young rascal, Jack Sheppard, used to frequent the "Bible" public-house—a printers' house of call—at No. 13. There was a trap in one of the rooms by which Jack could drop into a subterraneous passage leading to Bell Yard. Tyburn gibbet cured Jack of this trick. In 1738 the lane went on even worse, for there Thomas Carr (a low attorney, of Elm Court) and Elizabeth Adams robbed and murdered a gentleman ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... only way out of it ... first of all, I must save the King, get him out of danger, and then arrange a trap to catch my gang." Fandor deliberated ...
— A Royal Prisoner • Pierre Souvestre
... confess all that is laid to their charge. The same thing, no doubt, would have happened with the bread and cheese of the Roman church, if it had been applied to any others but ecclesiastics. The latter had too much wisdom to be caught in a trap of their own setting.] ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... tree that has been felled for that purpose, and deeply notched at one end to prevent the rope from slipping. This log, which weighs about five or six hundredweight, is then buried horizontally in the ground, and the entire trap is covered with earth and carefully concealed; the surface is smoothed over with a branch instead of the hand, as the scent of a human touch would at once be detected by the rhinoceros. When completed, a quantity ...
— The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia • Samuel W. Baker
... light might attract the attention of some outsider, and in the absence of any written authority from the owner might cause us temporary trouble, while to explore the distillery without a light was out of the question, for we might fall through some trap-door or into a vat, besides which, we could hear a great rush of water in the rear of the premises, so we decided ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... heard from the tower, accompanied by an impious oath. The heavy trap groaned for the fourth time. The green water received with a loud noise a burden which cracked the enormous wheel of the mill; one of its large spokes was torn away, and a man entangled in its beams appeared ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... but myself. I have faithfully followed your orders, and kept him like a rat in a trap. He takes to eating and sleeping prodigious kindly, and has shown no disposition to ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams
... has become the fashion nowadays to ascribe hatred to non-co-operationism. And I regret to find that even Col. Wedgewood has fallen into the trap. I make bold to say that the only way to remove hatred is to give it disciplined vent. No man can—I cannot—perform the impossible task of removing hatred so long as contempt and despise for the feelings of India are sedulously nursed. It is a mockery ...
— Freedom's Battle - Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present Situation • Mahatma Gandhi
... gods in such "merry jests." These two tendencies seem to have grown upon him as years went on and to have become more and more pronounced. Often, with artists, the reverse thing happens. Every human being has his own secretive reaction, his own furtive recoil, from the queer trap we are all in,—his little private method of retaliation. But many writers are most unscrupulously themselves when they are young. The changes and chances of this mortal life mellow them into a ...
— Visions and Revisions - A Book of Literary Devotions • John Cowper Powys
... towards the glassy deep, But oft retarded; once with a hidden net, Though with great windows, (for when need first taught These tricks to catch food, then they were not wrought As now, with curious greediness, to let None 'scape, but few and fit for use to get,) As in this trap a ravenous pike was ta'en, Who, though himself distress'd, would fain have slain This wretch; so hardly are ill ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... steadily have we been coming just to this! I think I knew it long ago. I have in me so much of the ancient Roman that I prize him, now that we are at grips, and think him a fair enemy. If I did not hate him, I would love him. But it is the first, and I'll not forgive this pretty trap he's laid! What does he think will come after these two weeks he has me shackled? Does he think that he can always keep me here?—or only until—until it is too late to go?" He struck his hand against the beech tree. "Well, well, mine enemy, we will ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... of glances from the others, but Mother Corey chuckled. "Heart like a steel trap, cobber," he said, almost approvingly. "Well, you'll be earning your keep here—yours and that granddaughter's, too. Here—you'll need ...
— Police Your Planet • Lester del Rey
... thinks to trap us who are but three. Well, kill on, Old Wizard, if you will, but know that if a hand is lifted, this spear of mine goes through your heart, and that the children of Lobengula die hard. Know also that then the impi which waits not far away will destroy you every ...
— Benita, An African Romance • H. Rider Haggard
... toward her. She had fallen on the long easy chair, and, covering her face at the spot where I had struck her, she looked at me. Her features exhibited fear and hatred toward me, her enemy, such as the rat exhibits when one lifts the rat-trap. At least, I saw nothing in her but that fear and hatred, the fear and hatred which love for another had provoked. Perhaps I still should have restrained myself, and should not have gone to the last extremity, if she had maintained silence. ...
— The Kreutzer Sonata and Other Stories • Leo Tolstoy
... first taken up by Women of Quality, and now run into Ridicule, by all the little common Devils of the Town; and is only a Trap for a Termer, a small new rais'd Officer, or a City Cully, where they baul out their eighteen Pence in Baudy, and filthy Nonsense, to the disturbance of the whole House, and the King's Peace: the Men of Quality ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume IV. • Aphra Behn
... of Mr. Charke was growing unpleasantly sharp and menacing; and as I looked down the long space before me, losing itself among ambiguous shadows, lulled in a sinister silence, and as it were inviting my entrance like a trap, I was very near yielding to the ...
— Uncle Silas - A Tale of Bartram-Haugh • J.S. Le Fanu
... while!" exclaimed the other with glowing eyes. "Lead them into a trap, where they would be mowed down like ripe grain, terrible as ...
— Air Service Boys Over The Enemy's Lines - The German Spy's Secret • Charles Amory Beach
... when trapping in the foothills of the Sierras, repeatedly had his traps robbed by an impudent member of the wolf family. One day while making his regular rounds and approaching a set, he saw in the distance a coyote run off with the catch of his trap. Seeing that the wolf turned up a branch creek, Ferguson cut across the intervening neck of the woods to intercept him if possible. He reached the stream bottom at the moment the coyote came trotting past. Having a blunt arrow on the bowstring, he shot across the twenty-five yards of ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... to hand her up 'the pewter' without its being witnessed by the audience. After much consultation, Malibran having been assured that her wish should be fulfilled, it was arranged that the pot of porter should be handed up to her through a trap in the stage at the moment when Jules had thrown himself on her body, supposing that life had fled; and Mr. Templeton was drilled into the manner in which he should so manage to conceal the necessary arrangement, that the audience would never suspect what was going on. At the ...
— The Merry-Go-Round • Carl Van Vechten
... Mary, and we gazed out. We were pressed against the bars, and sunlight was on our heads and shoulders. I realized that we could be plainly seen from across the glade. We were lures—decoys to trap Harl. ...
— Astounding Stories, May, 1931 • Various
... in. Supposing he had recognized her, my being so close would have made it none the better for her. And could I be sure that he had not seen her? I did not think he was the kind, of man, with all his faults, to lay a trap even for an enemy whom he suspected; ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... auberge, and I had for my companion a ruby-faced cattle-dealer of about fifty. He spent his life chiefly in a trap, followed by an old cattle-dog of formidable build and determined expression of mouth. This animal was now lying down near the table, so tired and footsore from almost perpetual running that he thought it too much trouble ...
— Wanderings by southern waters, eastern Aquitaine • Edward Harrison Barker
... her, for it might well be that a trick had been played on her, and that this was true. Or perhaps this tale of Noie's death was but a trap to test her powers; moreover, it was not likely that the King, who had promised that she should live, would dare to break his word to one whom he believed or ...
— The Ghost Kings • H. Rider Haggard
... this wise they galloped over the white road until the hedges disappeared and they were in the streets, and people turned to look at them, and even stood and stared. Then she drew rein a little and went slower, knowing with shuddering agony that the trap was closing ...
— A Lady of Quality • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... information of all this sent to Miss Lorton's bankers in London, and her solicitors, so as to prevent Gualtier from accomplishing his fourth step, and also in order to secure their co-operation in laying a trap for him which will certainly ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... choking sound was heard, and a horrible scuffling and tapping of feet upon the polished floor, a sound most dreadful. They were murdering her—murdering an old, kind woman silently and methodically in the darkness. The girl strained and twisted against the pillar furiously, like an animal in a trap. But the coils of rope held her; the scarf suffocated her. The scuffling became a spasmodic sound, with intervals between, and then ceased altogether. A voice spoke—a man's voice—Wethermill's. But Celia would never have recognised ...
— At the Villa Rose • A. E. W. Mason
... counting-house, and ascended the face of the cliff—then, walked a short distance along the edge, descended a little again, and stopped at a wooden platform built across a deep gully. Here, the miner pulled up a trap-door, and disclosed a perpendicular ladder leading down to a black hole, like the opening of a chimney. "This is the shaft; I will go down first, to catch you in case you tumble; follow me and hold tight;" saying this, our ...
— Rambles Beyond Railways; - or, Notes in Cornwall taken A-foot • Wilkie Collins
... saw at once that he had been lured into a trap. It was natural for him to jump to the conclusion that it was for robbery, owing to the fact of his coming into possession of the great Marsh fortune so recently, and a sudden sternness settled upon his face. ...
— Mischievous Maid Faynie • Laura Jean Libbey
... age; And therefore waited on him so, As dwarfs upon Knights Errant do. It was a serviceable dudgeon, Either for fighting or for drudging. 380 When it had stabb'd, or broke a head, It would scrape trenchers, or chip bread; Toast cheese or bacon; tho' it were To bait a mouse-trap, 'twould not care. 'Twould make clean shoes; and in the earth 385 Set leeks and onions, and so forth. It had been 'prentice to a brewer, Where this and more it did endure; But left the trade, as many more Have lately done on the same ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... which has in turn excited the most scathing ridicule and the most extravagant admiration. Thus George Inness, the American artist, wrote of him: "Turner's 'Slave Ship' is the most infernal piece of clap-trap ever painted. There is nothing in it." Thackeray confessed with delightful frankness: "I don't know whether it is sublime or ridiculous." Mark Twain, the American humorist, has voiced both of these views at once, whereas Ruskin ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson
... Pawnes, are sillie swaines, Which seeldome serue, except by hap, And yet those Pawnes, can lay their traines, To catch a great man, in a trap: So that I see, sometime a groome May not be spared ...
— Microcosmography - or, a Piece of the World Discovered; in Essays and Characters • John Earle
... enjoyed my first experience in buffalo-hunting we arrived in the neighbourhood of the great elephant corral, or great elephant trap, as it might very properly be called. We had been travelling through dense forests scarcely penetrated by the sun's beams, where but seldom we had heard the song of birds, the hum of insects, or even the roar of wild ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... Bergen Hill, New Jersey. This comprises the range of bluffs of trap rock commencing at Bergen Point and running up behind Jersey City and Hoboken, etc., to the part opposite about Thirtieth Street, New York, where it comes close to the river, and from there along the river to the north for a long distance, known as ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 344, August 5, 1882 • Various
... when he began speaking, but a second or two later he had plenty of them. Hasty steps sounded in the hall below and came up the ladder, and in less time than it takes to write it the top of the tower was covered with boys. The last one who came up turned about and slammed down the trap-door through which he had gained access to the roof. It was Dixon, the tall student who had compelled the orderly to fold the flag properly, and who afterward told Dick Graham right where to find it. Being ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon
... ahead of us, and they'll be waiting," Jack explained. "I've got to cut through the fields here, so that we can get on another road where they won't be looking for us. Otherwise I'm afraid we wouldn't get very far before we ran into a trap that all our armor and all our speed wouldn't get us out of without capture. You don't want to lose this car on its ...
— The Boy Scout Automobilists - or, Jack Danby in the Woods • Robert Maitland
... good-looking youth in white flannels, who immediately blushed distressingly. "Yes, you are, young man! I'm amazed that you have the decency to blush! Your insolent sheet, the Evening Star, refers to my Trust Company as a Green Mouse Trap and a Mouseleum. It also publishes preposterous pictures of myself and family. Dammit, sir, they even produce a photograph of Orlando, the family cat! You did it, I am told. ...
— The Green Mouse • Robert W. Chambers
... be," says Kjartan, "while I can keep my feet and handle a sword; it seems to me a pitiful thing to be taken thus like a lamb out of the pen, or a fox out of the trap. I hold it a far better choice, if one must die, to do something first that shall be ...
— Epic and Romance - Essays on Medieval Literature • W. P. Ker
... only when his freedman, Anicetus, the commander of the fleet, proposed a plan that seemed to guarantee secrecy for the crime: to have a ship built with a concealed trap. It was the spring of the year 59 A.D.; the Court had moved to Baiae, on the Gulf of Naples. If Nero succeeded in getting his mother on board the vessel, Anicetus would take upon himself the task of burying quickly below the waves the secret of her death; the people who hated Agrippina ...
— Characters and events of Roman History • Guglielmo Ferrero
... contents in still heavier torrents; not a creature was to be seen in the streets. To reach up to the bell was what he did not like; to cry aloud for help would have availed him little; besides, how ashamed would he have been to be found caught in a trap, like an outwitted fox! How was he to twist himself through! He saw clearly that it was his irrevocable destiny to remain a prisoner till dawn, or, perhaps, even late in the morning; then the smith must be fetched to file away the ...
— Andersen's Fairy Tales • Hans Christian Andersen
... with moths in no time. Miss Katharine, how she did hate the sight of a moth-miller! There's something I'll speak about before I forget it: the mice have eat the backs of a pile o' old books that's stored away in the west chamber closet next to Miss Katharine's room, and I set a trap there, but it was older 'n the ten commandments, that trap was, and the spring's rusty. I guess you'd better get some new ones and set round in different places, 'less the mice'll pester you. There ain't been no chance for 'em to get much of a living 'long through the ...
— Deephaven and Selected Stories & Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... about eleven, and Mr. Crips was trudging contentedly along, the road, swinging his bag and singing his tender lay, at peace with the world, and buoyed with great hopes, when a trap drove up and a voice out of the ...
— The Missing Link • Edward Dyson
... (amateur soldiers always cabbage-hoers at heart) afford him a good deal of amusement; as if you should send out the mayor of Jonesville, Arkansaw, against a Foch or a Hindenburg. One of them, a fool of a fellow, blunders into a booby-trap and loses the army which is almost the sole hope of Rome; and comes home, utterly defeated, —to be gravely thanked by the Senate for not committing suicide after his defeat: "for not despairing of the Republic." Ah, there is real Great Stuff in that; they ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... To see a fly-trap in a dream, is signal of malicious designing against you. To see one full of flies, denotes that small embarrassments will ...
— 10,000 Dreams Interpreted • Gustavus Hindman Miller
... completeness of the trap into which she had fallen, the futility of resistance. If the man who seemed in control exhibited any consideration, it was not from the slightest desire to show mercy, but rather to render the work as easy as possible. ...
— The Strange Case of Cavendish • Randall Parrish
... may be at the very end of your journey. The Count may have spies within sight of the convent. You may fall into a trap at the last moment." ...
— The Bright Face of Danger • Robert Neilson Stephens
... larger numbers than usual, they no longer saw her in her old place on the settle, where Rhoda's pretty face had made so strong a contrast with her aunt's. Miss Priscilla, after Rhoda's foolish flight, always retreated to her bedroom overhead, in which there was a small trap-door, made when her mother was bedridden, that she might hear the prayers and the sermon and the singing in the kitchen below. It was some weeks before old Nathan, who looked every Sunday if the trap-door was open, ...
— The Christmas Child • Hesba Stretton
... fear smote him—a fear wherein lay buried like a fly in amber a hope for life, the only hope that had yet come to him since his awakening there in that trap sealed ...
— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England
... there were four men who saw him after the train left Newark; and the porter remembered holding the vestibule door and trap-platform open for some one ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... trust, and petty frauds were punished with the bastinado; but robbery and house-breaking were sometimes considered capital crimes, and deserving of death; as is evident from the conduct of the thief when caught by the trap in the treasury of Rhampsinitus, and from what ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... startling. In the early morning we heard that the forts had been heavily fired on. One of them remained silent for a long time, and then the garrison lighted cart-loads of straw in order to deceive the Germans, who fell into the trap, thinking the fort was disabled and on fire, and rushed in to take it. They were met with a furious cannonade. But one of the other ...
— My War Experiences in Two Continents • Sarah Macnaughtan
... he said, "but if she did, I take it she has been deceived and walked into a trap. If we can find that car we shall be on the ...
— The Master Detective - Being Some Further Investigations of Christopher Quarles • Percy James Brebner
... Mall Drake was smitten by a sudden impulse. The fog had cleared from the streets; he looked up at the sky. The night was moonless but starlit, and very clear. He lifted the trap, spoke to the cabman, and in a few minutes was ...
— The Philanderers • A.E.W. Mason
... finding a magistrate among hundreds to aid them, but that now, before they hunt a slave, they must hunt and catch a United States judge, or a commissioner of six or eight in a whole State. Truly a hard case, and yet the slaveholders themselves set the very trap in which they have been caught, and thus it is that, through their folly, and your generosity in not pointing out to them the blunder they were committing, the new law is more favorable to the ...
— A Letter to the Hon. Samuel Eliot, Representative in Congress From the City of Boston, In Reply to His Apology For Voting For the Fugitive Slave Bill. • Hancock
... You've nearly killed her. The idea of taking a pregnant woman up in this death trap! What in Fleming's name's the ...
— The Lani People • J. F. Bone
... thing as fear. He had the heart of a lion, and jaws like a steel trap. And no wise dog ever let Benny get a good, ...
— The Tale of Benny Badger • Arthur Scott Bailey
... and have offered him great sums of money to come and bring the Pottawatomies and Kickapoos with him." He refused, saying, "Your British father has not enough money to induce me to join you. I have now laid a trap for him. I have sent Gomo and a party of Indians to take him prisoner and bring him here alive. I expect him ...
— Autobiography of Ma-ka-tai-me-she-kia-kiak, or Black Hawk • Black Hawk
... particularly in the wet weather of spring and of late fall, that the soil will become charged with more of these waste matters than the bacteria can destroy, and that these waste poisons will be washed down in the rain water right into the pit, or trap, which has been dug for ...
— A Handbook of Health • Woods Hutchinson
... gay in these outlyin' parts," he commented sourly, and closed the trap, but presently opened it again. His horse had dropped to a walk. "Did you ...
— Two Sides of the Face - Midwinter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... America into Adams's eye. Honor is venerable to us because it is no ephemera. It is always ancient virtue. We worship it to-day because it is not of to-day. We love it and pay it homage because it is not a trap for our love and homage, but is self-dependent, self-derived, and therefore of an old immaculate pedigree, even if shown in a ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... I hadn't she would have walked right into a trap—she and Zara. Maybe it was too late, but I hope not. And our staying behind here was a mighty lucky thing. If we hadn't had some warning of what Mr. Holmes and the others were planning, I don't know what ...
— The Camp Fire Girls on the March - Bessie King's Test of Friendship • Jane L. Stewart
... when the utmost permitted limits of our reconnoissance were reached, there were still no signs of any other camp, and the Rebel cavalry still kept provokingly before us. Their evident object was to lure us on to their own stronghold, and had we fallen into the trap, it would perhaps have resembled, on a smaller scale, the Olustee of the following year. With a good deal of reluctance, however, I caused the recall to be sounded, and, after a slight halt, we began to ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... that? What can he be at? Is it a cat? Ah, my poor little brother, He's caught in the trap That goes-to with a snap! Ah me! there was never, Nor will be for ever— There was never such another, Such a funny, funny bunny, Such a frisking, such a whisking, Such a frolicking brother! He's screeching, beseeching! They're ...
— Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Vol. 2 • George MacDonald
... Ulung Ela made a fish-trap and when he returned next morning he found it full of fish. He put them in his rattan bag, which he slung on his back and started for home. As he walked, he heard an antoh, Aaton Kohang, singing, and he saw many ...
— Through Central Borneo: - An Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters - Between the Years 1913 and 1917 • Carl Lumholtz
... the Temple. One body of communist partisans after another was detached from its allegiance. The deluge of rain emptied the Place de Greve, and when companies came up from the sections in obedience to orders from Hanriot and the Commune, the silence made them suspect a trap, and they withdrew towards the great ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 1 of 3) - Essay 1: Robespierre • John Morley
... mountain spring, were partaken of most sociably and Al Stevens didn't always smoke. How good everything tasted! I don't believe I have ever really enjoyed apple pie with a fork as I enjoyed it sitting on a log with a generous wedge in one hand and a hearty morsel of mouse-trap cheese ...
— The Smiling Hill-Top - And Other California Sketches • Julia M. Sloane
... almost follow a woman so arrayed by the sequins that fall from her. Perhaps it was the delicate nature of the clew thus offered that pleased him, perhaps it was a recognition of the irony of fate in thus making a trap for unwary mortals out of their vanities. Whatever it was, the smile with which he turned his eye upon the table toward which he had thus been led was very eloquent. But before examining this article of furniture ...
— The Circular Study • Anna Katharine Green
... parted to answer, then closed again dumbly,—for it was then that she saw the boots, then the legs of the road agent slide uncertainly through the open trap, fumble clumsily for the rungs of the ladder, then slip and stumble as the weight of the following body came upon them while the weak fingers strained desperately for a hold. The whole heart and soul and mind of the Girl seemed to be reaching out impotently to give ...
— The Girl of the Golden West • David Belasco
... wearily, as if it tired him to carry so heavy a heart. Life was unkind, nature cruel, fate a trickster. One was caught, as a rat in a trap, "in the fell clutch of circumstance." What was the use of anything? Why any of ...
— The Purple Heights • Marie Conway Oemler
... replied bluntly. "If there were any possible way of getting you back to Villa Mon Reve to-night, I'd move heaven and earth to do it. But there isn't. We've no more chance of getting away from here than rats in a trap." ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler
... too tired to sing the Hindmost Hymn to-night, Grandpa?" asked Christina slyly. But Grandpa did not fall into the trap. ...
— In Orchard Glen • Marian Keith
... that cheap, clap-trap affair," growled Jerry. "Goodness knows if we'll hear anything else from him all the time we're in camp. I declare I've half ...
— The Outdoor Chums - The First Tour of the Rod, Gun and Camera Club • Captain Quincy Allen
... the boulevard, which was crowded at this hour of twilight, men were driving themselves home in high carts, and through the windows of the broughams shone the luxuries of evening attire. Dresser's glance shifted from face to face, from one trap to another, sucking in the glitter of the showy scene. The flashing procession on the boulevard pricked his hungry senses, goaded his ambitions. The men and women in the carriages were the bait; the men and women on the street sniffed it, ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... Victorine, and try to trap me into confessions. You know I have no confession to make, or I should have made it ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope
... of the master. "I don't know," says our friend; "he's a deal slower at it than he used to be. For my part, I wish Jorrocks would go; he's getting too old." Then he bolts a mutton chop and a couple of eggs hurriedly, and submits himself to be carried off in the trap. ...
— Hunting Sketches • Anthony Trollope
... mechanic's coveralls, with the emblem of his government and the numeral 1 on his breast. He carried no dagger; if he had worn a dress weapon, it would probably have been a slide rule. His head was completely shaven, and he had small, pale eyes and a rat-trap mouth. He was regarding the Durendalians with a distaste that was all ...
— Ministry of Disturbance • Henry Beam Piper
... suffocated by smoke, raised the lid of a very heavy trapdoor, and stumbled down some steps into a place, half storehouse half cellar, under the mess room. How I knew about it being there I don't know. The trap closed over my head with a bang. That ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty
... names of Lindsay of Byres and William Ruthven. O noble Lord Herries," cried Mary, "loyal James Melville, you alone were right then, when you threw yourselves at my feet, entreating me not to conclude this marriage, which, I see it clearly to-day, was only a trap set for an ignorant woman by perfidious ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - MARY STUART—1587 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... unsuccessful attempt to escape, another one attended with better success, was made by a number of the prisoners. At sunset the prisoners were driven below, and the main hatchway was closed. In this there was a trap-door, large enough for a man to pass through, and a sentinel was placed over it with orders to permit one prisoner at a time to come up ...
— American Prisoners of the Revolution • Danske Dandridge
... carried to his mother's house, saw a man hurry by to call Mrs. Haddon, and waited for some time after she arrived, hidden in a gutter near at hand, listening for every word. After about a quarter of an hour Pete Holden drove his trap to the door, and Dick heard them talking of the hospital and Yarraman; then he knew that Harry was not dead, and dragged his worn, aching limbs to his own home, stupefied with suffering, hunger, ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson
... the fierce resolve of the author's wife to defend her husband's privacy and facilitate his encounters with the Muse. It was abominable, simply abominable, that Ellie Vanderlyn should have drawn her into such a trap! ...
— The Glimpses of the Moon • Edith Wharton
... the hill; which was again laid across with smaller sticks, instead of laths, and then thatched over a great thickness with the rice-straw, which was strong, like reeds; and at the hole or place which was left to go in or out by the ladder, I had placed a kind of trap-door, which, if it had been attempted on the outside, would not have opened at all, but would have fallen down, and make a great noise: as to weapons, I took them all into my side every night. But I needed none of all this precaution; for never man had a more faithful, loving, sincere ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Of York, Mariner, Vol. 1 • Daniel Defoe
... joy to her mother heart. Even the wolverine had some wicked-eyed little cubs that, to her, were precious beyond rubies; but which would ultimately receive all the oaths in the language for stealing bait on the trap lines out from ...
— The Sky Line of Spruce • Edison Marshall
... front and flanks, artillery and machine-guns opened fire upon them. They were terribly exposed; possibly they had been lured into a trap. At any rate, the process of "isolation" had not been carried far enough. One thing, and only one thing, could have saved them from destruction and their enterprise from disaster—the support of big guns, and big guns, and more big guns. These could have ...
— The First Hundred Thousand • Ian Hay
... this time. The dignity, delicacy, and pride, that is oftener found in these old families than out of them, saved her from that peril. She did not see the trap; but she spurned the bait by ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 103, May, 1866 • Various
... that first; it's not a great sight, I warn you—only a whitewashed, thatched cottage in a by-street. When we've seen that, we'll take a trap and drive to the ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan
... a ponderous bobcat descending upon its prey, Braden stole soft-footed across the room. "Nick!" he said. His jaws came together with the click of a steel trap. ...
— The Plow-Woman • Eleanor Gates
... are built with frames of wood, with the sides of boards, and roof covered with iju. They usually consist of a single large room, which is entered by a trap-door in the middle. The number seldom exceeds twenty in one kampong; but opposite to each is a kind of open building that serves for sitting in during the day, and as a sleeping-place for the unmarried ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden
... the fifty miles to Brighton, directly southward, and the number of motors passing over this highway on fine Sundays is astonishing. I noted a report in the papers that on a certain Sunday afternoon no less than two hundred cars passed a police trap, and of these, thirty-five were summoned before the magistrates for breaking the speed limit. To the average American, this run to Brighton would not be at all attractive compared with many other roads leading out of London, on which one would ...
— British Highways And Byways From A Motor Car - Being A Record Of A Five Thousand Mile Tour In England, - Wales And Scotland • Thomas D. Murphy
... ways, they have invoked the machinery of state to put a rope around my neck and shut off my breath by the weight of my body. Oh, I know how the experts give expert judgment that the fall through the trap breaks the victim's neck. And the victims, like Shakespeare's traveller, never return to testify to the contrary. But we who have lived in the stir know of the cases that are hushed in the prison crypts, where the ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... is the Bargello and all his guard; and he says that if you do not open at once, he will knock the door down. They have torches, and a thousand things besides with them!" I answered: "Tell them that I am huddling my clothes on, and will come out to them in my shirt." Supposing it was a trap laid to murder me, as had before been done by Signor Pier Luigi, I seized an excellent dagger with my right hand, and with the left I took the safe-conduct; then I ran to the back-window, which looked out on gardens, and ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... a real one, Lady Sandgate," Mr. Bender said; "you can generally distinguish a real one from the squeak of two or three mice! But granted mice do affect you, Lord Theign, it will interest me to hear what sort of a trap—by what you say—you propose to set ...
— The Outcry • Henry James
... enchanting borders of this lake, whose azure waters flow from the mountainous frontier of Tunisia to the opulent plains of Bona. You botanists, who are attracted by the singular colour or strange beauty of some plant or flower here, beware how you approach. Under this magnificent vegetation a trap—a mortal trap—is laid: the banks are of quick-sand! One step, and you meet death—a horrible death. The earth gives way, and you disappear without a trace, for those delicious flowers and plants close up their ranks again, like immortelles over your ...
— Notes in North Africa - Being a Guide to the Sportsman and Tourist in Algeria and Tunisia • W. G. Windham
... first killed a man. "For why, say they, should they commit an act of aggression, when he and his kindred can so easily repay them? But should the alligator take a human life, revenge becomes a sacred duty of the living relatives, who will trap the man-eater in the spirit of an officer of justice pursuing a criminal. Others, even then, hang back, reluctant to embroil themselves in a quarrel which does not concern them. The man-eating alligator is supposed to be pursued by a righteous Nemesis; and whenever one is caught they have a ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer |
