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Cast about   /kæst əbˈaʊt/   Listen
Cast about

verb
1.
Search anxiously.  Synonyms: beat about, cast around.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Cast about" Quotes from Famous Books



... afforded (the sun being very hot) I began to reflect upon this ill-chance Fate, in the person of Adam, had played me (cast again thus helpless at the mercy of Joanna) and instead of wasting myself in futile rages against Adam (and him so far out of my reach) I began instead to cast about in my mind how soonest I might escape from this hateful situation; to the which end I determined to follow Resolution's advice is so far as I might, viz: to preserve towards Joanna as kindly a seeming ...
— Martin Conisby's Vengeance • Jeffery Farnol

... P. Sybarite withdrew to a respectful remove and held himself coolly alert against reprisals that never came. The other picked himself up quickly, cast about for the taxicab, discovered it swiftly making off—already twenty yards distant—and with a howl of rage bounded through the gate and gave chase at the top of ...
— The Day of Days - An Extravaganza • Louis Joseph Vance

... to the prospect. He noticed that young Fuellenberg cared for nothing except to produce an impression; and young Fuellenberg noticed that Frederick von Kammacher was not susceptible to the impression he tried to produce. He cast about ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann

... idea that a general address on behalf of a particular demand must necessarily fail, he let his eyes rest on one there, whose face was neither stupid nor repellent, and who, though he did not look up, had an attentive, thoughtful cast about the mouth. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... I cast about me in search of red cedar that I might make a bow. I searched the willow thicket for arrow shafts, and prowled among little flints and pointed stones on the shores of our stream, seeking arrow points. It finally appeared to me that we might rest here ...
— The Way of a Man • Emerson Hough

... charming... I see it, Fine as the day, running after her, I, like a fool, left the house paternal, And fled there'on to woods and vales Her hair, in sombre rolls, On her neck threw warm shades, Her eyes of enveloping azure, Cast about glances fresh and pure. And as our car without shock or tremor Carried our loves and hearts, her vibrant voice and sweet, To the heav'ns that listened, threw the conq'ring cry, And the eternal echo resounded ...
— The Tales of Hoffmann - Les contes d'Hoffmann • Book By Jules Barbier; Music By J. Offenbach

... a printer could be found to publish it; but a few months' experience had made the Free Press a terrible burden to its founders; it could not be sustained, and it could not be let die without final disaster to the interests of the town; and the committee began to cast about for a publisher who could also be editor. Bartley, to whom it fell, could not be said to have thrown his heart and soul into the work, but he threw all his energy, and he made it more than its friends could have hoped. He espoused the cause of Equity in the pending question with the zeal ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells

... there's nothing to guide you. I can't recollect this tree or that tree, because they're all so much alike, and it's as puzzling as being in the dark. There's only one way out of it, and that is to do as I say; you stand fast, and I'll cast about like a dog does after losing the scent till I find the right track. Only mind this: if I don't have you to guide me back with whistle and shout I shall be lost more ...
— Rob Harlow's Adventures - A Story of the Grand Chaco • George Manville Fenn

... a quick one," proceeded Ashton-Kirk; "any one who follows his work in the Standard knows that. He at once began to cast about, so it seems to me, for a way of concealing his sister's guilt. He took her to her room, and came down once more to the sitting-room. Allowing for a proper passage of time, he then asked the nurse to call in the police. ...
— Ashton-Kirk, Criminologist • John T. McIntyre

... backwards plunging Field, the pack, and himself entirely under the water, except his heels which appeared above the water as his head went under. In a moment Field popped up and, after shaking his head as a swimmer will do after taking a plunge, cast about to take his bearings, or to determine just where he was, and began to paddle with his hands, much as he did when the canoes were upset on the river, or somewhat after the style of a swimming dog. On coming to the surface, ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly

... to cast about for more congenial quarters. There were too many foreigners in the apartments, and none of them especially good housekeepers. Always, nowadays, somebody had a washing out on the line, the odour of ...
— The Drums Of Jeopardy • Harold MacGrath

... breaking heart could not stand that. There must somehow be a way to save him. She cast about desperately for one, and had not found it when she begged the outlaw chief to ...
— Brand Blotters • William MacLeod Raine

... because you cannot command the winds. You are not obliged to assault people with discourses that are out of their road, when you see that their received notions must prevent your making an impression upon them: you ought rather to cast about and to manage things with all the dexterity in your power, so that, if you are not able to make them go well, they may be as little ill as possible; for, except all men were good, everything cannot be right, and that is a blessing that I do not at present hope ...
— Utopia • Thomas More

... carver, when he cometh to the ewerye boorde, doe there washe together with the Sewer, and that done be armed (videlt.) with an armeinge towell cast about his necke, and putt under his girdle on both sides, and one napkyn on his lefte shoulder, and an other on the same arme; and thence beinge broughte by my Gentleman Usher to my table, with two curteseyes thereto, ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas

... worst scrapes had been brought about by her incapacity to allow any one to part from her on bad terms, and, moreover, she liked Rupert Gunning. She cast about in her mind for something conciliatory to say ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross

... half is always a vantage ground for the hounds, and the hares know it well; they are generally viewed on the side of Barby Hill, and all eyes are on the lookout for them to-day. But not a sign of them appears, so now will be the hard work for the hounds, and there is nothing for it but to cast about for the scent, for it is now the hares' turn, and they may baffle the pack dreadfully ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes

... of his chair growing even more uncomfortable than before, and he cast about for an avenue of escape. ...
— Ben Blair - The Story of a Plainsman • Will Lillibridge

... same opinion, and cast about for a suitable victim. Now the son of the aged Voivoda who had ordered the assault lived in Cetinje. He was the captain of the Royal Body Guard, the hero of many a fight with the Turks, and famed throughout the land. We knew his son, ...
— The Land of the Black Mountain - The Adventures of Two Englishmen in Montenegro • Reginald Wyon

... that her husband was nervous and irritable, and with wifely protective instinct she attributed his condition to overwork. She did not take up the challenge which he in a manner flung down. She seldom argued with him now; she cast about in her mind for a safe topic of conversation, and, by ill-luck, hit upon the one least calculated to restore Arthur to good humor ...
— The Philistines • Arlo Bates

... now full of struggling groups, for though a score of the longboat's crew had climbed aboard, the pirates were putting up a fierce resistance. Jeremy, panting from his encounter, cast about for a weapon and soon found a cutlass, with which he armed himself. He turned toward the mainmast foot once more, and to his joy discovered that his shot had taken effect. The mulatto had disappeared ...
— The Black Buccaneer • Stephen W. Meader

... that in his face which told her that he knew the story and its heroine quite well. When she delivered the sentence ending with the professedly fictitious words: 'I thus was reduced to great distress, and vainly cast about me for directions what to do,' Lord Mountclere's manner became so excited and anxious that it acted reciprocally upon Ethelberta; her voice trembled, she moved her lips but uttered nothing. To bring the story up to the date of that very evening had been her intent, ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy

... and quite took away his appetite, for a few moments, he began to cast about for a way to prevent such a sad affair. If you could have seen him with a worried look on his face, anxiously asking everybody he met to give him advice, you would have thought that he felt very, very sorry ...
— The Tale of Benny Badger • Arthur Scott Bailey

... had no sooner come in than he cast about for some excuse to retire, mumbling: "I beg your ...
— The Home and the World • Rabindranath Tagore

... a course soon presented itself, and Jimmie cast about for some other method of meeting the dangerous situation. He could hear the visitor fumbling at the door, and wondered if he knew the secret ...
— Boy Scouts in a Submarine • G. Harvey Ralphson

... after-noone, wee came to three great rivers. So we stood along to the northermost, thinking to have gone into it, but we found it to have a very shoald barre before it, for we had but ten foot water. Then we cast about to the southward, and found two fathoms, three fathoms, and three and a quarter, till we came to the souther side of them; then we had five and sixe ...
— Great Epochs in American History, Volume I. - Voyages Of Discovery And Early Explorations: 1000 A.D.-1682 • Various

... them in the probable loss of one of their most valuable connections." Landells, who always regarded this action—without any definite grounds that I can discover—as a diplomatic move to involve him and his friends still more, so that more advantageous salvage terms might be made, hurriedly cast about for other succour, and alighted on one William Wood, printer, who lent money, but whose agreement as a whole was not executed, as it was considered "either usurious or exorbitant" by their solicitors, who characteristically concluded their ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann

... master of my business I began to cast about for an opportunity of launching into the world, in hope of finding some provision that might make amends for the difficulties I had undergone; but, as this could not be effected without a small sum of money to equip me for the field, ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett

... foothold, he cast about vainly for a clue to the other's whereabouts; for if the night was thick in the open, here in the trench its density was as that of the pit; the man could distinguish positively nothing more than a pallid rift ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph

... her situation, this apathy was thrown off, and the native energy of purpose which she had exhibited so strikingly on former occasions, quickened her spirit and restored vigor to her frame. Immediately she began to collect her thoughts, and cast about to see if there was no way of escape from this new danger. At first she thought of making a confidant of Duffel, and throwing herself upon his generosity; but remembering all that he had done, she felt that this would be vain, so far as she was concerned, ...
— Eveline Mandeville - The Horse Thief Rival • Alvin Addison

... it was to bring the meat from the storeroom for the men. Old Pierre, in the kindness of his heart, used to select the fattest and the best pieces for his companions. This did not long escape the keen-eyed bourgeois, who was greatly disturbed at such improvidence, and cast about for some means to stop it. At last he hit on a plan that exactly suited him. At the side of the meat-room, and separated from it by a clay partition, was another compartment, used for the storage of furs. It had no other communication ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.

... to do, and he felt inclined to strangle her when he saw her. He hated her with a ferocious, cunning hatred, the hatred of a peasant who has been robbed, and began to cast about for means of ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 1 (of 8) - Boule de Suif and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant

... see, Rokesmith,' he went on, 'a literary man—WITH a wooden leg—is liable to jealousy. I shall therefore cast about for comfortable ways and means of not calling up Wegg's jealousy, but of keeping you in your department, ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens

... supposed it to be the maine of Noua Xembla. [Footnote: They were really in the Gulf of Petchora.] About 2. in the afternoone we laide it to the Southward to double the ice, which wee could not doe vpon that boorde, so that we cast about againe and lay West along vnder the ice. About seuen in the afternoone we gote about the greatest part thereof. About 11. a clock at night we brought the ice Southeast of us, and thus we were ridde of this ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of The English Nation v. 4 • Richard Hakluyt

... and from the stand-point of an imaginary Buddhist. This is indicated plainly on the title-page, in the preface, and in the course of the poem itself; and when the book comes to be read by the light of this explanation, a limitation is cast about much of its more startling language. To take, for instance, such expressions as "Our Lord," "Saviour," "come to save the world," constantly assigned to Buddha in the course of the poem. However accustomed Christians may be to ...
— Religion in Japan • George A. Cobbold, B.A.

... hounds scented a rabbit in the sassafras beyond the fence, he started with a shout at the heels of the pursuing pack. Swinging himself over the brushwood, Christopher followed slowly across the waste of lifeeverlasting, tearing impatiently through the flowering net which the wild potato vine cast about his feet. ...
— The Deliverance; A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields • Ellen Glasgow

... table did not hesitate nor did he cast about for words. On the contrary, he replied with embarrassing ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman

... archer, commanded him to shoot from a great distance at an apple on the head of his child. God, says an old chronicler, was with him; and the vogt, who had not expected such a specimen of skill and fortune, now cast about for new ways to entrap the object of his malice; and, seeing a second arrow in his quiver, asked him what that was for? Tell replied, evasively, that such was the usual practice of archers. Not content with this reply, the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 554, Saturday, June 30, 1832 • Various

... cast about my shoulder my silver-studded sword, and took my bow also, and bade him lead me by the way by which he had gone. But he caught me by both my hands, and besought me, saying: 'Take me not thither against my will; for I am persuaded that thou thyself wilt not return again, nor bring any of thy comrades. ...
— The Story Of The Odyssey • The Rev. Alfred J. Church

... himself quite willing, as ever, to help her, he did not once on his own initiative address the man who had been introduced for his benefit; and Chris, aware of an atmosphere that was highly charged with electricity, notwithstanding its apparent calm, began to cast about for ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell

... pondered. Her elders cast about in their minds for a speedy change of subject; but their somewhat scattered wits were not quick enough. It was ...
— Miss Billy's Decision • Eleanor H. Porter

... loved them not, albeit she was always entreating me in nowise to thwart or gainsay my father. I cannot but hope that these long months of absence will have gone far to break the spell that those evil men seemed to cast about him. Be that as it may, I myself have grown from a child to a woman, and I say now, as I said then, that no power in the world shall induce me to give my hand in marriage to Peter Sanghurst. I will ...
— In the Days of Chivalry • Evelyn Everett-Green

... a child is nearly grown, a collar bearing his name and the device of his house is cast about his neck. This collar is made of 'arenak,' a synthetic metal which, once formed, cannot be altered by any usual means. It cannot be scratched, cut, bent, broken, or worked in any way except at such a high temperature that death would result, if such heat were applied to ...
— The Skylark of Space • Edward Elmer Smith and Lee Hawkins Garby

... was led away to the place appointed for slaughter, by lord Rich, and being come to the stake, mildly and patiently prepared himself for the fire, having a strong chain cast about his middle, with a multitude of people on every side compassing him about. Unto whom after he had spoken many things, and poured out his soul unto God, ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox

... character, manners, faces, a few incidents have an emphasis in your memory out of all proportion to their apparent significance if you measure them by ordinary standards. They relate to your gift. Let them have their weight, and do not reject them, or cast about for illustrations and facts more usual ...
— The Principles of Success in Literature • George Henry Lewes

... The compass {22} itself is so placed that you can see it well while either sitting or standing up, or when lying at full length on the deck, with the back against a pillow propped by the mizen mast, the blight sun or moon overhead, and a turn or two of the mainsheet cast about your body to keep the sleepy steersman from rolling over into the ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor

... countenances of the bare-legged, bare-armed, red-capped crowd who adhered like polypi to the rough foundation-stones of the mole sufficed to show that the performance they had come to witness would not soon commence. Our berths once visited, we cast about for some quiet position wherein to while away the intervening time. The top of the deck-house offered as pleasant a prospect as could be hoped for, ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 34, August, 1860 • Various

... that a fair young knight, and renowned in arms, lay sick at your lady's house, she nursing him, would you not have cast about for ways of coming ...
— A Monk of Fife • Andrew Lang

... know the last of Jimsy, though in one sense he was blotted out when the last copy was bound. He had saved one hundred pounds by that time, and being now neither able to work nor to live alone, his friends cast about for a home for his remaining years. He was very spent and feeble, yet he had the fear that he might be still alive when all his money was gone. After that was the workhouse. He covered sheets of paper with calculations ...
— A Window in Thrums • J. M. Barrie

... dead yet," I remarked, "and needn't be if only you will collect your wits. Come, let us cast about a bit; maybe you'll find some landmark that will ...
— At the Point of the Sword • Herbert Hayens

... for some time before mounting his horse. Gudule palpitated between life and death, as she beheld him cast about the Place that uneasy look of a hunting dog which instinctively feels that the lair of the beast is close to him, and is loath to go away. At length he shook his head and leaped into his saddle. Gudule's horribly compressed heart now dilated, and she said in a low voice, as she cast a glance at ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo

... holidays during those two years I had written a novel. I could supply conversation and description, but it was very difficult to invent a plot, and still more difficult to invent one which of itself would speak. I had collected a quantity of matter of all kinds before I began, and then I cast about for a frame in which to fit it. At last I settled that my hero, if hero he could be called, should fall in love with a poor but intelligent and educated girl. He had a fortune of about two thousand pounds ...
— More Pages from a Journal • Mark Rutherford

... they have, that any compliances they shall make, will remove the evil of dissension, while the liberty still continues of professing whatever new opinion we please? Or how can it be imagined that the body of dissenting teachers, who must be all undone by such a revolution, will not cast about for some new objections to withhold their flocks, and draw in fresh proselytes by some ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. III.: Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Vol. I. • Jonathan Swift

... the United States in 1907, he and his more prudent advisors did not consider it good political judgment for him to seek at that time nomination for what would have been, in effect, a third term. He therefore began to cast about to find a successor who would carry out his policies. As President, he had inaugurated certain policies of administration which he regarded as being of the highest possible importance to the country, and to the world at large. We are not here discussing the common sense, wisdom, and statesmanship ...
— Analyzing Character • Katherine M. H. Blackford and Arthur Newcomb

... Candish was growing graver, and his sallow face beginning to flush through its thin skin. It was evident that Mrs. Fenton saw and appreciated these signs, and wished to change the subject of conversation. Philip wondered that she took the matter so gravely, but cast about in his own mind for the means of helping her. Before he could think of anything to say his cousin ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates

... and how he slipped his cable and escaped pursuit, cannot be told here. Enough to say that he found his way to Greenland, and chose out a fair haven for himself and his company. When he was settled in, and had his town of Ericshaven marked out, and his house built, he felt himself like a king and cast about for alliances. He sent out messengers to Iceland calling upon all men who had been his friends to rally about him. Many came, and by the time his friend Thorbeorn had decided to join him there was a ...
— Gudrid the Fair - A Tale of the Discovery of America • Maurice Hewlett

... fires and subterranean heavings of the new moral instincts below, these latter will assuredly burst up at last in strong mountains of rock, to crest the world. Unable to conceive such a truth, they cast about them accordingly to find the paternity of our American institutions in purely accidental causes. We are clear of aristocratic orders, they say, because there was no blood of which to make an aristocracy; independent of king and parliament, because we grew into independence ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various

... all other reckonings, inasmuch as of this you must never look to have a good account if you be strict in imposing checks. Let a council of huntsmen, assembled beforehand, tell you which way the stag shall run, where you shall cast about at the fault, and how you shall ride to be in at the chase all the day; but these may as well do that, as a council of war direct a general. The hours that have painted wings, and of different colors, are his council; he must be like the eye that makes not the scene, ...
— The Commonwealth of Oceana • James Harrington

... impulse was to dash in the heads of the casks where they stood; but a moment's reflection told him that the odor, so near the cabin, would be unpleasant to every one, and might have a tendency to exasperate the owner of the liquor. He cast about him, therefore, for the means of removing the casks, in order to stave them, at ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper

... breakfast somewhere about noon the next day, and I was fain to admit to my special friend that I had put myself in an awkward, if not an unenviable, position. However, I was in for it, and being naturally of an elastic temperament, began to cast about for a cheerful view of my undertaking. In the course of the day preliminaries were arranged and reduced to writing with all the care which Englishmen practice in such affairs of "honor." I only stipulated that I should be allowed to use a stout walking-stick in my ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 11, - No. 22, January, 1873 • Various

... that he did. But at the time I believed that he was guilty. I saw that he would be arrested, and in a frenzy of alarm I cast about for some means to save him. I remembered your motor-car was waiting at the gates. I sent Trim away ...
— A Coin of Edward VII - A Detective Story • Fergus Hume

... hope, perhaps a land of refuge. The men of the lower South, also stirred and unsettled, moved in long columns to the West and Southwest, following the ancient immigration into Texas. The men of Texas, citizens of a crude empire of unproved resources, likewise cast about them restlessly. Their cattle must some day find a market. To the north of them, still unknown and alluring, lay the new upper country known ...
— The Girl at the Halfway House • Emerson Hough

... special causes. The general causes are to be found in the fact that society de la fin de siecle is in such a state of profound disturbance, and the existing order feels so insecure, that that order—as it always does—begins to cast about in the shadows to find, if it may, some Big Man with a Sword; him when found we will make our Imperator, and by sharing some of our estates with certain of his military subalterns we will make sure of the rest—and after ...
— The Arena - Volume 18, No. 92, July, 1897 • Various

... would have centred Gibbie's boyish affections in herself, she was too conscientious and experienced not to regard the danger of any special effort in that direction, and began therefore to cast about in her mind what could be done to protect him from one at least of the natural consequences of his early familiarity with things unseemly—exposure, namely, to the risk of forming low alliances—the more imminent that it was much too late to attempt ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald

... up with the absence of the people I care about, a little better perhaps than most people. I do not feel that I have lost them at all," and she cast about for a while as if her thought was difficult to express. "You know how things happen," she resumed. "One goes along in a dull sort of way, and then suddenly a face springs out from the crowd of one's acquaintances, and you know it at once and certainly for the face of a friend, or rather you recognise ...
— The Four Feathers • A. E. W. Mason

... affected, so much the worse for them. He had a real, if unobtrusive, contempt for groundlings, of whatever class; and it never entered his head to step an inch out of his course in deference to their vagaries. Nor did it come home to him that Mrs. Noel, wrapped in the glamour which he cast about her, could possibly suffer from the meanness of vulgar minds. Shropton's note, indeed, caused him the more annoyance of those two documents. It was like his brother-in-law ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... cast about him, however, were impassive enough. His mind was charged with the ceaseless responsibility of being astonished at nothing. A man took his hat, and helped him off with his coat. Another moved toward the ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic

... to tell you that this spells destitution. This island depends on its fish, and, since cod and hake and pollock have left us, we must cast about for other means ...
— The Harbor of Doubt • Frank Williams

... As I cast about me for a word, we had drawn closer, and taking the hand which half-hid in the folds of her dress, gleamed more white and pure, I would have raised it to my lips. Even at such a time I noted the device upon a ring she wore, a device grown so familiar: ...
— The Black Wolf's Breed - A Story of France in the Old World and the New, happening - in the Reign of Louis XIV • Harris Dickson

... surgeon-general of Shelby's corps, was stationed. Some one hundred and fifty or two hundred yards in the rear, colonel Johnson was taken from his horse. He appeared faint and much exhausted. I asked him if he would have water, to which he answered, yes. I cast about immediately for some, but there was none at hand, nor any thing that I could see to bring it in, better than a common funnel, which I saw lying on the ground, and which I seized and ran to the river, (Thames) a distance probably of one hundred yards or more; and ...
— Life of Tecumseh, and of His Brother the Prophet - With a Historical Sketch of the Shawanoe Indians • Benjamin Drake

... her head, away from his as far as the bonds he had cast about her would allow. "Air! Air!" she ...
— Mistress Wilding • Rafael Sabatini

... their door, when I saw Monsieur Voisin come hastily out, and after seeming to hesitate a moment upon the threshold, run down the steps and move rapidly away southward. I could see that his face wore a sombre look, and I wondered if he had seen me in the hasty glance he had cast about him. There were others upon the pavement between him and myself, and I trusted that he had not; still, I felt a strange reluctance to being seen by this man so often in the same place, and I slackened my pace and finally stood still, reading the 'to ...
— Against Odds - A Detective Story • Lawrence L. Lynch

... and safety which such a transaction would afford him over the alternative of being compelled to touch at some port, and I had little doubt that my surmise as to his intentions would prove correct. At all events, his determination to speak the barque was evident, and I began to cast about for some means whereby the encounter might be utilised to the advantage ...
— The Castaways • Harry Collingwood

... Simon Dun.] After he had ended his businesse at Southampton, he drew with his people towards London, and comming thither, besieged the citie both by water and land, causing a great trench to be cast about it, so that [Sidenote: London besieged.] no man might either get in or come foorth. Manie great assalts he caused to be giuen vnto the citie, but the Londoners and others within so valiantlie defended the wals and gates, that the enimies ...
— Chronicles (1 of 6): The Historie of England (7 of 8) - The Seventh Boke of the Historie of England • Raphael Holinshed

... different times about us human-beings: sometimes I get pretty indignant when we are attacked (for there is altogether too much abuse of us by spectator philosophers) and yet at other times I too feel like a spectator, an alien: but even then I had never felt so alien or despairing as Potter. I cast about for the probable cause of our difference. "Let's remember," I said, "it's ...
— This Simian World • Clarence Day

... He laughed with her, his disappointment passing before the old love spell, which she knew so well how to cast about him. "You couldn't have come at a better time, either, for now there is some one here who can be company for you. That is," he added lamely, "when you're tired ...
— Hidden Gold • Wilder Anthony

... presence of a dogma, whether it be political, moral, or religious, is to cast about for the best way to masticate, digest, and ...
— Youth and Egolatry • Pio Baroja

... about to see her, and to win her love. And she cast about to see him, and win his love. But neither saw the other for a while; and it might have been better for one of them had they never ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley

... into its secret recesses, discovering it in its lurking holes, and drags it forth to public detestation. If a tyrannically disposed prince, supported by an unprincipled, profligate minister, backed by a notoriously corrupt Parliament, were to cast about for means to secure such a triple tyranny, I know of no means he could devise so effectual for that purpose as the bill now ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various

... thought it need not come to his giving up his paper, that somehow affairs might change. But his newspaper would have gone to nothing in his hands if he had tried to publish it as a Free Soil paper after the election of the Whig candidate; so he sold it, and began to cast about for some other business; how anxiously, my boy was too young to know. He only felt the relief that the whole family felt for a while at getting out of the printing business; the boys wanted to go into almost anything else: the drug-business, ...
— A Boy's Town • W. D. Howells

... stopped him. No man could leap it. He cast about for another way. There was none. He must run across. He scowled. Disinclination increased. He snarled: "Green ice!" He crossed then like a cat—on tiptoe and swiftly; and he came to the other side with his heart ...
— Harbor Tales Down North - With an Appreciation by Wilfred T. Grenfell, M.D. • Norman Duncan

... eldest son with a course of foreign travel as a substitute for University training; but this turned out a failure, and he had the good sense to acknowledge his mistake. So for his second boy he cast about to find a profession; "but what course to take I was at a loss: Cambridge was so far off, I could not have an eye upon him; Oxford I ...
— From a Cornish Window - A New Edition • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... The memory arouses an agreeable feeling—an affective response, this may be called. In its turn, this may lead me to imagine how pleasant it would be to spend another vacation on that island, and to cast about for ways and means to accomplish this result—here we have imagination and reasoning, aroused by what preceded just as the sensation was aroused by ...
— Psychology - A Study Of Mental Life • Robert S. Woodworth

... and malignant looks which were cast, from time to time, at Wilder, as the labour proceeded, proclaimed the danger of awakening such obstinate and ignorant minds into renewed acts of violence. The governess bethought her of an appeal to the wounded man, but the look of wild care which he had cast about him, on being lifted to the deck, and the expression of bodily and mental pain that gleamed across his rugged features, as he buried them in the blankets by which he was enveloped, but too plainly announced ...
— The Red Rover • James Fenimore Cooper

... darling's side! The never-fading thought that Jeanne was leaving her in anger, with a face that spoke solely of gloomy hatred, seared her heart like a red-hot iron. She well divined that Mademoiselle Aurelie was there to watch her, and cast about for some opportunity to escape ...
— A Love Episode • Emile Zola

... the lodges, gloomy and sullen, like any other multitude that had been disappointed in an execution. Curiosity, or perhaps a better feeling, induced him to approach the stranger. He found him, standing with one arm cast about the protecting post, and breathing thick and hard, after his exertions, but disdaining to permit a single sign of suffering to escape. His person was now protected by immemorial and sacred usage, until the tribe in council had deliberated and determined on his fate. ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper

... greyhound, but it sickened and died. Remembering that a comrade-in-arms possessed a Turkish dwarf with an abnormally large head, he cast about to procure some such monstrosity for her amusement. He sent her jewellery—necklaces torn by his soldiers from the breasts of ladies in surrendered towns, rings wrested from fingers raised ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various

... their unlucky hexameters and elegiacs. The majesty and grace of the learned tongues, contrasting with the poverty of their own language, impressed, and to a great extent rightly impressed, the early Elizabethans, so that they naturally enough cast about for any means to improve the one, and hesitated at any peculiarity which was not found in the other. It was unpardonable in Milton to sneer at rhyme after the fifty years of magnificent production which had put English on a level with Greek and above Latin as a literary instrument. But for ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury

... stoically under the eyes of people from whose regard, an hour before, he had shrunk with such apparent suffering. Was it that courage comes with despair? Or was he too absorbed in his own misery to note the shadow it cast about him? His brooding brow and vacant eye spoke of a mind withdrawn from present surroundings. Into what depths of remorse, who could say? Certainly not this old detective, seasoned though he was by lifelong contact with criminals, some of them of ...
— The Circular Study • Anna Katharine Green

... innumerable glittering Fish Like Jewels polish-sharp, to the sharp Eye But for an Instant visible, glancing through As Silver Scissors slice a blue Brocade; Though were the Dragon from its Hollow roused, The Dragon of the Stars would stare Aghast. Salaman eyed the Sea, and cast about To cross it—and forthwith upon the Shore Devis'd a Shallop like a Crescent Moon, Wherein that Sun and Moon in happy Hour, Enter'd as into some Celestial Sign; That, figured like a Bow, but Arrow-like In Flight, was feather'd with a little Sail, And, pitcht upon the Water like a Duck, ...
— Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam and Salaman and Absal • Omar Khayyam and Ralph Waldo Emerson

... morning, I sent for my master, letting him know that I proposed, when the viceroy should come up near us, to cast about and charge him suddenly, that we might strike unexpected terror in his people, who now bragged us, seeing us flee before them. To this end I went on board all the ships, giving them directions how ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume IX. • Robert Kerr

... leaving us together Miss Haldin had an intention—that something was entrusted to me, since, by a mere accident I had been found at hand. On this assumed ground I put all possible friendliness into my manner. I cast about for some right thing to say, and suddenly in Miss Haldin's last words I perceived the clue to the ...
— Under Western Eyes • Joseph Conrad

... viewed it is evident from the passage in her diary, already quoted; that the Lord "smott" her, was unquestioned, and she cast about in her girlish mind for the shadow of the sin that had brought such judgment, making solemn resolutions, not only against any further indulgence in "Pride and Vanity," but all other offences, deciding ...
— Anne Bradstreet and Her Time • Helen Campbell

... valleys, till by fortune he came to a fair castle, and as he passed beyond the castle him thought he heard two bells ring. And then was he ware of a falcon came flying over his head toward an high elm, and long lunes about her feet, and as she flew unto the elm to take her perch the lunes over-cast about a bough. And when she would have taken her flight she hung by the legs fast; and Sir Launcelot saw how she hung, and beheld the fair falcon perigot, and he ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume I (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory

... are sufficiently interested to cast about for a reason for the hopeless state of the columns in the Colony at this period, they may possibly find in the experiences of the brigade a solution of the remount question which has so puzzled the more intelligent students ...
— On the Heels of De Wet • The Intelligence Officer

... fine-nosed dames now cry, 'Would to God we had sea-coal! Oh! the want of fire undoes us! O the sweet sea-coal fires we used to have! how we want them now: no fire to your sea-coal!'... This for the rich: a word for the poor! The great want of fuel for fire makes many a poor creature cast about how to pass over this cold winter to come; but, finding small redress for so cruel an enemy as the cold makes, some turn thieves that never stole before—steal posts, seats, benches from doors, rails, nay, the very stocks that should punish them; and ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson

... Melchior, and seemed to cast about for another word, but repeated, "—entertainingly. If the state of your ankle permits, sir, you will perhaps take an interest in our pictures. I shall be happy to show them ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... of faint green and red, out on the brown and green plains of Tennessee shining in the sun, or left and right across the canyons of the coves to the stately procession of receding headlands. Then I cast about for a way down into one of the coves, and presently came ...
— Penguin Persons & Peppermints • Walter Prichard Eaton

... fire. It even drowned all the noises of the street. But not for a moment did he think of turning back, though he knew how awful the danger would be if he tried to go up that burning stairway. He cast about for some sort of protection. A flimsy curtain of cotton material was stretched across a doorway. This Hodge pulled down and wrapped round his head, protecting his hands with it also as well as he could. Then he measured the stairway and its direction ...
— Frank Merriwell's Reward • Burt L. Standish

... refusal to allow Zubehr to go to the Soudan began the long and miserable disagreement between the Government and their envoy. Puzzled and disturbed at the reception accorded to his first request, Gordon cast about for other expedients. He had already stated that Zubehr was 'the only chance.' But it is the duty of subordinates to suggest other courses when those they recommend are rejected; and with a whole-hearted enthusiasm and unreserved ...
— The River War • Winston S. Churchill

... greatly at heart; he had struggled, and planned, and managed with such preternatural activity and tact and energy from the first, that it would smite him hard to know that it was all in vain. And then his vicarious ambitions, his pride, his pleasure, in the elevation of "Fambly"! Walter cast about futilely for an assurance that he might have the satisfaction of reducing all this. He knew that Justus, in his mistaken certainty of the result of the election, would not ask for information, and that he could not read the newspapers. A letter—even if there were any remote presumption as to his ...
— The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain and Other Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock

... Marrable cognisant of the facts. She was not the least alarmed that she should have that curious rolling gait alongside of her. She was uneasy, for all that, as to how a sudden visit of this man to Strides Cottage would work, and cast about in her mind how she should best dissuade him from making his presence known to his mother before she herself had had an opportunity of sounding a note of preparation. She had not intended to go home for a day or two, but she could get her son-in-law to ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan

... camp here?" "Yes, I am," I snapped. "Have you any objections?" "Oh, no, none that won't keep," he assured me. It has always been a theory of mine that when we become sorry for ourselves we make our misfortunes harder to bear, because we lose courage and can't think without bias; so I cast about me for something to be glad about, and the comfort that at least we were safer with a simpleton than near a drunken Mexican came to me; so I began to view the situation with a little ...
— Letters of a Woman Homesteader • Elinore Pruitt Stewart

... a matter of course, following such a line of procedure, he became a very rich man, and his disposition being of an enterprising nature, he began to cast about him for new investments, seeking new fields to conquer. The explosion of a boat on the Hudson, discommoding for a time the existing line, offered to Drew the favorable opportunity for which he was looking, and as was characteristic he at once ...
— Hidden Treasures - Why Some Succeed While Others Fail • Harry A. Lewis

... to cast about in his ingenious mind for some means of getting the younger children's attention off the discomfort of a room the temperature of which was down to sixty. In one corner were two stacks of sectional bookcases which Aunt Jo had just bought, but which had no books in them ...
— Six Little Bunkers at Mammy June's • Laura Lee Hope

... gripping knees had relaxed somewhat the tension of its muscles. Was the poor brute collapsing? Roldan leaned over and patted his neck. It responded for a moment, then fell back again. Roldan set his lips. As he did so he cast about him the instinctive glance of those in peril. A huge log was bearing down upon him like ...
— The Valiant Runaways • Gertrude Atherton

... star had met with an automobile accident on his way to the performance, and that he was too damaged to appear; money would be refunded at the box office. The girls still clamored for their matinee, and Miss Wadsworth hurriedly cast about for a ...
— Just Patty • Jean Webster

... my sister, "I exempt Bottles. And considering, John, that the house is too large, and perhaps too lonely, to be kept well in hand by Bottles, you, and me, I propose that we cast about among our friends for a certain selected number of the most reliable and willing—form a Society here for three months—wait upon ourselves and one another—live cheerfully and ...
— The Signal-Man #33 • Charles Dickens

... wind served, passed forward on their iournie with great ioy and gladnesse, as men put in comfort to find out the wished seats for their firme and sure [Sidenote: Brute with his companie landed in Affrike.] habitations. From hence therefore they cast about, and making westward, first arrived in Affrica, and after keeping on their course, they passed the straits of Gibralterra, and coasting alongst the shore on the right hand, they found another companie that were likewise descended of the [Sidenote: The mistaking of those ...
— Chronicles (1 of 6): The Historie of England (2 of 8) - The Second Booke Of The Historie Of England • Raphael Holinshed

... exercise systematically for her body's good, or her mind's. She went in a spirit of unwholesome, brooding curiosity and a bitter resentment. Going to France, was she? Lots of good she'd do there. Better stay home and—and what? Tessie cast about in her mind for a fitting job for Angie. Guess she might's well go, after all. Nobody'd miss her, unless it was her father, and he didn't see her but about a third of the time. But in Tessie's heart was a great envy for this girl who could bridge the hideous waste of ocean that separated ...
— Half Portions • Edna Ferber

... pleasure were so keen and exquisite, and her beauty, so delicate, yet so interfused with energy, expressed it so fully, that any added word would have been commonplace and futile. I dreaded lest the others should come in suddenly and break the spell she had cast about me; but we stood there a while by the corner of the big gable of the house, and no one came. I heard the merry voices some way off presently, and knew that they were going along the river to the great meadow on the other side of ...
— News from Nowhere - or An Epoch of Rest, being some chapters from A Utopian Romance • William Morris

... men in the field between the wall and the water, there were homesteads up and down the Dale whereso men found it easy and pleasant to dwell: their halls were built of much the same fashion as those within the Thorp; but many had a high garth-wall cast about them, so that they might make a stout defence in their own houses if war ...
— The Roots of the Mountains • William Morris

... the afternoon drew near its end, they began to cast about for a camping place. To the delight of Nick they had been able to pick up a duck here and there, until there were now four ...
— Motor Boat Boys Down the Coast - or Through Storm and Stress to Florida • Louis Arundel

... pictures for the Rotunda, has seriously and vitally affected my enthusiasm in my art. When that event was announced to me I was tempted to yield up all in despair, but I roused myself to resist the temptation, and, determining still to fix my mind upon the work, cast about for the means of accomplishing it in such ways as my Heavenly Father should make plain. My telegraphic enterprise was one of those means. Induced to prosecute it by the Secretary of the Treasury, and encouraged by success in every part of its progress, urged forward ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume II • Samuel F. B. Morse

... beeing seene and allowed, they begane to cast about for more money, whereuppon a new privy seale was drawn in Latin." "Those which were served with this writte and obey'd" contributed a total ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson

... Sagas, we learn hardly anything of Sutherland, or, indeed, of the extreme north of Scotland from any record written either by anyone living there or by anyone with local knowledge, and for facts before those given in the Orkneyinga Saga we have to cast about among historians of the Roman Empire and amongst early Greek geographers, or later ecclesiastical writers, to find nothing save a few names of places and some scattered references to vanished races, tongues and Churches. For information about the Picts we have ...
— Sutherland and Caithness in Saga-Time - or, The Jarls and The Freskyns • James Gray

... so dreadful to me in prospect that I began to cast about among all manner of impracticable plans for escaping it. Of these the most promising—although I had no money—was to give the Stimcoes leg-bail and run home; the most alluring, too, since it offered to deaden the torment of uncertainty by keeping me employed, mind and ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)



Words linked to "Cast about" :   search, research, cast around, explore



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