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Clout   /klaʊt/   Listen
Clout

noun
1.
A target used in archery.
2.
Special advantage or influence.  Synonym: pull.
3.
A short nail with a flat head; used to attach sheet metal to wood.  Synonym: clout nail.
4.
(boxing) a blow with the fist.  Synonyms: biff, lick, poke, punch, slug.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Clout" Quotes from Famous Books



... of steamers, the man with the clout, The chantyman bent at the halliards putting a tune to the shout, The drowsy man at the wheel and ...
— Modern British Poetry • Various

... its iron adornments the nature of him who had passed in. Then he re-entered his house, and if I mistake not is still on the watch at that casement. If we stand here for a minute or two, perchance he may come out to see what delays you in this dark corner, in which case I may well give him a clout with my axe which will ...
— Winning His Spurs - A Tale of the Crusades • George Alfred Henty

... beams made the bellying sail above me a thing of glory where it swung against an azure heaven, flecked with clouds pink and gold and flaming red; and stark against this splendour was the grim figure of Resolution Day, a bloody clout twisted about his head, where he sat, one sinewy hand upon the tiller, the other upon the worn Bible open upon his knees, his lips moving as he read, while hard beside me on the floor of the boat lay Joanna, fast asleep. At sight of her ...
— Martin Conisby's Vengeance • Jeffery Farnol

... a Hubert!' shouted the populace, more interested in a known person than in a stranger. 'In the clout!—in the ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch

... last, "it's no a vera genteel present tae be makin' ye, I doot," and he held up the battered shoes. "They're unco worn, an' wi' a clout here an' there, ye'll notice, but the buckles are guid siller, an' I hae naething else to gi'e ye. Ay, man! but it's many a weary mile I've marched in these at the head o' the Ninety-Second, an' it's mony a stark fecht ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol

... castaway clout, She is quite shut out! She might call and shout, But no one about Would ever call back, "Who's there?" There is never a hut, Not a door to shut, Not a footpath or rut, Long road or short ...
— A Double Story • George MacDonald

... us. [Proudly.] And if 'twasn't for me and my great strength, I'm telling you—and it's God's truth—there'd been mutiny itself in the stokehole. 'Twas me held them to it, with a kick to wan and a clout to another, and they not caring a damn for the engineers any more, but fearing a clout of my right arm more than they'd fear the sea itself. [He glances at her anxiously, eager for ...
— Anna Christie • Eugene O'Neill

... one of the main-deck ports. A heavy squall, as he spoke, carried away the fore and main-top-masts. It was no easy matter for us to refrain from cheering at the accident, but the probability of getting a clout on our heads, and being sent below for our patriotism, kept us silent. "There's no fear now, that before many hours are over we shall be under our own flag again," whispered Tony to me. "The same mishap which has occurred ...
— Tales of the Sea - And of our Jack Tars • W.H.G. Kingston

... to go to Bursley Station, that is," said Amy, observing that Constance was descending King Street instead of crossing it into Wedgwood Street. And she caught Spot 'a fair clout on the head,' to indicate to him that she had him alone in the ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett

... clout like an infant's, and with a pepper and salt head, and a kind of attorney air, now approached Captain Delano. In tolerable Spanish, and with a good-natured, knowing wink, he informed him that the old knotter was ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville

... Spenser began to write his masterpiece The Faery Queen. Raleigh, to whom the first three books were read, was so impressed by the beauty of the work that he hurried the poet off to London, and gained for him the royal favor. In the poem "Colin Clout's Come Home Again" we may read Spenser's account of how the court impressed him after his ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long

... Day, or Christmas Eve, you hang a wash-clout on a hedge, and then groom the horses with it, ...
— The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought • Alexander F. Chamberlain

... receives much attention. The poorest of the men wear clouts of banana leaf, and the women, when in danger of capture, don skirts of bark; but on most occasions we find the man wearing a colored cotton clout, above which is a bright belt of the same material, while for ceremonies he may add a short coat or jacket. A headband, sometimes of gold, keeps his long hair in place, and for very special events he may adorn each hair with a golden bead (pp. ...
— Traditions of the Tinguian: A Study in Philippine Folk-Lore • Fay-Cooper Cole

... ignorant of Indian treachery and in spite of the warnings of Antoine, offering no obstruction to their approach, has allowed them to enter the camp. What madness! They have divested themselves of their buffalo-robes, and appear naked to the breech-clout and armed with bows and arrows, tomahawks, and scalping knives. Six or seven only come in at first, but others quickly follow, dropping in by twos and threes until a score or more are collected ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler

... end of each sentence, wearing a great purse by her side, with her hand often in it, fingering her money as if that was her chief delight;" of poor Feeblemind of the town of Uncertain, with his "whitely look, the cast in his eye, and his trembling speech;" of Littlefaith, as "white as a clout," neither able to fight nor fly when the thieves from Dead Man's Lane were on him; of Ready-to-halt, at first coming along on his crutches, and then when Giant Despair had been slain and Doubting Castle demolished, taking Despondency's daughter Much-afraid ...
— The Life of John Bunyan • Edmund Venables

... restored to favour, speaks of 'that nearness to her Majesty which I still enjoy,' and directly contradicts the rumour of his disgrace. This, however, is not in accordance with the statement made by Spenser in his poem of Colin Clout's come home again, in which he says that all Raleigh's ...
— Raleigh • Edmund Gosse

... among the deep tangle of leaves and vines a primitive landing. It was a little dock with a thatched lodge in the rear of it and a few cords of wood stacked upon its end. There were some natives here—Indians probably,—with dark skins bared from head to foot; they wore only the breech-clout, and this of the briefest. Evidently ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard

... Scythians[271] who made Tomi a prison, and the descendants of the earlier English settlers had degenerated as much as the Mix-Hellenes who disgusted the Latin poet. Spenser himself looked on his life in Ireland as a banishment. In his "Colm Clout's come Home again" he tells us that Sir Walter Raleigh, who visited him in 1589, and heard what was then ...
— Among My Books • James Russell Lowell

... formed from a leopard's head, with a sort of visor made from the beak of a hornbill, the whole surmounted by a bunch of yard-long tail-feathers from some bright-plumaged bird. When the presentation was concluded all the chieftain had left was his breech-clout. He did not share in my enthusiasm. From the murderous glance which he shot at me when the Regent was not looking, I judged that if he ever met me alone in the jungle he would get his shield back, with another scalp to add to his collection. And ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell

... the barke of trees.] There are neere to the sea vpon this Riuer diuers inhabitants, which are mighty bigge men and go al naked except some thing before their priuie parts, which is like a clout about a quarter of a yard long made of the barke of trees, and yet it is like a cloth: for the barke is of that nature, that it will spin small after the maner of linnen. [Sidenote: The Negroes race their skinnes.] Some of them also weare the like vpon their heades ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of - The English Nation, Vol. 11 • Richard Hakluyt

... the crowd, followed by a dozen or more dogs. He was losing speed, but likewise his pursuers were dropping off steadily. Only the sturdy Eskimo dog held to his even gait, and behind him in the frail travois leaned forward the little Matohinshda, nude save a breech clout, his left hand holding fast the convenient tail of his dog, the right grasping firmly one of the poles of the travois. His black eyes were bulging almost out of their sockets; his long hair flowed out behind like ...
— Indian Heroes and Great Chieftains • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman

... not been so swift but that I have caught him a clout as he went. Yet he will do it again; and those like-minded will assuredly also continue to show how much more completely human, how much more sensitive, how much more responsible, is the art of the critic than the world has ever dreamt ...
— The Rhythm of Life • Alice Meynell

... of forests, became the pilot of our voyage up Lake Moosetocmaguntic. We shoved off in a bateau, while Joseph Bourgogne, sad at losing us, stood among the stumps, waving adieux with a dish-clout. We had solaced his soul with meed of praise. And now, alas! we left him to the rude jokes and half-sympathies of the lumbermen. The artist-cook saw his appreciators vanish away, and his proud dish-clout ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various

... see this caitiff's meaning? He would destroy us all, and all our kin, Yet had I liever see him hanged by the chin, Rather than that should be brought about; And with this dagger thou shalt have a clout, Without thou wilt be lightly ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume I. • R. Dodsley

... keeper of the sun, undertook to deprive the people of it, because of some slight, Kana waded across the sea and forced that king to behave himself instanter; then, having seen the light properly placed in the sky, he spread his breech-clout over a few acres of volcano to dry, and took a nap on a mile or so of lava bed. This deity had the power of compressing himself into a small space, and likewise of pulling himself out to any desired length, like an accordion, ...
— Myths & Legends of our New Possessions & Protectorate • Charles M. Skinner

... others made a grimace, as they banged down their irons. None of them liked fish; it was not a bit satisfying; and besides that it was full of bones. Squint-eyed Augustine, having dared to observe that she liked skate, Clemence shut her mouth for her with a good sound clout. At length the mistress thought of stewed pig's back and potatoes, which restored the smiles to every countenance. Then Virginie entered like a puff of wind, with a strange ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola

... with separate titlepage bearing imprint 'At London, Printed by H. L. for Mathew Lownes. Anno Dom. 1613'. Epistle dedicatory to Lady Compton and Mountegle, signed Ed: Sp. The signatures are continuous throughout the remainder of the volume. 'Colin Clout' with separate titlepage having imprint without date. Epistle dedicatory to Sir W. Raleigh signed Ed. Sp. and dated, Kilcolman, Dec. 27, 1591. 'Astrophel' follows with head-title only. 'Prothalamion' 'Amoretti' 'Epitalamion' 'Hymnes' 'Daphnaida' 'Complaints' and 'Muiopotmos' ...
— Catalogue of the Books Presented by Edward Capell to the Library of Trinity College in Cambridge • W. W. Greg

... vicarage a motley group had gathered. There was John Proudfoot, the blacksmith, uncommonly awkward in a frock coat and a pair of kid gloves that sat on his great hands like a clout on a pitchfork. Dick, the miller, was there, too, with Giles Raisley, the miner; and Job Sheepshanks (by the way of treaty of peace) stood stroking the tangled mane of Gubblum Oglethorpe's pony. Children hung on the fence, women gathered about the gate, dogs capered on the path. Gubblum ...
— A Son of Hagar - A Romance of Our Time • Sir Hall Caine

... in civilization treats its own social conventions, whatever they may be, as final, and as having some subtle but necessary connection with morals. When the Indian squats round the tribal pot in his breech-clout, and eats his dinner with his dirty paw, he is fully satisfied that he is as well equipped, both as regards dress and manners, not only as a man need be, but as a man ought to be. The toilet, the chamber, ...
— Reflections and Comments 1865-1895 • Edwin Lawrence Godkin

... Colin's scorn, I've known no pleasure, night, or noon, or morn. Help me, ye gipsies, bring him home again, And to a constant lass give back her swain. Have I not sat with thee full many a night, When dying embers were our only light, When every creature did in slumber lie, Besides our cat, my Colin Clout, and I? No troublous thoughts the cat or Colin move, While I alone am kept awake by love. Remember, Colin, when at last year's wake I bought the costly present for thy sake: Could thou spell o'er the posy on ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant

... child is pricked with a pin, and lies crying in the mother's lap, but cannot show its mother where the pin is; but there is pity enough in the mother to supply this defect of the child; wherefore she undresses it, opens it, searches every clout from head to the foot of the child, and so finds where the pin is. Thus will thy lawyer do; he will search and find out thy difficulties, and where Satan seeketh an advantage of thee, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... back him to fight Les Darcy. Look out for yourself; don't you handle him!" he continued as the other approached the figure. "Leave him to me. As like as not, if you get fooling about him, he'll give you a clout that'll ...
— Three Elephant Power • Andrew Barton 'Banjo' Paterson

... a craning neck, was daubed with vermilion, the high crest of hair bristling across the shaven crowns. Grimly impassive they came nearer, not speaking nor moving their eyes from the three whites. One of them, a young man, naked save for a breech clout and moccasins, was in the lead. As he approached David saw that his eyelids were painted scarlet and that a spot of silver on his breast was a medal ...
— The Emigrant Trail • Geraldine Bonner

... of heroic proportions; he was clad in but a breech-clout, and was so broad as to appear squat in stature. He carried a short club, and appeared almost as dumbfounded as the two Americans. A moment he regarded them, then, with a ferocious snarl of rage, he hurled himself upon the startled Ward and half clubbed, ...
— The Heads of Apex • Francis Flagg

... minister's wife coost out. Guess ye what it was about? Black puddin', dish-clout, Eerie, orrie, you ...
— Children's Rhymes, Children's Games, Children's Songs, Children's Stories - A Book for Bairns and Big Folk • Robert Ford

... the way Weeping for sorrow, I saw a simple man me by, Upon the plow hanging. His coat was of a clout That cary[8] was called; His hood was full of holes, And his hair out; With his knopped[9] shoon Clouted full thick; His toes totedun[10] out As he the land treaded; His hosen overhung his hockshins On every side, All beslomered ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 109, November, 1866 • Various

... George be a present help to the English. This soldier happened to know Latin and other useless things, and now, as he fired at his man in the grey advancing mass—300 yards away—he uttered the pious vegetarian motto. He went on firing to the end, and at last Bill on his right had to clout him cheerfully over the head to make him stop, pointing out as he did so that the King's ammunition cost money and was not lightly to be wasted in drilling funny patterns ...
— The Angels of Mons • Arthur Machen

... up and down, threatening the flames With bisson rheum; a clout upon that head Where late the diadem stood, and for a robe, About her lank and all o'erteemed loins, A blanket, in the alarm of fear caught up;— Who this had seen, with tongue in venom steep'd, 'Gainst ...
— Hamlet, Prince of Denmark • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]

... Assizes, about some case, I think. Oh, I remember—the 'Stowmarket Mystery'—and he stayed at the hotel where Flossie was engaged. How she ever came to take notice of him, I can't imagine. She was a queer sort of girl—used to wear bloomers, and get off her bike to clout the small boys who ...
— The Stowmarket Mystery - Or, A Legacy of Hate • Louis Tracy

... scarce turn a well-drawn shaft," said a third. "Shoot dead upon him and you will be clap in the clout." ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle

... tempest, she is frozen wiz a repose. Do you, hein? sink it will come out,"—Pericles eyed Merthyr with a subtle smile askew,—"I have sot so;—it will come out when she is one day in a terrible scene . . . Mon Dieu! it was a terrible scene for me when I looked on ze clout zat washed ze blood of ze terrible assassination. So goes out a voice, possibly! Divine, you say? We are a machine. Now, you behold, she has faints. It may happen at my concert where she sings to-morrow night. You saw me in my carriage speaking to a man. He is ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... whose chief dress was a breach clout and deerskin leggings, formidable in their war-paint and war plumes, with scalping-knives and tomahawks, were only partially held in hand by Chief Brant, conspicuous by his height, his wampum fillet and eagle plumes, and his King George's ...
— Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher • William Henry Withrow

... then on Hawkeye's part. Toddles, equipped for another excursion through the train with a stack of magazines and books that almost hid him, received a sudden and vicious clout on the side of ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Campfire Stories • Various

... to himself some words in secret, after gaue the patient a powder like the ashes of wood, which was to be boiled in running water, and with it to wash the vlcer, after certaine clouts were to be applyed, with speciall care to lay that side of the clout vnto the sore, which was by him crossed, and marked; and all these clothes must at once be bound vpon it, and euery day the lowest remoued or taken away: thus in short time that anguish and griefe ceased; but not long ...
— A Treatise of Witchcraft • Alexander Roberts

... soldiers were seen flying to their rendezvous. I stood composedly at the dining-room window, and was very thankful that I wasna provost in such a hurricane, when I saw poor Mr Keg, as pale as a dish clout, running to and fro bareheaded, with the town-officers and their halberts at his heels, exhorting and crying till he was as hoarse as a crow, to the angry multitude, that was raging and tossing like a sea in the market-place. Then it was that he felt the consequence of his pridefulness ...
— The Provost • John Galt

... there. The Indians had two tom-toms, and the squaws beat on them while the Indians, all painted hideously, jumped stiff legged, cut themselves until they were covered with blood and sweat and yowled their hideous war whoop. They were naked excepting their breech clout. Sargeant Jones had control of all the guns at the fort, and unknown to us, the cannon were all trained on the dancers. We could not understand why the soldiers were so near us, but later in the day learned that there was a soldier for everyone of us ...
— Old Rail Fence Corners - The A. B. C's. of Minnesota History • Various

... and not this stripling, have induced me to consider and to conclude a weighty matter for knightly scholarship. I never could rightly understand before how Colin Clout, and sundry others calling themselves shepherds, should argue like doctors in law, ...
— Citation and Examination of William Shakspeare • Walter Savage Landor

... skipper, ye'd not be sendin' me to choppin' poles wid a head on me like a lobster-pot?" he whispered. "Sure, skipper, me poor head feels that desperate bad, what wid the liquor an' the clout ye give me, I couldn't heave it up from the pillow if Saint Peter ...
— The Harbor Master • Theodore Goodridge Roberts

... and a crowded audience of at least twenty-five pounds kept waiting, because the actors had hid away the breeches of Rosalind, and have known Hamlet stalk solemnly on to deliver his soliloquy, with a dish-clout pinned to his skirts. Such are the baleful consequences of a manager's getting a ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving

... stage remained between him and Baghdad when robbers came upon him and stripped him of all his clothes, so that he was compelled to enter the capital in foulest condition, naked even as his mother bare him. And after some charitable wight had thrown an old robe about him and bound his head with a clout (and his unshorn hair fell over his eyes)[FN360] he fell to asking for the mansion of the Wazir Ja'afar and the folk guided him thereto. But when he would have entered the attendants suffered him not; so he stood at the gate ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton

... cloak it was a very good cloak, It hath been always true to the wear; But now it is not worth a groat: I have had it four and forty year'. Sometime it was of cloth in grain: 'Tis now but a sigh clout, as you may see: It will neither hold out wind nor rain; And I'll have a new ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy

... the buckler, Lest its bite on his back should be deadly At the bringing together of weapons. My sword was not sharp for the onset When I sought the helm-wearer in battle; But the cur got enough to cry craven, With a clout that will mind ...
— The Life and Death of Cormac the Skald • Unknown

... fifteen miles on the road, an Apache Indian appeared, and so suddenly that it seemed as if he must have sprung up from the ground. He was in full war dress—that is, no dress at all except the breech clout and moccasins—and his face and whole naked body were stained in many colors in the most hideous manner. In his scalp lock was fastened a number of eagle feathers, and of course he wore two or three necklaces of beads and wampum. There ...
— Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 • Frances M.A. Roe

... barefoot up and down, threatening the flames; A clout upon that head Where late the diadem stood; and, for a robe, A blanket, in the alarm of fear caught up; Who this had seen, with tongue in venom steep'd, 'Gainst fortune's state would ...
— Hamlet • William Shakespeare

... his long hair braided behind, and banged and plastered with clay in front so that it stood upright, and he dressed in blanket, breech clout, leggings and moccasins, and the lower joints of several of his fingers were cut off in accordance with the Indian custom of mutilating themselves at the burial of a friend. His first appearance to a new teacher who came the following spring caused her no little trepidation, ...
— American Missionary, Volume 43, No. 5, May, 1889 • Various

... of the clout," the bowman said gravely. "By my hilt! I have seen a stronger fortalice carried in a summer evening. I remember such a one in Picardy, with a name as long as a Gascon's pedigree. It was when I served under Sir Robert Knolles, before the days of the Company; and ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle

... was a very good cloak, It hath been always true to the wear, But now it is not worth a groat; I have had it four and forty year: Sometime it was of cloth in grain, 'Tis now but a sigh-clout, as you may see, It will neither hold out wind nor rain; And I'll have a ...
— A Bundle of Ballads • Various

... eleven o'clock at the time, I thought I had better hurry in case there was another Flushing-bound train. So I scuttled towards the door only to receive another heavy clout from the sentry's rifle. What the interpreter really said was "Ah! No, you can't go!" As I rubbed my bruised head I treated that interpreter to a candid opinion of his English speaking qualifications, but he did not understand half ...
— Sixteen Months in Four German Prisons - Wesel, Sennelager, Klingelputz, Ruhleben • Henry Charles Mahoney

... the Rocket ran out By jumping the railings and kicking a clout Of rotten white woodwork to startle the trout. When Charles cleared the water, the grass stretcht before And the glory of going ...
— Right Royal • John Masefield

... of bear's claws and was hideously painted. He had the snake totem on his chest and was nude except for his breech-clout and moccasins. Fastened to his clout were four awful exhibits of his predaceous success—four scalps. One was gray, another streaked with gray, and two—oh, the pity of ...
— A Virginia Scout • Hugh Pendexter

... soupled yestreen, I was as yauld as an eel. And then what wad a' the country about do for want o' auld Edie Ochiltree, that brings news and country cracks frae ae farm-steading to anither, and gingerbread to the lasses, and helps the lads to mend their fiddles, and the gudewives to clout their pans, and plaits rush-swords and grenadier caps for the weans, and busks the laird's flees, and has skill o' cow-ills and horse-ills, and kens mair auld sangs and tales than a' the barony besides, and gars ilka body laugh wherever he comes? Troth, my ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott

... ever were Korah, Dathan and Abiram. Not the most despised of the habits or the feeblest of the three-year-olds had been left behind to give a hint of their course; but the hoof-marks showed black on a marshy down-grade of grass, and with an angry clout of her crop on Pilot's unaccustomed ribs, she set off again. A narrow road cut across the hills at the end of the field. The latter was divided from it by a low, thin wall of sharp slaty stones, and on the further side there was a wide and boggy drain. It was not a nice ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross

... leaf when he bound her hands and feet; and when he was about to bind over her sweet eyes a nasty old filthy clout wherein my maid had seen him carry fish but the day before, and which was still all over shining scales, I perceived it, and pulled off my silken neckerchief, begging him to use that instead, which he did. Hereupon the thumb-screw was put on her, ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold

... That glory greater than of earthly state Crowning his head, that majesty which brought All men, so awed and silent, in his steps. Nathless the King broke forth: "Ends it in this, That great Siddartha steals into his realm, Wrapped in a clout, shorn, sandalled, craving food Of low-borns, he whose life was as a god's, My son! heir of this spacious power, and heir Of Kings who did but clap their palms to have What earth could give or eager service bring? Thou should'st have come ...
— The Light of Asia • Sir Edwin Arnold

... four times we got within range of him and four times he broke away. He carried a few bullets away with him beneath his hide, indeed, but a lot he cared about that! He gave one or two of our badly-aiming huntsmen a clout on the head which sent them flying, stripped the skin from the head of one of the beaters and then took refuge in the wilderness. Friend Leonard and the other gentlemen now wanted to abandon the chase, for they were frightfully hungry and the heavy rain and rock scrambling had pretty well torn our ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai

... camp in that semi-hostile country. There were no road-agents to speak of, for sums of money large enough to tempt gentry of that ilk seldom passed over those isolated trails; but here and there stray parties of Stonies and Blackfeet, young bucks in war-paint and breech-clout, hot on the trail of their first medicine, skulked warily among the coulee-scarred ridges, keeping in touch with the drifting buffalo-herds and alert for a chance to ambush a straggling white man and lift ...
— Raw Gold - A Novel • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... goodness! My heart turns to water at the nude recollection of such an unparalleled predicament, for the now unrestrained bicycle vires acquirit eundo, and in seven-league boots! While I, wet as a clout with anxiety and perspiration, did grasp the handles like the horns of a dilemma, calling out in agonised accents to the bystanders,—"Help! I am running away with myself! Half ...
— Baboo Jabberjee, B.A. • F. Anstey

... One must be near one's tailor in May to see about one's summer clothes. Choosing a flannel suit in May is one of the moments of one's life—only equalled by certain other great moments at the hosier's and hatter's. "Ne'er cast a clout till May be out" says a particularly idiotic saw, but as you have already disregarded it by casting your fur coat, you may as well go through with the business now. Socks; I ask you to think of summer ...
— If I May • A. A. Milne

... rushed forward, Halliday and I shouting to the Arab to stop, while Ben with loud cries advised Boxall to give the black rascal a thundering clout on the head, and that we would quickly come to his assistance; but I am inclined to think that neither the one nor the other heard us. Boxall did endeavour to release himself, but the Arab held him fast. Indeed, at the rate the camel was going, he could ...
— Saved from the Sea - The Loss of the Viper, and her Crew's Saharan Adventures • W.H.G. Kingston

... 2d line from the bottom. Change breech-clout. It's a word that you love and I abominate. I would take that and ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... satirist, his chief poetic works being "Why come ye not to Courte," a satire against Wolsey; the "Book of Colin Clout," against the corruption of the Church; and the "Book of Phyllyp Sparrow," the grief of a nun for the death of her sparrow; Erasmus calls him "the glory and ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... has fitly characterized as "an attempt to navigate a sardine dish with Great Eastern machinery"; and it suggested also the Indian chief humorously mentioned by Irving as generously "decked out in cocked hat and military coat, in contrast with his breech clout and leathern leggins, being grand officer at top and ragged Indian at bottom." [Footnote: Bonneville, p. 34.] Whatever may be said by credulous and enthusiastic authors to decorate this Indian pueblo, its houses and its breech-cloth people, cannot conceal the "ragged Indian" therein by dressing ...
— Houses and House-Life of the American Aborigines • Lewis H. Morgan

... coincidence that the inconsolable widower of the "Daphnaida" is named Alcyon, while Chaucer's poem begins with a reference to the myth of Ceyx and Alcyone. Sir Arthur Gorges re-appears in Alcyon in "Colin Clout's come home again."); but it is the first passage in Chaucer's writings revealing, one would have thought unmistakeably, the dramatic power which was among his most characteristic gifts. The charm of this poem, notwithstanding ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward

... Socrates the ungallant remark that women were capable of learning anything which you will that they should know. The figures in this pas de deux appear frequently to have terminated in what children, with their customary coarseness of speech, are pleased to call "wringing the dish-clout"—clasping the hands, throwing the arms above the head and turning rapidly, each as on a pivot, without loosing the hands of the other, and resting ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce

... the close, and some o' the dirty jaups splashed about his shins. But was I to blame for that?—ye maun walk wide o' a whalebone besom if ye dinna want to be splashed. Afore I kenned where I was, he up wi' a dirty washing-clout and slashed me in the face wi't! I hit him a thud in the ear—as wha wadna? Out come his mither like a fury, skirling about her hoose, and her servants, and her weans. 'Your servant!' says I—'your servant! You're a nice-looking ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown

... thickened, and its green eyes glaring defiance at everything animate, inanimate, or otherwise, insomuch that Maggot made sundry efforts to quell it with the three-legged stool—and Mrs Maggot followed suit with a dish-clout—but in vain! ...
— Deep Down, a Tale of the Cornish Mines • R.M. Ballantyne

... him a clout on the head, but I did not. The sunlight was coming in through the window at the top of the stairs, and shining on the rope that was tied to the banister. The end of the rope was covered with stains, brown, with a glint ...
— The Case of Jennie Brice • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... aught but the smallest beer, for morning Drinking; for though we had to pay for our Wine and Ardent Drinks, the cellar of the Stag o' Tyne was always handsomely furnished with barrels of strong ale, which Lobbin Clout or Colin Mayfly, the Hind or the Plough-churl, would bring us secretly by night in their Wains for gratitude. I know not where they got the malt from, but there was narrow a fault to find with the Brew. I recollect its savour now with a ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 1 of 3 • George Augustus Sala

... out a' day, and frighted—na, I winna say that neither but mistrysted wi' bogles in the hame-coming, an' then to hae to flyte wi' a wheen women that hae been doing naething a' the live-lang day, but whirling a bit stick, wi' a thread trailing at it, or boring at a clout." ...
— The Black Dwarf • Sir Walter Scott

... bridle-wise,' the Chauffeur gloated, while she performed that dreadful, menial task. 'A trifle balky at times, Professor, a trifle balky; but a clout alongside the jaw makes her as meek and gentle as ...
— The Scarlet Plague • Jack London

... wi' a braw burn trout, An' speer'd how acquaintance were greeing; He brought it frae Peebles, tied up in a clout, An' said it wad just be a preeing, a preeing, An' said it wad just ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various

... the buffalo robe upon mine; my boots were cast aside, and my legs encased in the scalp-fringed leggings; my hips were swathed in the leathern "breech-clout;" and my feet thrust into the foot-gear of the Comanche, which, by good fortune, fitted ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid

... 'August 2, 1841.—Clout nailmaking goes on here rather considerably, and is a very neat and pretty operation to observe. I love a smith's shop and anything relating to smithery. ...
— Faraday As A Discoverer • John Tyndall

... Learning is a thing that hath been much cried up, and coveted in all ages, especially in this last century of years, by people of all sorts, though never so mean and mechanical; every man strains his fortune to keep his children at school; the cobbler will clout it till midnight, the porter will carry burdens till his bones crack again, the ploughman will pinch both back and belly to give his son learning, and I find that this ambition reigns no where so much as in this island. But, under favour, this word, learning, is taken in a narrower sense ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 19. Issue 539 - 24 Mar 1832 • Various

... one Paris, that would faine lay knife aboard: but she good soule had as leeue see a Toade, a very Toade as see him: I anger her sometimes, and tell her that Paris is the properer man, but Ile warrant you, when I say so, shee lookes as pale as any clout in the versall world. Doth not Rosemarie and Romeo begin both with a letter? Rom. I Nurse, what of that? Both with an R Nur. A mocker that's the dogs name. R. is for the no, I know it begins with some other letter, and she hath the prettiest ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... retrogression to the obscure depths of time. So, too, one's glance would often sweep in a twinkling from a European clothed in garments of the latest mode to a Hindu whose sole covering was his dhotee, or clout about the loins, taking in between these two extremes a number of distinct stages in the process of evolution through which our clothes have gone. In the evening we visited the Sangam, where the small streams ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - February, 1876, Vol. XVII, No. 98. • Various

... Puritan—it won't deny—but I'll uphold him a gentleman and a pretty fellow, for all that.—Madam, says I, you may think your cousin looks like a psalm-singing weaver, in that bare felt, and with that rascally brown cloak; that band, which looks like a baby's clout, and those loose boots, which have a whole calf-skin in each of them,—but let him wear on the one side of his head a castor, with a plume befitting his quality; give him a good Toledo by his side, ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott

... yearn for the missionaries, but there was refined etiquette in China, and an interchange of many of the pleasantest courtesies of modern civilisation, when we noble Britons were grubbing in the forest, painted savages with a clout. ...
— An Australian in China - Being the Narrative of a Quiet Journey Across China to Burma • George Ernest Morrison

... the squalidness of his furniture, the gallant White Plume presented some such whimsical incongruity as we see in the gala equipments of an Indian chief on a treaty-making embassy at Washington, who has been generously decked out in cocked hat and military coat, in contrast to his breech-clout and leathern legging; being grand officer at top, ...
— The Adventures of Captain Bonneville - Digested From His Journal • Washington Irving

... iii. Scene 5 to forsake Romeo for Paris indicates the bias of the hierarchy in favour of Essex—"a lovely gentleman"—rather than of the ultra-Protestant policy of Burghley, who doubtless in the eyes of courtiers and churchmen was "a dish-clout ...
— A Study of Shakespeare • Algernon Charles Swinburne

... dizziness had passed, and I could again see clearly, the warrior was standing upon the Stone of Sacrifice—naked save for his breech-clout, and armed with a round shield and a maccahuitl of hardened gold. The monk still wore his flowing habit, whence the hood had fallen back, so that his head was bare; in one hand he held his crucifix, and with the other he was motioning away the sword and shield that a soldier held out to him: ...
— The Aztec Treasure-House • Thomas Allibone Janvier

... are in the palace, On a white and downy bed; And some are in the garret, With a clout beneath their head; And some are on the cold, hard earth, Whose mothers have ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf; a Practical Plan of Character Building, Volume I (of 17) - Fun and Thought for Little Folk • Various

... Then, having shouted to Baptiste, I approached the crevice just as the Indian crawled out. Too weak to rise, he propped himself against a rock. He was bleeding profusely from a dozen wounds. His shirt of buffalo skin, his breech-clout, his fringed leggings of antelope, all had been ripped to tatters by the grizzly's claws; his feathered scalp-lock was half torn from his head, and one shoulder ...
— The Cryptogram - A Story of Northwest Canada • William Murray Graydon

... matter of clothes." He grinned again. "We'll want a breech clout, at least. I propose that we get the sheerest silk gauze we can find, and cut an eighth-inch square apiece to tie about our ...
— The Raid on the Termites • Paul Ernst

... At a distance of five score yards was set a little "clout," or target, of white wood, not more than two feet square. This clout had a red mark, or eye, three inches across, painted in its centre, and stood not very high above ...
— Red Eve • H. Rider Haggard

... skinned the ells. Tom's a good boy, Jacob, but not steady, as they say you are. His mother spoils him, and I can't bear to be cross to him neither; for his heart's in the right place, after all. There's the old woman shaking her dish-clout at us as a signal. I wish I had gone on shore myself, but I can't step into these paper-built little boats without my timber toes going through ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat

... stays at home, spends, sooner or later, 40,000 pounds on Virginia, writes charming court-poetry with Oxford, Buckhurst, and Paget, brings over Spenser from Ireland and introduces Colin Clout to Gloriana, who loves—as who would not have loved?—that most beautiful of faces and of souls; helps poor puritan Udall out of his scrape as far as he can; begs for Captain Spring, begs for many more, whose names are only known by being ...
— Sir Walter Raleigh and his Time from - "Plays and Puritans and Other Historical Essays" • Charles Kingsley

... repent a snout that's bent, And if again I tap it, Oh, with a clout I'll bend that snout With force enough to ...
— The Magic Pudding • Norman Lindsay

... reported that the wounded savage was the only one, of a party of eight, who returned to their towns; that on being asked by some one, "what news,"—he replied, "bad news for poor Indian, me lose a son, me lose a brother,—the squaws have taken the breech clout, and fight worse than the ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers

... of our contree ben in comoun. Oure mete, that we susteyne with alle oure bodyes, is our richesse: and in stede of tresoure of gold and sylver, wee maken oure tresoure of accord and pees, and for to love every man other. And for to apparaylle with oure bodyes, wee usen a sely litylle clout, for to wrappen in oure carcynes. Oure wyfes ne ben not arrayed for to make no man plesance, but only connable array, for to eschewe folye. Whan men peynen hem to arraye the body, for to make it semen ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, - and Discoveries of The English Nation, Volume 9 - Asia, Part 2 • Richard Hakluyt

... Randulf, at the club, "when so old a man gets so young a wife, it is all up with him"; and saying this he made a movement, as if wringing a clout and ...
— Skipper Worse • Alexander Lange Kielland

... knew The valor of the gen'ral and his troops; And seeing this affair must end in blood, I brought a clout, to ...
— The Comedies of Terence • Publius Terentius Afer

... stole the barley Out of the baker's shop; The baker came out, and gave him a clout, And made ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole

... curiosity. The Pilgrime's Tale telling forth the evil lives of churchmen. William Thynne in favour with Henry VIII., who promiseth to countenance him. The promise broken through the power of Wolsey. The most part of Colin Clout written at William Thynne's house at Erith. Chaucer's works like to be destroyed by parliament. Reasons why the Pilgrime's Tale should be Chaucer's. How William Thynne's collection of Chaucer's MS. was dispersed abroad. He differeth from Master Speight on Chaucer's family. ...
— Animaduersions uppon the annotacions and corrections of some imperfections of impressiones of Chaucer's workes - 1865 edition • Francis Thynne

... Pecan are neither squaws, dogs, nor ponies; only men, naked to the breech clout, their bodies brightly painted from hip to head, chequered like a hatchment, or the jacket of a stage harlequin, with its fantastic devices, some ludicrous, others grotesque; still others of aspect ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid

... clout! you have hit the very white," said the damsel, suppressing a great inclination ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott

... over the corp of the Almirante. I've been mad with fever, and jumped into the Palmas River among the alligators, and not one of them touched me, though I was swimming about crying that the water was burning oil. And then a lad in a boat gave me a clout on the head that knocked the daftness out of me, and in a week I was marching on my own deck, with my bonnet cocked like a king's captain. I've been set by my unfriends on a rock in the Florida Keys, with a keg of dirty water and a bunch of figs, and the sun like to melt my brains, and ...
— Salute to Adventurers • John Buchan

... think the miner is still hanging around this cabin?" asked Sandy. "Do you think he is the man who gave Bert the clout on the head? If you do think so, we'd better keep a ...
— The Call of the Beaver Patrol - or, A Break in the Glacier • V. T. Sherman

... prophecies, and made to bend to explanations at the will and whimsical conceits of sectaries, expounders, and commentators. Every thing unintelligible was prophetical, and every thing insignificant was typical. A blunder would have served for a prophecy; and a dish-clout for a type. ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine

... she, stepping at me, with a black stripe across her face, she was that destroyed with rage, and I stepped back and held up me basket between us, she being bigger than I, and I getting no chance, and herself slipped and fell, and her nose got a clout with the hard edge of the basket, it would trouble the saints to say how, and then I picked her up and wint home with her to thry and quinch the blood. Sure I was sorry for the crathur an' she having such a timper ...
— The Queen's Twin and Other Stories • Sarah Orne Jewett

... sunlight piercing the blackness of a dungeon. He felt among the inner folds of his ragged blanket, withdrew a small object and thrust it into his mouth. A second later the blanket was snatched from his body leaving him clad only in a breech clout, and he was given a push into the lane as a hint that his time for running ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore

... < chapter xii 21 BIOGRAPHICAL > Queequeg was a native of Kokovoko, an island far away to the West and South. It is not down in any map; true places never are. When a new-hatched savage running wild about his native woodlands in a grass clout, followed by the nibbling goats, as if he were a green sapling; even then, in Queequeg's ambitious soul, lurked a strong desire to see something more of Christendom than a specimen whaler or two. His father was a High Chief, ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville

... the example; but as we were not qualified by years of arduously won sanctity to stand stark naked in the presence he conceded us a clout apiece torn from a filthy length of calico that some one had tossed in a corner. And he tore another piece of filthy red cotton cloth in halves, and divided it between us to twist around our heads. ...
— Caves of Terror • Talbot Mundy

... for the beaded clout, and painted scarlet from brow to ankle, beat the witch-drums tump-a-tump! tump-a-tump! while a fourth stood, erect as a vermilion statue, holding a chain belt woven in ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers

... irritated by another stroke on his chops, he gave her such a remembrance in the guts, that she began to roar loud enough to be heard all over the house. Adams then, seizing her by the hair (for her double-clout had fallen off in the scuffle), pinned her head down to the bolster, and then both called for lights together. The Lady Booby, who was as wakeful as any of her guests, had been alarmed from the beginning; and, being a woman of a bold spirit, she slipt on a ...
— Joseph Andrews, Vol. 2 • Henry Fielding

... gone quite off his head. I don't know what I am about That I don't give the Jew a clout: 430 Would you ...
— Four Plays of Gil Vicente • Gil Vicente

... towards her. "You jist say that again, Lizzie Gordon, and I'll give you a clout over the head ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith

... never existed, never been born at all! Nothing but filth and mud, however you knock at your coffin lid at night, when the dead arise, however you cry: 'Let me out, kind people, to live in the light of day! My life was no life at all; my life has been thrown away like a dish-clout; it was drunk away in the tavern at the Haymarket; let me out, kind people, to live in the ...
— Notes from the Underground • Feodor Dostoevsky

... was cast out I was a child.... If I did weave some clout Of raiment, would he keep the vesture now He wore in childhood? Should my weaving grow As his limbs grew?... 'Tis lost long since. No more! O, either 'twas some stranger passed, and shore His locks for very ruth ...
— The Electra of Euripides • Euripides

... islands. These seem to be the chief; for besides them we saw also shock curl-pated New Guinea negroes; many of which are slaves to the others, but I think not all. They are very poor, wear no clothes, but have a clout about their middle, made of the rinds of the tops of palmetto-trees; but the women had a sort of calico cloths. Their chief ornaments are blue and yellow beads, worn about their wrists. The men arm themselves with bows and arrows, lances, broad swords like those of Mindanao; ...
— A Continuation of a Voyage to New Holland • William Dampier



Words linked to "Clout" :   vantage, nail, KO punch, boxing, parry, pugilism, rabbit punch, knockout punch, strike, Sunday punch, hook, sucker punch, target, counter, mark, blow, advantage, counterpunch, jab, haymaker, fisticuffs



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