"Cuff" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "did you figger I'd take notes in lead pencil on my cuff of where I was to build that railroad? Did you figger I was goin' to lay down a railroad without knowin' the place I put it was where it b'longed? Castle he knows me better 'n you, and he wouldn't guess I'd do sich a thing. No, sir, Mr. McKettrick. I took ...
— Scattergood Baines • Clarence Budington Kelland
... at C—— school: a man in the tenth part of a century learns a deal of worldly wisdom, and his hand, which goes naturally forward to seize the gloved finger of a millionnaire, or a milor, draws instinctively back from a dirty fist, encompassed by a ragged wristband and a tattered cuff. But Attwood was in nowise so backward; and the iron squeeze with which he shook my passive paw, proved that he was either very affectionate or very poor. You, my dear sir, who are reading this history, know very ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... head as to why they take place. Captain James is a gentleman; I make no doubt of that ever since I saw him stop to pick up old Goody Blake (when she tumbled down on the slide last winter) and then swear at a little lad who was laughing at her, and cuff him till he tumbled down crying; but we must have bread somehow, and though I like it better baked at home in a good sweet brick oven, yet, as some folks never can get it to rise, I don't see why a man may not be a baker. You see, my lady, I look upon baking as a simple trade, and as ...
— My Lady Ludlow • Elizabeth Gaskell
... herself just over the orifice of the burrow, in her posture of defence, her fangs open, her four front legs uplifted. Can the other have been stabbed? Not at all, for she emerges in her turn, not without receiving on the way a cuff from the Spider, who immediately regains her lair. Dislodged from her basement a second and yet a third time, the Tarantula always comes up unwounded; she always awaits her adversary on her threshold, administers punishment and reenters ...
— More Hunting Wasps • J. Henri Fabre
... North End boys came in and sat on the same bench. Then Jimmy Sears shuffled past the North Enders, and sat beside Bud. After which the inevitable happened. It kept happening. They "passed it on," and passed it back again; first a pinch, then a chug, then a cuff, then a kick under the bench. Heads craned toward the boys occasionally, and there came an awful moment when Bud Perkins found himself looking brazenly into the eyes of the preacher, who had paused to glare at the boys in the midst of his sermon. The ...
— The Court of Boyville • William Allen White
... legs into the room, and, closing the door with extraordinary care, passed the cuff of his coat across his eyes and surveyed ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs
... fuss you make about A little bit of warning; I've often done the thing myself— There's nothing so alarming. Now take this for yourself," he said, "And next time be less squalling:" Then gave the cat a hearty cuff, Which sent ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... greave[obs3], galligaskin[obs3], gamache[obs3], gamashes[obs3], moccasin, gambado, gaiter, spatterdash[obs3], brogue, antigropelos[obs3]; stocking, hose, gaskins[obs3], trunk hose, sock; hosiery. glove, gauntlet, mitten, cuff, wristband, sleeve. swaddling cloth, baby linen, layette; ice wool; taffeta. pocket handkerchief, hanky[obs3], hankie. clothier, tailor, milliner, costumier, sempstress[obs3], snip; dressmaker, habitmaker[obs3], breechesmaker[obs3], shoemaker; Crispin; friseur[Fr]; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... herself to her feet alone. One noon her father came in from his work and, removing his cuffs, laid them on the table. The little girl crept to the table, and raised herself to a standing position, holding on to the table. She then took a cuff in one hand, and inserted the other hand into it, thus, for the first time, standing unsupported. She put on the other cuff in like manner, and then marched across the room, as proud as you please. For a few days she could walk only ...
— Psychology - A Study Of Mental Life • Robert S. Woodworth
... store in America, in a smallish town. I glanced at his reddish, smooth, rather knuckly hands, and thin wrists in the frayed cuff. They were real ...
— Twilight in Italy • D.H. Lawrence
... the leaves are all worked in tapestry-stitch; the bird and the lady's hair in long straight stitches; the stalks, fruits, and grasses are worked in variously coloured silk threads, thickly and strongly bound round with very fine silver wire. The lady has a coif, cuff, and belt of short pieces of silver and gold guimp ...
— English Embroidered Bookbindings • Cyril James Humphries Davenport
... about the same, and scribbling three or four names on his shirt-cuff, he rushed off to ...
— The Port of Adventure • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... eye over the various instruments which Gaines and his students used in their studies, and was now examining something in a corner on a little table. It was a peculiar affair, quite simple, but conveying to me no idea of its use. There seemed to be a cuff, a glass chamber full of water into which it fitted, tubes and wires that attached various dials and recording instruments to the chamber, and what ...
— The Treasure-Train • Arthur B. Reeve
... old cat, 'you don't think I shall believe such absurd stuff, do you?' I'll box your ears for telling stories—' and she gave Wishie such a hearty cuff with her paw, that she sent her spinning into the great gallery, to amuse ...
— Tales From Catland, for Little Kittens • Tabitha Grimalkin
... smoke. It sometimes happened that officious busybodies spoke to him of Marius, and asked him: "What is your grandson doing?" "What has become of him?" The old bourgeois replied with a sigh, that he was a sad case, and giving a fillip to his cuff, if he wished to appear gay: "Monsieur le Baron de Pontmercy is practising pettifogging in some ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... for: not those customary odd scraps of fuel which she usually found him willing enough to accept. It was not as if his visitors had been worth anything!—They were simply musical fellows like himself; and dressed as such—without even so much as a touch of gold on cuff or lapel! ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter
... to be sitting insolently in the tap-room of the New Inn near the harbour, where the captain had entered to buy an ounce of tobacco. After paying for his purchase with three half-pence extracted from the corner of a handkerchief which he carried in the cuff of his sleeve, Captain Hagberd went out. As soon as the door was shut the barber laughed. "The old one and the young one will be strolling arm in arm to get shaved in my place presently. The tailor shall be set to work, and the barber, and ...
— To-morrow • Joseph Conrad
... try all he can;" and the black made a rush at one of his retreating companions whom he saw in the act of throwing away his rough cutlass; and catching him by the shoulder he gave him a heavy cuff on the ear and then forced him to pick up the weapon he had discarded and join a few compatriots who were making ...
— Hunting the Skipper - The Cruise of the "Seafowl" Sloop • George Manville Fenn
... are always going to the same rhythm. How delicious are these moments of sex and rhythm, and how intense if the woman should take a little handkerchief edged with black and thrust it into her dancer's cuff with some little murmur implying that she wishes him to keep it. To whomsoever these things happen life becomes a song. A little event of this kind lifts one out of the humdrum of material existence. I suppose the cause of our extraordinary ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore
... they went, he still behaving in the same mad way, for when the priest asked Petruchio if Katharine should be his wife, he swore so loud that she should, that, all amazed, the priest let fall his book, and as he stooped to take it up this mad-brained bridegroom gave him such a cuff that down fell the priest and his book again. And all the while they were being married he stamped and swore so that the high-spirited Katharine trembled and shook with fear. After the ceremony was ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... have your lovers—dusky beaux Not made of the poetic stuff That sports an Apollonian nose, And wears a sleek Byronic cuff. ...
— The Poems of Henry Kendall • Henry Kendall
... kahv-ve, which is unlikely. The change from a to o, in my opinion, is better accounted for as an imperfect appreciation. The exact sound of a in Arabic and other Oriental languages is that of the English short U, as in "cuff." This sound, so easy to us, is a great stumbling-block to other nations. I judge that Dutch koffie and kindred forms are imperfect attempts at the notation of a vowel which the writers could not grasp. It is clear that the French type is more correct. The Germans have corrected ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... you've been pretty sick, haven't you?" she mused gently. Cautiously then she reached out and touched the soft, woolly cuff of his blanket-wrapper. "Did you really ...
— Molly Make-Believe • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... and, resting his knuckles on his writing-table, gazed down upon us. He was a man of over six feet, with the shoulders, chest, and waist of a forcing batsman. His neck, perhaps, was a little too big, the fault of a powerful frame; and the wrist that came below his cuff was such that it made us wonder what was the size of his forearm. His mouth was hard, and set above a squaring chin, so that you thought him relentless, till his grey ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... room that claimed his lasting attention was pussy, but she was much more animated than the sofa-pillow. The first time that the fuzzy little cub went up and smelted of her, she gave him a savage cuff on the nose, which sent him whining to his box, and he did not seek further acquaintance with pussy ...
— Black Bruin - The Biography of a Bear • Clarence Hawkes
... be figured out if you're good at that sort of thing. By working on your cuff and backs of envelopes, you can translate them in no time at all compared to the time taken by a cocoon to change into a butterfly, for instance. All you have to do is remember that "M" stands for either "millium," meaning thousand, or for "million." By referring to the context ...
— Love Conquers All • Robert C. Benchley
... (1740-1795) we have another extraordinary figure,—a shallow little Scotch barrister, who trots about like a dog at the heels of his big master, frantic at a caress and groveling at a cuff, and abundantly contented if only he can be near him and record his oracles. All his life long Boswell's one ambition seems to have been to shine in the reflected glory of great men, and his chief task to record their sayings and doings. When he came to London, ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... raising my hand as though to give him a cuff, with the result that the half-sovereign slipped out of it and fell ...
— A Tale of Three Lions • H. Rider Haggard
... heat relax?' JOHNSON. 'Sir, you are not to imagine the water is to be very hot. I would not coddle the child. No, Sir, the hardy method of treating children does no good. I'll take you five children from London, who shall cuff five Highland children. Sir, a man bred in London will carry a burthen, or run, or wrestle, as well as a man brought up in the hardiest manner in the country.' BOSWELL. 'Good living, I suppose, makes the Londoners strong.' ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell
... adopt towards the Natives the privilege of the aristocrat — not always with the manners of an aristocrat. Many whites expect as a matter of course obeisance and service from all Natives, and think it perfectly natural to cuff and correct them when they make mistakes. Any resentment is apt to draw down severe punishment. In the law courts the Natives do not get the same justice as the whites. A Native convicted of an offence gets, in the first place, the punishment which a white man would get and something extra for ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje
... had a hard life of it, ordered about by every one on board, often receiving an undeserved cuff and kick, or finding the end of a rope laid sharply across his shoulders when he did not understand an order which he had never before heard issued. His clothes and face and hands were now almost as dirty as those of his ...
— The History of Little Peter, the Ship Boy • W.H.G. Kingston
... embarrassed a practice which has recently gained some hold at private balls, of supplying no dance-programmes at all, has afforded a novel and most happy relief. For when one man has asked for (and perhaps fondly noted on his ample cuff) "the third dance from now," another "the second galop," and a third "the fourth round," she is so genuinely bewildered as to how many and what dances she is and is not engaged for that it becomes alike easy to checkmate proposals by the reply "engaged," and at any time in the course of ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 12, No. 32, November, 1873 • Various
... the furniture man with him; and the house was filled anew with the affair of the soiled sofa, so that Deb's presence, as also her departure, attracted little attention. As her brother-in-law pushed out a valedictory hand, she noticed a shirt-cuff that had the ...
— Sisters • Ada Cambridge
... noticed that his clothes bore the cut of a foreign tailor—French or Italian—and his boots were too long and pointed to be English. His well-kept, white hands were the hands of a foreigner, long and pointed, with nails trimmed to points, and upon his left wrist, concealed by his round shirt-cuff secured by solitaires in place of links, he wore a gold bangle ...
— The White Lie • William Le Queux
... narrow hall watching her run swiftly upstairs, twirling his hat in his hands, his good-natured face flushed. Once he glanced in the direction of the bar-room, wiping his lips with his cuff, and his feet shuffled. But he resisted the temptation, and was still there ...
— Molly McDonald - A Tale of the Old Frontier • Randall Parrish
... fast that it kept me dancing. I flung the noose and caught his right paw. Hiram bawled something that made me all the more heedless, and in tightening the noose I ran in too close. The bear gave me a slashing cuff on the side of the head, and I ...
— The Young Forester • Zane Grey
... to Pennie just now to cuff and scold Jemima, and to pet the Lady Dulcibella, who was a wax doll with a lovely pink and white complexion, and real golden hair and eyelashes. She had everything befitting a doll of her station and appearance—a comfortable bed with white curtains, an arm-chair with ...
— The Hawthorns - A Story about Children • Amy Walton
... Dolly, in front, repeated Lord Ingleton's phrase with ingenuous wonder. "I know it's clever," she insisted, "but what does it mean? Now that other thing—what was it?—'Subtract vice, and virtue is what is left'—that's an easy one. Write it down on your cuff for me, will you, Colonel Cummins? I shall be so ...
— Hilda - A Story of Calcutta • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... Rameau, their dear Rameau, their Rameau the mad, the impertinent, the lazy, the greedy, the merry-man, the lout. There was not one of these epithets which did not bring me a smile, a caress, a tap on the shoulder, a cuff, a kick; at table, a titbit tossed on to my plate; away from the table, a freedom that I took without consequences, for, do you see, I am a man without consequence. They do with me and before me and at me whatever they like, without my standing on any ceremony. And the little presents that ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists - Volume II. • John Morley
... man's shrunken and withered dead face. "I will do the honors alone for you, my departed friend," he sneered, "for I am the master here now." The absence of all articles of value, the disappearance of Johnstone's three superb ruby shirt-studs, and his magnificent single diamond cuff-buttons, told of the greed of the robbers, presumably familiar with his personal ornaments, while the terrific stab in the back showed that the heavy knife had been driven through the back up to its ...
— A Fascinating Traitor • Richard Henry Savage
... faithless, and which delights to play with poor female hearts. A scuffle ensues; a clatter is heard among the knives and forks of the dessert; a glass tumbles over and breaks. An "Oh!" escapes from the innocent lips of Maria, The disturbance has been caused by the broad cuff of Mr. Warrington's coat, which has been stretched across the table to seize Lady Maria's hand, and has upset the wine-glass in so doing. Surely nothing could be more natural, or indeed necessary, than that Harry, upon hearing ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... case, coffer, carton, caddy, bandbox, casket, caisson; ciborium, pyx; binnacle; slap, cuff, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... Christian—you are now," said the honest Joliet, polishing his eyeball with his coat-cuff. "The good woman holds by them, it is true. Holy Virgin! it's she that has raised them, and I may say brooded over them in the coop. The eggs were for our salad when we had nothing better than nettles and sorrel. But, day in and night in, we have no ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 29. August, 1873. • Various
... certain: malevolent amusement in a contemptuous appraisal of his, Jimmie Dale's, person; but the other, in spite of the new, glad exhilaration Jimmie Dale was experiencing, annoyed Jimmie Dale—the blatant expanse of pink shirt cuff, for instance, in order to display the Pippin's diamond-snake links, famous from One end of the underworld to the other, was eminently typical of the man. The cuff links were undoubtedly an object of envy to the society in which the Pippin moved; they were even beautiful cuff links, ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... he brushed it round with a cuff. The great clumsy thing heated his forehead; in these days he often got a rush of blood to the head—his circulation was not what it ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... flashed back under her cuff. She looked at her wrist wonderingly as if surprised that the trinket had disappeared; then she glanced at Kirkwood, casually, as though she were in the habit of saying such things to him, which ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson
... through the entrance Sir James looked at the sergeant. His own coat-cuff had been shorn through by a bullet. The ...
— Two Sides of the Face - Midwinter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... those six weeks. At the end of the fourth week I received a small carton containing some of my personal junk that had been in Catherine's apartment. A man can't date his girl for weeks without dropping a few things like a cigarette lighter, a tie clip, one odd cuff-link, some papers, a few letters, some books, and stuff both valuable and worthless that had turned up as gifts for one reason or another. It was a shock to get this box and its arrival bounced me deep into a doldrum-period of ...
— Highways in Hiding • George Oliver Smith
... machines make only ribbed fabrics. Still, many garments in their make-up include both kinds of knitting; therefore, many machines produce only certain parts of particular garments. In the case of half-hose there is frequently a ribbed top, or in underwear a ribbed cuff, and these may be made either of circular web or full fashioned. In each case the ribbed portion is first knit and then transferred to a plain machine, and being placed upon the needles is worked on to the rest of the garment. In some instances the heel is made by the machine working the leg, though ...
— Textiles • William H. Dooley
... got your nails clean. Now rub your face; here, on your temples, by your ear.... Will you go in that shirt? Where are you going? Look, all the cuff of your right ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... of impulse which, when it does come, shatters routine and habit to bits, seized the bear. Without premeditation, he dealt the trainer a cuff that knocked him clean over a wagon-pole and broke his arm. Before any of the other attendants could realize what had happened, the bear was beyond the circle of wagons, and half-way across the buckwheat-fields. In ten minutes more he was in the spicy glooms ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts
... startled by her tone, and he turned his head so quickly that his cuff-link caught the string of his nose-glasses and pulled them awry. "Why? Why, dear me, I don't know. She ...
— Alexander's Bridge and The Barrel Organ • Willa Cather and Alfred Noyes
... through all the disappointments of the countryman turned townsman. Persecuted by bad luck, borne down by the burden, for all his energy and good will, he was far indeed from starting me in entomology. He had other cares, cares more direct and more serious. A good cuff or two when he saw me pinning an insect to a cork was all the encouragement that I received from him. Perhaps ...
— The Life of the Fly - With Which are Interspersed Some Chapters of Autobiography • J. Henri Fabre
... and brawny, apparently well fitted to wield the ponderous sword that hung from his hip; but his left had been severed between wrist and elbow, and in its stead an iron hook protruded from the empty coat-cuff. On his right shoulder a single epaulet, with long silver bullion, marked his rank as that of lieutenant ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... cut any capers right now, I'll cuff your ears!" cried father. "This is no proper time for ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter
... another time would have earned the speaker an admonition or a cuff. They fell on Gerard now like idle air. He paid the lad in silence, and descended the hill alone. The brook was silvery; it ran murmuring over little pebbles, that glittered, varnished by the clear water; he sat down and looked stupidly at them. Then he drank ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... waxed parquetry, silks, satins, pure linen and pure wool, diversified by a few walking-sticks and a cuff link or so. Faced by a judge-like middle-aged authority in a frock-coat, Mr. Prohack suddenly lost the magisterial demeanour which he had exhibited to a defenceless girl in the car. He comprehended in a flash that suits of clothes were a ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett
... that!" he said. He extended his cuff and added the words "Vitally important" to what he had just written. "It was ...
— Three Men and a Maid • P. G. Wodehouse
... said the Man from the Moon, and his voice sounded softer than the voices of the men. But still the boy hesitated, and said, "You will cuff me." ...
— A Treasury of Eskimo Tales • Clara Kern Bayliss
... skipper was drunk half his time, and the mates the other two quarters, I could not get much out of them. The only fellow who really was of use was young Rip Van Winkle. He took a liking to me, as I did to him, from the first, and I often saved him from many a cuff and kick which he was wont to receive from the crew. He was, I confess, a sort of 'dirty Dick' on board, and so he would have continued had I not taught him to clean himself; and now he is as fond of washing as any one, except when the weather ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston
... the field," I said hotly, "By St. Andrew! I will cuff his ears and send him back to the ...
— A Monk of Fife • Andrew Lang
... kind to Anne, Grace and Miriam, as Miriam's muff and scarf of Russian sable, Grace's camera, and Anne's diamond ring (a present from the Southards) testified. Then there were the less expensive but equally valued remembrances in the way of embroidered sofa pillows, center pieces, and collar and cuff sets, every stitch of which had been taken by the patient ...
— Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... what I replied, but I am sure it was flippant; to the day of my death I shall never forget the stinging, good-natured cuff with which the cook knocked my head against the wall. "Sho' now," ...
— The Mutineers • Charles Boardman Hawes
... honor the great games, and dedicate a temple to the goddess whom the Romans call Matuta the Mother, though, from the ceremonies which are used, one would think she was Leucothea. For they take a servant-maid into the secret part of the temple, and there cuff her, and drive her out again, and they embrace their brothers' children in place of their own; and, in general, the ceremonies of the sacrifice remind one of the nursing of Bacchus by Ino, and the calamities occasioned by her husband's concubine. Camillus, having ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... happened to be out of humour; but those were trifles, as I never was much hurt, and Peter told me I was fortunate to get nothing worse. There was one ill-conditioned fellow, Barney Bogle by name, who lost no opportunity of giving me a cuff for the merest trifle, if he could do so without being seen by Peter, of whom he was mortally afraid. In his presence, the bully always kept his hands off me. Of course it would not have been wise in me to complain of Barney to Peter, as it might have caused a quarrel; ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston
... "Oh! my cuff-button rolled in here somewhere," said David, emerging crab-wise, and lifting a red face. "Give us a hand, Joe, and help pull out the bed. Plague on this room for being such a box! There!" with ...
— Five Little Peppers Grown Up • Margaret Sidney
... cuff of his left sleeve with his right hand, and dared not look at the old man, who smiled as he thought that this modest young fellow no doubt needed, as he had needed once on a time, some encouragement ...
— At the Sign of the Cat and Racket • Honore de Balzac
... money, desisted at last in favour of the most vulgar, who climbed on to the top of the man's burden, and remained there, viewing the landscape and commenting in general terms upon the nature of public affairs, and when the man complained a little, the politician did but cuff him sharply on the side of the head to teach him ...
— On Nothing & Kindred Subjects • Hilaire Belloc
... are d——d, our sins are deadly, You alone are heal'd"— 'Twas not thus their gospel redly Saints and martyrs seal'd. You had seem'd more like a martyr, Than you seem to us, To the beasts that caught a Tartar Once at Ephesus; Rather than the stout apostle Of the Gentiles, who, Pagan-like, could cuff and wrestle, They'd have ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... here and there Enthralls the crimson stomacher; A cuff neglectful, and thereby Ribands that flow confusedly; A winning wave, deserving note In the tempestuous petticoat; A careless shoe-string, in whose tie I see a wild civility; Do more bewitch me, than when art Is too precise ...
— English Songs and Ballads • Various
... morning the chapter was from the Book of Daniel, and a little boy who sat next me went all wrong in pronouncing the names of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. The teacher had great difficulty in setting him right, and before he succeeded was obliged to scold the boy and cuff him for his stupidity. The nest verse came to me, and so the chapter went along down the class. Presently it started on its way back, and soon after I noticed that the little fellow began crying. On this I asked him, 'What's ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White Volume II • Andrew Dickson White
... misspent hours, false hopes, and disappointed expectations. May a morrow dawn that will bring recompense and requital for the sorrows of the days gone by, and a new order of things when there will be more starch in cuff and collar, and ...
— Rolling Stones • O. Henry
... not much, Monsieur!' he observed, deprecatingly, smoothing his hat with the cuff of his frayed coat-sleeve. 'But it is sufficient; and I prefer it to teaching. In effect, they are very charming, the seraphic young girls of your country! But they seem to care little for music; and I am a difficult ...
— The Poems And Prose Of Ernest Dowson • Ernest Dowson et al
... "The Rose of Allandale." He met two small boys out bird's-nesting: he gave them a shilling apiece, and then inconsistently informed them that if he caught them then or at any other time with a bird's nest in their hands he would cuff their ears. Then he walked hastily home, put by his fishing-rod, and shut himself up in his study with half a dozen of those learned volumes which he had ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various
... unintelligible but of gratified import, and bowed low after the retreating vision. A moment later he was staring with mystified absorption at the hat in his hands, quite as if the hat were a stranger's—and then he brushed it around and around with the cuff of his coat sleeve as if the stranger had not ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson
... saw the waiting figure of the chauffeur. He had stepped clear of the bushes, and, behind the mask-like goggles, his eyes were fixed upon the young Venezuelan. He took a short step forward, and his right hand reached up under his left cuff. ...
— The White Mice • Richard Harding Davis
... stop. She says to me, Mannie, you're killing yourself, and you got to quit it; and if you don't, every time you take a grain, I'll take two. And she did! I'd come home, and she'd see what I'd been doing, and she'd up with her sleeves, and—" In horrible pantomime, the boy lifted the cuff of his shirt, and pressed his right thumb against the wrist of his other arm. At the memory of it, he gave a shiver and, with a blow, roughly struck the cuff into place. "God!" he muttered, "I couldn't stand it. I begged, ...
— Vera - The Medium • Richard Harding Davis
... grasp—but all of a sudden his ears rang, as if pistols were snapp'd close to them; lights of various hues flicker'd in his eye, (he had but one, it will be remember'd,) and a strong propelling power caused him to move from his position, and keep moving until he was brought up by the wall. A blow, a cuff given in such a scientific manner that the hand from which it proceeded was evidently no stranger to the pugilistic art, had been suddenly planted in the ear of the sailor. It was planted by the young ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... the ordinary acceptation of such language, it should have been a blow. As the world runs, it ought to have been a sound, hearty cuff; for Mr. Pickwick had been duped, deceived, and wronged by the destitute outcast who was now wholly in his power. Must we tell the truth? It was something from Mr. Pickwick's waistcoat pocket, which chinked as it was given into Job's hand, and the giving of which, somehow or other imparted ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... did I look when I did it? Did you not really see that I shut my eyes? Did you not really see that I stuck my tongue out? Was I pouring the water while I did it? Or before, or after? Did I wear a ring on my hand? Was my cuff visible? What was the position of my fingers while I held the glass? These questions may be multiplied. And it is as astonishing as amusing to see how little correctness there is in the answers, and ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden
... door opened, and there entered a complex odour of hairwash and perfumery—a collar which must have been nearly related to a cuff, and a pair of tight patent-leather boots, all attached to and somewhat overpowering a ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... 'and don't forget the happy days you spent at Sid Euson's.' Right there is where I got that scratch. But I being pretty nifty with my fins gave her a cuff on the chops that she won't have to put down in her diary to remember. I was just fishing for an opening to land when Wilbur stayed my upraised arm, and I could only give her a kick on the limb with my French heel. Naturally the noise and the words ...
— The Sorrows of a Show Girl • Kenneth McGaffey
... eyes on—a tooth-brush. All the while she was examining various shapes of toothbrushes, she had a vision of George raising his hat to take leave of her, and she could see not only the curve of his hand and the whiteness of his cuff, but also the millions of tiny marks and creases on the coarse skin of his face, extraordinarily different from her own smooth, pure, delicate, silky complexion. And she remembered that less than three years ago she had regarded ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... deir Niggers wid de weddin's and buyed deir clothes for 'em. I 'members once a man friend of mine come to ax could he marry one of our gals. Marster axed him a right smart of questions and den he told him he could have her, but he mustn't knock or cuff her 'bout when he didn't want her no more, but ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume IV, Georgia Narratives, Part 1 • Works Projects Administration
... in the dress Kindles in clothes a wantonness: A lawn about the shoulders thrown Into a fine distraction: An erring lace, which here and there Enthrals the crimson stomacher: A cuff neglectful, and thereby Ribbons to flow confusedly: A winning wave, deserving note, In the tempestuous petticoat: A careless shoe-string, in whose tie I see a wild civility: Do more bewitch me than when art Is too precise in ...
— On The Art of Reading • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... his cuff back from a slender yellow wrist, revealing a curious mark which appeared to be branded upon the flesh. It was in the form of a torch or flambeau surmounted by a tongue of flame. He raised his ...
— Fire-Tongue • Sax Rohmer
... with an answer he could not have uttered it, for just then a terrible little man in black, who had been searching for him in likely places, seized him by the cuff of the neck, and, turning his face in an easterly direction, ran him to family worship. But there was still work to do for the other two. Walking home alone that night from Mr. Patullo's party, Mr. Cathro had an uncomfortable feeling that he was being dogged. When he stopped to listen, all ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie
... function, in order to see the celebrities, who were sure to be there, from the latest actress to the newest bishop. In one corner a belated critic endeavoured to scratch hasty impressions on his shirt-cuff or the margin of a little square catalogue; in another an interested dealer used his best endeavours to rivet a patron's attention on the merits of his speculative purchase. The providers of the feast were not so much in evidence as their ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... and Douglas could dimly see the forms of the two men as they rolled and tumbled about on the ground. Then some one pulled them apart and administered a resounding cuff upon their ears. ...
— The Unknown Wrestler • H. A. (Hiram Alfred) Cody
... Capitola, riding through the pleasant woods skirting the back of the mountain range that sheltered Hurricane Hall, got a fall, for which she was afterwards inclined to cuff Wool. ...
— Capitola's Peril - A Sequel to 'The Hidden Hand' • Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth
... enough," returned the old creature, shaking her head and administering an unintentional cuff to the poor cat; "folk write a heap o' lees noo-a-days, ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne
... and then in a tumultuous bunch rushed upon La Mothe. Charlemagne vouched for him, Charlemagne who was their oracle as grown-up brothers so often are, and they could let loose the exuberance of their puppydom without a fear that a sudden cuff would teach their youth that wild delights find an end in sorrow. Over each other they sprawled in their heedless eagerness to get near to this new playfellow, one, a little weaker than the rest, lagging ...
— The Justice of the King • Hamilton Drummond
... figure dimmed and faded. A misty shadow hid it from his eyes. He could just see the shining of the silver strings, and the white line of his linen cuff. ...
— The Upas Tree - A Christmas Story for all the Year • Florence L. Barclay
... in your place," said "Judge" Hiram Look, his interest in horse-trotting paling beside this more familiar phase of sport, "I'd go down and cuff his old chops. You'll have the crowd with you ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... the fellow such a resounding cuff that he flopped out of the seat, and, scrambling to his feet, ...
— Brave Tom - The Battle That Won • Edward S. Ellis
... he said to an elderly man beside him. "You stick to the beer. The sperits in here is clean poison, and it's a sin and a shame as they should be let sell such stuff to Christian men. See here—see my sleeve!" He showed the threadbare cuff of his coat, which was corroded away in one part, as by a powerful acid. "I give ye my word I done that by wiping my lips wi' it two or three times after drinkin' at this bar. That was afore I found out that the whisky was solid vitriol. If thread and cotton can't stand ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... call on Mrs Bosenna. She had as good as engaged him by a promise, and, moreover, there was her cuff to be returned. . . . Well, the visit must be paid this morning. 'Bias would be arriving by the afternoon train; and, apart from that, when you've a daunting job that cannot be escaped, the wise course is to play the man and ...
— Hocken and Hunken • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... before. But it was the first time she had seen her laugh. The Man-Who-Makes-Faces, too. Now, at the same moment, both witnessed an extraordinary thing: As Jane chuckled, she lifted one stout arm so that a black sateen cuff was close to the mouth of the front face. And holding it there, actually laughed in ...
— The Poor Little Rich Girl • Eleanor Gates
... undressed and put to bed, provided Quin would later submit to the same treatment. It was not the first time Quin had thus assisted a brother in misfortune, but he had never before had to do with gold buttons and jeweled cuff-links, to say nothing of silk underwear and sky-blue pajamas. Being on the eve of adopting civilian clothes for the first time in two years, he took a lively interest in every detail of his patient's attire, from the modish cut ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... bed I had put my boots under my pillow, and thrown my coat over me, keeping the cuff of one sleeve in my hand. A practised claw slipped under my head and deftly fingered the insides of my boots: Blank. The coat pockets were next examined: Blank. Still I dog-slept. The wrinkled lips were now working angrily, churning up two specks of foam that shone ...
— The Best British Short Stories of 1922 • Edward J. O'Brien and John Cournos, editors
... forest, to fight and bring to the dust a cruel bloodthirsty nation of savages, contemptuously described by Baden-Powell as "the bully tribe" of the Gold Coast Hinterland. Instead of finding the bully as willing to fight as Cuff was willing to face dear old Dobbin, B.-P. found a cowering, cringing enemy, willing to lick the dust and abase himself in any manner the ingenious white man might suggest. So it was with no feelings of elation ...
— The Story of Baden-Powell - 'The Wolf That Never Sleeps' • Harold Begbie
... direction of the young lady we have described, and then completed the pantomime with a melancholy shake of the head. The wife turned round and looked hard, the scissors horizontally raised in one hand, while the other reposed on the cuff of the jacket. At this moment a low knock was heard at the street-door. The worthy pair saw the girl shrink back, with a kind of tremulous movement; presently there came the sound of a footstep below, the creak of a hinge on the ground-floor, and ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... conjectures you please; but I know of no anti-bibliomaniacal satirist of this period. STUBBES did what he could, in his "Anatomy of Abuses,"[337] to disturb every social and harmless amusement of the age. He was the forerunner of that snarling satirist, Prynne; but I ought not thus to cuff him, for fear of bringing upon me the united indignation of a host of black-letter critics and philologists. A large and clean copy of his sorrily printed work is among the choicest treasures ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... same mad way, for when the priest asked Petruchio if Katharine should be his wife, he swore so loud that she should, that, all amazed, the priest let fall his book, and as he stooped to take it up, this mad-brained bridegroom gave him such a cuff, that down fell the priest and his book again. And all the while they were being married he stamped and swore so, that the high-spirited Katharine trembled and shook with fear. After the ceremony was over, while they were yet in the church, he called for wine, and drank a loud ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... old-maidy?" Harriet asked, mildly, glancing down at the severe blue cross-barred gown she wore, and straightening a transparent cuff. ...
— Harriet and the Piper - (Norris Volume XI) • Kathleen Norris
... in advance. There were two "gentlemen friends"—one without any hair on his head—high living ungrew it; and we can prove it—the other a young man whose worth and sophistication he impressed upon you in two convincing ways—he swore that all the wine was corked; and he wore diamond cuff buttons. This young man perceived irresistible excellencies in Nancy. His taste ran to shop-girls; and here was one that added the voice and manners of his high social world to the franker charms of her own caste. So, on the following day, he appeared ...
— The Trimmed Lamp • O. Henry
... animal stepped with dignity upon his outstretched hand and permitted itself to be lifted into the light.... Its glittering neck-feathers stood up, and while it whetted its beak on Niebeldingk's cuff-links, it repeated in a most ...
— The Indian Lily and Other Stories • Hermann Sudermann
... dingy London ocean. The London that was to be an adventurous escape from the slumber of Wimblehurst, had vanished from my dreams. I saw my uncle pointing to the houses in Park Lane and showing a frayed shirt-cuff as he did so. I heard my aunt: "I'm to ride in my carriage ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... say?" A shrewd look came into his eyes. "Some of the cutest devils I know are Greeks." He pulled down a shirt-cuff and took a diamond-studded pencil from his waistcoat pocket. "How do you spell it? ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, July 21, 1920 • Various
... that a gentleman was fond of fishing. If you see his left cuff with little tufts of cloth sticking up, you may be sure he fishes. When he takes his flies off the line he will either stick them into his cap to dry, or hook them into his sleeve. When dry he pulls them out, which often tears a thread or two of ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... face, chest, and shoulders, - the more alarming because unaccompanied by any noise whatever. These emotions, however, gradually subsided, and after three or four short relapses he wiped his eyes with the cuff of his coat, and looked about him ...
— Master Humphrey's Clock • Charles Dickens
... Chief, on the side, was a hand-cuff expert. One day he managed to slip out of his chains and away from his tiresome cannon balls. He made a daring dash for liberty, disarming and killing a sentry. Boldly, he sought out the Captain of the Royal ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... early age of the child. A boy or girl of twelve or fifteen has no fear of a beating from father, or mother, or governess, or school-teacher. School-masters are no longer allowed to whip their pupils, or even to cuff them. ...
— Heart and Soul • Victor Mapes (AKA Maveric Post)
... whirlwind kiss, threw little Sam high in the air and caught him as he came within half an inch of the ground, shook the old grandfather's readily extended hand with a sturdy grasp, and wound up, for a moment, with a great cuff on the side of the head with a roll of stuff for a new gown for Mopsey, saying as he delivered it, "Dere, what d'ye ...
— Chanticleer - A Thanksgiving Story of the Peabody Family • Cornelius Mathews
... I'll drink his health. Here's your health, Captain John Quin!' And I flung a glass of claret into his face. I don't know how he looked after it, for the next moment I myself was under the table, tripped up by Ulick, who hit me a violent cuff on the head as I went down; and I had hardly leisure to hear the general screaming and skurrying that was taking place above me, being so fully occupied with kicks, and thumps, and curses, with which Ulick was belabouring me. 'You fool!' roared he—' you great blundering marplot—you ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... news of. About half-way across I came on a rabbit sitting on a stump, cleaning his silly face with his paws. He was a pretty scared animal when I crept up behind him and placed a heavy fore-paw on his shoulder. I had to cuff his head once or twice to get any sense out of it at all. At last I managed to extract from him that Mole had been seen in the Wild Wood last night by one of them. It was the talk of the burrows, he said, how Mole, Mr. Rat's ...
— The Wind in the Willows • Kenneth Grahame
... with long strides; little Oliver, firmly grasping his gold-laced cuff, trotted beside him, inquiring at the end of every quarter of a mile whether they were 'nearly there.' To these interrogations Mr. Bumble returned very brief and snappish replies; for the temporary blandness ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... Silver Fruit Knife, a Pocket Tool-Holder, a beautiful Wallet, a Toy Cannon, a Box of Alphabet Blocks, a nice Pocket-Knife, a Dissected Map of the United States, a Checker-Board, Gold Sleeve Buttons, Ladies' Cuff-Pins. ...
— The Nursery, No. 169, January, 1881, Vol. XXIX - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest Readers • Various
... the drama-loving Charteris, leaning back and taking advantage of a pause, "is the hobby of the sportsman and the life work of the avaricious." He took a little pencil from his waistcoat pocket, and made a rapid note on his cuff. ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse
... of Mr. Trimm's right hand, turned it sideways and settled one of the steel cuffs over the top of the wrist, flipping the notched jaw up from beneath and pressing it in so that it locked automatically with a brisk little click. Slipping the locked cuff back and forth on Mr. Trimm's lower arm like a man adjusting a part of machinery, and then bringing the left hand up to meet the right, he treated it the same way. Then he ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... sarcy young lubber, if the luff warn't a-lying there and I didn't want to wake him, I'd give yer such a cuff over the ear as 'd make yer think bells ...
— Syd Belton - The Boy who would not go to Sea • George Manville Fenn
... sleeves, much in the fashion of the stage-coachmen's greatcoats in former times; and instead of cuffs, the sleeves were carried out to the ends of the fingers, leaving it to the fancy of the wearer to sport a long cuff or a short cuff, or no cuff at all—just as the weather dictated. Though the coat was single-breasted, he had a hole made on the button side, to enable him to keep it together by means of a miniature ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... quietly pulled his cuff over his hand, produced a pencil instead of his fountain pen, and proceeded to divide five hundred thousand by four hundred and eighty-four ...
— Fair Margaret - A Portrait • Francis Marion Crawford
... face, and his gestures became so rapid as to cause the ring on his finger to flash through the air like the link of a chain. Also, I was able to detect the fact that on the small, neat wrist under his left cuff, there was a bracelet ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky
... distance of a hundred yards. For a time my beach walks resulted in inarticulate reaction. After months in the blindfolded canyons of New York's streets, a hemicircle of horizon, a hemisphere of sky, and a vast expanse of open water lent itself neither to calm appraisal nor to impromptu cuff-notes. ...
— Edge of the Jungle • William Beebe
... Arthur breaks down altogether, and fairly bursts out crying, and dashes the cuff of his jacket across his eyes, blushing up to the roots of his hair, and feeling as if he should like to go down suddenly through the floor. The whole form are taken aback; most of them stare stupidly at him, while those who are gifted with presence of mind find their places and look ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... won at ecarte a large sum of money from Lord Glendinning. I will therefore put you upon an expeditious and decisive plan of obtaining this very necessary information. Please to examine, at your leisure, the inner linings of the cuff of his left sleeve, and the several little packages which may be found in the somewhat capacious pockets of his embroidered ...
— Selections From Poe • J. Montgomery Gambrill
... sea-wagons—the coasters known as the "Apple-treers." Their weatherwise skippers, old sea-dogs who could smell weather as bloodhounds sniff trails, had their noses in the air in good season that day, and knew that they must depend on a thinning wind to cuff them into port. One after the other, barnacled anchors splashed from catheads, dragging rusty chains from hawse-holes, and old, patched sails came sprawling down with chuckle of sheaves and lisp of ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... these words, he strove to get away from the blind man, but he who after his long experience expected this refusal of his benefactor, did his utmost to keep hold of him, and cried, "O my lord, forgive my audacity and my persistency; and I implore thee either give me a cuff on the ear, or take back thine alms, for I may not receive it save on that condition, without falsing a solemn oath I have sworn before the face of Allah; and, if thou knew the reason, thou wouldst accord with me that the penalty is light indeed." ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... know you and your poor play," repeated Nozdrev, for the third time as he made a third move. At the same moment the cuff of one of his sleeves happened to dislodge another chessman from ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... throat, where it shone like the jet ring which fantastic nature had fastened round the tail of a white angora cat. She knew all the little tricks of a girl who seeks to marry; her fingers arranged her curls which were not in the least out of order; she entreated Rogron to fasten a cuff-button, thus showing him her wrist, a request which that dazzled fool rudely refused, hiding his emotions under the mask of indifference. The timidity of the only love he was ever to feel in the whole course of his ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac |
