"Nimble" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... much as we have been informed by some of our nimble messengers, who are constantly abroad to obtain information, that seven prisoners, of the seven most villainous and dangerous species in the world, have arrived lately at your royal palace, and that it is your intention to hurl them over the cliff into my kingdom. I hereby counsel ...
— The Sleeping Bard - or, Visions of the World, Death, and Hell • Ellis Wynne
... the nimble little Will, Jack cavorted, swung his lantern and by signs indicated his desire to imitate Tweedle-dum's and Tweedle-dee's performances, to which Will promptly acceded and ...
— A Dixie School Girl • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... necessity enthusiastic. The Vealer was quartered in double-quick time, and the first fitful rays of sunlight found their way to the Creek crossing to light up an advancing forest of boughs and mistletoe clumps that moved forward on nimble ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn
... the log was so close that the nimble-footed Ben leaped ashore and strode straight for the valiant Rutherford, who immediately threw himself in "position." His attitude was certainly artistic, with his left foot thrown forward, his right fist clinched and held across his breast, and his left ...
— The Telegraph Messenger Boy - The Straight Road to Success • Edward S. Ellis
... well, about whose flowery banks The nimble-footed fairies dance their rounds By the ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 4 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... evening before the attack, a band of one hundred and fifty American militia, on their way to join Williamson, entered the fort. The assault was made before dawn; it was promptly repulsed, and at daybreak the enemy fled, having suffered some loss; thirteen of the tories were captured, but the more nimble Indians escaped. ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt
... then came the gallants, Before the board they stood— O, they were nimble at the tongue, Could speak ...
— The Serpent Knight - and other ballads - - - Translator: George Borrow • Thomas J. Wise
... statesman's head above the task and wrought with nimble fingers the while he talked. It was difficult, this talk of his, scattered, fragmentary; and his mind would go from it, his voice expire untimely. He must be prompted, recalled, questioned. His hands worked with a very certain ...
— Somewhere in Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... harpies came rushing down upon them, seizing in their talons the meat from the dishes and flying away with it. Aeneas and his companions drew their swords and dealt vigorous blows among the monsters, but to no purpose, for they were so nimble it was almost impossible to hit them, and their feathers were like armor impenetrable to steel. One of them, perched on a neighboring cliff, screamed out, "Is it thus, Trojans, you treat us innocent birds, ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... fatal mouths gaping on girded Harfleur. Suppose the ambassador from the French comes back; Tells Harry that the king doth offer him Katharine his daughter, and with her to dowry Some petty and unprofitable dukedoms. The offer likes not: and the nimble gunner With linstock now the devilish cannon touches, And ...
— Lyra Heroica - A Book of Verse for Boys • Various
... their long holidays, they would change the look of the academic apartment into that of a miniature Covent Garden market or greengrocer's shop, filling it up with heaps of evergreens—holly and ivy and yew, ad libitum, to be transformed by the aid of their nimble fingers into all sorts of floral decorations. Garlands were woven, elaborate illuminated texts and scrolls painted, and wondrous crosses of commingled laurel leaves and holly berries contrived; all of which went so far to change the aspect of the old church, that those well acquainted ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson
... remarkably broad, without any taperness, so as to be characteristic of this genus: the tail-fin is broad, and square at the end. From the breadth and muscular strength of the tail, it appears to be an active nimble fish.' ...
— The Natural History of Selborne • Gilbert White
... class had all to run through a narrow cavern, and the venerable president was entitled to the hindmost, if he could catch him. Sometimes it happened that he caught only his shadow, and in that case the man who had been nimble enough to do what Goethe pronounces impossible, became the most profound magician of his year. Hence our proverb of the Devil take the hindmost, and ...
— Among My Books - First Series • James Russell Lowell
... chide or sigh— Never so poor that I could not buy A sweet, sweet kiss from my little Grisette. If I could nothing gain or get, By hook, or crook, or song, or story, Along the starving road to glory, I marvelled how your nimble thimble, As to a tune, danced fast and fleeting, And stopped my pen to catch the music, But only heard my heart a-beating; The quaint old roofs and gables airy Flung down the light for you to wear it, And made my love a queen in faery, To ...
— Bohemian Days - Three American Tales • Geo. Alfred Townsend
... nimble thimble-rigger," said Smith genially, "while I take ten minutes' rest we'll have a little polite conversation. Or, rather, a monologue. Because I don't want to ...
— The Flaming Jewel • Robert W. Chambers
... distance of about two hundred yards, and by our glasses discovered them to be a woman and a boy; the woman, like the rest, being stark naked. We observed, that all of them were remarkably clean-limbed, and exceedingly active and nimble. One of these strangers had a necklace of shells, very prettily made, and a bracelet upon his arm, formed of several strings, so as to resemble what in England is called gymp: Both of them had a piece of bark tied over the forehead, and were disfigured by the bone in the nose. We thought their ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr
... Quickly her nimble feet carried her, and in a few minutes she was scrutinizing the faces of her fellow-passengers. Sitting across the aisle from her was a young lady, who to Rosa seemed the embodiment of beauty and elegance. While intently ...
— Rosa's Quest - The Way to the Beautiful Land • Anna Potter Wright
... knees. William leant against a third tree consuming a little heap of scraps collected from the larder, while on his knees also reposed what was apparently a red handkerchief. Jumble sat in the middle catching with nimble, snapping jaws dainties flung to him from time to time by his circle ...
— More William • Richmal Crompton
... contributing to its pages all along articles of great brilliancy; he was distinguished also at the bar in several famous trials; became Lord Advocate of Scotland in 1830, M.P. for Edinburgh in 1832, and finally, in 1834, one of the judges in the Court of Session; lie was a dark-eyed, nimble little man, of alert intelligence and quick in all his movements; died ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... for, with another question as briefly asked and answered, the click of swords crossed and uncrossed before and behind him, and the screechy grind of bolts, Michael passed out of sight within. While as for me, I was left to twirl my thumbs, and wish that I had stayed at home to watch the nimble fingers of the Playmate busy at her sewing, and the rounded slenderness of her sweet body set against the light of evening, which would at that hour be shining through the ...
— Red Axe • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... hull of the Merrimac bore down on the Monitor now to ram and sink her at a blow. The nimble craft side stepped the avalanche of iron, turned quickly and attempted to jamb her nose into the steering gear ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon
... pleasure in truth, in justice, in laudable practices and in purity; let him keep in subjection his speech, his arm, and his appetites. Wealth and pleasures repugnant to law, let him shun; and even lawful acts which may cause pain, or be offensive to mankind. Let him not have nimble hands, restless feet, or voluble eyes; let him not be flippant in his speech, nor intelligent in doing mischief. Let him walk in the path of good men" (Manu, p. 7). "He who neglecteth the duties of this life ...
— The Freethinker's Text Book, Part II. - Christianity: Its Evidences, Its Origin, Its Morality, Its History • Annie Besant
... Three nimble sailors were soon stretched along the slanting gaff of the great foresail, a perilous and quivering berth, with nothing for the hands to grasp but the shivering leech and shivered boom of the topsail. The ...
— Ralph Granger's Fortunes • William Perry Brown
... dodged the next six or eight assaults it did look as though Hal had spoken the truth when he stated that he had learned his style of fighting from a dancing master. For the nimble rookie never did seem to be just where Bill Hooper looked for ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys in the Ranks - or, Two Recruits in the United States Army • H. Irving Hancock
... that from the house they heard a woman call. "Oh come and stay with us, go not away. Our land is full of all the riches nature gives; our woods are bright with o-lil-lie most luscious to the taste; on yonder hill the nimble ah-tooch feed; in every stream the silver salmon swim so come within our lodge with us and stay awhile." Ha-houlth-thuk-amik was mesmerized by the sweet welcoming and entered in, whereat the klootsmah said to him, "We welcome thee strange one unto our lodge, for we have never seen a ...
— Indian Legends of Vancouver Island • Alfred Carmichael
... about, little ones, quicke and nimble; In and out, wheele about, run, hope, and amble; Joyne your hands louingly; well done, muisition: Mirth keepeth one in health like a physicion. Elues, vrchins, goblins all, and little fairyes That doe filch, blacke, and pinch maydes of the dairyes, Make a ring in this ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... the mate was there. He ran up and down with the others, to show how nimble his legs were. He was ...
— Stories of American Life and Adventure • Edward Eggleston
... Oh! You mean that box? Oh!" He peeped at it between his meagre legs, then turned a nimble ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... tried their strength and skill with the Indian lads, but, although they were stronger and more nimble than most boys of their age, they found that they were no ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... in monie lands, An' Auld Light caddies bure sic hands, That, faith, the youngsters took the sands Wi' nimble shanks, 'Till lairds forbade, by strict commands, Sic ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... habit and practice had made the men so familiar with the place, and so nimble in their movements, that they traversed the levels with wonderful rapidity, and most of them ascended the shaft of the ...
— Deep Down, a Tale of the Cornish Mines • R.M. Ballantyne
... school-books and straw previously prepared for braiding, while the old fireplace, heaped with blazing logs of hickory, oak, and fragrant birch, made the room warm and cheerful. Here, with their books before them and fastened open to the next day's lessons, the children with nimble fingers plaited the straw and studied at the same time. For children taught to be industrious, usually carry into the schoolroom the principles thus developed, and are ambitious to keep as near the head ...
— Choice Readings for the Home Circle • Anonymous
... sing Mass save for extra pay; (3) against swaggering archdeacons who suspended churches, and persons beyond their beat. These gentlemen, in the absence of a bishop, seem to have grown into popes at the least. (4) Mass not to be laid as a penance upon any non-priestly person. This was a nimble way by which confessors fined penitents to their own profit. (5) Annual and other customary masses to be said without temporal gain. (6) Priestly administration only to be undertaken by those who are ...
— Hugh, Bishop of Lincoln - A Short Story of One of the Makers of Mediaeval England • Charles L. Marson
... not help taking judicial notice of in spite of his law books, were those eyes out there on the street. They were indeed beautiful eyes and they said so much, and yet left much to the imagination—and the imagination of Judge Van Dorn was exceedingly nimble in those little matters, and in many other matters besides. Indeed, so nimble was his imagination that if it hadn't been for the fact that at Judge Van Dorn's own extra-judicial suggestion, every lawyer in town, excepting Henry ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... I said. He was, I could see, hastily collecting his sufficiently nimble powers of subterfuge. "One must buy something, you know, ...
— Select Conversations with an Uncle • H. G. Wells
... summer, but rather to follow the brook up into the wood and lie adown in the flecked shadow and rest him wholly, as if there were nought for him to do but to take in rest all that was done for his service, both by the earth and by the hands and nimble feet of Birdalone. And as she was wilful in other ways of her cherishing, so also in this, that for nought in that daylight would she go anywise disarrayed, nay not so much as to go barefoot, though he prayed her thereof sorely, and told her that fairer ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris
... her spirits, and her nimble tongue its wonted flexibility. Without further invitation or preface she entered at once upon a lively description of her wonderful journey through the jungle, the subsequent ocean voyage, and the mishap at the pier, ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... very well; the combined fleet was only a few hours distant; and I had no doubt that, with so nimble-heeled a craft as the Sword Fish, I should have very little difficulty in overtaking them in the course of a day or two. The question now was whether I should proceed forthwith in pursuit of ...
— The Log of a Privateersman • Harry Collingwood
... Even so This way the Chamois leapt: her nimble feet Have baffled me; my gains to-day will scarce Repay my break-neck travail.—What is here? Who seems not of my trade, and yet hath reached 60 A height which none even of our mountaineers, Save our best hunters, may attain: his garb Is goodly, his mien manly, and his air Proud ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron
... tried to convince himself that some noise natural to the lonely beach deceived him. In the high tide of life that the bracing air had brought him, his senses were acute and true. He knew that he heard this step: it was light, like a child's; it was nimble, like a fawn's; sometimes it was very near him. He was not in the least afraid; but do what he would, his mind could form no idea of what creature it might be who thus attended him. No dark or fearful picture crossed his mind ...
— The Mermaid - A Love Tale • Lily Dougall
... receive. The woman with the Madonna face may unmask and show the lineaments of a common shrew in her chamber. And the virago may soften into the gentleness of a saint as she gives way to the penitence of her own thoughts. The dignified man with the air of virtue and authority might show himself as a nimble-motioned rascal, timid and furtive, if he believed only God saw him. Not one of us ever acts absolutely true to what we know we are except when the door between us and every other man is closed. It is barely possible that sometimes ...
— The Co-Citizens • Corra Harris
... the passages, and up the stairs, muttering some indistinct answers to the chidings of her companion; being at length compelled to pause for breath, she gave the light into her hand, and remained behind to follow as she might: while the more nimble superior made her way to the room where the ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... Cedar street jobbers would in the present day be considered mere Liliputians, since many of their stores measured less than eighteen by thirty feet. They were occupied by a class of active men, who bought of importers and sold to country dealers on the principle of the nimble sixpence. Of this class (now about extinct) a few built up large concerns, while others, after hopelessly contending year after year with adverse fortune, sunk eventually into bankruptcy, and may in some instances now be found in the ranks of clerkship. From Cedar street, trade moved to Liberty, ...
— The Continental Monthly , Vol. 2 No. 5, November 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... by his side, A beast of fearful form he spied: At first he thought it was a bear, And headlong fell in dire despair. He lost one slipper in the moss, And this was not his only loss. With paws and snout the beast was nimble, And very soon cleared ...
— Verses for Children - and Songs for Music • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... a dozen, labor together in each sementera. They begin at one side and pass across the plat, gathering all grain as they pass. Men and women work together, but women are recognized the better harvesters, since their hands are more nimble. Each fruited stalk is grasped shortly below the fruit head, and the upper section or joint of the stalk, together with the fruit head and topmost leaf, is pulled off. As most Bontoc Igorot are right-handed, the plucked grain is laid in the left hand, the fruit heads projecting ...
— The Bontoc Igorot • Albert Ernest Jenks
... chief ways of quarrelling, the four gates to this delightful city. For it is delightful, once your 'prentice days are past. In a way it is like a cold bath on a winter's morning, and you glow all day. In a way it is like football, as the nimble aggravation dances to and fro. In a way it is like chess. Indeed, all games of skill are watered quarrels, quarrel and soda, come to see them in a proper light. And without quarrelling you have not fully appreciated your fellow-man. ...
— Certain Personal Matters • H. G. Wells
... to his subsistence, the difference in the achievements of different individuals at first remained very great. The skilful hunter gets a far richer booty than the less skilful one; the strong and nimble agriculturist achieves with the spade a manifold greater result than the weak and the slow. The invention of the plough very materially reduces this difference, and—so far as the difference depends upon physical capacity—the invention of the power-machine reduces it almost ...
— Freeland - A Social Anticipation • Theodor Hertzka
... unwieldy combined mass could be rendered powerless by his comparatively homogeneous and mobile fleet, inferior as it was, so long as he could keep it at sea and to the westward. The appreciation of the power of a nimble inferior fleet which he wrote at this time has already been given.[23] When the worst of the position was fully known, and the enemy was reported off the mouth of the Channel, he wrote another to Middleton. His only doubt was whether his fleet had the necessary cohesion and mobility. ...
— Some Principles of Maritime Strategy • Julian Stafford Corbett
... Brimming with energy, nimble of mind, impetuous, sure of himself, quick to strike, a fearless foe, frank, resourceful, audacious, honest, versatile—Roosevelt possessed the qualities which would challenge the admiration of the typical American. One who ...
— The United States Since The Civil War • Charles Ramsdell Lingley
... The nimble hours danced on, as they had a trick of doing in Madame Le Fort's salon. "I am afraid you forget the three ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 86, February, 1875 • Various
... and responsible, she swept and straightened and dusted, while her mind worked even faster than her nimble hands. Standards are formed by comparisons, and so far Nance's opportunity for instituting comparisons ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice
... of the magnificent advantages possessed by the city for prosecuting manufacturing upon an extensive scale, is wholly inexplicable. There is a mine of unproductive wealth in our midst that might at once be placed at compound interest. It now lies dormant in the sinewy arms of men and the nimble fingers of women and children. There is thus a moral aspect in this question that addresses itself with peculiar earnestness to the philanthropic. But it were a philanthropy that would lay up treasures on earth. Daily, almost ...
— Old Mackinaw - The Fortress of the Lakes and its Surroundings • W. P. Strickland
... of carrying the biggest possible cargo that could be packed into certain prescribed limits, and consequently, as might be expected, phenomenally slow. To commission such a vessel to chase and capture the nimble craft that were usually employed to transport the unhappy blacks across the Atlantic was simply a ghastly farce, and caused us, her unfortunate crew, to be the laughing-stock of the entire coast. Yet, considering all things, we had not done so very badly; for realising, early in the commission, ...
— A Middy of the Slave Squadron - A West African Story • Harry Collingwood
... evening the Lord of Jossebelin was advised that the gentleman was with his sister, and, hastening thither, found the poor love-blinded pair lying in bed together. His anger at the sight robbed him of speech, and, drawing his sword, he ran after the gentleman to kill him. But the other, being nimble of body, fled in nothing but his shirt, and, being unable to escape by the door, leaped through ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. IV. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... and the nimble running over the rocks, ever the favourite haunt, denote the "perdix." The head is black, as in the C. melanocephala of Abyssinia, and the legs and feet are red like the smaller "Greek" caccabis that inhabits the Hism; the male birds have no spurs, and they are but little ...
— The Land of Midian, Vol. 2 • Richard Burton
... his nimble feet, the high-tempered Bar kicked the shepherd in the side. Caught at full leap, she was knocked completely over and ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... the robin in the spring, Aunt Emmie on Honey Camp Run, in clean starched apron and calico frock, dragged her rocker to the front stoop of her little house and there she sat for hours rocking contentedly while her nimble fingers moved swiftly with crochet needle and thread. "Aunt Emmie's crocheting lace for Lulie Bell's wedding garments." Folks knew the signs. Hadn't Lulie Bell ridden muleback from Old Nell Knob just as soon as winter broke to take the day with the old woman. ...
— Blue Ridge Country • Jean Thomas
... and mutton-chop whiskers that projected on either side as if electrified—was standing on the poop to windward, with the first mate, Mr Scuppers, and the passenger, "Mr Meredith," looking up aloft at the nimble topmen, who were adding acre to acre to the sail-surface of the ship, and pluming her snowy pinions with a pull here and a shake there. Mr Sprott, the second mate, was to leeward of the helmsman; the boatswain on the forecastle, ...
— The Penang Pirate - and, The Lost Pinnace • John Conroy Hutcheson
... hen-roost was again visited, and the fowl counted one less in the morning. The oldest son, with some attendants made search, and came upon the poor fellow, in the act of dressing his spoil. He was too nimble for them, and made his retreat good into a dense swamp. When much effort to start him from his hiding place had proved unsuccessful, it was resolved to lay an ambush for him, some distance ahead. The wagon, meantime, was in charge of a lad, who accompanied ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... this was so far from being tiresome that she quite forgot what her godmother had recommended to her, so that she at last counted the clock striking twelve when she took it to be no more than eleven. She then rose up and fled as nimble as a deer. The prince followed, but could not overtake her. She left behind one of her glass slippers, which the prince took up most carefully. She got home, but quite out of breath, without coach or footmen, and in her old cinder clothes, having nothing left ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... appealed to, fidgeted and turned color, and his hands worked by his side. "Your reverence!" cried he, in an imploring tone, and stayed where he was. On this Mr. Eden made no more ado, but darted to Josephs' side and began to unfasten him with nimble fingers. ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... in proportion to its monstrosity. For all that—despite his prejudices, despite even his often deliberate perversion of the truth, it is difficult to avoid a certain kindliness for him. To the literary student he is indeed a captivating figure. With his half-Welsh, half-Norman blood; with the nimble, excitable, distinctly Celtic vein constantly discernible in him; with a love of fighting which could hardly have been exceeded by the doughtiest of the knights, his cousins and brothers; with a pen that seems to fly like an arrow across the page; ...
— The Story Of Ireland • Emily Lawless
... believe I have said, soon set up with the smallest spice of encouragement. He was, moreover, as light and nimble as a grasshopper, and, in his whole appearance, much such an animal, could it be made to stand on end. His dream, therefore, was enough. He vowed a vow of unconquerable might, and to it he went. Springing upon his board, ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... snored so loud that he could not hear the music; and Jack quickly stole out, and seizing the harp, ran away with it. But the harp was a fairy belonging to the giant, and as Jack ran, it cried out, "Master! Master!" The giant woke up slowly and rushed after Jack, but the boy was very nimble and outran him. You may imagine how fast Jack went down the bean-stalk this time, hearing all the while the tramp of ...
— The National Nursery Book - With 120 illustrations • Unknown
... made his bed Among the glowing embers red. A Fiery Furnace, to his mind, Hygiene and Luxury combined. He was, if I may put it so, A Saurian Abednigo. He loved to climb with nimble ease The branches of the Gas-log Trees Where oft on chilly winter nights He rose to dizzy Fahrenheits. Believers in Soul Transmigration See in him the Re-incarnation Of those Sad Plagues of summer, who Ask, "Is ...
— The Mythological Zoo • Oliver Herford
... sagacity that he made no more objections, and professed himself ready to begin the adventure immediately. They accordingly set out and walked at a pretty brisk pace; so brisk, indeed, that Perseus found it rather difficult to keep up with his nimble friend Quicksilver. To say the truth, he had a singular idea that Quicksilver was furnished with a pair of winged shoes, which, of course, helped him along marvelously. And then, too, when Perseus looked sideways at him out of the corner of his eye, he seemed to see wings on the ...
— Famous Tales of Fact and Fancy - Myths and Legends of the Nations of the World Retold for Boys and Girls • Various
... are light on their feet: it takes stout poets to write nimble verses (Mr. Chesterton, for instance). Don Marquis has something of Dobsonian cunning to set his musings to delicate, austere music. He can turn a rondeau or a triolet as gracefully as a paying ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley
... left alone by their husbands and fathers, who were with the army, were more than ever thrown on their own resources. They tilled the farm, reared their swarthy and nimble broods of children, and sent the boys in blue and buff all they could spare from their slender store. During all this trying period they were fitting themselves for that new life in the western wilds which had been marked out for them by the hand ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... heaviness of lobe which is a sure sign of sluggish intellect and coarse perception. Hers is the artist's ear. Note next those hands: how beautifully shaped! small, but not doll-like hands,—ready and nimble, firm and nervous hands, that could work for a helpmate. By no means very white, still less red, but somewhat embrowned as by the sun, such as you may see in girls reared in southern climes, and in her perhaps betokening an ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... the most grotesque is that the weak can come together, can pass a law to curb the strong, can set one of their number to enforce it, may then disperse with no occasion further to trouble about the strong. Every line of every page of history tells how the strong—the nimble-witted, the farsighted, the ambitious—have worked their will upon their feebler and less purposeful fellow men, regardless of any and all precautions to the contrary. Conditions have improved only because the number of the strong has increased. With so many lions at war with each other not ...
— The Grain Of Dust - A Novel • David Graham Phillips
... difference between English and Irish there are many; nimble apprehension, fluent utterance, genial demeanour, the attraction of the flashing Celtic face, distinguish an Irish from an English group, but characteristics like this do not prove any original or consistent ...
— The Quarterly Review, Volume 162, No. 324, April, 1886 • Various
... to the cannery site, abreast of which lay The Bedford Castle, where they lingered until the creeping twilight forced them to the boat again. When they reached the ship the cool Arctic night had descended, but its quiet was broken by the halting nimble of steam- winches, the creak of tackle, the cries of men, and the sounds of a great activity. Baring his head to the breezes Boyd filled his lungs full of the bracing air, sweet with the flavor of spring, vowing secretly that no music that he had ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach
... so pretty and so nimble. I believe he could run up—' and then she stopped; but I knew what the complete sentence would have been. She was going to say: 'I believe he could run up the gangways without ...
— Aylwin • Theodore Watts-Dunton
... In wrestling nimble, and in running swift, In shooting steady, and in swimming strong, Well made to strike, to leap, to throw, to lift, And all the ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... Irish harvesters, Stranryan "strappers" and "lifters," crow-boys, and all the miscellany of a Galloway farm about the end of the Napoleonic wars ate from wooden platters, with only their own horn spoon and pocket-knife to aid their nimble fingers. There was no complaint, for Glenanmays was "a grand meat house," and with the broth served without stint and the meats rent asunder by the hands of the senior ploughman, the Young Lions ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett
... which engirdle this island," the Ambassador said thoughtfully, "have brought the English great weal, as they may bring to her much woe. The too-nimble brain of the diplomat has its parallel of insincerity in the people whose interests he seems to guard. I believe in the honesty of the English politicians, I have placed that belief on record in the small volume of memoirs which I shall presently entrust to you. ...
— The Great Impersonation • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... (not yet called the "OLD Dessauer," being under forty yet), General Glasenap, Colonel Derschau, General Flans; these, and the other nameless Generals and Officials, are a curious counterpart to the Camases, the Hautcharmoys and Forcades, with their nimble tongues and rapiers; still more to the Beausobres, Achards, full of ecclesiastical logic, made of Bayle and Calvin kneaded together; and to the high-frizzled ladies rustling in stiff silk, with ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume IV. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Friedrich's Apprenticeship, First Stage—1713-1728 • Thomas Carlyle
... we seen Done at the Mermaid? heard words that have been So nimble, and so full of subtle flame, As if that every one from whence they came Had meant to put his whole wit in a jest, And had resolved to live a fool the rest Of his ...
— A Life of William Shakespeare - with portraits and facsimiles • Sidney Lee
... middle size, rather slender than otherwise; many are little, but few tall or stout; the most of them have good features, and agreeable countenances; are, like all the tropical race, active and nimble; and seem to excel in the use of arms, but not to be fond of labour. They never would put a hand to assist in any work we were carrying on, which the people of the other islands used to delight in. Bat what I judge most ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World Volume 2 • James Cook
... good man Grangousier, who was then merrily drinking with his guests, heard his son roar out for drink, he said to him in French, "Que Grand Tu As et souple le gousier!" That is to say, "How great and nimble a throat thou hast." Hearing this, the company said that the child verily ought to be called Gargantua, because it was the first word uttered by his father at his birth. Which the father graciously permitted, and to calm the child ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various
... shall we have for the wedding supper?' Heigho, &c. 'A roasted potato and a roll o' butter.' Terry heigho, &c. Supper was laid down to dine, Heigho, &c. Changed a farthing and brought up wine, Terry heigho, &c. First come in was a nimble bee, Heigho, &c. With his fiddle upon his knee, Terry heigho, &c. Next come in was a creeping snail, Heigho, &c. With his bagpipes under his tail, Terry heigho, &c. Next came in was a neighbour's pig, Heigho, &c. 'Pray, good people, will ye play us a jig?' Terry heigho, ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 35, June 29, 1850 • Various
... of a girl larger and older than the rest,—a genuine, coal-black, woolly-headed, thick-lipped young negro. This was the daughter of Venus, the cook, and her appointment of service was the kitchen. Full of fun, and nimble as an eel in every joint, her various pranks and feats of skill were perfectly amazing, and were received with boisterous applause by the rest of ...
— Step by Step - or, Tidy's Way to Freedom • The American Tract Society
... to the woman. He had for some seconds been intently watching what was going on a few steps away. He was looking at the Armenian family and at two French soldiers who had gone up to them. One of these, a nimble little man, was wearing a blue coat tied round the waist with a rope. He had a nightcap on his head and his feet were bare. The other, whose appearance particularly struck Pierre, was a long, lank, round-shouldered, ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... he opened the door of the stable, when a supple, nimble body darted between his legs, and threw him on his face. It was Marius, running ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... too nimble for your sense, Is guilty of a high offence; Hath introduced unkind debate, And topsy-turvy turn'd our state. In gallantry I sent the ring, The token of a love-sick king: Under fair Mab's auspicious name From me the trifling ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume I • Horace Walpole
... bough; and such a windless hush Breathes through the air, it seems the fairy glen About some phantom palace, pale abode Of fabled Sleeping Beauty. Songless birds Flit restlessly about the breathless wood, Waiting the sudden breaking of the charm; And as they quickly spring on nimble wing From the white twig, a sparkling shower falls Starlike. It is not whiteness, but a clear Outshining of all purity, which takes The winking eyes with such a silvery gleam. No sunshine, and the sky is all one cloud. The vale seems ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow, Vol. IV (of IV) • Harrison S. Morris
... young horseman, but as Black Boy bounded forward they stopped short. A score of bullets came whizzing about Bart's ears, and as the reports of the pieces echoed from the face of the mountain, the cob reared right up and fell over backwards, Bart saving himself by a nimble spring on one side, and fortunately retaining his hold of the bridle as ...
— The Silver Canyon - A Tale of the Western Plains • George Manville Fenn
... the order, "Get under way at once." From the surrounding men-of-war came the shrill pipe of the boatswains' whistle, and the steady tramp of the men at the capstan bars as they dragged the anchors to the cat-heads. The nimble blue-jackets, climbing about the shrouds and yards, soon had the snowy clouds of canvas set. The wind was fresh; and with bands playing, and cheers of blue-jackets and soldiers, the stately squadron sailed ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... ma'am; you are very kind," replied Katy; and her nimble fingers had soon made a nice little parcel for the lady, who gave her ...
— Poor and Proud - or The Fortunes of Katy Redburn • Oliver Optic
... which are arranged before the bodies of four men, who stand in the centre of the weird circle. Bombay, as ever comical, never so much at home as when in the dance of the Mrima, has my water-bucket on his head; Chowpereh— the sturdy, the nimble, sure-footed Chowpereh—has an axe in his hand, and wears a goatskin on his head; Baraka has my bearskin, and handles a spear; Mabruki, the "Bull-headed," has entered into the spirit of the thing, and steps up and down ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... Byzantine imagination brought hither, perhaps, by a Spanish Army of occupation. Also it has a tea-room which is the trysting-place of all the officers in billets, and the chatelaine of which answers your lame and halting French in nimble English. On the road to Locre it has those Baths and Wash-houses which have become so justly famous, and whence hosts of British soldiers come forth like Naaman white as snow, but infinitely more companionable. Almost any day ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan
... general appearance, it partakes more of the goat. It has two large twisted horns, sometimes weighing, when at full growth, from twenty-five to thirty pounds, which in, running it rests upon its back. These creatures are exceedingly, nimble and swift, haunt only the most craggy and mountainous parts, and make their way among the steepest rocks with an agility that is astonishing. The natives work their horns into spoons, and small cups and platters; and have frequently one of ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 17 • Robert Kerr
... then gusts came first larboard then starboard, and again bows on and stern on, with a force that snapped the rigging like pipe stems, and tore the canvass from the bolt ropes, notwithstanding the prompt orders and nimble efforts of the seamen, before it could be secured. Half an hour of this strange weather nearly stripped the ship of her standing rigging, leaving her comparatively a helpless wreck upon the waters, a mere log at the mercy of the wind ...
— The Sea-Witch - or, The African Quadroon A Story of the Slave Coast • Maturin Murray
... well, about whose flowery banks The nimble-footed Fairies dance their rounds, By the pale moon-shine, dipping oftentimes Their stolen children, so to make them free From dying flesh, and ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3) • Walter Scott
... But Jack was too nimble to remain still and receive whatever attack the other might rain upon him, and when Furniss' fist descended it missed its mark, to strike plump upon the sharp edge of a bar of iron, peeling the skin on its ...
— Jack North's Treasure Hunt - Daring Adventures in South America • Roy Rockwood
... they haue broade and flatte visages, of a tanned colour into yellowe and blacke, fierce and cruell lookes, thinne haired vpon the upper lippe, and pitte of the chinne, light and nimble bodied, with short legges, as if they were made naturally for horsemen: whereto they practise themselues from their childhood, seldome going afoot about anie businesse. Their speech is verie sudden and loude, speaking as it were out of a deepe hollowe throate. When they sing you would ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of The English Nation v. 4 • Richard Hakluyt
... hearts they are contrary to God; they are proud, disobedient, rebellious, and he who sees and knows his own heart sees all this to be in it; and he knows that it is the Lord who cries upon him, in the day of His own power, and frames his heart in a new mould, and makes it to be so nimble and cheerful in any good work,—that albeit they had been before running with all their speed to the devil, yet He makes them to stand still in the way and look about them, and consider what they have been doing, and then to turn about again. Albeit thou were like ...
— The Covenants And The Covenanters - Covenants, Sermons, and Documents of the Covenanted Reformation • Various
... corporations. This assumption proved to be false, and Secretary Ballinger was exonerated by a public investigation; but for two years, at least, the cloud hung over Mr. Taft's reputation, and, as always happens, the correction being far less nimble than the accusation, took a much longer time in remedying the harm that it ...
— Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography, • William Roscoe Thayer
... than usual: gone to the house of the spoiler. Nor did she come home, as she had been wont to do, with radiant eyes, and a soft, sweet smile coming and going, and many a pleasant piece of news to tell off on her nimble fingers. She returned with tear-stained eyelids and a downcast air, and was often altogether silent as to the result of ...
— Cobwebs and Cables • Hesba Stretton
... patiently into the snowy lawn Unfolds its bosom; buds, and leaves, and sprigs, And curling tendrils, gracefully disposed, Follow the nimble finger of the fair; A wreath, that cannot fade, of flowers that blow With most success when all ...
— The Marquis of Lossie • George MacDonald
... Without the beauty of a womans face; From womens eyes this doctrine I deriue, They are the Ground, the Bookes, the Achadems, From whence doth spring the true Promethean fire. Why, vniuersall plodding poysons vp The nimble spirits in the arteries, As motion and long during action tyres The sinnowy vigour of the trauailer. Now for not looking on a womans face, You haue in that forsworne the vse of eyes: And studie too, the causer of your vow. For where is ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... may have taught his fingers to be nimble; may have given them speed of motion and precision in their action. No child of his born after he acquired this wonderful facility of execution is any more likely to be a skilled musician than a child born before ...
— The Meaning of Evolution • Samuel Christian Schmucker
... eyes are open while mine close. Let no dreams my head infest, But such as Jacob's temples blest. While I do rest, my soul advance: Make my sleep a holy trance: That I may, my rest being wrought, Awake into some holy thought, And with as active vigour run My course as doth the nimble sun. Sleep is a death;—Oh make me try, By sleeping, what it is to die! And as gently lay my head On my grave, as now my bed. Howe'er I rest, great God, let me Awake again at last with thee. And thus assured, behold I lie Securely, or to wake or die. These are my ...
— Religio Medici, Hydriotaphia, and the Letter to a Friend • Sir Thomas Browne
... to believe that they were the most profoundly cultivated of all peoples; that a larger proportion of men lived complete, well-rounded, harmonious lives in ancient Athens than in any other known community. Keen, nimble-minded, and self-possessed; audacious speculators, but temperate and averse to extravagance; emotionally healthy, and endowed with an unequalled sense of beauty and propriety; how admirable and wonderful they ...
— The Unseen World and Other Essays • John Fiske
... advance, while his aged, but seemingly robust, employer would follow silently and thoughtfully at a distance of a few yards. At home, however, his position was more clearly defined, and William became the humble valet and the nimble waiter. ...
— Bucholz and the Detectives • Allan Pinkerton
... matter, they often denote it by some mark only, as those other titles Andria Eunuchus, or these, Sylla, Cicero, Torquatus. I love a poetic march, by leaps and skips, 'tis an art, as Plato says, light, nimble; and a little demoniacal. There are places in Plutarch where he forgets his theme, where the proposition of his argument is only found incidentally, and stuffed throughout with foreign matter. Do but observe his meanders in the Demon of Socrates. How beautiful are his variations and ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... which the fathers contemplated in founding our nation. When they undertook to secure for us all "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," they did not mean a bare clinging to existence, liberty to starve, and the pursuit of a nimble happiness by the lame, the halt, and the blind. They meant fullness of life, liberty in the broadest sense, both outer and inner, and that almost certain success in the attainment of happiness which these two guarantee a ...
— The Joyful Heart • Robert Haven Schauffler
... the darkness was more dense in the mesquite bush than on the open prairie, and, although he caught a glimpse of the vanishing mustang, he saw nothing of the figure on his back, for the reason that, when the nimble youth vaulted thither, he threw himself forward ...
— The Great Cattle Trail • Edward S. Ellis
... hysterical laugh, at the very instant when something giving way aloft let the ship right herself again. "Hold on a minute," I said. "Take this water. Now drink a little. I'll be back in a moment." The ship was rolling drunkenly in the trough of the sea; but I made a nimble rush to the cabin, where the captain's cruet of brandy bottles still swung from a hook in the beams. I ran back to her with a bottle of brandy. There were a few unbroken mugs in the pantry, so I gave her a drink ...
— Martin Hyde, The Duke's Messenger • John Masefield
... ran swiftly through the woods The nimble deer to take, That with their cries the hills and dales An ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester
... leaves and bits of bark; that one leg of the table was too short and had to be propped up with a piece of tile. He tells us that the kindhearted couple tried to catch their one goose so as to cook it for the supper of their guests; but that they were so old, and the goose so nimble of wing, that he escaped them and flew to the Gods for refuge. We are so accustomed to think of Latin as a grave, dignified language that almost every line of Ovid's "Metamorphoses" is a pleasant surprise. The stories that he tells, "The Miraculous Pitcher", ...
— The Children's Hour, Volume 3 (of 10) • Various
... I am also indebted for a description of Mary Anderson in As You Like It: "Miss Anderson, superbly handsome as Rosalind, indicated that beneath her pretty swagger, nimble satire and silver playfulness Rosalind is as earnest of Juliet—though different in temperament and mind—as fond as Viola ...
— The Merry-Go-Round • Carl Van Vechten
... myself that I combined frankness with good-nature in the right proportion, and in the end he was always satisfied with the nimble fiver. But I'm afraid things are going harder with him. He has lost his old alert gaiety, and he's a little down at heel in character as well as in person. There's a furtive look about him, as though he ...
— The Explorer • W. Somerset Maugham
... Brown-eyed Boy and the Blue-eyed Girl looked over the five homely, floundering little birds, and, choosing Corbie, put him into his hat and climbed down with him. He was a nimble sort of father, or he never could have done it, so tall a tree it was, with no ...
— Bird Stories • Edith M. Patch
... be nimble both in mind and body. The moment he had read Ashton's order, he wheeled about to rush back the way he had come, and let out a bull-like bellow: "Hi, youse! clear ...
— Out of the Primitive • Robert Ames Bennet
... Third Out. Being nimble-footed, he hath outrun us, But Moses and Valerius follow him. Go thou with her to the west end of the wood; There is our captain: we'll follow him that's fled; 10 The thicket is beset; ...
— Two Gentlemen of Verona - The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.] • William Shakespeare
... up, sir: and I may say, between ourselves, as your friend, sir, put up a bit of a fight for him. Very nimble with his fists he was, sir, or so I heard it mentioned. I wasn't myself mixed up in the affair. But from the faces on them as brought him in I should say, strikly between ourselves, he's lucky the word isn't assault—even aggeravated. But the Inspector took the report . . . and ...
— Foe-Farrell • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... nimble youths climb up the trunk and near the top tie two stout and very long Indian canes, letting the ends dangle to the ground. As soon as the tree gives the slightest sign of vacillation the men hurry down, grasp a rattan upon each side and with all their might, rhythmically ...
— My Friends the Savages - Notes and Observations of a Perak settler (Malay Peninsula) • Giovanni Battista Cerruti
... the doctor's mind was nimble, and he said in quick expostulation: "Come, come; you mustn't be morbid. You are thinking about poor Sam and blaming yourself. Why, Mrs. Richie, you are no more responsible for his ...
— The Awakening of Helena Richie • Margaret Deland
... to the ground. Conscious of both, their glittering arms he stripp'd, 135 For he had seen them when from Ida's heights Achilles led them to the Grecian fleet. As with resistless fangs the lion breaks The young in pieces of the nimble hind, Entering her lair, and takes their feeble lives; 140 She, though at hand, can yield them no defence, But through the thick wood, wing'd with terror, starts Herself away, trembling at such a foe; ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer
... considered goods, when a man may enjoy an abundance of them, and yet be most miserable. Is there any doubt but that a man who enjoys the best health, and who has strength and beauty, and his senses flourishing in their utmost quickness and perfection; suppose him likewise, if you please, nimble and active, nay, give him riches, honours, authority, power, glory; now, I say, should this person, who is in possession of all these, be unjust, intemperate, timid, stupid, or an idiot, could you hesitate to call such ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero
... this particular crop: for these reasons he always left it until the last, and then revelled in the gold of sunshine, bird, butterfly, and flower. Several days were required to harvest the mullein and during the time the man worked with nimble fingers, while his brain was intensely occupied with the question of what to do next in his search for ...
— The Harvester • Gene Stratton Porter
... host awaiting us—a thin little man, of some fifty years of age, nimble in his movements, and extremely courteous and affable. He appeared to be one who occupied himself, much less with the affairs of his parish, than with the cultivation of his garden, and the preservation of entomological specimens—of which ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid
... by being taught to imitate. Except that they are charming, revivals of morris-dancing and folk-singing are little better than Arts and Crafts in the open. The dust of the museum is upon them. They may turn boys and girls into nimble virtuosi; they will not make them artists. Because no two ages express their sense of form in precisely the same way all attempts to recreate the forms of another age must sacrifice emotional expression to imitative address. Old-world merry-making ...
— Art • Clive Bell
... seized the bar and rushed at the Indian. Then began a duel in which the savage's quickness and cunning matched the white man's strength and fury. Silvertip dodged the vicious swings Joe aimed at him; he parried many blows, any one of which would have crushed his skull. Nimble as a cat, he avoided every rush, while his dark eyes watched for an opening. He fought wholly on the defensive, craftily reserving his strength until ...
— The Spirit of the Border - A Romance of the Early Settlers in the Ohio Valley • Zane Grey
... difficulties, by talking in large terms about the progressiveness of the revelation, as though the progress were from error to truth, instead of from half light to full light, is another illustration. The nimble way in which we have turned what is given as history into fiction, and allowed imagination to roam through the Bible, is another illustration. One of our later writers tells the story of Jonah, and says it sounds like fiction; why not call it fiction? Another ...
— The Greatest English Classic A Study of the King James Version of • Cleland Boyd McAfee |
