"Odd" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... nevertheless we are implacable opponents. Mr. Parker has graciously spread, face up on the table for my inspection, an extremely hard hand to beat; so now it's quite in order for me to spring my little joker and try to take the odd trick. Mr. Conway, I want you to do something for me. Not for my sake or the sake of my dead father, who was a good friend of yours, but for the sake of this state where we were both born and which we love because it is symbolical of the United States. ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne
... to kape the breath av loife in a poor soul, with a bitter hard winter over me, and niver a chick or child to do a hand's turn.' I hadn't much faith in her, remembering my other humbug, but I did pity the old mummy; so I got some tea and sugar, and a shawl, and used to give her my odd pennies as I passed. I never told at home, they made such fun of my efforts to be charitable. I thought I really was getting on pretty well after a time, as my old Biddy seemed quite cheered up, and I was planning ...
— A Garland for Girls • Louisa May Alcott
... action which ensued the Arethusa appears to have got the worst of it. In the end, after about an hour's fighting, Keppel's liners came up, and the Belle Poule made off. She was afterwards driven ashore by a superior English force, and it is an odd coincidence that in 1789 the Arethusa ran ashore off Brest during her action (10th March) with l'Aigrette. As for the French captain, he lived to command l'Hercule, De Grasse's leading ship in the great sea-fight (12th April 1782) with Rodney ...
— Lyra Heroica - A Book of Verse for Boys • Various
... odd for me to feel this last to be a disadvantage, being myself an only child, and always a happy one, sharing with mother all the space in father's big heart. But this is because God has been very good to me, ...
— People of the Whirlpool • Mabel Osgood Wright
... There happen frequently little odd coincidences in time, that recall momentary faith in the notion of sympathies acting in absence. I heard of your brother's return, for the first time, on Monday last, the day on which your letter is dated, from Stoddart. Had it rained on my naked skin I could not have felt more strangely. The ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull
... black hair of which they are possessors is taken care of in an odd manner. The men cut all their hair close to the head, except a strip about an inch wide, running over the front of the scalp from temple to temple, and another strip, of about the same width, perpendicular to the former, crossing the crown of the head ...
— The Seminole Indians of Florida • Clay MacCauley
... as in a checker game they had him at disadvantage with the odd number of the "move." Theirs was the chance to observe, and an open attempt to follow them would be ridiculous. Then, the footprints gave him ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball
... like father," he said once, which, perhaps, explained the preference; but then Allan had so much tact and gentleness. Fred did not understand him at all; he called him odd and uncanny, which ...
— Esther - A Book for Girls • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... first view of Venice—and this of Amsterdam, are among the delightful shocks which I have had as a traveller. Amsterdam is as good as Venice, with a superadded humor and grotesqueness, which gives the sight-seer the most singular zest and pleasure. A run through Pekin I could hardly fancy to be more odd, strange, and yet familiar. This rush, and crowd, and prodigious vitality; this immense swarm of life; these busy waters, crowding barges, swinging drawbridges, piled ancient gables, spacious markets teeming with people; that ever-wonderful ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... quantity of spare reeds and thorns, and wound quite a large skein of silk to bind the barbed heads with, as they were quite prepared to lose several of their arrows at the outset, and accordingly made ample provision for their replacement, which could be done at odd moments, while working their way up the river. Their next business was to plait two quivers of palm-leaf fibre, with shoulder straps to support the same; and it was Stukely who had to make these, for when Dick endeavoured to follow his friend's instructions ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... Chinamen went about the decks wearing but their jeans and blouses. Kitchell had long since abandoned his coat and vest. Wilbur's oilskins became intolerable, and he was at last constrained to trade his pocket-knife to Charlie for a suit of jeans and wicker sandals, such as the coolies wore—and odd ...
— Moran of the Lady Letty • Frank Norris
... him to diagnose his sensations correctly. This odd impulse to leap across the compartment and kiss Joan was not love. It was merely the natural desire of a good-hearted young man to be ...
— Something New • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... the mountains, on the outskirts of the village. These were of curious forms and excellent workmanship, and included large ornaments for the ears and pendants for the neck, made of thin sheets of gold; turtles and human skulls cast in a single piece; and most curious of all, odd pieces of filigree where the gold-wire was coiled into strange human heads. One of these was made half of gold and half ...
— In Indian Mexico (1908) • Frederick Starr
... for a minute at the two odd figures, and cried: "Why! it's Mother Hubbard's dog and Puss in Boots!" And ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, October 1878, No. 12 • Various
... An odd element of fatality seemed to attach itself to the Byzantine Saint Peter in the cathedral of Delgratz. Joan nearly lost her life within a few hours of the time when first she saw that remarkable work of art, and it was ordained that one of the last ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy
... have just found out," said I; "father bids me to be sure and see her, if possible, and says that I must ask you about it. It is very odd I never have heard of this before. By the bye, Bill, my boy, look at this here!" and I displayed a draft on Mr. Stowe ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... there has been more than one case where a letter has been mailed on which there was not space to place the stamps; an entire sheet (100) of 15 cents stamps was pasted on, obliterated, and then another with some odd values completed the prepayment; and the case can be recalled of a letter on which $40.00 postage was prepaid. While the Jubilee set was in everyday use the sight of the higher values was quite common on any mail for the ...
— The Stamps of Canada • Bertram Poole
... "Aren't you ashamed to treat my dog that way after I fed you sugar and gave you my lunch?" he asked. "And now I suppose I shall have to give you more sugar to get you to come down. I don't care to have Mother Bruin with her three hundred odd pounds roosting in ...
— Followers of the Trail • Zoe Meyer
... insects jerked the abdomen sharply downward, butting the comb or shell of smooth paper a forceful blow, and producing a very distinct noise. I could not at first see the mass of wasps which were giving forth the major rhythm, as they were hidden deep in the nest, but the fifty-odd wasps in sight kept perfect time, or occasionally an individual skipped one or two beats, coming in regularly on every alternate or every third beat. Where they were two or three deep, the uppermost wasps struck the insects below them with their ...
— Edge of the Jungle • William Beebe
... is that, on the whole he is so peculiarly serious. This may seem an odd ground of praise for a jocose draughtsman, and of course what I mean is that his comic force is serious—a very different thin from the absence of comedy. This essential sign of the caricaturist may surely be anything it will so long as it is there. Daumier's figures ...
— Picture and Text - 1893 • Henry James
... employed, Mr. HARE should have given a very light comedy, nay, even a farcical touch to his treatment of the "business" of sniffing the perfume—when he is literally "on the scent"—and to the momentous situation of his interview with Zicka. "Maintenant a nos deux!" Odd that, in his treatment of the strength of the scent, SARDOU should have shown the feebleness of his methods. Yet so it is. The play, at this point, being practically played out, he carelessly chucks the puppets into a corner. He has made ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, March 4, 1893 • Various
... so much attacked for his scruples of conscience as this prince; and what seems odd enough, no person has been so much attacked for resorting to books of Casuistry, and for encouraging literary men to write books of Casuistry. Under his suggestion and sanction, Saunderson wrote his book on the obligation of an oath, (for which ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v1 • Thomas de Quincey
... have been two whole weeks without writing," she said. "It seems so odd to me, because you have spoiled me by your customary goodness. I know that other men when they are engaged do not trouble themselves with constant letter-writing. Even Theodore, who, according to Cecilia, is perfect, would not write to her then very ...
— The Claverings • Anthony Trollope
... "A" Company found it full of the enemy. Odd lengths of trenches here and there, cellars in every direction were filled with bombers and machine gun teams, some facing West, others, who had realised our intentions, facing East. Led by Lieut. Brodribb and their platoon commanders, "A" Company dashed in with the bayonet. ...
— The Fifth Leicestershire - A Record Of The 1/5th Battalion The Leicestershire Regiment, - T.F., During The War, 1914-1919. • J.D. Hills
... ever since. All our property, except the factory itself, this schooner, and a few hundred acres of worthless land, has gone to the lawyers. While they have fought over the case, I have made a sort of a living for the family by running the factory at odd times, when there was no warship at hand to prevent. This season promises to be one of the best for lobsters ever known, and we had so nearly exhausted our supply of cans that I went to St. Johns ...
— Under the Great Bear • Kirk Munroe
... and the meter was merely a black void in the panel. Whatever had been mounted at the top had been broken away, to leave ragged shards. Inside the gaping hole in the case, tiny, blackened components hung at odd angles. ...
— Millennium • Everett B. Cole
... no bright pleasure in her eyes this time; the girl looked worn and haggard. She drew Amelius away into a corner, and whispered to him. "I get a pain sometimes where the bruise is," she said; "and I've got it bad, now." She glanced, with an odd furtive jealousy, at Rufus. "I kept away from you," she explained, "because I didn't want him to know." She stopped, and put her hand on her bosom, and clenched her teeth fast. "Never mind," she said cheerfully, as the pang passed ...
— The Fallen Leaves • Wilkie Collins
... distribution has actually been observed in the pollen mother-cell in rubrinervis. When a gamete with 8 chromosomes unites in fertilisation with a normal gamete with 7 the zygote has 15. The lata mutants having an odd chromosome are almost completely male-sterile, and their seed production is also much reduced: but this partial sterility cannot be attributed entirely to the odd chromosome because semilata, which has also 15 chromosomes, does not show the ...
— Hormones and Heredity • J. T. Cunningham
... page 41 that he was "an odd mixture of small shrewdness and simple credulity," did he mean that he was shrewd, or that he was not shrewd? Can you find anything in the paragraphs to develop the thought that he was shrewd? How many paragraphs are given to his simple credulity? ...
— English: Composition and Literature • W. F. (William Franklin) Webster
... never before heard of the street mentioned in Virginia's last letter, and her heart misgave her as to its being one of the most fashionable for the abodes of the wealthy. The curiously scrutinizing look and odd smile of the hack-driver when she gave him the address did not tend ...
— Grandmother Elsie • Martha Finley
... universal of all acts should be associated by men with the most exclusive of all types of institution. It is only because we are so accustomed to this—taking churches for granted, even when we reject them—that we do not see how odd they really are: how curious it is that men do not set up exclusive and mutually hostile clubs full of rules and regulations to enjoy the light of the sun in particular times and fashions, but do persistently set up such exclusives clubs full of rules and regulations, ...
— The Life of the Spirit and the Life of To-day • Evelyn Underhill
... now "does trouble himself about the Warming Pan?"—which is yet "a harmless necessary and I will add a comforting article of domestic furniture." Observe necessary, as though every family had it as an article of their "domestic furniture." It is odd to think of Mary going round all the beds in the house, and deftly introducing this "article" between the sheets. Or was it only for the old people: or in chilly weather merely? On these points we must be unsatisfied. The practice, however, points to a certain effeminacy—the average person ...
— Pickwickian Manners and Customs • Percy Fitzgerald
... thee my horses after breakfast; and we'll go a bird-netting to-night, and on Monday there's a cock-match at Winchester—do you love cock-fighting, Harry?—between the gentlemen of Sussex and the gentlemen of Hampshire, at ten pound the battle, and fifty pound the odd battle ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... see everything—Father Dan in his surplice, the fishermen in their clean "ganzies," the village people in their Sunday clothes, the Rechabites, the Foresters, and the Odd-fellows with their coloured badges and banners coming round the corner of the road, and the mothers with babies too young to be left looking ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... "It's very odd," observed Mr. Palfrey to his wife and daughters. "He seems to say Freely's his brother come back ...
— Brother Jacob • George Eliot
... "Wherever fighting's the game, Or a spice of danger in grown man's work," Said Kelly, "you'll find my name." "And do we fall short," said Burke, getting mad, "When it's touch and go for life?" Said Shea, "It's thirty-odd years, be dad, Since I charged to drum and fife Up Marye's Heights, and my old canteen Stopped a Rebel ball on its way. There were blossoms of blood on our sprigs of green— Kelly and Burke and Shea— And the dead didn't brag." ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various
... doubtful to me if Emerson really knows or feels what Poetry is at its highest, as in the Bible, for instance, or Homer or Shakspere. I see he covertly or plainly likes best superb verbal polish, or something old or odd—Waller's "Go, lovely rose," or Lovelace's lines "to Lucusta"—the quaint conceits of the old French bards, and the like. Of power he seems to have a gentleman's admiration—but in his inmost heart the grandest attribute of God and Poets is always subordinate ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... our seventeenth century dwelling being extremely deep and solidly built, was at once commandeered as refuge for one hundred persons in case of bombardment, and we must needs share it with some ninety odd less fortunate neighbours. ...
— With Those Who Wait • Frances Wilson Huard
... "That was an odd pledge that she beguiled me into," he murmured. "I fear that in the wiles of her unselfish heart she has caught me in some kind of a trap." But after a little time he relapsed again into a condition of ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe
... suddenly say, "Boo!" That, MILNER thought, would be conclusive proof of the efficacy of the boots as making the tread inaudible. On other hand, SPEAKER mightn't like it. So, by way of compromise, brought down odd boot in tail-pocket of his coat, and shook it at HOME SECRETARY when ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, March 25, 1893 • Various
... wasn't going to borrow money I couldn't pay! I'd rather not tell you, all the same, father! At least, I earned twenty cents of it. That's the odd twenty, that makes the three seventy. I don't ...
— The Little City Of Hope - A Christmas Story • F. Marion Crawford
... It seems odd to me that Levitan did not like Italy. It's a fascinating country. If I were a solitary person, an artist, and had money, I should live here in the winter. You see, Italy, apart from its natural scenery and warmth, is the one country in which you feel convinced that art is really supreme ...
— Letters of Anton Chekhov • Anton Chekhov
... coast is just exactly as indefensible as if they should now claim the island of Nantucket." He was willing, however, to refer the question unconfused by other issues to a second Joint Commission of six. The commission was duly constituted. There was no odd neutral member of this body, as in an arbitration, but merely three representatives from each side. Of the British representatives two were Canadians and the third was the Lord Chief Justice of ...
— Theodore Roosevelt and His Times - A Chronicle of the Progressive Movement; Volume 47 in The - Chronicles Of America Series • Harold Howland
... with their Pipes 18. They visit an extraordinary old Antiquary 19. They go down into the Catacombs 20. Babbalanja quotes from an antique Pagan; and earnestly presses it upon the Company, that what he recites is not his but another's 21. They visit a wealthy old Pauper 22. Yoomy sings some odd Verses, and Babbalanja quotes from the old Authors right and left 23. What manner of Men the Tapparians were 24. Their adventures upon landing at Pimminee 25. A, I, and O 26. A Reception-day at Pimminee 27. Babbalanja ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. II (of 2) • Herman Melville
... limp, ungainly, awkward, and odd, with long lean limbs, broad flat hands, and feet of striking size. His eyes were small and deep-set, his nose very large, his neck very long; but he masked his defects by studied care in dress, and always fancied he looked distinguished, delighting to ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... with stoves, even in the hottest weather; the personal baths; the change of wet clothing; the airing of bedding, were all foreign and repugnant to the notions of the seamen of the day, and it required constant supervision and wise management to enforce the adoption of these odd foods and customs. ...
— Captain Cook's Journal During the First Voyage Round the World • James Cook
... have; the blackguard! He is going to open his house on Travers's side. He came to me as bold as brass, and told me so, saying that he never liked gentlemen who kept him waiting for his odd money. What angers me is that he ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... in a chronicler who was one of Vespasian's staff, but it is odd in the Jewish commander of Galilee. Again, he makes certain confusions about Hebrew names of places, which are easily explained in a Roman, but are inexplicable in the learned priest he represents himself to be. He says the town of Gamala was ...
— Josephus • Norman Bentwich
... perhaps; I don't know," replied Mr. Cadwallader. "It's odd, you know, the number of princes and blue-bloods and all that sort of thing one can find knocking about in Italy and Germany and Spain. One never hears of half of them. I never had heard of the Prince d'Abruzzi until I went to Italy, and ...
— Elusive Isabel • Jacques Futrelle
... road. He's wondering who you are. He sees we are friends, and he's pretending to be jealous. Dogs are funny, aren't they? But you were speaking about my poems. It's odd that their first criticism should come from you like this. You must be about the same age I was when I began writing—when I wanted above anything to write a book like that, and when such a book seemed the most impossible ...
— Read-Aloud Plays • Horace Holley
... it's no good saying he's wrong!' Rum, eh, after all those years.... No, he didn't say, 'You sickening fool' this time. I reminded him how he used to, and he laughed and said, 'Yes; did I? Well, I still get riled, you know, when chaps can't see—' And then he said 'Yes, "sickening fool"; so I did; odd!' and he looked out of the window as though he was looking a thousand miles away—this was in his office, you know—and chucked ...
— If Winter Comes • A.S.M. Hutchinson
... with his renown, to let himself out to hire to a barbarian, an Egyptian rebel, (for Tachos was no better) and to fight for pay, as captain only of a band of mercenaries. If, they said, at those years of eighty and odd, after his body had been worn out with age, and enfeebled with wounds, he had resumed that noble undertaking, the liberation of the Greeks from Persia, it had been worthy of some reproof. To make an action honorable, it ought to be agreeable to the age, and other circumstances of the person; ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... Does ye credit, Dick. I remember Tom's wife right well, and she was allers a right good housekeeper. Ye can't do too much for her, son. But about that ere fishin' hole, dye know I believe 'twas the same I used to hook 'em out of thirty-odd year ago. Is it the ripple just back o' Banker ...
— Dick the Bank Boy - Or, A Missing Fortune • Frank V. Webster
... instincts that active or dormant lurk in every strong man. He twisted her head roughly, and as naturally as water flows down hill their lips met. He felt the girl's body nestle with a little tremor closer to his, felt with an odd exaltation the quick hammer of her heart against his breast. He held her tight, and her face slowly drew away from him, and ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... low voice, but vibrating with outraged pride. "How dare you thus insult me? You seem to think—to think—that because—last night—he and I were kept from our home by the storm——" She pauses; that old, first odd sensation of choking now again oppresses her. She lays her hand upon the back of a chair near her, and presses heavily upon it. "You think I have disgraced myself," says she, the words coming in a little gasp from ...
— April's Lady - A Novel • Margaret Wolfe Hungerford
... At odd times that summer he had been surveying a new road with Harry Needles for his helper. In September they resumed their work upon it in the vicinity of New Salem and Abe began to carry the letters in his hat again. Every day Ann was looking for him as he came ...
— A Man for the Ages - A Story of the Builders of Democracy • Irving Bacheller
... in their dances. The same fate befell the pretty Queen Mab, who made herself a royal chariot out of a walnut-shell. They are all rather whimsical, and sometimes ill-humoured. But can we be surprised at them, remembering their woeful lot? Tiny and odd as they are, they have a heart, a longing to be loved. They are good and they are bad and full of fancies. On the birth of a baby they come down the chimney, to endow it and order its future. They are fond of good spinning-women—they even spin divinely themselves. Do we not talk of ...
— La Sorciere: The Witch of the Middle Ages • Jules Michelet
... been at infinite pains to discover me; he has even been at the trouble to write me a warning letter, and is now in Paris watching me. I, in my turn, take care to protect myself;—I am followed by detectives, and am at enormous pains to guard my life; not for my own sake but for his. An odd complication of circumstances, is it not? I cannot have him arrested because he would at once relate his history, and my name would be ruined. And that would be quite as good a vengeance for him as the other thing. You will admit that it is a ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... exports of the South have been made the basis of the Federal revenue. The twenty odd millions annually levied upon imported goods are deducted out of the price of their cotton, rice, and tobacco, either in the diminished prices which they receive for those staples in foreign ports, or in the increased ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke
... news create more interest and rouse greater hopes than in the household of the Bennets, the chief inhabitants of Longbourn; for Mr. Bennet—who was so odd a mixture of quick parts, sarcastic humour, reserve and caprice, that the experience of three-and-twenty years had been insufficient to make his wife understand his character—was the father of five ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol. I • Various
... a joiner's workshop down there; our mechanical workshop we had in the engine-room. The smithy was at first on deck, and afterwards on the ice; tinsmith's work was done chiefly in the chart-room; shoemaker's and sailmaker's, and various odd sorts of work, in the saloon. And all these occupations were carried on with interest and activity during the rest of the expedition. There was nothing, from the most delicate instruments down to wooden shoes and axe-handles, that could not be made on board the Fram. When we were found ...
— Farthest North - Being the Record of a Voyage of Exploration of the Ship 'Fram' 1893-1896 • Fridtjof Nansen
... the Prince Albert in 1851, and the Advance with Kane, in 1853, were kept prisoners by the ice for several weeks. The odd form of the Devil's Thumb, the dreary deserts in its vicinity, the vast circus of icebergs—some of them more than three hundred feet high—the cracking of the ice, reproduced by the echo in so sinister a manner, rendered the position of the Forward ...
— The English at the North Pole - Part I of the Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... replied Tom, "that matters should have taken this turn; but I guess nothing will come of it. I know Matthew always wants his own way, though, and is bound to have it, and that is why his actions seem so odd just now." ...
— Under Fire - A Tale of New England Village Life • Frank A. Munsey
... ever since we have been here, overflowing the back land and making it necessary to bridge it before we could move.—Before receiving this you will hear by telegraph of Fort Donelson being attacked.—Yesterday I went up the Tennessee River twenty odd miles, and to-day crossed over near the Cumberland River at Fort Donelson.—Our men had a little engagement with the enemy's pickets, killing five of them, wounding a number, and, expressively speaking, "gobbling up" some ...
— Letters of Ulysses S. Grant to His Father and His Youngest Sister, - 1857-78 • Ulysses S. Grant
... believe that she had not yet spent twenty-four hours in Beni-Mora. A conviction came to her that she would be there for a long while, that she would strike roots into this sunny place of peace. When she heard the church bell now she thought of the interior of the church and of the priest with an odd sort of familiar pleasure, as people in England often think of the village church in which they have always been accustomed to worship, and of the clergyman who ministers in it Sunday after Sunday. Yet at moments she remembered her inward cry in Count Anteoni's garden, "Oh, ...
— The Garden Of Allah • Robert Hichens
... I, smilin, "it is an odd business, an' I dinna wunnur at yer bein deceived; but it's a' easily aneuch explained. It's this confounded name o' mine that's at the bottom o' a' the mischief. The Willie Smith here mentioned, I need hardly say, I suppose, is no me; but I kent him weel aneuch, an' a decent ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume III • Various
... Why did he not go? The old grandmother, although still so sharp in her lucid intervals, appeared not to notice him. How odd! So they remained over against one another, seeming respectively to question with a yearning desire. But the moments were flitting, and each second seemed to emphasize the silence between them. They gazed at one ...
— An Iceland Fisherman • Pierre Loti
... Insulae Timor. This is a very odd plant, agreeing with no described genus. The leaf is almost round, green on the upper side and whitish underneath, with several fibres running from the insertion of the pedicule towards the circumference, it is umbilicated ...
— A Voyage to New Holland • William Dampier
... accumulation of poor as fatal to their health as to their morality. They are mostly country people whom eviction has driven from the country, who have been unable to emigrate, and who were unwilling to shut themselves up immediately in the workhouses. The resources they procure for themselves, by doing odd work, are so completely insufficient, that it is impossible to be surprised ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud
... eye as I entered the vast rotunda was an iron staircase rising diagonally against one of the inner walls. A uniformed man, with some papers in his hands, ascended it with brisk, resounding step till he disappeared through a door not many inches from the ceiling. It may seem odd, but I can never think of my arrival in this country without hearing the ringing footfalls of this official and beholding the yellow eyes of the black cat which stared at us at the Hoboken pier. The ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan
... silly logicians, Cornificians, as he calls them, an appellation that stuck to them all through the Middle Ages, and at their long phrases interlarded with so many negative particles that, in order to find out whether yes or no was meant, it became necessary to examine if the number of noes was an odd or ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... under a tree in the public gardens during an odd minute of waiting for Charlotte and Mrs. Goodman; and he said no more to her in private that day. Few as her words had been he liked them better than any he had lately received. The conversation was not resumed till they were gliding 'between the banks that bear the vine,' ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... be odd to you," said Julie, with vivacity. "In reality, it's not in the least odd. There's the same quality in him that there is in Lady Henry—something that beats you down," she added, under her breath. "There, that's enough about Mr. ...
— Lady Rose's Daughter • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... a nurse for my poor children," said a butterfly to a quiet caterpillar, who was strolling along a cabbage-leaf in her odd, lumbering fashion. ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott
... shirt, and sit down and read this letter ten times over, until you understand every word of it. And if you do that, you will laugh at the parson and tax-gatherer's coaxings about Savings Banks. You will keep your odd pennies to yourself; or lay them out in ...
— Political Pamphlets • George Saintsbury
... An odd and improbable alliance, that between Hugh Carnaby and Harvey Rolfe. Yet in several ways they suited each other. Old-time memories had a little, not much, to do with it; more of the essence of the matter was their ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing
... "It's odd how weak my voice has grown," said Sibyl, with a laugh. "Mother says I am getting better, and perhaps I am, only somehow I do feel weak. Do you know, mother wanted me to dress dolls for her, but I couldn't. Nursie did 'em. There's ...
— Daddy's Girl • L. T. Meade
... was lately saying in such a one's funeral-sermon. It is too possible that one or two of the visages of the company, of the younger people especially, might wear, during a good part of the time, somewhat of a derisive smile, meaning, "What odd kind of stuff all this is;" as if they could not help thinking it ludicrously strange that any one should be talking of God, of the Saviour of mankind, the facts of the Bible, the welfare of the soul, the shortness and value of life, and a future account, when he might be talking of ...
— An Essay on the Evils of Popular Ignorance • John Foster
... the fight had made us friendly, and I had no Rupert now, and was rather jealous of his taking completely to Henrietta, and most of all, I fancy, because Johnson Minor was determined to be friends with me. He was a very odd fellow. There was nothing he liked so much as wonderful stories about people, and I never heard such wonderful stories as he told himself. When we became friends he told me that he had never meant to bully me when he asked about ...
— A Great Emergency and Other Tales - A Great Emergency; A Very Ill-Tempered Family; Our Field; Madam Liberality • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
... windows and a deep green carpet. There was a fireplace, with a grate, supported by varnished oak pillars and elaborate mantel and glass, a glittering reddish center-table with a great many small odd shelves below, a desk with sheaves of hotel writing paper and ...
— Linda Condon • Joseph Hergesheimer
... and threaten their enemies in a very odd manner, namely, by opening their mouths widely as in the act of yawning. Mr. Bartlett has often seen two baboons, when first placed in the same compartment, sitting opposite to each other and thus alternately opening their mouths; and this action ...
— The Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals • Charles Darwin
... that I should like to run wild in a wood for ever!" At night we stayed in beautiful little inns which were ever so much more cheap and comfortable than the hotels of to-day. In some of the places we were asked out to tea and dinner and very much feted. An odd little troupe we were! Father was what we will call for courtesy's sake "Stage Manager," but in reality he set the stage himself, and did the work which generally falls to the lot of the stage manager and an army of carpenters combined. My mother used to coach us up in ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry
... at odd moments sit for the production of what they call "phenomena," with no other object than the gratification of an inquisitive vanity, I would drive them with whips from the field of psychical research. They are people whose presence in this area of serious enquiry ...
— Second Sight - A study of Natural and Induced Clairvoyance • Sepharial
... without. All is gloom and silence in the house; even the voice of the child is hushed; his infant sports are disregarded when his mother weeps; his "alley tors" and his "commoneys" are alike neglected; he forgets the long familiar cry of "knuckle down," and at tip-cheese, or odd and even, his hand is out. But Pickwick, gentlemen, Pickwick, the ruthless destroyer of this domestic oasis in the desert of Goswell Street—Pickwick who has choked up the well, and thrown ashes on the sward—Pickwick, who comes before you to-day with his heartless ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... suddenly white. "Nor I," he said, with an odd intensity; "there are several things ... that you may trust me ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... fast asleep, and dreaming of Anson sitting gibbering at him as he played the part of a monkey filling his cheeks with nuts till the pouches were bulged out as if he were suffering from a very bad attack of mumps. The odd part of it was that when he took out and tried to crack one of the nuts in his teeth he could not, from the simple ...
— A Dash from Diamond City • George Manville Fenn
... came out and woke me, and we went "aloft." We were going down the Scheldt, and R. was in fits of delight because every tree you see is exactly like the trees in boxes of toys. Not a bit like English trees. The flat green banks and odd little villages (of which you can only see the tops of the houses) ...
— Juliana Horatia Ewing And Her Books • Horatia K. F. Eden
... specially cultivated for the production of seed in order to obtain the best results from these seeds for fibre plants. Many of the ryots (farmers) use seed which has been collected from plants grown from inferior seed, or from odd and often poor plants; they also grow plants year after year on the same soil. The fibres obtained, as a rule, and as a result of this method of obtaining seeds, gradually deteriorate; much better results accrue when succession of crops and ...
— The Jute Industry: From Seed to Finished Cloth • T. Woodhouse and P. Kilgour
... butterflies, and mandarins, and pagodas, and Chinese beauties upon them; and very often when the girls came to see her she would open this cupboard and they would have a little treat, which seemed all the more delightful because the plates were so odd. There was an open fireplace in the room, and when the days were cold and there was a snapping, blazing wood-fire, they used to ask Miss Ketchum if they might not bring their chestnuts and roast them in the ...
— Ruby at School • Minnie E. Paull
... seemed odd to the king that he had been so long in the grave. It appeared but a few minutes ago that he had descended, passed along a few steps to the place where he had peeped beyond the veil, and returned again ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Various
... its own with Dorothy's auburn glory, framed features self-reliant and strong, yet of womanly softness; and in this genial atmosphere her quick tongue had a delicate wit and a facility of expression that delighted all three. Dorothy, after the manner of Southern women, became the hostess of this odd "party," as she styled it, and unconsciously adopted the attitude of a lady in her ...
— The Skylark of Space • Edward Elmer Smith and Lee Hawkins Garby
... courtesy, before she opened the envelope. Mercy made the necessary acknowledgment, and moved away to the other end of the room, little thinking that the arrival of the letter marked a crisis in her life. Lady Janet put on her spectacles. "Odd that he should have come back already!" she said to herself, as she threw the empty envelope on ...
— The New Magdalen • Wilkie Collins
... Why, he hath not been here, for long. If now it 'twere Basil his brother and the Captain had left them here—from Sir Marmaduke Langdale too. Here is something wrong. I feel choked. Let me put them back. Why now, I could swear I had seen them placed there. It is very odd. And to think of my keys too. I could fancy they were only skeletons. Yet I know their jingle well. I'll to my brewer now, and, as there is no one here, I say [looks round] God keep the poor king's head on his shoulders, and may it be long ere he die ...
— Cromwell • Alfred B. Richards
... Nayler." The following "Sonnet to Elia," from the London Magazine, is also in the volume: it is odd that Lamb ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) - Letters 1821-1842 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... her racked misery, his resentment vanished and an odd impersonal kind of pity for her possessed him instead, though her attraction was gone forever. He could see the scar on her forehead, and it troubled and reproached him vaguely, seemed a symbol of a deeper wound he had dealt her, though never meaning any ...
— Wild Wings - A Romance of Youth • Margaret Rebecca Piper
... Bagdemagus; of the inability of all knights but Lancelot (who has been absent from Court in one of the lovers' quarrels) to rescue her; and of his undertaking the task, though hampered in various ways, one of the earliest of which compelled him to ride in a cart—a thing regarded, by one of the odd[24] conventions of chivalry, as disgraceful to a knight. Meleagraunce, though no coward, is treacherous and "felon," and all sorts of mishaps befall Lancelot before he is able for the second time to conquer his antagonist, and ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... Sallust played at odd and even, and the umbra looked on, while Glaucus and Clodius became gradually absorbed in the chances of ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton
... them. Sometimes, as before, the things seemed to dance about without hands, and turn into odd shapes, as if there were people inside them; but not a creature was seen and not a sound was heard. And though there was neither wind nor sun, very soon all ...
— The Adventures of A Brownie - As Told to My Child by Miss Mulock • Miss Mulock
... he gave lectures and private lessons, being devoted, so his father was wont to say, to pure mathematics. A second son was in the government School of Engineering. Phellion had a pension of nine hundred francs, and he possessed a little property of nine thousand and a few odd hundred francs; the fruit of his economy and that of his wife during thirty years of toil and privation. He was, moreover, the owner of a little house and garden where he lived in the "impasse" des Feuillantines,—in thirty ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac
... The last odd entry of three widows' men was an official fiction (now abolished) by which the pay of so many imaginary persons was transferred to a fund for the relief of the widows of commissioned and warrant officers. Real men are now allowed in ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... all male hairless pithecanthropi begin with a consonant, have an even number of syllables, and end with a consonant, while the names of the females of the same species begin with a vowel, have an odd number of syllables, and end with a vowel. On the contrary, the names of the male hairy black pithecanthropi while having an even number of syllables begin with a vowel and end with a consonant; while the females of this species have an odd number of syllables in their ...
— Tarzan the Terrible • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... street tapping his various pockets furtively as he walked. He was hungry. His diverse emotions had given him an appetite. He went into an eating-house and commanded a liberal supper. He had an odd fancy as he gave his order. "That's the sort of supper I would have, if it was my last—if I was to be hanged tomorrow." He thought of Sleeny and hoped they would treat him well in jail. He felt ...
— The Bread-winners - A Social Study • John Hay
... staring at a patch of wintry moonlight on the odd striped paper of his wall—it had stopped snowing since they had come into the house, and the clouds had broken away, leaving a brilliant sky—discovered his door to be softly opening. The glimmer of a candle filtered through ...
— On Christmas Day in the Morning • Grace S. Richmond
... absorbed in these fancies, when Sancho said to him, "Isn't it odd, senor, that I have still before my eyes that monstrous enormous nose of ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... great story-teller. Every tribe has its traditions, and the elderly men and women like to recount them, for they always find listeners. And odd stories they tell, too. Just listen to this, for example. It is a legend among the tribes ...
— Myths And Legends Of Our Own Land, Complete • Charles M. Skinner
... not fear," he replied, with odd emphasis. "And now," he continued, "time presses; you received your package, ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch
... their country's cause, on the grounds of the Presidio, the principal cemeteries of San Francisco seem to cluster around Lone Mountain in the northwestern part of the city and south of the Military Reservation. These are Laurel Hill, Calvary, Masonic and Odd Fellows. The Jews have their special burying ground between Eighteenth and Twentieth streets, and the old Mission cemetery where some of the early Indian converts and Franciscan Fathers sleep their last sleep, is close by the Mission Dolores, ...
— By the Golden Gate • Joseph Carey
... far behind his neighbour. And as to the difference of shape in the first young leaves, what could it signify? It is true the young mustards were round and thick; the cresses oval and pointed; the carrots mere green threads; the onions sharp little blades; while the beets had an odd, stainy look. But they all woke up to the same life and enjoyment, and were all greeted with friendly welcome as they appeared, by the dew, and light, and sunshine, and breezes, so necessary ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... inwardly, it happened beyond a doubt, and in spite of the jeers of his few friends who heard the tale, and observed wisely that "such a thing might perhaps have come to Iszard, that crack-brained Iszard, or to that odd fish Minski, but it could never have happened to commonplace little Vezin, who was fore-ordained to live and ...
— Three John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... the censors might have done much better than they were able to do. Such censors generally can. These dozen lecturers have all been earnest students of our civil war, as is abundantly testified by the twenty odd volumes on the subject published by them since the reports of operations became available; and they keenly feel that modesty which is always bred of study. Such as they had, they were glad to give the public; nor do they in any wise shrink from generous disagreement or courteous ...
— The Campaign of Chancellorsville • Theodore A. Dodge
... his own light. He wears a higher priced tie than the boss; he is immaculately neat; he looks like a fashion plate, but at the same time his tailor bill is not paid, he is owing money right and left. He spends his evenings in the cafes, and at odd moments during the day he dodges out to look over the racing form and smoke a cigaret. This dude employe sits up late at night. He spends his salary, and more too, in the gay life. He is tired next morning when ...
— Dollars and Sense • Col. Wm. C. Hunter
... "An odd fish, young man," he said, shaking his head; "take care not to make him your model. If you want a proper model to imitate, you need not go far. Modesty, which is my weakness, prevents ...
— The Last of the Foresters • John Esten Cooke
... said Mr. Mortimer, surprised. "That's odd. I haven't! It's funny how one doesn't do the things one thinks one does. I'm ...
— Three Men and a Maid • P. G. Wodehouse
... forehead. He could not fully grasp the meaning of a passion that led a man to such lengths as this. Why, the man had proposed murder—murder and suicide; and all because of this strange love of a woman. He had been driven stark raving mad because of it. He sat there now before him, an odd combination of craven weakness and giant strength because of it. In the face of such a revelation, Covington ...
— The Triflers • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... I can tell you is this," said Smerdyakov, as though thinking better of it; "I am here as an old friend and neighbor, and it would be odd if I didn't come. On the other hand, Ivan Fyodorovitch sent me first thing this morning to your brother's lodging in Lake Street, without a letter, but with a message to Dmitri Fyodorovitch to go to dine with him at the restaurant ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... look for the wagon, but nothing was to be seen or heard. As, with increasing anxiety, they turned back to the first path, the poacher grew restless. His crooked mouth twisted to and fro in strange contortions, not a muscle of his coarse face was till, and this looked so odd and yet so horrible, that Ruth could not help laughing, and the smith ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... sitting, stretch of arms, various diameters of head and peculiarities of the physiognomy taken down. While he with two assistants was thus employed, two of our photographic corps were busily engaged in preserving as many of their odd faces and costumes as possible, making pictures of their picturesque camp on the side of a hill sloping toward an arm of the Gut, with its round tent covered with birch and fir bark, dogs and children, and stacks of logs or wood—from which they make the strips ...
— Bowdoin Boys in Labrador • Jonathan Prince (Jr.) Cilley
... There's two votes. A hundred and odd more'll put me in. Here goes for politics and popularity. I may be president yet; you can't tell. And say! this town meetin' won't be DULL, whichever ...
— Cy Whittaker's Place • Joseph C. Lincoln
... well. About eight miles on we came to one of Evans' camps and the solitary pony wall told its own tale of the death of the other two. He must have had a miserable return. At eleven miles there were two bales of fodder depoted, we were only 50 miles odd from our destination off Cape Armitage, and had one meal over three days' food. If, therefore, we could average 15 miles a day that would suffice. It was a silly risk in view of blizzards and other possibilities, chiefly our own ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard
... portraits of the Emperor and the Empress, busts, colours draped with Parisian cunning, gave to the scene an appearance of festivity that looked quite fairy-like in so sombre a region. As for our gallant host, I never saw such spirits; he is a fine old grey-headed blow-hard of fifty odd, talking English like a native, and combining the frank open-hearted cordiality of a sailor with that graceful winning gaiety peculiar to Frenchmen. I never saw anything more perfect than the kind, ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... of Gaskin's gong announcing dinner. It was odd how the little details of life went calmly on even when life itself was threatened with extinction. As Madden went below to his meal, he met Malone who came from below, looking as black as an Ethiopian. The mate had been directing the firing in this ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling
... "How odd it is that his characters talk so well in his books, and that he is such a stick!" thought ...
— The Autobiography of a Slander • Edna Lyall
... a youthful, feminine version of himself in her plainness; though the grace was all her own. Her complexion was not the leathery red of her father's, but a smooth and even white from cheek to throat. She let her loose cloak fall to the chair behind her, and showed herself tall and slim, with that odd visage of hers drooping from a perfect neck. "Why," she said, "if we had all been horned cattle, he couldn't have treated ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells |
