"On the fly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... some other subject evidently upon his mind, and mentioning, "forty sous," in the same manner that he would have said twenty sous, or a hundred sous. "Yes, sir," I exclaimed, "forty sous, will do," catching the ball "on the fly." "Let it be so," answered the notary; "the head clerk will take charge of the expense, and I will settle with him." Thereupon the governor shut the door in my face.' You must confess, gentleman that Germain ...
— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue
... catchers and first basemen, was a good move, as was the introduction of a penalty for the failure of umpires to prevent "kicking." One change introduces a new experiment, and that is the call of a strike on every foul tip caught on the fly. The calls of strikes will be more numerous than ever, viz., the regular strikes, the strikes on foul bunts and ...
— Spalding's Baseball Guide and Official League Book for 1895 • Edited by Henry Chadwick
... season. His story was published on the eve of his departure. He received a few copies, which he regarded with a half-fond, half-whimsical air. One he sent to Kate Underwood, having first written his initials on the fly-leaf underneath the brief petition, "Be merciful." He then went his way, his time and attention wholly occupied by his work, with little thought as to whether the newly launched craft was destined to ride the waves ...
— At the Time Appointed • A. Maynard Barbour
... broken wheel of a gun-carriage, an exploded caisson, a handspike, and some of the accoutrements of the men. In the fork of a tree I found a Testament, with the words, 'Charles Durrale, Corporal of Company G,' written on the fly-leaf. The guns and the gunners, have disappeared. Some of the latter are now with the column moving in pursuit of the enemy, others are suffering in the hospitals, and still others are resting where the bugle's reveille shall ...
— Camp-Fire and Cotton-Field • Thomas W. Knox
... who seeks to give a grace to the commonest things around her. With the mechanical habit of a student, Leonard took down one or two of the volumes still left on the shelves. He found SPENSER'S Fairy Queen, RACINE in French, TASSO in Italian; and on the fly-leaf of each volume, in the exquisite hand-writing familiar to his memory, the name "Leonora." He kissed the books, and replaced them with a feeling akin both ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... "works." See note to the preface to the Last Essays of Elia. The old India House ledgers of Lamb's day are no longer in existence, but a copy of Booth's Tables of Interest is preserved, with some mock notices from the press on the fly-leaves in Lamb's hand. Lamb's portrait by Meyer was bought for the India Office ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... question himself," said Aymer, idly drawing appalling pictures of steamrollers on the fly-leaf of a book, "as to the second—" he paused in his drawing, put the book down and turned to ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant
... entering to dash for the bill-of-fare, and give an order (if he is adroit enough to catch one of the maids on the fly) before removing either coat or hat. At least fifteen seconds may be economized in this way. Once seated, the luncher falls to on anything at hand; bread, cold slaw, crackers, or catsup. When the dish ordered arrives, he gets his fork into it as it appears ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory
... most of the passengers and to the railroad company also. For that reason the sleeping car is provided that you may sleep with as much comfort as if you were in your own home, the dining car is provided to furnish you a good meal on the fly and at a price that all can afford. The library and drawing room cars are provided, where you can make yourself as comfortable as you can in your own house. The porter will get your morning paper, furnish you with writing materials or your morning high ball, and look after you like ...
— The Life and Adventures of Nat Love - Better Known in the Cattle Country as "Deadwood Dick" • Nat Love
... these treatises are printed by Thomas Berthelet. I know not if any of these treatises are now scarce. On the fly-leaf opposite the first page we find the following scriptural sentences, which are, in my opinion, and in that of others to whom I have shown the book, evidently written by the ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 44, Saturday, August 31, 1850 • Various
... tenth century. It is also supposed that the missing verses at the beginning of the gospels were all written on purple-stained vellum, and that there may have been a miniature of the evangelist before each gospel. An inscription on the fly-leaf states that it belonged to the monastery of St. Augustine at Canterbury, and that it formed part of that ...
— Studies from Court and Cloister • J.M. Stone
... passed since I laid away my old school geography that its exact situation had escaped my memory, and the only other knowledge I had retained of the country was a confused sense of its being a sort of Arctic wilderness. Hubbard proceeded to enlighten me, by tracing with his pencil, on the fly-leaf of his notebook, an outline ...
— The Lure of the Labrador Wild • Dillon Wallace
... day in Magdalen College Hall, Oxon, dinner and supper throughout the year for the after grace, by the chaplains, clarkes, and choristers there. Composed by Benjamin Rogers, Doctor of Musique of the University of Oxon, 1685." It is entered in a folio volume, with this note on the fly-leaf,—"Ben Rogers, his book, Aug. 18. 1673, and presented me by Mr. John Playford, Stationer in the Temple, London." The Latin Grace, Te Deum Patrem colimus, is popularly supposed to be the Hymnus Eucharisticus written by Dr. Nathaniel Ingelo, and sung at the civic feast at Guildhall on the ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 27. Saturday, May 4, 1850 • Various
... gazed on the shining reaches of the Hudson, their colour deepening to blue as she neared the sea. A gold-bound volume of Shelley, with his name on the fly-leaf, lay in her lap. And two lines she repeated softly to herself—two lines that ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... fugitive sympathies; they are not connected with any of the great interests of life, and consequently they represent nothing. Nevertheless, Nathan maintains his ground by the quickness of his mind, by those lucky hits which billiard-players call a "good stroke." He is the cleverest shot at ideas on the fly in all Paris. His fecundity is not his own, but that of his epoch; he lives on chance events, and to control them he distorts their meaning. In short, he is not true; his presentation is false; in him, as Comte Felix said, is ...
— A Daughter of Eve • Honore de Balzac
... On the fly leaf of the notebook he found the name of Dade Newbert. He had refolded the paper, and was still staring at the name written in the notebook when Newbert himself, greatly ...
— Rival Pitchers of Oakdale • Morgan Scott
... must hear that. He insists on the fly, and the inn, and the wet boots, and the warming mixture, and the testimony of the landlady and the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... in the form of a package addressed in her handwriting. Avidly he opened it. It was the promised Bible, mailed from New York City. On the fly-leaf was written "I.O.W. to E.B."—nothing more. He went through it page by page, seeking marked passages. There was none. The doubt settled down on him again. The Hunger ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... sixty years or more that the globe had stood in the corner of the square hall: it had made no sort of difference in the geography lessons. Arethusa had learned history, from ancient history books with almost obliterated names on the fly-leaves. But it had been rather a biased version of the period connected with the Civil War which she had learned, for Miss Eliza was very bitter about those years of her country's existence. Her only brother, and her twin, had been killed fighting for the Confederacy. ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... had been spent like water so that the child, when she was seen, might look like a small princess. But she found no plaything—no dolls or toys, and only one picture book, and that had "Donal" written on the fly leaf and evidently ...
— The Head of the House of Coombe • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... the dream of all Irishmen uniting in a common love of their country, a love which should transcend the differences of rival creeds, found a realisation. The witness, written in crabbed characters on the fly-leaf of a lexicon, lay on the knees of a broken old man in the cottage of a widow within earshot of the perpetual clamour of ...
— The Northern Iron - 1907 • George A. Birmingham
... thirty shillings; besides which substantial reward, he enjoyed considerable fame and honour: having a presentation copy of Mr Curdle's pamphlet forwarded to the theatre, with that gentleman's own autograph (in itself an inestimable treasure) on the fly-leaf, accompanied with a note, containing many expressions of approval, and an unsolicited assurance that Mr Curdle would be very happy to read Shakespeare to him for three hours every morning before breakfast during ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... amiss. His vast and accurate calculations on the fly-leaves of books, or on the backs of playbills, appeared to have been an idle sacrifice of time. By these, he had variously computed the weekly takings of the house, from sums as modest as five-and-twenty shillings, ...
— The Dynamiter • Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny van de Grift Stevenson
... search low, there was no sign of my dear, dumpy Virgil, in yellowing parchment with red edges. I found Kate's cookery-book, and would have flung it through the window, but my eye caught the quaint inscription on the fly-leaf, in her ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... indeed, sir," Amelius answered. "Only as much religion as there is in the New Testament. I was not quite old enough to understand him easily—so he wrote down his discourse on the fly-leaf of a story-book I had with me, and gave it to me to read when I was tired of the stories. Stories were scarce with me in those days; and, when I had exhausted my little stock, rather than read nothing I read my sermon—read it so often that I think ...
— The Fallen Leaves • Wilkie Collins
... and nearer; for one must come as the wind comes who would approach the Red Admiral. Peter had no paper, so a fly-leaf of his geography would have to do. All athrill, he worked with his bit of pencil; and on the fly-leaf grew the worm-fence with the blackberry bramble climbing along its corners, and the fennel, and the elder bushes near by; and in the foreground the tall thistle, with the butterfly upon it. The Red Admiral is a gourmet; he lingers daintily over his meals; so Peter ...
— The Purple Heights • Marie Conway Oemler
... Felix and Aunt Victoria, it was strange she had never before thought—of course not—what a hideous idea! That book, back in Lydford, with Horace Gilbert's name on the fly-leaf, and Aunt Victoria's cool, casual voice as she explained, "Oh, just a young architect who used to—" Oh, the man in the Pantheon was simply brutalized by drugs; he did not know what he was saying. His ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... owners, it may be mentioned that when the great Mr. Fox's furniture was sold by auction after his death in 1806, amongst the books there happened to be the first volume of Gibbon's 'Decline and Fall,' which apparently had been given by the author to Fox, who wrote on the fly-leaf this note: 'The author at Brooks' said there was no salvation for this country, until six heads of the principal persons in the administration were laid on the table. Eleven days after, this same gentleman accepted ...
— The Book-Hunter in London - Historical and Other Studies of Collectors and Collecting • William Roberts
... he cried gaily, as he returned, bringing the lady in question. "Just caught her on the fly. Trust little Teddums to get you what you want, Miss ...
— Two Little Women on a Holiday • Carolyn Wells
... We called at the appointed hour. The general had gone out on some important matter, but (even amid his pressing duties) had left the prayer-books with a member of his staff, with instructions concerning them. He had written on the fly-leaf of each, 'Presented by R.E. Lee,' and we are sure that those of the gallant men to whom they were given who survive the war will now cherish them as precious legacies, and hand them down ...
— A Life of Gen. Robert E. Lee • John Esten Cooke
... blank panel. Sadly, very few computers still have them (the three LEDs on a PC keyboard certainly don't count). The obvious reasons (cost of wiring, cost of front-panel cutouts, almost nobody needs or wants to interpret machine-register states on the fly anymore) are only part of the story. Another part of it is that radio-frequency leakage from the lamp wiring was beginning to be a problem as far back as transistor machines. But the most fundamental fact is that there are very few ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... Wanted us to fire Bearse right off, but we kept him, thanks to me. If he'd seen the 'sissy' kick the ball once, same as I did, it might have changed his mind some. He was passin' along the end of the field when the gang was practicin', and the ball come his way. He caught it on the fly, and sent it back with his toe. It went a mile, seemed so, whirlin' and whizzin'. Willie never even looked to see where it went; just kept on his course for ...
— The Depot Master • Joseph C. Lincoln
... any other heroic novel, would be a desperate task. The great number of personages introduced in pairs, the intrigues of each couple forming a separate thread wound into the complex web of the plot, is alone enough to make any following of the story a great difficulty. On the fly-leaf of a copy of Cleopatra which lies before me, some dear lady of the seventeenth century has very conscientiously written out "a list of the Pairs of Lovers," and there are thirteen pairs. Pharamond begins almost in the same manner as a novel by ...
— Gossip in a Library • Edmund Gosse
... read: "Aunt Hepsey's Muffins," "Sarah's Indian Pudding," and on another page, "Hasty's Lemon Tarts," "Aunt Susan's Method of Cooking a Leg of Mutton," and "Josie Well's Pressed Calf Liver." Here were my own, my very own family recipes, copied into Bowen's ledger, in large illiterate characters; and on the fly-leaf, "Charles Bowen's Receipt Book." I burst into a good hearty laugh, almost the first one I had enjoyed since I arrived ...
— Vanished Arizona - Recollections of the Army Life by a New England Woman • Martha Summerhayes
... crosscut. The fly-wheel ought to have a rim weighing from eighty to one hundred pounds, and it should be, for a 12-inch saw, not less than a foot in diameter. It should be placed on the saw arbor. The belt should not run on the fly-wheel, but on a special pulley, and the treadle and crank motion should be so adjusted that the foot will move through an arc of from 10 to ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various
... Muetterchen gave me a little 'brown Bible' for my very own, which she said her mother had given to her. Oh, I must show it to you, sir!" and, darting off, the child ran into the house, returning with the treasured book in her hand. The pastor examined it and read the inscription written on the fly-leaf—"To my dear Hilda, from her loving mother, on her eighteenth birthday." That was all, but he felt sure from the many underlined passages that the book had been well studied. He found that Frida could read ...
— Little Frida - A Tale of the Black Forest • Anonymous
... said, handing it to him. "I have written my name and address on the fly-leaf. If you ever need a friend, dear, or are in trouble of any kind, let me know and I ...
— Big Brother • Annie Fellows-Johnston
... Mary Hunter. It appears that you wished to give me a book for Christmas, but were in doubt what book to give me as I seemed to have little taste for reading, so in your embarrassment you gave me a Bible. It lies on my table now with the date 1898 on the fly-leaf—my constant companion and chief literary interest for the last eighteen years. Itself a literature, it has led me into many various literatures and ...
— The Brook Kerith - A Syrian story • George Moore
... been one of the restored victims of the Retiring Board of 1855, and had the reputation of knowing that sideboards exist for other purposes than merely being secured; hence, at this pathetic remark, the carpenter caught a wink, "on the fly," as it passed from the flag-officer to the captain of the Congress and back again. The commander invalided soon after, and the sloop went on her way to China under the charge ...
— From Sail to Steam, Recollections of Naval Life • Captain A. T. Mahan
... to keep score on his classmates on the fly-leaf of one of his books. Jimmy was a far harsher judge than the teacher. He marked them either wrong or right; he gave no credit for trying, or for their stumbling efforts to express their muddled ideas and incomplete grasp. He found ...
— The Fourth R • George Oliver Smith
... exertion than to-day, and that on the whole it would be rather pleasant than otherwise to find himself at that particular height. There was a barbed-wire fence intervening, and it pleased him to take it "on the fly." He had undoubtedly been going down-hill of late, but his legs, at least, had held their own, he assured himself, with some satisfaction, as he alighted, right side up, within the enclosure. He thought, with a whimsical turn, of Pheidippides, ...
— Peak and Prairie - From a Colorado Sketch-book • Anna Fuller
... scrap-book of old engravings in charge of the verger, showing the buildings in various phases of their history since the Dissolution. These interesting pictures were presented anonymously, but a note on the fly-leaf by Dr. Norman Moore, dated 23rd May, 1885, informs us that the donor was William Morrant Baker, F.R.C.S., Surgeon to St. Bartholomew's Hospital, Lecturer on Physiology, and Warden of its College. There is a tablet to his memory in the Church of ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Priory Church of St. Bartholomew-the-Great, Smithfield • George Worley
... bowl and spoon, drew his three-legged stool to the corner of the fireplace, where he could see to read, seated himself, opened his packet, and displayed his treasure. It was a large, thick, octavo volume, bound in stout leather, and filled with portraits and pictured battle scenes. And on the fly-leaf was written: ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... of the 'Christian Year,' and writing on the fly-leaf showed that it belonged, or had once belonged, ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... considerable time before Binks could believe that he had not been hailed by David Jones himself, for he had seen nothing, being at the time in the lower cabin reading his Bible, and writing his name, "Binnacle Binks, Master of brig 'Martha Blunt,'" on the fly-leaf; and he was only disturbed in this praiseworthy occupation by a heavy body plunging overboard, and by one of the drowsy crew, who had, with his comrades, been sleeping near, reporting that circumstance ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... upon a page which is not your own. All you need, then, for your index, is a little page of paper, folded in where you can use it for a book-mark, on which you will make the same memorandum which you would have made on the fly-leaf, were the book your own. In this case you will keep these memorandum pages together in your scrap-book, so that you can easily find them. And if, as is very likely, you have to refer to the book afterward, in another edition, you will be glad if your first reference has been so precise ...
— How To Do It • Edward Everett Hale
... at Jerusalem; but it was not for himself. It was a little souvenir volume bound in olive and balsam wood, and on the fly-leaf is inscribed: ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... of any given place, or the intersection of a part of such a circle with the horizon. Rhumbs, therefore, coincide with points of the world, or of the horizon; and hence seamen distinguish the rhumbs by the same names as the points and winds, as marked on the fly or card of the compass. The rhumb-line, therefore, is a line prolonged from any point of the compass in a nautical chart, except the four cardinal points; or it is a line which a ship, keeping in the same collateral point or rhumb, describes ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... cradle gradually to shore. Inside, a baby smiled up at him with the bluest eyes he ever had seen. There was a picture primer tucked beneath the flannel coverlet and it contained the single clue to her identity. "Esther Tisdale" was written on the fly-leaf ...
— The Lady Doc • Caroline Lockhart
... so that he who is courting sleep has all the advantage of studying the dialogue of the slums. These disturbances last till two in the morning in some otherwise quiet districts near the river. When Battersea 'Arry has been "on the fly" in Chelsea, while Chelsea 'Arry has been pursuing pleasure in Battersea, the homeward-faring bands meet, about one in the morning, on the Embankment. Then does Cheyne Walk hear the amoebean dialogues of strayed revellers, and knows not whether Battersea ...
— Lost Leaders • Andrew Lang
... allowed them thirty-five minutes, and quietly proceeded with his exposition. As the head of the leading column swung into sight around the base of the foot-hills, he sought in his haversack and drew out a small volume—the Pilgrim's Progress—and having dog's-eared a page of it inscribed my name on the fly-leaf, "from ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... Mullett was comforted and Eve, who had been standing by the marble-topped table, idly opened a book lying there. It wasn't a very interesting volume, from her point of view, being a work on metallurgy. She turned to the front and found Wade's name written on the fly-leaf, and was about to lay it down when she caught sight of a piece of paper marking a place. With no thought of prying, she opened the book again. The paper proved to be an empty envelope addressed to Wade in typewritten characters. In the upper left-hand corner was ...
— The Lilac Girl • Ralph Henry Barbour
... Perhaps she thought I had a headache, and could not bear to talk; at any rate, she saw that her loquacious vivacity annoyed me, as I could tell by the malicious pertinacity with which she persisted. But I checked it effectually by putting into her hand the book I had been trying to read, on the fly-leaf of which I ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte
... either the sanctity of life or the full sweetness of its sweetest things unless he sees, written over every one of them, the name of God, their giver. Your common mercies are His love tokens, and they all come to us, just as the gifts of parents to their children do, with this on the fly-leaf, 'With a father's love.' Whatever comes to God's child with that inscription, surely it ought to kindle a thrill of gladness. That 'the king of Assyria's heart is turned'; shall we thank the king of ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... glimpse of our characters. I have here before me a small volume (printed for private circulation: no printer's name; n.d.), 'Poesies par Frederic et Amelie.' Mine is a presentation copy, obtained for me by Mr. Bain in the Haymarket; and the name of the first owner is written on the fly-leaf in the hand of Prince Otto himself. The modest epigraph - 'Le rime n'est pas riche' - may be attributed, with a good show of likelihood, to the same collaborator. It is strikingly appropriate, and I have found the volume very dreary. Those pieces in which I seem ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson
... reach her. It was useless to try to read: every perception of the outer world was lost in the hum of inner activity that made her mind like a forge throbbing with heat and noise. But suddenly her glance fell on some pencilled sentences on the fly-leaf. They were in Amherst's hand, and the sight arrested her as though ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... procure, on which tie your hook which must be at least a size larger than the Palmer hook; arm this hook with a strong pig's bristle, which must lay on the back of the hook, protruding a short way over the top of the shank. In putting on the fly, insert the point of the hook under the head of the fly, passing through the body, bring it out underneath the tail, then take and press the fly upwards over the head of the bristle on your hook, bringing it so far down that it ...
— The Teesdale Angler • R Lakeland
... British Museum Library there is a copy with an autograph note by Lord Cockburn on the fly-leaf, which ...
— George Borrow and His Circle - Wherein May Be Found Many Hitherto Unpublished Letters Of - Borrow And His Friends • Clement King Shorter
... (subbureau), IOC, SPC Diplomatic representation in US: none (territory of the US) Flag: blue with a white triangle edged in red that is based on the fly side and extends to the hoist side; a brown and white American bald eagle flying toward the hoist side is carrying two traditional Samoan symbols of authority, a staff and a ...
— The 1993 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... a book which brings considerable prices. However, by some lucky chance, some Socratic daemon whispering, may be, in his ear, he picked up the little dingy volume of the last century. It was of a Paris edition, 1751, but what was the name on the fly-leaf. M. de Latour read a J. J. Rousseau. There was no mistake about it, the good bibliophile knew Rousseau's handwriting perfectly well; to make still more sure he paid his seventy-five centimes for ...
— The Library • Andrew Lang
... made her an offer of marriage, which she refused for the glory of God, from whose holy angel she believed she had received the water. The receipt for making it and directions for using it, were also found on the fly-leaf. The principal component parts were burnt wine and rosemary, passed through an alembic; a drachm of it was to be taken once a week, 'etelbenn vagy italbann,' in the food or the drink, early in the morning, and the cheeks were to be moistened with it every day. The ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... and then went into the corridor to drop them in the chute beside the elevator shaft; as I approached, the car came down with Mrs. Spencer in it. Something impelled me to follow her; and running back I grabbed a cloak, and dashed for the elevator, catching it on the fly. She wasn't in the main corridor; on a chance, I hurried to the F Street entrance; I got there just as she stepped into a taxi and shot away. Instantly I called another taxi and told the driver to follow the car that had just departed. He did for a little way; but in a sudden halt of traffic ...
— The Cab of the Sleeping Horse • John Reed Scott
... valuable things like that and not return them. The laughing that Benlian and I have had over that diary! It fooled them all—the clever X-ray men, the artists of the academies, everybody! Written on the fly-leaf was "To My Pudgie." I shall publish it when I ...
— Widdershins • Oliver Onions
... smitten with frenzy, and died raving in the Metropolitan Lunatic Asylum. Alfred Bourdon, after a lengthened imprisonment, was liberated. He called on me, by appointment, a few days previous to leaving this country forever; and I placed in his hands a small pocket-Bible, on the fly-leaf of which was written one word—"Ellen!" His dim eye lighted up with something of its old fire as he glanced at the characters; he then closed the book, placed it in his bosom, and waving me a mute farewell—I saw he durst not trust himself to speak—hastily departed. ...
— The Experiences of a Barrister, and Confessions of an Attorney • Samuel Warren
... ink on the fleshly tables of his heart. As he turned over the well-thumbed pages he made many mental calculations, sometimes smiling and sometimes sighing as his eye fell on an irreclaimable debt. Then, taking up his pencil, he entered an account on the fly-sheet of the Bible, and seemed satisfied when he discovered that his illness would not involve him in the loss which he had anticipated; and smiling the smile of selfish gain, he closed his ...
— Lancashire Idylls (1898) • Marshall Mather
... Samuel himself gave her ladyship a copy of the Holy Bible, bound in the best Russian leather, with various texts marked, which had never failed to bring her comfort when intoned in the meek monotony of his gentle voice. On the fly-leaf he had inscribed her name—Lady Bray, from her devoted friend and ...
— Sally Bishop - A Romance • E. Temple Thurston
... garrulous tailor, and ranting with an alien flippancy; now it is Beelzebub he addresses, now the King; now he is waxing eloquent on the virtues of Scotch whisky, anon writing to a young friend in words of wisdom that might well be written on the fly-leaf ...
— Robert Burns - Famous Scots Series • Gabriel Setoun
... reading-men are in the habit of noting down on the fly-leaves of their books memoranda, sometimes critical, sometimes bibliographical, the result of their own knowledge or research. The following are specimens of the kind of Notes to which we allude; and ...
— Notes And Queries,(Series 1, Vol. 2, Issue 1), - Saturday, November 3, 1849. • Various
... alas! also to Gallio-like apathy and indifference, can scarcely form a conception of what was at that time the popular estimate of a Papist. A fair view of it is given by the following sarcastic description, written on the fly-leaf of a volume of manuscript sermons ...
— It Might Have Been - The Story of the Gunpowder Plot • Emily Sarah Holt
... it) without risk of being put out, but thereafter can be put out by being touched with the ball in the hands of a fielder unless some part of the runner's person is in contact with the base. When a fair or foul ball struck by a batsman on his side is caught on the fly, he must retouch his base, or be put out if the baseman receives the ball before he can do so. A runner on first-base is forced to run to second as soon as a fair ball is batted, or, being on second with another runner on first, he is forced to run to third. ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various
... that we were still alive, but hitherto had failed. Now we had a providential opportunity. Some of the prisoners who were captured at the battle of Murfreesboro' were brought to Richmond, and confined in the basement of our building. While they remained, I wrote a note with a pencil, on the fly-leaf of a book, and when taken down to wash in the morning, slipped around to the door of the Western prisoners, and gave it to an Irishman. He concealed it until he was exchanged, and then mailed it to my father. It produced a great sensation among my friends, most of ...
— Daring and Suffering: - A History of the Great Railroad Adventure • William Pittenger
... before we went to bed. Can see how hard this would be for real tenderfeet. Found an old Klondike shack, fallen in, this afternoon, apparently deserted nearly twenty years. Caught some splendid Arctic trout on the fly—the gamest fish we ever saw, and mighty good to eat. They look like sea-trout, although they are a hundred and fifty miles from the sea here. Our camp in a round pocket to-night. The canyon bends ...
— Young Alaskans in the Far North • Emerson Hough
... talking. He would write the invitations; and he would take care to mention the leading part he had taken in the fight, and how he had laid the Chief Weasel flat; and he would hint at his adventures, and what a career of triumph he had to tell about; and on the fly-leaf he would set out a sort of a programme of entertainment for the evening—something like this, as he sketched it out ...
— The Wind in the Willows • Kenneth Grahame
... came to hear him his lessons at home. The good pedagogue does not figure after this in Hawthorne's boyish history; but a copy of Worcester's Dictionary still exists and is in present use, which bears in a tremulous writing on the fly-leaf the legend: "Nathaniel Hawthorne, Esq., with the respects of J. E. Worcester." For a long time, in the worst of his lameness, the gentle boy was forced to lie prostrate, and choosing the floor for his couch, he would ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop
... a mighty civil war to lay bare what may have been, if not the source of the rules themselves, the origin and suggestion of their compilation. At that time a little volume was found in Virginia bearing the name of George Washington in a boyish hand on the fly-leaf, and the date 1742. The book was entitled, "The Young Man's Companion." It was an English work, and had passed through thirteen editions, which was little enough in view of its varied and extensive information. It was written by W. Mather, in a plain and easy style, and ...
— George Washington, Vol. I • Henry Cabot Lodge
... fancied that he had only laid down the pencil for an instant, and would take it up again in a moment more. I likewise saw a copy of a handsome, illustrated edition of Childe Harold, presented by old John Murray to Mr. Rogers, with an inscription on the fly-leaf, purporting that it was a token of gratitude from the publisher, because, when everybody else thought him imprudent in giving four hundred guineas for the poem, Mr. Rogers told him it would turn out the ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... itself disagreeable to the foreign invader. It was a patrolling party from St. Meuse that intercepted the courier on his way from the battlefield of Sedan to Germany, carrying the hurried lines to his wife which the Crown Prince of Prussia scrawled on the fly-leaf of an orderly book while as yet the last shots of the combat were dropping in the distance; carrying too the notes of the momentous battle which William Howard-Russell had jotted down in the heat of the action and had taken the same opportunity of despatching. St. Meuse, then, ...
— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes
... ejaculated Stephen mentally; "wonder what his own girl's like anyway." Then he tossed himself back on the rug and looked at a little postage-stamp photograph Katrine had given him of herself, which he had stuck on the fly-leaf of his ...
— A Girl of the Klondike • Victoria Cross
... a large, black dog, and guided by one of my aunt's negroes armed and dressed in Federal uniform, galloped into the yard and searched the house for "rebel soldiers." Passing through the Federal campground, from among the numerous household articles, etc., I picked up a book, on the fly-leaf of which was written, "Captured at Washington College, Lexington, Rockingham County, Virginia." That afternoon, as I was slowly toiling up the steep mountain path almost overgrown with ferns, I was stopped by an old, white-bearded mountaineer at a small gate which he held open for ...
— The Story of a Cannoneer Under Stonewall Jackson • Edward A. Moore
... that be possible, and who certainly enjoyed making others like themselves. Encouraged by their laughter and approbation, Alec began to emulate them, and would soon have had very little to learn if things had not taken a turn. A great hand is sometimes laid even on the fly-wheel of life's engine. ...
— Alec Forbes of Howglen • George MacDonald
... but is played over a lower dividing line, and the ball is batted with the hand instead of with a racket; it is always played from a bound, never "on the fly." ...
— Games for the Playground, Home, School and Gymnasium • Jessie H. Bancroft
... in all), and burned a town; and so come away. By and by the Duke of Yorke with his books showed us the very place and manner, and that it was not our design or expectation to have done this, but only to have landed on the Fly, and burned some of their store; but being come in, we spied those ships, and with our long boats, one by one, fired them, our ships running all aground, it being so shoal water. We were led to this by, it seems, a renegado captain of the Hollanders, ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... ears, and to Leonard they seemed fateful—a prophecy of utter loss. Sighing heavily, he opened the packet and examined its contents by the feeble moonlight. They were not large: a prayer-book bound in morocco, her own, with her name on the fly-leaf and a short inscription beneath, and in the pocket of its cover a lock of auburn ...
— The People Of The Mist • H. Rider Haggard
... You will be obliged, in the first place, to maintain sustained attention over long periods of time. The situation is not like that in reading, in which a temporary lapse of attention may be remedied by turning back and rereading. In listening to a lecture, you are obliged to catch the words "on the fly." Accordingly you must develop new habits of paying attention. You will also need to develop a new technic for memorizing, especially for memorizing things heard. As a partial aid in this, and also for purposes of organizing ...
— How to Use Your Mind • Harry D. Kitson
... Now," and he brought his fist down on the table, "I'm going to play that young man wide open, and I'll bet you I don't lose by him neither. He looks as honest as a mastiff pup, for all he dresses kind of nice. I might just as well try him on the fly, as to go lunk-heading around and get stuck anyhow, with the unsatisfactory addition of feeling that I was a fool, as well ...
— Red Saunders • Henry Wallace Phillips
... till a few minutes ago." She reiterated that she was indebted to me for the perfect safety of her house and property, and added, "You remember, when you were at our house on Cooper River in 1845, you gave me a book;" and she handed me the book in question, on the fly leaf of which was written: "To Miss Poyas, with the compliments of W. T. Sherman, First-lieutenant Third Artillery." She then explained that, as our army approached Columbia, there was a doubt ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... class now assembled at Charlie's Oak and proceeded to gather branches of autumn leaves. With the aid of a handkerchief and a ribbon, these were arranged in the semblance of a large wreath. On the fly leaf, torn from the ...
— Molly Brown's Senior Days • Nell Speed
... his reading. The book was a treatise on ontology; it was written by another philosopher, a friend of this philosopher's; it bristled with fallacies, and this philosopher was discovering them all, and noting them on the fly-leaf at the end. He was not going to review the book (as some might have thought from his behaviour), or even to answer it in a work of his own. It was just that he found a pleasure in stripping any poor fallacy naked and ...
— Stories by English Authors: England • Various
... moccasin with his claw. Tell you I was doin' some tall thinkin' jest then. I knew he had the wind of me and I could never make the brush, so I pulled my little lunch out of my pocket and dropped it on the fly. ...
— Dutch Courage and Other Stories • Jack London
... attention from its similarity to the one he had procured for his friend. It was, in fact, the same. It had found its way back to its original owner. On opening it, he found some melancholy lines written on the fly-leaf, and signed with his present name and address. He immediately repurchased the book, and hastened to the discovery, and, as it proved, the rescue ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 57, No. 352, February 1845 • Various
... shape of a dogfish or a skate. These are to be looked for and welcomed. Once the horse mackerel struck into Massachusetts Bay. These weigh a thousand pounds apiece and take live fish of considerable size on the fly. In those days a deep-sea fisherman, hauling in a respectable cod, was likely to find adventure enough with the situation suddenly reversed and a horse mackerel hauling in the line with the fisherman, on ...
— Old Plymouth Trails • Winthrop Packard
... ideas of life. One day he was lying with his head up-stream, as was his usual habit, when a particularly fat, plump little larva, torn from his home by the remorseless river, came drifting down with the current. He looked very tempting, and our friend sallied out from under a stick and caught him on the fly, just as he had seen the star-gazer catch his own brother. The funny little creature wriggled deliciously on his tongue, and he held him between his jaws for a moment in a kind of ecstasy; but he couldn't quite make up his mind to ...
— Forest Neighbors - Life Stories of Wild Animals • William Davenport Hulbert
... it;—it was a fancy, perhaps,—but I can't keep it out of my mind this evening. If any of my fancies should come true, Helen, there are two or three messages I want to leave with you. I have marked a book or two with a cross in pencil on the fly-leaf;—these are for you. There is a little hymn-book I should like to have you give to Elsie from me;—it may be a kind of ...
— Elsie Venner • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... reason to believe this is the New Testament referred to. The name on the opposite page was written on the fly-leaf. It is obviously the writing of a boy, and bears a resemblance to Mr. Brown's handwriting in mature life. It is imperfect, wanting a great part of the Gospel of Matthew. The autograph at the end is that of his son, ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown
... On the fly-leaf of a book in his library the Earl of Shaftesbury noted in pencil some of the obstacles which beset his progress when seeking the good of the distressed children: "I had to break every political connection, ...
— Ten Englishmen of the Nineteenth Century • James Richard Joy
... know yo' automobile fellers," he said with a laugh. "You want to get some grub on the fly, so you won't have to stop, an' can beat th' other fellow. I know you, fer I see them automobile goggles ...
— Tom Swift and his Airship • Victor Appleton
... knock the mule down with a neck-yoke, the animal had grabbed the chaplain by the coat tail, with its mouth, taking some of his pants, also, and perhaps a little skin, raised him up into the air, about seven feet, let go of him, and tried to turn around and kick the good man on the fly as he came down. We drove the mule away, rescued the chaplain, tied his pants together with a piece of string, cut off the tail of his coat which the mule had not torn off, so it was the same length as the other one, and made him look quite presentable, ...
— How Private George W. Peck Put Down The Rebellion - or, The Funny Experiences of a Raw Recruit - 1887 • George W. Peck
... fell in with a small work by this divine, entitled Ter Tria, and on the fly-leaf is a MS. note, stating that some years ago a copy of the same book was priced, in a bookseller's catalogue in London, at 1l. 7s. 6d. I wish to learn some particulars relative to the author, and if the work is valuable, or ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 187, May 28, 1853 • Various
... conversation with him was in his house in Onslow Gardens, and there I very frequently sat for hours with him, and he also presented me with copies of all his books, with an autograph letter on the fly-leaf of each. I think the recent Land Purchase Act, having been followed by increased agitation for Home Rule in Ireland, bears out what he said about the folly of trying to reconcile the irreconcilables, and also bears out what Lord Morris called the 'criminal idiotcy' of attempting to satisfy ...
— The Reminiscences of an Irish Land Agent • S.M. Hussey
... exclaim against the wind, shuffle the leaves till he got the right page, and settle to his reading. The book was a treatise on ontology; it was written by another philosopher, a friend of this philosopher's; it bristled with fallacies, and this philosopher was discovering them all, and noting them on the fly leaf at the end. He was not going to review the book (as some might have thought from his behavior), or even to answer it in a work of his own. It was just that he found a pleasure in stripping any poor ...
— Frivolous Cupid • Anthony Hope
... offered her pretty gilt hymn-book to her guardian. He accepted it mechanically, and during the reading of the Scriptures that soon followed he slowly turned over the leaves until he reached the title-page. On the fly-leaf that fluttered over was written: "Regina Orme. With the love and prayers ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... His memories, I am told, extend back to a personal knowledge of Dr. Johnson. How I should like to sit by him, and search into that cabinet of recollections! He presented me his poems, beautifully illustrated by Turner, with his own autograph on the fly leaf. He writes still a clear, firm, beautiful hand, like ...
— Sunny Memories Of Foreign Lands, Volume 1 (of 2) • Harriet Elizabeth (Beecher) Stowe
... copy of Montaigne's Essays in the British Museum, which bears Shakspere's autograph on the title-page, we found—long after our treatise had been completed—that on the fly-leaf at the end of the volume is written: Mors incrta, (Written somewhat indistinctly, meaning probably incerta. It might also be an abbreviation of 'incertam horam' [incr. ho.], as contained in the Latin verse on ...
— Shakspere And Montaigne • Jacob Feis
... They do it well, but it always spoils my devotion. To save my life, I can't help watching them, as I watch to see a duck dive at the flash of a gun, and that is not what I go to church for. It is a juggler's trick, and there is no more religion in it than in catching a ball on the fly. ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... had asked me for a complete list of my published works, to print it on the fly-leaf of another of them. I sat down with the best intention and compiled it for him, and, in honest oblivion, omitted a couple—of books, mind you—not of pamphlets, reviews, stray articles, short stories, or any such trifles, ...
— From a Cornish Window - A New Edition • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... these names?' he asked, pointing to the words written on the fly-leaf, which were, "Margaret Jones, from her ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... And here's your gold pencil-case too," continued the boy, as he raised the corner of the book. "Why, they have been turning the watch-ribbon into a marker, and somebody has been writing here on the fly-leaf." ...
— The Ocean Cat's Paw - The Story of a Strange Cruise • George Manville Fenn
... is written in pencil on the fly-leaf of a copy of Poems 1833 in the Dyce Collection in South Kensington Museum. Reprinted with many alterations in Life, vol. ...
— The Suppressed Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... reading was on the fly leaves; and, on turning them over, I lighted upon some half effaced pencil-marks to the following effect: "Jonathan Jones, from his particular friend Daniel Dods, 1798." So it must have originally belonged to Mr. Jones' father; and I wondered whether he had ever read it; ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... when it turned out more than usually funny. His chief amusement was hunting through the bookstalls along the quays, and I have, amongst my old books, an early life of Raphael, which he gave me, with his name on the fly leaf. ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I • Stillman, William James
... dark, damp cell. Here, breviary in hand, he had stood, and lain, and knelt. Here, in this miserable prison, he had found something to love, and on which to expend the rare intelligence and benevolence of his nature. Here, finally, in the last hours of his life, he had written on the fly-leaf of his prayer-book something to comfort his successor, and "being dead yet spoke" the words of consolation which he had administered in his lifetime. Monsieur the Viscount read that ...
— Frances Kane's Fortune • L. T. Meade
... all—books which it is one's habit to "take as read"; to presume sufficiently known to speak of, but never to open. Thus, one day my hand fell upon the Anabasis, the little Oxford edition which I used at school, with its boyish sign-manual on the fly-leaf, its blots and underlinings and marginal scrawls. To my shame I possess no other edition; yet this is a book one would like to have in beautiful form. I opened it, I began to read—a ghost of boyhood stirring in my heart—and from chapter to ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing
... night, they found that the bed had not been used during Le Gallais' occupation. A copy of Ben Jonson's Poems lay on the table; by the side of which were pen and ink, and a burnt-out candle. On opening the book, Mdlle. de St. Martin found some lines written on the fly-leaf, which ran as follows:— ...
— St George's Cross • H. G. Keene
... to her during service this afternoon by writing my feelings on the fly-leaf of the hymn-book, or something like that; but I knew that aunt Celia would never forgive such blasphemy, and I thought that Kitty herself might consider it wicked. Besides, if she should chance to accept me, there was nothing I could do, in a cathedral, to ...
— A Cathedral Courtship • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... the desk were some dry letters and a Business Book—at least, that's how it was marked—with lists of names, each having an occupation or task set down opposite it, I suppose the names of long-dead slaves. On the fly-leaf was written, in a neat and very legible hand, ...
— A Woman Named Smith • Marie Conway Oemler
... spring, there was of course some mitigation of the trials of the winter. Here is an almost idyllic passage from a letter to his sister, written on the fly-leaves of 'Les Confessions de ...
— Poems • Alan Seeger
... scholar and who took great interest in the boy. Preserved to the end of the poet's life was a copy of the Odes of Horace, in translation, given to him as a lad of twelve, with his uncle's autograph inscription on the fly-leaf. This was the translation made by Christopher Smart, whose "Song of David" soon became one of the boy's favorites, and it is curious to trace how, more than sixty years later, Browning embodied Smart in his "Parleyings with Certain People of Importance in their ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting
... Lords, next session!—Will you do me this favour?" Of course I immediately procured the book to be forwarded to him, and it afforded him uncommon pleasure for many days. He read it entirely through with deep attention, as his numerous pencil marks on the margin attest, as well as several notes on the fly-leaf, of leading points of difference between our law and that of Scotland. At page 35, Sec.76, the text runs thus:—"Tacit acceptance may be inferred from silence, when the refusal is so put as to require rejection, if the party do not mean to assent; ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCLXXVI. February, 1847. Vol. LXI. • Various
... and landed it on some outlying point before the next meal-hour. With her blunt jib-boom she had prodded a hole in the side of a lighthouse supply-boat, and sailed away without answering questions. The government was taking cognizance, and her description was written on the fly-leaves of several revenue cutters' log-books, while Sunday newspapers in the large cities began a series of special articles about the mysterious schooner-rigged ...
— "Where Angels Fear to Tread" and Other Stories of the Sea • Morgan Robertson
... Maggie sat breathless in it. When it became too trying, she rose softly and went to the next room. There was a small table there, and on it a shaded lamp and a few books. One of them was turned with its face downward and looked unfamiliar; she lifted it, and saw on the fly-leaf, Cornelius Fleming, A.D. 1800. It was a pocket edition of the Alcestis in English, and the good man had drawn a pencil opposite some lines, which he doubtless intended Maggie ...
— A Daughter of Fife • Amelia Edith Barr
... of the night and unburden my heart to this argus-eyed watchman, and, lo! you come flying in answer to my wish. Quick service, Judge. In appreciation of your telepathy I present you with some lumbago cure." He tossed a bank-note to Regan, who snatched it eagerly on the fly. ...
— The Auction Block • Rex Beach
... he said quickly. "I show you." Then the wag of a Delaware tossed the first stone fully twenty feet aloft, caught up the others, and took that on the fly. ...
— The Daughter of the Chieftain - The Story of an Indian Girl • Edward S. Ellis
... of the players has the serve—that is, he attempts to strike the ball so that it will go over the net and into a specified space on the opposite side of the net. His opponent then attempts to return the serve—that is, to strike the ball either on the fly or the first bound and knock it back over the net somewhere within the playing space as determined by the lines. In this way the ball is volleyed or knocked back and forth until one of the players fails either to return it over the net or into the required ...
— Outdoor Sports and Games • Claude H. Miller
... just gathered his earliest laurels. My brother John gave me the first copy of his poems I ever possessed, with a prophecy of his future fame and excellence written on the fly-leaf of it. I have never ceased to exult in my possession of that copy of the first edition of those poems, which became the songs of our every day and every hour, almost; we delighted in them and knew them by heart, and read and said them over and over again incessantly; they were our ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... the paper, and put into Rosalie's hands a small black Testament. The child opened the book, and read on the fly-leaf, 'Mrs. Augustus Joyce. From her friend Mrs. Bernard, in remembrance of little Arthur, and with the prayer that she may meet her ...
— A Peep Behind the Scenes • Mrs. O. F. Walton
... the original binding. It was procured by Mr. Heber from Hanwell, the Bookseller in Oxford, who had probably purchased it on the taking down of Ricot, the old seat of the Norreys family, and the dispersion of its contents. It has the autograph of Francis Lord Norreys on the fly-leaf, and was no doubt a presentation copy to him from Basse. The poetry of this work does not rise above mediocrity, and is not equal in thought or vigour to the Epitaph on Shakspeare. The chief portion of ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 19, Saturday, March 9, 1850 • Various
... husband she had voyaged in all manner of rickety craft among the islands of the Pacific, reflectively adding, 'Our tastes were similar.' Following the subject of voyages she gave me the four beautiful volumes of sailing directories for the Mediterranean, writing on the fly-leaf of the first, 'To Captain Slocum. These volumes have been read and re-read many times by my husband, and I am very sure that he would be pleased that they should be passed on to the sort of sea-faring man that he liked above all others. Fanny V. de G. Stevenson.' ...
— The Life of Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson • Nellie Van de Grift Sanchez
... lot more comfortable," answered Mary, humbly, with another kiss as Betty handed her the book. On the fly-leaf she had written her own name and Mary's and the inscription borne by the old sun-dial ...
— The Little Colonel: Maid of Honor • Annie Fellows Johnston
... sitting down, putting two volumes to support the third, and opening it. "H'm—no name on the fly-leaf. ...
— The Invisible Man • H. G. Wells
... were flying out into the garden, and those objects were books. I had the curiosity and agility to catch a few as they fell, and to pick others up. They were mostly volumes of Poetry, and, in every case, they bore ST. BARBE'S name on the fly-leaf, with a flattering manuscript inscription by the author. Some of the authors' names were unknown to me; in others I recognised ladies of title whom I had read about in the Society Journals. Urging my way through a hot fire of octavos, I rang the bell. The maid who opened the door ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 103, December 17, 1892 • Various
... cue instantly at a word from the ringmaster. He picked up the vegetable, made a profound bow to the sender, juggled it cleverly with his training wand, one-two-three, and turned the tables completely as the smart baby elephant caught it on the fly. ...
— Andy the Acrobat • Peter T. Harkness
... singular bequest was a Bible, with three cigarette-lighters for markers, and a date on the fly-leaf: ...
— The Tree of Heaven • May Sinclair
... the roof at home was a pile of handsomely bound books, lying on a chest beside her mother's Bible. They were twelve in all, and had come in several different Christmas boxes, and each one had Betty's name on the fly-leaf, with the date of the Christmas on which it happened to be sent. Underneath was always written: "From your loving godmother, Elizabeth ...
— The Little Colonel's House Party • Annie Fellows Johnston |
