"Pick off" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... they were almost young men, when of an evening they returned to the town amidst the still oppressive heat of a summer sunset. Later on they became very fond of shooting, but shooting such as is carried on in a region devoid of game, where they had to trudge a score of miles to pick off half a dozen pettychaps, or fig-peckers; wonderful expeditions, whence they returned with their bags empty, or with a mere bat, which they had managed to bring down while discharging their guns at the outskirts of the town. Their eyes moistened ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola
... example, a proportion of them, always the best marksmen, direct their fire entirely upon the wireless finding and sighting apparatus of the big guns of an attacking naval force; another detail attends to the smaller guns in the same way; others pick off the gunners; still others the officers; while certain other quotas concentrate their attention upon the other members of the crew, upon the upper works, and upon the ...
— A Princess of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... gather the cows throughout the first night the round-up crew was in from the range and hold them a few miles from the ranch. In case the freighters failed to leave before the others came back from Brill's the raid would have been staged just the same; men cached along the lip of the valley to pick off all those who should attempt to ride down and turn the run; others ready to slip down from behind and torch the buildings while the fight was going on in the flat. Lang could not know that Slade was locked up and that Morrow was dead so ...
— The Settling of the Sage • Hal G. Evarts
... mile or two. Then we halted, and hid our own horses, and took cover behind the rocks to wait for the Kurds; and as they came, making a good running fight of it, dodging hither and thither behind the boulders to try to pick off Ranjoor Singh's men, we would open fire on their rear unexpectedly, thus throwing them into confusion again,—and ...
— Hira Singh - When India came to fight in Flanders • Talbot Mundy
... a minute, and then alighted upon her favorite sweet-meats, "pepnits." She chose for her portion a large amount of these, an harmonica, and a sugar pig, which Dotty assured her was not "colored." "Nothing but pink dots, and those you can pick off." ...
— Dotty Dimple's Flyaway • Sophie May
... "get your riflemen together and pick off those fellows as fast as you can. Never mind those bags of sand. ...
— Sustained honor - The Age of Liberty Established • John R. Musick,
... uncle as aint public anyways. It's in the papers off an' on, see? An' now another election's comin' down the pike, y'll have to be gittin' used to all kinds o' spiels. Fac's is fac's, kid, an' when I says the Hon. Milt aint no sweet-scented geranium but's out fer all the simoleons he can pick off the little old Mazuma Tree,—why, I on'y says what I reads an' hears, believe me. You bein' his nephew aint changin' public opinion ...
— Every Man for Himself • Hopkins Moorhouse
... contrary, took his grain of corn to a branch, or sometimes to the trunk of a tree, where he sought a suitable crevice in the bark or in a crotch, placed his kernel, hammered it well in till firm and safe, and then proceeded to pick off pieces and eat them daintily, one by one. Sometimes he left a kernel there, and I saw how firmly it was wedged in, when the English sparrow discovered his store, fell upon it, and dug it out. It was a good deal of work for a strong-billed, persistent sparrow to dislodge a grain thus placed. ...
— A Bird-Lover in the West • Olive Thorne Miller
... from insects, nicely wash them, and pick off any dead or discoloured leaves from the outsides; put them into a saucepan of boiling water, with salt and soda in the above proportion; keep the pan uncovered, and let them boil quickly over a brisk fire until ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... militia came up, sober farmers of the village that lay below us buried in smoke; and our dragoons listened to the tales of these men, some of whom had been in the village when the onset came, and had remained there, skulking about to pick off the enemy until their ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... and pick off the green Stalk, then boil some Sugar till it blows very strong; throw in the Violets, and boil it till it blows again, then with a Spoon rub the Sugar against the Side of the Pan till white, then stir all till the Sugar leaves them; then sift them ...
— The Art of Confectionary • Edward Lambert
... to be a country gentleman's wife," Rebecca thought. "I think I could be a good woman if I had five thousand a year. I could dawdle about in the nursery and count the apricots on the wall. I could water plants in a green-house and pick off dead leaves from the geraniums. I could ask old women about their rheumatisms and order half-a-crown's worth of soup for the poor. I shouldn't miss it much, out of five thousand a year. I could even drive out ten miles to dine at a neighbour's, and dress in the fashions of the year ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... cover was smashed the Mexican soldiers would once more have the advantage. Only a man at a time could reach the roof. It ought not to be difficult for the defenders to pick off a Navy man at a time as the Americans ...
— Dave Darrin at Vera Cruz • H. Irving Hancock
... impossible for the men to stand at the wheel, we will make mincemeat of this fellow in no time. Directly I have fired our port broadside, I am going to bring her up into the wind on the opposite tack, and give him the starboard broadside at close quarters. Don't fire until we have gone about, and then pick off the ...
— The Tiger of Mysore - A Story of the War with Tippoo Saib • G. A. Henty
... within a hundred yards of the Russian guns in a fort they called the Redan, and jumped into a pit which the enemy had themselves dug to shelter their own riflemen, who came there at night to annoy our working parties. Here we were sheltered, and could pick off the Russian gunners without being seen. They soon, however, found us out, and sent doses of cannister and grape shot towards us, knocking the dust and stones about our heads. A grape shot hit the right hand of one of my comrades, and took off the forefinger. ...
— Taking Tales - Instructive and Entertaining Reading • W.H.G. Kingston
... nothing much happened over our way. Indians occasionally passed and repassed; now striding openly across to the island on friendly visit, now skulking over to pick off unwary settlers. Once we caught, in a hazy way, the most touching picture associated with the old isthmus—the little savage maiden, Pocahontas, with heart divided between her own people and the pale-faces, crossing ...
— Virginia: The Old Dominion • Frank W. Hutchins and Cortelle Hutchins
... soil by fixing on the soil, through property and its enjoyment, a troop of brave men under the leadership of a brave chieftain. The danger having passed away the structure became dilapidated. For a pecuniary compensation the seigniors allowed the economical and tenacious peasant to pick off it a good many stones. Through constraint they suffered the king to appropriate to himself the public portion. The primitive foundation remains, property as organized in ancient times, the fettered or exhausted ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... side came handier. We were told, and I believe it to be true, that during the fighting at Sunnaiyat the Turks sent over to know if we would agree to a three days' truce, during which time we should join forces against the Arabs, who were watching on the flank to pick off ...
— War in the Garden of Eden • Kermit Roosevelt
... would they be safer than right here in these mountains? Give me a rifle and something to eat and I'll defy an army getting me out there. And think of it: If this is Trevors's work, if he means business, think what two gunmen on these heights could do to us. They could pick off a three-thousand-dollar stallion down in the pens; they could drop more than one prize bull or cow; and," she added sharply, "if they thought about girls as some men think, they could take a chance on scaring Judith Sanford out ...
— Judith of Blue Lake Ranch • Jackson Gregory
... would carry us. The enemy held Port Hudson, below where the Red River debouches, and all the Mississippi above to Vicksburg. The Red River, Washita and Tensas were, as has been said, all navigable streams, on which the enemy could throw small bodies of men to obstruct our passage and pick off our troops with their sharpshooters. I let the work go on, believing employment was better than idleness for the men. Then, too, it served as a cover for other efforts which gave a better prospect of success. This work was abandoned after the ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... screaming loudly; and some of them were audacious enough to pounce upon our caps, and wreak their vengeance by giving us one or two hearty pecks. The cockswain, working like a telegraph with his swinging oar, generally contrived to pick off these skirmishers. ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross
... their forms at least, the familiar rose aphis; but probably few people ever look at them closely and critically enough to observe how very beautiful and wonderful is the organisation of their tiny limbs in all its exquisite detail. If you pick off one good-sized wingless insect, however, from a blighted rose-leaf, and put him on a glass slide under a low power of the microscope, you will most likely be quite surprised to find what a lovely little creature it is that you have been ...
— Falling in Love - With Other Essays on More Exact Branches of Science • Grant Allen
... the wounded Irregular lengthened in disgust. "My crimson luck! And I'd made up my mind to pick off a brace o' them blasted Dutch wart 'ogs over that there bad job of ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... famous shot, Belmont," cried the Colonel. "I've heard of you as one of the cracks. Don't, you think you could pick off their ...
— A Desert Drama - Being The Tragedy Of The "Korosko" • A. Conan Doyle
... the edge of the stumps and try to pick off our men," said Robert, "but they won't make a rush. St. Luc would never allow it. I don't understand this demonstration. It must be a cover for ...
— The Lords of the Wild - A Story of the Old New York Border • Joseph A. Altsheler
... when I tried to pick off the women with my attractor. That is why I am leaving at midnight. He always goes to bed at eleven-thirty, and I will be out of range of his object-compass before he wakes up. Seaton and I understand each other perfectly. We both ...
— Skylark Three • Edward Elmer Smith
... of bean-vines in Benjamin's yard, And the cabbages grow round it, planted for greens; In the time of my childhood 'twas terribly hard To bend down the bean-poles, and pick off the beans. ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various |
