"Sharp" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... mystery to me; I might venture to guess that it is between thirty and fifty. Past thirty all men begin to dry up or fatten, and he was certainly a lean person. His face was hidden beneath a beard of bristling, bushy red, and he had a sharp hook nose and small, bright eyes. From his appearance you could not tell whether he was a good man or a bad one, wise or stupid, kind-hearted or a brute. He seemed of a neutral tone. His clothes marked him as a man of the city, for we do not wear ...
— The Soldier of the Valley • Nelson Lloyd
... at first notices the different appearance of the native cat from the English animal; it is of small size, with closely lying hairs; its head is small, with a receding forehead; but the ears are large and sharp; altogether it has what is there called a "low-caste" appearance. Rengger (1/93. 'Saugethiere von Paraguay' 1830 s. 212.) says that the domestic cat, which has been bred for 300 years in Paraguay, presents a striking ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication - Volume I • Charles Darwin
... the attractions of the busy world, Preferring studious leisure, I had chosen A habitation in this peaceful Vale, Sharp season followed of continual storm In deepest winter; and, from week to week, 5 Pathway, and lane, and public road, were clogged With frequent showers of snow. Upon a hill At a short distance from my cottage, stands A stately Fir-grove, whither I was wont To hasten, for I found, beneath the ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. III • William Wordsworth
... really was. And so was he." She rose and threw the handkerchief away from her. "I'm not going to step out of the engagement by the side door you've left open for me, you dear old simple thing. It stands if you like. We're all honourable people, and Oliver"—she drew a sharp little breath—"Oliver will ...
— The Rough Road • William John Locke
... right philosophy was abandoned, and begin again. There is no impossibility or even difficulty here. History is not a dead thing, a thing of the past; it is eternally present to man, and this is one of the sharp differentiations between man and beast. The material monuments of man crumble and disappear, but the spirit that built the Parthenon or Reims Cathedral, that inspired St. Paul on Mars' hill or forged Magna Charta or the ...
— Towards the Great Peace • Ralph Adams Cram
... Blessed Lord's garment, thus saturated with His blood, adhered to His wounded body, and when again removed caused Him unspeakable pain. Next, the soldiers, because Our Lord had said He was a king—meaning a spiritual king—led Him into a large hall and mocked Him. They made a crown of long, sharp thorns, and forced it down upon His brow with a heavy rod or reed; every stroke driving the thorns into His head, and causing the blood to roll down His sacred face. They again took off His garments, and opened anew the painful ...
— Baltimore Catechism No. 4 (of 4) - An Explanation Of The Baltimore Catechism of Christian Doctrine • Thomas L. Kinkead
... tools have ever been found in the mounds, ruins or cliff dwellings, the hieroglyphics were probably picked into the rock with a sharp-pointed stone much harder than the rock upon which the work was done. It is a singular fact that, although iron, copper, gold and silver abound in the mountains in Arizona, no tools, utensils or ornaments ...
— My Native Land • James Cox
... crossed, he became as reckless as a reeling hurricane. Once, in a passion, he drove two of his father's "kye," or cattle, down a steep hill to their death. He seemed not to care for home or kindred, and often pierced the tender heart of his mother with sharp words. When she came at night, and "happed" the bed-clothes carefully about his form, and then stooped to kiss his nut-brown cheeks, he turned away with a frown, muttering, ...
— Fairy Book • Sophie May
... yesterday, dear Michael Jefgrafowitch, and, as you see, I do not delay the answer. Your letter is by no means "dull and blunt," as you say. On the contrary, it is very good and sensible. It gave me pleasure. There hovers about it some power and better health, in sharp contrast with its immediate predecessor, which was an extremely gloomy production. Besides, I am by no means cheerful myself at present: this is the third ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, September, 1885 • Various
... rivers, as well as in extensive deposits upon or beneath the surface of the dry land, appears to consist essentially of the detritus of rocks. It is not always by any means clear through what agency the solid rock has been reduced to a granular condition; for there are beds of quartzose sand, where the sharp, angular shape of the particles renders it highly improbable that they have been formed by gradual abrasion and attrition, and where the supposition of a crushing mechanical force seems equally inadmissible. In common ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... the year Lord Aberdeen had desired to retire, but enquiry soon disclosed that Lord John Russell no longer had the influence necessary to form a Ministry, and in the face of danger Lord Aberdeen remained at his post. But there were sharp dissensions in the Cabinet, especially between Lord Palmerston, representing the anti-Russian party, on the one hand, and on the other Lord Aberdeen, who distrusted the Turks, and Mr Gladstone, who disavowed any obligation to uphold the integrity ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria
... discussion was which company of the regiment would be called upon to start upon the raid, the members of each hoping to be selected; and Captain Roby maintaining loudly, in a sharp, snappish way, that without doubt his company would be chosen, and turning fiercely upon any of his brother ...
— The Kopje Garrison - A Story of the Boer War • George Manville Fenn
... wail, a sharp little note, piercing the quiet evening with its suggestion of discomfort or alarm. In an instant Persis was on her feet. Again her face was luminous. Suffused with a transforming tenderness, it lost its stern lines and became radiantly youthful. Blue misty ...
— Other People's Business - The Romantic Career of the Practical Miss Dale • Harriet L. Smith
... passing, Biron heard sharp firing on his left, beyond the village. He hastened there, and found an encounter of infantry going on. He sustained it as well as he could, whilst the enemy were gaining ground on the left, and, the ground being difficult (there was a ravine there), the enemy were ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... passed an Act against lawless love, and invited the Estates and Privy Council to "use sharp punishment" against some "idolaters," including Eglintoun, Cassilis, and Quentin Kennedy, Abbot of Crosraguel, who disputed later against Knox, the Laird of Gala (a ...
— John Knox and the Reformation • Andrew Lang
... and prayed him that he would make him Christian. And when Dacian knew that he was become Christian he made to smite off his head. And after, on the morn, he made St. George to be set between two wheels, which were full of swords, sharp and cutting on both sides, but anon the wheels were broken and St. George escaped without hurt. And then commanded Dacian that they should put him in a caldron full of molten lead, and when St. George entered therein, by the virtue of our Lord it seemed that he was in a bath well at ...
— Bible Stories and Religious Classics • Philip P. Wells
... interesting character. It matters not how intense the cold, it never deserts our woods, but remains hunting for insects in the cavities and among the branches of the trees with the most assiduous caution. They hatch their young in holes, which they perforate in decayed trees with their sharp bills. If a person happens to come near their nests during the time of incubation, it vociferates most strenuously against the intrusion, while its feathers expand, its eyes sparkle with rage, and it darts from branch to branch with the most astonishing rapidity. It is frequently to be ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... Indians, and to whom we have alluded before. This woman, although not of openly godless life, is more wise than devout, although her knowledge is not very extensive, and does not surpass that of the women of New Netherland. She is a truly worldly woman, proud and conceited, and sharp in trading with wild[349] people, as well as tame ones, or what shall I call them, not to give them the name of Christians, or if I do, it is only to distinguish them from the others. This trading is ...
— Journal of Jasper Danckaerts, 1679-1680 • Jasper Danckaerts
... Telemachus replies: "Never will that come to pass, I think, though I hope for it; no, not even if the Gods should so will." Assuredly a young skeptic he shows himself, probably in a fit of despondency; sharp is the reproof of the Goddess: "O Telemachus, what kind of talk is that? Easily can a God, if he wills it, save a man even at a distance." Thus she, a Goddess, asserts the supremacy of the Gods, even though they cannot avert death. But the ...
— Homer's Odyssey - A Commentary • Denton J. Snider
... perfection. Before he began we are told that the South Downs were of "small size and ill shape, long and thin in the neck, high on the shoulders, low behind, high on the loins, down on the rumps, the tail set on very low, sharp on the back, the ribs flat," &c., &c., and were not mature enough to fatten until three years old or past. Of his flock in 1794, Arthur Young[25] says: "Mr. Ellman's flock of sheep, I must observe in this place, is unquestionably the first in the country; there ...
— The Principles of Breeding • S. L. Goodale
... therefore, and stood away to the south-east, pretty close to the wind. Various other channels communicated with this main passage, or the Hope; and, about noon, Mark tacked into one of them, heading about north-east, when trimmed up sharp to do so. The water was deep, and at first the passage was half a mile in width; but after standing along it for a mile or two, it seemed all at once to terminate in an oval basin, that might have been a mile in its largest ...
— The Crater • James Fenimore Cooper
... and the house was quiet as the grave, sure enough the silver whistle sounded as sharp and shrill as if Sir Robert was blowing it, and up got the twa auld serving-men, and tottered into the room where the dead man lay. Hutcheon saw aneugh at the first glance; for there were torches in the room, ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... April when the pettish month assumes a matronly air of summer and wears it till the end of the day. The beech twigs were strongly embrowned, the larches shot up green spires by the borders of woods and on mounds within, deep ditchbanks unrolled profuse tangles of new blades, and sharp eyes might light on a late white violet overlooked by the children; primroses ran along the banks. Jane had a maxim that flowers should be spared to live their life, especially flowers of the wilds; she had reared herself on our poets; hence Mrs. Lackstraw's dread of the arrival of one of the minstrel ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... was towards us as we entered, and, unnoticed by him, we saw him hold up to the light a small sharp dagger, with a handle beautifully ornamented. He was indicating with his finger, for Monica's benefit, the delicate tracery upon gold, when, warned by lack of attention and wandering glances on the part of ...
— The Car of Destiny • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... that boom cleared away, Manton, we won't want the mainsail long. Here comes a squall. Look sharp. Close reef topsails." ...
— Gascoyne, the Sandal-Wood Trader • R.M. Ballantyne
... us," said Mrs. Smithers, half to herself. "Your uncle allers 'ad 'is dinner at one o'clock, sharp, and 'e wouldn't like it to 'ave such scandalous goin's on in 'is ...
— At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern • Myrtle Reed
... went. Robert let me at last, though I had a struggle for even that, the air being rather over-sharp for me. But I represented to him that one might as well lose one's life as one's peace of mind for ever, and if I lost seeing her I should with difficulty get over it. So I put on my respirator, smothered ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume II • Elizabeth Barrett Browning
... the royal family. The king shook hands with us, and immediately proceeded to march up and down in quick step, putting one foot before the other with mathematical precision, as if under drill. "Forewarned, forearmed!" my friend whispered that I should prepare myself for a sharp cross-questioning as to my age, my husband, children, and other strictly personal concerns. Suddenly his Majesty, having cogitated sufficiently in his peculiar manner, with one long final stride halted in front of us, and pointing straight at me ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens
... quarrel, but he got as little out of the priests as the father. It was fixed in the church, you understand, and he could not take it away. He climbed through the window one night and tried to burn it—the marks are there to this day—but they were too sharp for him. And he took the business so much to heart that he also soon died quite young! And ...
— Old Calabria • Norman Douglas
... neighbouring height shook it in his great hands till every hill echoed and the very trees quivered with the horrid sound. And the man-eating birds? Not one remained hidden. Each and every one rose terrified in the air, croaking and working its steely talons and sharp-pointed feathers ...
— Heroes Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... banker threw a ghastly and withering glance at the punters, and cried, in a sharp voice, "Make your game!" as the young man came in. The silence seemed to grow deeper as all heads turned curiously towards the new arrival. Who would have thought it? The jaded elders, the fossilized waiters, the onlookers, the fanatical Italian himself, felt an indefinable dread ...
— The Magic Skin • Honore de Balzac
... hour was now clamored down as rationally as it had been cried up, and its dishonored rival, with no good will and no good looks on the part of the chagrined populace, was reared in its stead. As it ascended, the sharp angles faded away, the rough points became smooth, the features full of expression, the whole figure radiant with majesty and beauty. The rude hewn mass, that before had scarcely appeared to bear even the human form, assumed at once the divinity ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... and started home. The sharp, crisp air was delicious. The starlit sky was a canopy of never ceasing beauty, and the song in his heart was the ever sweet song of hope. The four hours' ride seemed little more than a journey of as many minutes; ...
— A Forest Hearth: A Romance of Indiana in the Thirties • Charles Major
... with their assaguays in their hands, leaping forward and hiding, as required, running with the greatest activity close up to the rear of the animals, either pierced them with their assaguays, or hamstrung them with their sharp-cutting weapons, crying out in their own tongue to the elephants, "Great captain! don't kill us—don't tread upon us, mighty chief!"—supplicating, strangely enough, the mercy of those to whom they were showing none. As it was almost impossible to fire without a chance ...
— The Mission • Frederick Marryat
... in a glade that commanded a fine view of the surrounding country and each of the boys took several time pictures with small lens openings, so as to get sharp outlines. ...
— Out with Gun and Camera • Ralph Bonehill
... Mr Beauclerk should speak a word to Lord Alfred. The rich man and the poor man were cousins, and had always been intimate. 'Alfred,' said the chosen mentor at the club one afternoon, 'I wonder whether you couldn't say something to Melmotte about his manner.' Lord Alfred turned sharp round and looked into his companion's face. 'They tell me he is giving offence. Of course he doesn't mean it. Couldn't he draw it a ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... parties were about equally divided in Daviess County. The Mormons held the balance of power, and could turn the scale whichever way they desired. I had heard of Judge Mourning as a sharp political worker, and I then thought he was trying to carry out an electioneering job ...
— The Mormon Menace - The Confessions of John Doyle Lee, Danite • John Doyle Lee
... The women are, as a rule, very fond of ornaments, and the men are, above all things, proud of a horse or a pair of scarlet breeches. Of late years they have in a few districts began to intermarry with the Wallachs, and the sharp distinction between them and the other races in Hungary ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... piece of nasty boldness as that to do with respect? She's the first that ever defied me!' exclaimed the young man, whose aspect somehow scarcely confirmed this pretension. 'You know all about her—don't make believe you don't,' he continued in another tone. 'You see everything—you're one of the sharp ones. There's no use beating about the bush, Laura—you've lived in this precious house and you're not so green as that comes to. Besides, you're so good yourself that you needn't give a shriek if ...
— A London Life; The Patagonia; The Liar; Mrs. Temperly • Henry James
... loud, clear, and sharp as an irritated watch-dog; but this one bow-wow vented, he was silent ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... is felt to be out of place in a dream-being, whose sole reality is its unreality. Their personal unimportance to the Universe, and remoteness from the Market-place of Life allow them to dawdle. Their experiences have no sharp edges, no abrupt precipices, no divisive gulfs, no defined beginnings and endings. The book of their sojourn in this world has neither chapters nor headings; the page runs on without hindrance from tragedy to comedy, comedy to farce, ...
— Murder Point - A Tale of Keewatin • Coningsby Dawson
... rang for his landlady, who presently appeared. Mrs. Rapkin was a superior type of her much-abused class. She was scrupulously clean and neat in her person; her sandy hair was so smooth and tightly knotted that it gave her head the colour and shape of a Barcelona nut; she had sharp, beady eyes, nostrils that seemed to smell battle afar off, a wide, thin mouth that apparently closed with a snap, and a dry, ...
— The Brass Bottle • F. Anstey
... of a "Parthian shot" when some one finishes a conversation or an argument with a sharp or witty remark, leaving no chance for an answer. This expression comes from the story of the Parthians, a people who lived on the shores of the Caspian Sea, and were famous as good archers among the ...
— Stories That Words Tell Us • Elizabeth O'Neill
... as if the bullet that had been fired from a musket had cut the leaves above his head and stood listening to the roll of echoes which followed the shot. Then there was another, and another, followed by scores, telling him that a sharp skirmish had begun; and after a while he could just make out a faint cloud of smoke above the trees, where the dim vapour ...
— !Tention - A Story of Boy-Life during the Peninsular War • George Manville Fenn
... bringin' back the nugget, and prowled round till he thought we was all asleep. Then he got into the cabin and carried it off. That is, he thought he did, but we was a little too sharp for him. We tied up a big rock in my handkerchief, and I guess he had a sweet time carryin' ...
— In A New World - or, Among The Gold Fields Of Australia • Horatio Alger
... his devotion to a great man. Neither would he encourage any unkind talk about the absent, or laugh at any good hit which was aimed at a friend. "You fiend!" he said to a friend who was laughing over a sharp attack on an acquaintance, and he refused to read or hear a word of it. Indeed, for steadfast loyalty to his friends, his equal has seldom been seen. He made common cause with them in everything, and nothing so enraged him as treachery or deceit ...
— Home Life of Great Authors • Hattie Tyng Griswold
... the means of giving to her heart was like a deep and placid river which never ceases to flow. Ah! there is a rich blessing in store for those who tenderly nurse and comfort the aged, when called upon to do so; and assuredly there is a sharp thorn prepared for those who neglect this sacred duty. Martin read the Bible to her night and morning; and she did nothing but watch for him at the window while he was out. As Martin afterwards became an active member of ...
— Martin Rattler • R.M. Ballantyne
... of war continued to gather about the summits of the mountains, and multitudes of the fierce warriors of the sierra descended to the lower heights of Bentomiz, which overhung the camp, intending to force their way to the city. A detachment was sent against them, which, after sharp fighting, drove them to the higher cliffs, where it ...
— Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada • Washington Irving
... light shields of closely woven wire and masks of the same material, and with spears consisting of a reed or grass about five feet in length, and exceedingly light. When perfectly ripened, these spears are exceeding formidable, their points being sharp enough to pierce the skin of any but a pachydermatous animal. Those employed in these games, however, are gathered while yet covered by a sheath, which, as they ripen, bursts and leaves the keen, hard point exposed. Considerable care is taken in their ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... very unwilling, but he found there was no alternative; the precious bottle must be broken. They had to get a hammer before this could be done, though, for the stony material had acquired the hardness of granite. A few sharp strokes, however, soon shivered it to fragments, many of which had pieces of paper sticking to them. These were carefully removed by Lord Glenarvan, and separated and spread out on the table before the eager gaze of his ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne
... March they were driven by a sharp fall of sleet into an Oyster Bar in the immediate neighbourhood of Leicester Square. Colonel Geraldine was dressed and painted to represent a person connected with the Press in reduced circumstances; while the Prince had, as usual, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 4 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... on his back, and those abominable girths that were cutting him in two, till, with his head between his knees, and his back arched like a bow, up he went vertically into the air, landing on all four feet. That irksome weight was still there, and he had received a sharp cut with some unknown instrument, but it might be worth while trying it again. So up he went a second time, the Joven grinning from ear to ear, but sitting like a rock, then, as it was as well to teach a young horse that bucking entailed punishment, the revenque ...
— Here, There And Everywhere • Lord Frederic Hamilton
... he was standing again in the outer court of a house in Petersburg—a house to which he was debtor for one night's shelter; it was early morning and deadly cold. The whole picture was sharp as a cut crystal—the triple court-yard, the stone pavement, the gray well, and frozen pile of firewood. He saw, recognized, lost it, and knew himself to be skimming down the Nevskiy Prospekt and across the Winter ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... by Vavasor, while Saffy ran to her mother, sped along the bank till she came to the weir, over which hardly any water was running. When Vavasor saw her turn sharp round and make for the weir, he would have prevented her, and laid his hand on her arm; but she turned on him with eyes that flashed, and lips which, notwithstanding her speed, were white as with the wrath that has no breath for words. He drew back and dared only follow. The ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald
... itself with a graceful spring from the ribbons of flame and ochre and sapphire. Its vivid light took level lines from hill to hill and flowed into the vales. The dusk dispersed, day mastered Nature. A sharp breeze crisped the air, the birds sang, life wakened everywhere. But the girl had hardly time to cast her eyes over the whole of this wondrous landscape before, by a phenomenon not infrequent in these cool regions, the mists spread ...
— The Chouans • Honore de Balzac
... all, Jacinth felt as she said. The thought that 'some day' Robin Redbreast might be her home would be quite enough for her, and she already loved her kind old friend sincerely. But one sentence in her sister's speech startled Frances with a quick sharp stab: 'No relations that she ...
— Robin Redbreast - A Story for Girls • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... of terror, as well it might. Mr. Quest, who had been sitting listening to her with his hand over his eyes, had risen, and his face was as the face of a fiend, alight with an intense and quiet fury which seemed to be burning inwardly. On the mantelpiece lay a sharp-pointed Goorka knife, which one of Mrs. d'Aubigne's travelled admirers had presented to her. It was an awful looking weapon, and keen-edged as a razor. This he had taken up and held in his right hand, and with it he was advancing towards her as she ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard
... from the head of the serpent and his hands moved so rapidly that they were almost invisible until, quicker than a snake could strike, one of them darted down and caught the slim neck behind the distended hood. He gave a sharp exclamation of triumph and sprang to his feet, the cobra coiling its body about his bare brown arm and giving ...
— Side Show Studies • Francis Metcalfe
... flood of sunshine that fell even to my feet. Through the doorway I looked on grass and trees, and heard sparrows twitter, and the chirp of crickets; and I found all so peaceful that my mind went no further, and it was only after some minutes that I recognized with a sharp return of terror, that turned me sick, that I was still in the hall of the empty house. That brought back other things, and with a shudder I carried my hand to my throat and tried to rise. A hand put me back, and a dry voice said in my ear, ...
— In Kings' Byways • Stanley J. Weyman
... say, your honor. 'I don't understand you, sir;' and that is bekaise you keep me in the dark, and that I can't explain to them properly what you want; divil a thing but an oracle you've made of me. But as to beauty—only listen, sir. This mornin' there came a woman to me wid a thin, sharp face, a fiery eye that looked as if she had a drop in it, or was goin' to fight a north-wester, and a thin, red nose that was nothing else than a stunner. She was, moreover, a good deal of the gentleman on the upper ...
— The Black Baronet; or, The Chronicles Of Ballytrain - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... in my old days I do grow irascible; 'the old man virulent' has long been my pet name for myself. Well, the temper is at least all gone now; time is good at lowering these distemperatures; far better is a sharp sickness, and I am just (and scarce) afoot again after a smoking hot little malady at Sydney. And the temper being gone, I still think the same. . . . We have not our parents for ever; we are never very good to them; when they go and we have lost our front-file man, we begin to feel all our ...
— Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson - Volume 2 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... that goodly and pleasant city which had been their resting-place near twelve years.' . . . Nine miles from Leyden a branch canal connects the Vliet with the Hague, and immediately beyond their junction a sharp turn is made to the left, as the canal passes beneath the Hoom-bridge; from this point, for the remaining five miles, the high road from the Hague to Delft, lined with noble trees, runs side by side with the canal. In our ...
— The Mayflower and Her Log, Complete • Azel Ames
... wreck of things—it might be to save her brother's life, it might be to save her tender feet from the stones of foreign streets. And in the same dream he had seen himself standing by her, alone against the world; as, to do him justice, he would have stood, no matter how sharp the ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman
... to implore pity, to promise I would behave better in short time, etc., etc. But she was inexorable, and ordered me to lie across her knees. Then, taking me round the waist, she gave a smart cut or two, really sharp, that made me for ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... this rapid survey, we have dropped out of the hoofed beasts all but the bovines and their near allies, and are thus far advanced toward our definition of a bison, but from this point we shall not find it easy to draw sharp distinctions, for while the Bovidae, as a whole, are well enough distinguished from all other animals, their characteristics are so much mixed among themselves that it is hardly possible to find any one or more striking features peculiar to one group, and for most of them recourse ...
— American Big Game in Its Haunts • Various
... carving and chasing of the silver were more precious even than the jewels which studded it, and whose rough setting gave so firm a grasp to my hand. Was the blade as fair as the covering, I wondered? A little resistance at first, and then the long thin steel slid easily out. Sharp, and bright, and finely tempered it looked with its deadly, tapering point. Stains, dull and irregular, crossed the fine engraving on its surface and dimmed its polish. I bent to examine them more closely, and as I did so a sudden stronger gust of wind blew out the candle. ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... moreover stated that he had lost 3,000l. by the Civil War. Actually, if his account is correct, he was insolvent; or, if his debt to his son-in-law were regarded as cancelled, he had but about 200l. left in the world. In criticising his account, however, the Committee would be sharp-sighted. They would remember that it was his interest, on the one hand, to rate his debts and losses at the highest figure, and, on the other hand, to represent at the lowest figure all his remaining property, except those items of "corn and household stuff," and "timber and wood," which ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... now give in illustration an old South American experience, an example, which deeply impressed me at the time, of the sharp contrast between a remote descendant of aristocrats and a child of the people in a country where class distinctions ...
— A Traveller in Little Things • W. H. Hudson
... fifteen miles, and, after having anchored midway to form a surveying station, brought up finally under a small unnamed islet in Trinity Bay. This island, viewed from our anchorage on its north-west side, presents the appearance of a ridge connecting two rounded eminences, with a sharp sea-face exposing the stratification of the rock. This is a micaceous rock, assuming at one place the appearance of mica slate, and at another being a conglomerate, with frequent veins of quartz. The strata, which are often flexuous, or slightly ...
— Narrative Of The Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Commanded By The Late Captain Owen Stanley, R.N., F.R.S. Etc. During The Years 1846-1850. Including Discoveries And Surveys In New Guinea, The Louisiade • John MacGillivray
... sailor was not moved by her smiles nor the glances from her sharp eyes, she planted herself before him, speaking to him ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... holding his breath; and, almost simultaneously with a sharp, rushing noise in the leaves overhead, something drops upon his shoulder. He grasps it, cautiously feels of it, and, to his unspeakable amazement, discovers that it is a rope apparently fastened to ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 2., No. 32, November 5, 1870 • Various
... charge me, after contracting not to issue or to allow the issue of a cheaper form, with the sharp practice ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... readily distinguish it from C. fusiformis by the tips, these not being sharp pointed. It is found in clusters in woods and pastures from August to October. As delicious as ...
— The Mushroom, Edible and Otherwise - Its Habitat and its Time of Growth • M. E. Hard
... his back, unable to endure the agony of watching. The click of the club was sharp and true. He turned to see the ball in full flight arrive unerringly ...
— Murder in Any Degree • Owen Johnson
... plants,—young trees and flowers,—to the beautiful little porch, covered with honeysuckles and creeping plants. The back of the house is turned to the road, and the front looks out over the loveliest green meadows, to the grand, quiet hills, sometimes clear and sharp in their outline against the blue sky, and at others wreathed with mist; and one might sit for hours at the large bay window in the parlor, watching these changes, ...
— Travellers' Tales • Eliza Lee Follen
... frowned, measured the distance again, and then stared out of the window with a perplexed air, thinking hard. It was curious that, when he concentrated himself on a process of reasoning, his eves seemed to lose something of their sharp brightness and ...
— Arsene Lupin • Edgar Jepson
... cover, that he was obliged to take him to a distance, and Phineas followed him. "If he breaks down wind," said Lord Chiltern, "we can't be better than we are here. If he goes up wind, he must turn before long, and we shall be all right." As he spoke an old hound opened true and sharp,—an old hound whom all the pack believed,—and in a moment there was no doubt that the fox had been found. "There are not above eight or nine acres in it," said Lord Chiltern, "and he can't hang long. ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... pronounced able to leave her room. The summer had ripened into autumn, and the leaves, which had turned crisp and brown, had fallen, making the branches bare. The air was sharp and frosty. Great logs burned in the fireplaces, delighting Laura with their cheerful blaze, and keeping her busy in the twilight finding pictures in the flames. She was now allowed to sit beside Kathie and read a little to her, a few verses, a hymn, or a Bible story. And to Laura was given ...
— The Princess Idleways - A Fairy Story • Mrs. W. J. Hays
... Filmer—he's the go-between in all this—will get that information, or the part about her going away, to Gaston; then the game's in our hands. If Gaston means business, he'll pay what we say. If he ain't sharp set as to a big figger, we've got Joyce; and by thunder! who's got a better right? Then we'll make tracks, after the spring freshet, to another place I know of where laws is stationary and folks ain't over keen, and where a handsome woman like Joyce will help. I've got money enough ...
— Joyce of the North Woods • Harriet T. Comstock
... sharp. I harrowed and rolled it and my neighbor said, 'Terry, you are ruining that land, it will never grow anything any more, it will all blow away.' I reminded him of his bargain; I should raise what I pleased and take the crop home. Every little while, I can't remember ...
— The Story of the Soil • Cyril G. Hopkins
... would be a regular 'guard, turn out!' And what chance would scarlatina and old clooty have? No, no, she'll be snug there in her sentry-box. What a blessed escape from ruin! Mary, dear, make me another tumbler, and d——n the gout!"—he had a sharp twinge. "I'll drink 'here's luck!' Frank, go pack your kit, and instead of demolishing Selby Sly, see Kitty decently sodded. Your mother, Constance, and myself will rumble after you to town by easy stages. I wonder how aunt Catherine will cut up. If ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. 1, No. 5, July 29, 1850 • Various
... violet haze. Half an hour since the sun had set in a blaze of splendor behind a crotch of the hills, but dusk had softened the vivid tints of orange and crimson and scarlet to a faint pink glow. Already the mountain silhouette had lost its sharp edge and the outlines were blurring. Soon night would sift down over the roof ...
— The Sheriff's Son • William MacLeod Raine
... "'Gainst the sharp keel, and tracks the wave with light. While just beneath him bounds the lighter skiff With bird-like speed; and darting to the ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 1, August 1850 - of Literature, Science and Art. • Various
... perfectly regular and legal transaction, and that you are, therefore, my lawful wife, and I exhort you to be wise, prudent and faithful to your marriage bonds; for, be assured, I am not one who will brook offense, but who will follow with swift, sharp vengeance the slightest infringement of my rights. I remain, and I intend to ...
— Her Mother's Secret • Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... Fan! And a sharp lookout. There, let me put your shawl round your head. I'll wait here till I hear ...
— Nell, of Shorne Mills - or, One Heart's Burden • Charles Garvice
... we have grasped the humanity of the word and missed the divinity of it. We are always doing that. Always gathering the meaning of the moments and missing the meaning of the years. Always smarting under the sharp discipline and missing the merciful design: 'With Him in trouble.' That helps me to believe in my religion. Trouble is the test of the creeds. A fig for the orthodoxy that cannot interpret tears! Write vanity upon the religion that is of no avail in the house ...
— The Threshold Grace • Percy C. Ainsworth
... "Look sharp, now; the current sets in the closest here, and maybe he's washed ashore and got tangled amongst the brush at the water's ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... she took me by the hand and led me to a large room, where she showed me a thick wheel, covered on both sides with thick boards, and opening a little window in the center of it, desired me to look with a candle on the inside of it, and I saw all the circumference of the wheel set with SHARP RAZORS. After that she showed me a PIT FULL OF SERPENTS AND TOADS. Then she said to me, 'Now, my good mistress, I'll tell you the use of these things. The dry pan and gradual fire are for those who oppose the holy father's will, and for heretics. They ...
— Life in the Grey Nunnery at Montreal • Sarah J Richardson
... At nine o'clock sharp in the morning everything was ready for departure, as she had ordered. We left the little Carpathian health- resort in a comfortable light carriage. The most interesting drama of my life had reached a point of development whose denouement it ...
— Venus in Furs • Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
... an awful sound, the sharp click of a pistol. No words in any known language—and the parson knew all the languages, dead and alive—could have filled up the hiatus so eloquently ...
— The Unseen Bridgegroom - or, Wedded For a Week • May Agnes Fleming
... Gate. Abraham had at God's command agreed to sacrifice his son Isaac, and the same God just in time had provided a ram of the thicket as a substitute; but here is another Isaac bound to the altar, and no hand arrests the sharp edges of laceration and death, and the universe shivers and quakes and recoils and groans ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage
... we will, the prospect is gloomy; and that which of all things most disturbs me is this, that your experience, sharp as it has been, does not seem to have made you wiser. All that I have been able to collect from your declarations leads me to apprehend that, while you continue to hold power, the future will be of a piece with the past. As to your ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... beyond all this, that could be put on paper, was the hope of a life—the sharp doubt of ...
— Faith Gartney's Girlhood • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... clear, quick, and sharp as the click of a revolver: "Perfectly, provided you can do the thing ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson
... far better,' said Alice to herself, 'if I could get to the top of that hill: and here's a path that leads straight to it—at least, no, it doesn't do that—' (after going a few yards along the path, and turning several sharp corners), 'but I suppose it will at last. But how curiously it twists! It's more like a corkscrew than a path! Well, THIS turn goes to the hill, I suppose—no, it doesn't! This goes straight back to the house! Well then, I'll try it ...
— Through the Looking-Glass • Charles Dodgson, AKA Lewis Carroll
... the way opened out on a jutting crest and made a sharp turn to the right, and the horse paused on the verge so suddenly that his rider lost his hold and fell headlong over into a scrub oak that caught him and held him suspended in its tough and twisted branches above a chasm so deep that the buzzards sailed on widespread ...
— The Eye of Dread • Payne Erskine
... in mystical gloom, in silence that could be felt; when at once,—not suddenly,—as if the night could forbear no more, but must utter some chord with the culmination of midnight horrors, a bird uttered one sharp cry, desolate utterly, hopeless, concentred, as if a keen blade parted its heart and the outraged life within remonstrated and despaired,—despaired not of life, for still the note repeated its monotone, but of death, of period to its pangs. That cry entered into my brain; it was unjust of ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various
... young, old, color when bruised, and if color changes, whether soft, waxy, brittle, or tough; sharp or ...
— Studies of American Fungi. Mushrooms, Edible, Poisonous, etc. • George Francis Atkinson
... He gives her a sharp slap behind the ear, and she shakes her head, rocks the cradle, and murmurs her song. The green patch and the shadows from the trousers and the baby-clothes move up and down, nod to her, and soon take possession of her brain again. Again she sees the high road covered ...
— The Cook's Wedding and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... that a tiny piece of dust or iron may stick in the surface of the eye, and refuse to be washed away by the tears. Take a square inch of writing paper, curve one of the sides of it, and draw it lightly and quickly over the spot. Never use any sharp instrument or pin. Repeat the operation a ...
— Papers on Health • John Kirk
... this scheme of revising the Bible we do not know, but whoever it was made a miscue. There was no one suffering particularly for a revision of the Bible. It was good enough as it was. No literary sharp of the present day has got any license to change anything in ...
— Peck's Compendium of Fun • George W. Peck
... wheat in the manner directed in Art. 47. Wash the dates in hot water, cut them lengthwise with a sharp knife, and remove the seeds. Cut each date into four pieces and add them to the cream of wheat 10 minutes before serving, stirring them into the cereal just enough to distribute them evenly. Serve hot with cream ...
— Woman's Institute Library of Cookery, Vol. 1 - Volume 1: Essentials of Cookery; Cereals; Bread; Hot Breads • Woman's Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences
... scrounger. His eyes are sharp, and he's always on the lookout for a salable piece of goods, even if he can only get a nickel for it. One night, we're sitting in a jungle near Sacramento, trying to figure out whether to go north for the grapes, or south for the grapes. They're all over California, you know, and they ...
— See? • Edward G. Robles
... vital question of the currency it demanded the repeal of the resumption clause of the Act of 1875, denouncing it as an hindrance to the resumption of specie payment. The Republicans, wishing to avoid too sharp a conflict with the soft money sentiment of the West, had pledged the fulfilment of the Public Credit Act,[1513] approved March 18, 1869, "by a continuous and steady progress to specie payments." ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... he reached the sea, and the sea was quite black and thick, and began to boil up from below, so that it threw up bubbles, and such a sharp wind blew over it that it curdled, and the man was afraid. Then he went and stood by ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... read through the whole prayer-book. I could hardly have done it just then, though, for Mike solicited an audience at the back door, and reported that Budge had given the carriage-sponge to the goat, put handfuls of oats into the pump-cylinder, pulled hairs out of the black mare's tail, and with a sharp nail drawn pictures on the enamel of the carriage-body. Budge made no denial, but looked very much aggrieved, and remarked that he couldn't never be happy without somebody having to go get bothered; ...
— Helen's Babies • John Habberton
... he found too infrequent an exercise in his ordinary life; and so he felt it good to be free for awhile, not from the restraints but from the safeguards, with which his social circumstances surrounded him. He had his spice of philosophy too, and discovered that these sharp contrasts,—luxury and hardship, treading hard upon each other and the new strange people with whom he fell in, kept fresh his ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... the thief and taken it off his finger, one night far outside the British lines at Quebec. The thief was a rebel who had nearly killed pale face woman. About two weeks after Paul had knocked the rebel down, there was a sharp sortie between some British soldiers and some Americans, and during the fight, which ended in the repulse of the Americans, the monkey-faced, cross-eyed rebel, "Will," was taken prisoner. He was a great coward, and acknowledged ...
— Young Lion of the Woods - A Story of Early Colonial Days • Thomas Barlow Smith
... sharp wit have to guard against is the thoughtless tendency toward writing ill-natured things. Ridicule is a much more amusing medium for the display of a subject than praise, which is always rather bromidic. ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... an expression of surprise and dismay as he might have worn had somebody unexpectedly pulled the chair from under him. He was feeling the sick shock which comes to those who tread on a non-existent last stair. And Sally, catching sight of his face, uttered a sharp wordless exclamation as if she had seen a child fall down and hurt itself in the street. The next moment she had run round the table and was standing behind him with her arms round his neck. She spoke across him with ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... was so obliging that she wished to amuse you, my son. Does it amuse you? Doesn't it make you cross? Do you know that you have spoken a great many sharp words ...
— Captain Horace • Sophie May
... of the wild that does not fit in with most architecture. Exceptions are when the house is on a rocky site that makes such planting desirable, if not imperative, and a slope from the rear or one side of a house that seems decided enough to permit of a sharp break in the general landscape treatment. Save in these circumstances, it is better that it should not be in sight of the house. This is not so hard as it sounds; even on a small place, the spot is easily concealed by ...
— Making A Rock Garden • Henry Sherman Adams
... and the clang of the music, as you listen in the great saloon, you hear from a neighboring room a certain sharp ringing clatter, and a hard clear voice cries out, "Zero rouge," or "Trente-cinq noir. Impair et passe." And then there is a pause of a couple of minutes, and then the voice says, "Faites le jeu, ...
— The Christmas Books • William Makepeace Thackeray
... dagger's point. Some of them made use of a gag—a contrivance designated at the period the poire d'angoisse. This instrument was of a spherical shape, and pierced all over with small holes; it was forced into the mouth of the person intended to be robbed, and upon touching a spring sharp points protruded from every hole, at once inflicting the most horrible anguish, and preventing the sufferer from uttering a single cry. It could not be withdrawn but by the use of the proper key, which contracted the spring. This device was adopted ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... he brought the Godsend a point nearer the wind; and, as we turn'd away with the Captain, was still muttering, his sharp grey eyes fix'd on ...
— The Splendid Spur • Arthur T. Quiller Couch
... the Air very Sharp and Cold; frequent showers of rain and Squalls. Soundings 75 fathoms. Saw some Penguins. Gave to each of the People a Fearnought Jacket and a pair of Trowsers, after which I never heard one Man Complain of Cold, not but that ...
— Captain Cook's Journal During the First Voyage Round the World • James Cook
... object. For hours this might last with nothing seen, and then in the gathering darkness the ship would make her way home often against a rising wind, and in the winter through hail and snow. Bombs were always carried, and on many occasions direct hits were observed on enemy submarines. A sharp look-out was always kept for mines, and many were destroyed, either by gunfire from the airship herself or through the agency of patrol boats in the vicinity. This was the chief work of the S.S. ships, and was brought to a high pitch of perfection by the S.S. Zero. These ...
— British Airships, Past, Present, and Future • George Whale
... entreated them not to kill themselves; and assured them that heaven would be satisfied, and that human nature could not endure beyond a certain point. No answer, but the loud sound of the scourges, which are many of them of iron, with sharp points that enter the flesh. At length, as if they were perfectly exhausted, the sound grew fainter, and little by little ceased altogether. We then got up in the dark, and, with great difficulty, groped our way in the pitch darkness through the galleries and down the stairs, till we reached ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon De La Barca
... their work, and it was nearly three hours later when their task was done. Boston Harbor was a great teapot, with the contents of three hundred and forty-two chests broken open and their contents scattered on the quiet water. A sharp watch was kept that none of it should be stolen, but a few grains were shaken out of a shoe, which may be seen to-day in a glass jar in Memorial Hall, Boston. And this was ...
— Ten American Girls From History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... appropriately, retains all the elements of savagism—high colors, sharp contrasts, profuseness of ornament. This is as it should be. But every enlightened man should regret that our female Dress is not more grave, classical, chaste, subdued, and appropriate, combining taste and utility, refinement and strength. A woman in full street ...
— Aims and Aids for Girls and Young Women • George Sumner Weaver
... Staff. It was found to be quite in order, and I went on with my work. But a few minutes later the general, having given his orders, gathered up his reins to ride away. As he slowly passed me, he gave me just one little sharp glance, and with a faint suspicion of a smile remarked, "I will look at that another time." The aide-de-camp had previously told him what my ...
— My Days of Adventure - The Fall of France, 1870-71 • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly
... five hundred years, burned itself to death and then rose again full grown from the ashes. Another fabulous creature was the unicorn, with the head and body of a horse, the hind legs of an antelope, the beard of a goat, and a long, sharp horn set in the middle of the forehead. Various plants and minerals were also credited with marvelous powers. Thus, the nasturtium, used as a liniment, would keep one's hair from falling out, and the sapphire, when powdered ...
— EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY • HUTTON WEBSTER
... body, it was gathered at the middle by a broad leathern belt, secured by a brass buckle; to one side of which was attached a sort of scrip, and to the other a ram's horn, accoutred with a mouthpiece, for the purpose of blowing. In the same belt was stuck one of those long, broad, sharp-pointed, and two-edged knives, with a buck's-horn handle, which were fabricated in the neighbourhood, and bore even at this early period the name of a Sheffield whittle. The man had no covering upon his head, which was only defended ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... out of the burned region," said Jack. "It's dismal, and I like to hear the wind cutting through the dry grass with its sharp swish." ...
— The Voyage of the Rattletrap • Hayden Carruth
... from a hollowed tree-trunk (like the American "dug-out"), sometimes provided with outriggers, to prevent it from upsetting, and sometimes with a roof of bamboo. The barangay is the most primitive and most characteristic boat in the Philippines; it is described as a sharp and slender craft, pointed at both ends, and put together with wooden nails and pegs. It is this boat which has given name to the primitive groups of the social organization; see Bourne's mention of these, Vol. I of this ...
— The Philippine Islands 1493-1898, Vol. 4 of 55 - 1576-1582 • Edited by E. H. Blair and J. A. Robertson
... towers is a sharp arch, filled by a huge oak door of the same shape and size, which, for further security or ornament, is closely studded with large diamond-headed nails. A man with keys at his girdle like the ancient housewives opens the huge door to you ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... Britons had coracles, which were simply very open basket-work covered with skins. Their Celtic descendants still use canvas coracles in parts of Wales and Ireland, just as the Eskimos still use skin-covered kayaks and oomiaks. The oomiak is for a family with all their baggage. The kayak—sharp as a needle and light as a feather—is for a well-armed man. The oomiak is a cargo carrier. ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood |
