"Stiff" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... hanging stiff by his side, and clutching its elbow with his left hand, as if in great pain, he hastened away from the spot, not having ...
— An Enemy To The King • Robert Neilson Stephens
... powers of facial expression. It was of a green New England farmer who visited Boston, and of course climbed up four flights of stairs to a skylight "studio" to have his "daguerotype took." After the artist had succeeded in getting his subject in as stiff and uncomfortable position as possible, after cautioning him not to move, he disappeared into his ill-smelling cabinet to prepare the plate. When this was ready he stepped airily out to the camera and bade his victim "look pleasant." Failing to get the impossible response the artist ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... flourish most in a soil moderately stiff and moist, is usually raised from seeds, the process of which is amply described by MILLER ...
— The Botanical Magazine Vol. 8 - Or, Flower-Garden Displayed • William Curtis
... cane, beholding the advancing current, bends to it. The others do not act in that way. After the current has passed away, the cane resumes its former posture. The cane knows the virtues of Time and opportunity. It is docile and obedient. It is yielding, without being stiff. For these reasons, it stands where it grows, without having to come with us. Those plants, trees, and creepers that bend and rise before the force of wind and water, have never to suffer discomfiture (by being taken ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... his hounds thereafter and he and the Lady followed running. Exceeding swift was she, and well-breathed withal, so that Walter wondered at her; and eager she was in the chase as the very hounds, heeding nothing the scratching of briars or the whipping of stiff twigs as she sped on. But for all their eager hunting, the quarry outran both dogs and folk, and gat him into a great thicket, amidmost whereof was a wide plash of water. Into the thicket they followed him, but he took to the water under their eyes ...
— The Wood Beyond the World • William Morris
... far, but at last the man made out an object toiling slowly toward the cabin. At first he thought it was a fox, and then a wolf, and then, as it loomed larger, a straying caribou. Kazan whined. The bristles along his spine rose stiff and menacing. Pelliter stared harder and harder, with his face pressed close against the cold glass of the window, and suddenly he gave a gasping cry of excitement. It was a man who was toiling toward the ...
— Isobel • James Oliver Curwood
... picter of his royal majesty"—giving the sailor alongside a new guinea—"and now tell the steward to mix us a jorum as stiff as a nor'wester, and, let's all drink the King's ...
— The Sketches of Seymour (Illustrated), Complete • Robert Seymour
... a joke, just to show how little he cared for the Emperor. Poisson put up with it in his stiff way without one knowing whether it really annoyed him or not. Besides the two men, though separated by their political convictions, had ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... and tried to read the other woman's face in the gloom. But Marguerite, who was taller than the Frenchwoman, was standing, very stiff and erect, giving the young actress neither discouragement nor confidence. She did not interrupt Candeille's long and voluble explanation: vaguely she wondered what it was all about, and even now when the Frenchwoman paused, Marguerite said nothing, but watched her quietly as ...
— The Elusive Pimpernel • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... Senators and Congressmen from political motives and for political services rendered, it is impossible to expect that while in office the appointees will not regard their tenure as more or less dependent upon continued political service for their patrons, and no regulations, however stiff or rigid, will prevent this, because such regulations, in view of the method and motive for selection, are plainly inconsistent and deemed hardly worthy ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... three men lately killed lay stark and stiff on the deck, which was sprinkled in many places with blood; while three others severely wounded were under the doctor's hands. Besides this, a portion of the bulwarks was knocked away; and, what was of still more consequence, two of her boats were ...
— The South Sea Whaler • W.H.G. Kingston
... lines of the cliff, Down the flat sea-line without skiff Or sail or back-blown fume for mark, Through wind-worn heads of heath and stiff Stems blossomless and stark With ...
— Songs before Sunrise • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... assemblage is without design. Those statues appear to have ranged themselves of their own accord about their master. Another hall enclosed the dull and rigid monuments of the Egyptians; of that people whose statues resembled mummies more than men, and who by their silent, stiff, and servile institutions, seem to have assimilated as much as possible, life to death. The Egyptians excelled much more in the art of imitating animals than in representing men: the dominion of the soul seems to have been ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael
... Winnebagoes, Each with its bow and its arrows, Each with its knife and its war gear, Its porphyry-carved tobacco pipe, Modern, I know by the fashioning. Often, I asked of them, As they lay there so silently, So stiff and stark in their bones, What right they had in these old places, Sacred to dead men of a race they knew not? And oh! the white laughters, The wicked malice of the white laughters Which they laughed at me, With ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 5, May, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... the powerful in your circle to have this condescension [they have had it, been obliged to have it, though Friedrich does not yet know]; for it will turn out ill to them, if they persist in being obstinately stiff. It begins already to be said That there are more than a million Russian subjects at this time refugees in Poland; whom, by I forget what cartel, the Republic was bound to deliver up. Orders have been given to Detachments of Military to enter certain places, and bring ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... flung open the doors and stood before them. No words could have spoken more plainly than that disheveled figure looking out with haggard eyes upon the assembled family. Before that living picture of Remorse the rest were dumb. It was easy to see that the Marquise's feet were stretched out stark and stiff with the agony of death; and Moina, leaning against the door-frame, looking into their faces, spoke in ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Honore de Balzac
... statesman than anybody else in America. The politician is notorious for his familiarity with all comers, and "the gentleman" has become too insignificant a person to furnish materials for a contrast; but the progressive man is sufficiently well known, and sufficiently stiff in his moral composition, to make it funny to see him in ...
— Reflections and Comments 1865-1895 • Edwin Lawrence Godkin
... The single gas jet burning in a fixture hanging from the ceiling was the only relief given to the eye in the blank expanse of white wall that surrounded me; while as to furniture, the room could boast of nothing more than an old-fashioned black-walnut table and two chairs, the latter cushioned, but stiff in the back and generally dilapidated in appearance. The only sign of comfort about me was a tray that stood on the table, containing a couple of bottles of wine and two glasses. The bottles were full and the glasses clean, and to add to this ...
— The Old Stone House and Other Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... hairy, especially the females. The neck and even the eyes are very hirsute. The eyes are red, quite large and pretty, though somewhat outre under the microscope, for from between the little lenses are projecting, straight, stiff hairs. As the insect is quite active, it must be that this fringing of the tiny eyelets with hair does not materially obscure its vision. When the minuteness of this singular arrangement is considered, it is surely remarkable. This general hairiness of ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 447, July 26, 1884 • Various
... at the bulwark, holding to my arm, and asking me what I thought of the situation. I hardly knew how to answer her, for there was no telling as yet what was going to happen. A stiff breeze was blowing ready for the canvas, and when the anchor was lifted we began to drift. But meanwhile the boat had come up close, and with evident determination to board us. It held ten men, and they were mostly ...
— The Cryptogram - A Story of Northwest Canada • William Murray Graydon
... I cannot conceal my interest in the behavior of that patriarchal bird whose wooden similitude gyrates on the church spire. Winter proper is well enough. Let the thermometer go to zero if it will; so much the better, if thereby the very winds are frozen and unable to flap their stiff wings. Sounds of bells in the keen air, clear, musical, heart-inspiring; quick tripping of fair moccasined feet on glittering ice pavements; bright eyes glancing above the uplifted muff like a sultana's behind the folds of her yashmac; ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... yolk of the egg until creamy, add seasoning and milk. Beat the white until stiff, but not dry, cut and fold into the yolk carefully. Heat an omelet pan, rub the bottom and sides with the butter, and turn in the omelet, spreading it evenly on the pan. Cook gently over the heat until the omelet ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Household Science in Rural Schools • Ministry of Education Ontario
... her in conversation; but though she answered, with a kind of stiff civility, I could get her into no freedom of discourse, and she began to look at her wheel and at the door more than once, as if she meditated a retreat. I was obliged, therefore, to proceed to some special questions; ...
— Chronicles of the Canongate • Sir Walter Scott
... rustle of stiff brocade, And I see no face at my library door; For now that the ghosts of my heart are laid, She ...
— Complete Poetical Works of Bret Harte • Bret Harte
... stuff I like to hear," said Lyne, and poured out from the long bottle which stood on the coffee-tray a stiff tot of Sam's favourite brandy. "Now, I'll give ...
— The Daffodil Mystery • Edgar Wallace
... come to the Convent of Portiuncula, as he frequently did, he wished to go at once into the cell where the Saint was at prayer; but scarcely had he seen him in that attitude, when he was pushed back by an invisible hand, his body became stiff, and he was unable to speak. Much astonished at this accident, he made his way back, as well as he could, to the other brethren; God restored his voice, and he made use of it, to acknowledge that he had committed a fault. The Celestial Spouse, ...
— The Life and Legends of Saint Francis of Assisi • Father Candide Chalippe
... the singing-boys arrived at the tranter's house, which was invariably the place of meeting, and preparations were made for the start. The older men and musicians wore thick coats, with stiff perpendicular collars, and coloured handkerchiefs wound round and round the neck till the end came to hand, over all which they just showed their ears and noses, like people looking over a wall. The remainder, stalwart ...
— Under the Greenwood Tree • Thomas Hardy
... Meusnier, of the French army, made designs for an egg-shaped power-balloon to be driven by three airscrews, supported on the rigging between the car and the balloon. To keep the balloon fully inflated and stiff, in order to drive it against the wind, he planned a double envelope, the inner space to contain hydrogen, the outer space to be pumped full of air. He may thus be said to have invented the ballonet, or ...
— The War in the Air; Vol. 1 - The Part played in the Great War by the Royal Air Force • Walter Raleigh
... outriders in livery, on the full trot, followed by several carriages. They came very fast, the outriders calling to the people to get out of the way. In the first carriage sat the emperor and the empress—he, cold, stiff, stately, and homely; she, pale, beautiful, and sad. They rode not two rods from us. There was not a hat taken off, not a single shout, not a "Vive l'Empereur? Without a single token of greeting or applause, ...
— Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands V2 • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... these are my guard,' Said the unknown—'Here, lo! Thy father's aged form, By poignard stroke laid low; Here thy wife, cruelly slain In the year thy brother fell; They stand, pale, bleeding, stiff,— Their murderer, ...
— Brittany & Its Byways • Fanny Bury Palliser
... to curb the stiff-necked Jews by all manner of fiendish persecution, Nicholas did not neglect to try the efficacy of some of the plans advocated by Lewis Way. Undismayed by the failure of the Committee of Guardians for Israelitish Christians, in which Alexander I had put so much confidence, ...
— The Haskalah Movement in Russia • Jacob S. Raisin
... such pain does it cause; no breath of wind moves it, it is fixed and motionless; it bites you, pierces through you, dries you, kills the trees, the plants, the insects, the small birds themselves, who fall from the branches on to the hard ground, and become stiff themselves under the ...
— Selected Writings of Guy de Maupassant • Guy de Maupassant
... be hard to cling there. It's a stiff position to hold, and we ought to stay here, where we have a good footing, as long as possible. There's time enough when the water ...
— Frank and Andy Afloat - The Cave on the Island • Vance Barnum
... paper and dark curtains, with dark painted wainscoating below the paper, and huge dark mahogany furniture. On the walls hung the portraits of the Scroopes for many generations past, some in armour, some in their robes of state, ladies with stiff bodices and high head-dresses, not beauties by Lely or warriors and statesmen by Kneller, but wooden, stiff, ungainly, hideous figures, by artists whose works had, unfortunately, been more enduring than their names. He was pacing up and down the room ...
— An Eye for an Eye • Anthony Trollope
... deeply religious man, and the mainspring of his efforts was the desire to bring back to the Church the educated classes, who had been repelled by the stiff Lutheran orthodoxy; but this only increased hostility to him. Opposition met him in Germany at every turn; and in England, Lloyd, Regius Professor of Hebrew at Cambridge, who sought patronage for a translation of Eichhorn's work, ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... when he was through; and when he had pulled a prim, stiff-brimmed, leather-banded sombrero well down toward his nose, he could find the heart ...
— The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower
... meadows. Philip remembered the wall-paper from his earliest years. On the walls were quaint water colours of the early Victorian period by a friend of the Vicar's youth. They had a faded charm. The dressing-table was surrounded by stiff muslin. There was an old tall-boy to put your clothes in. Philip gave a sigh of pleasure; he had never realised that all those things meant anything to him at all. At the vicarage life went on as it had always done. No piece of furniture had ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham
... was destined for the valley of the Po, in order, if possible, to draw off the Celts serving in the army of Hannibal to their homes. These resolutions were judicious; everything depended on their coming to an equally judicious decision respecting the supreme command. The stiff carriage of Quintus Fabius, and the attacks of the demagogues which it provoked, had rendered the dictatorship and the senate generally more unpopular than ever: amongst the people, not without the connivance of their leaders, the foolish report ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... but soon afterwards returned. Attired in another man's dress suit and a stiff white tie which kept sawing at his neck and trying to slip away from the collar, he was sitting at midnight in the club drawing-room, and was saying ...
— The Lady with the Dog and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... close our account of the century with a few words about Dr. Bernard, a stiff, hard, and straightforward reader, whose library of medicine and general literature was sold by auction in 1698. 'Being a person who collected his books not for ostentation or ornament he seemed no more solicitous about their dress than his own'; and therefore, ...
— The Great Book-Collectors • Charles Isaac Elton and Mary Augusta Elton
... and they will be wondering if I can produce another illustration equally good. I can, of course, for this book is rich in illustrations. I can see, as it were, the old fellow on the third seat, who has been sitting there as stiff and straight as a ramrod, limber up just a mite, and with my next point I hope to induce him to lean forward an inch, at ...
— Reveries of a Schoolmaster • Francis B. Pearson
... however, of catching it with my hands, and suspected that it would fly away should I attempt to approach it nearer. I therefore retreated, and considered what was best to be done. Then, I bethought me that by cutting a long stiff sepo to serve as a wand, I might form a noose at the end of it, and thus catch not only the bird before me, but any others which might be in the trees. I immediately put my plan into execution; and a sepo suitable for the purpose being within my reach, I cut it. Fortunately ...
— The Wanderers - Adventures in the Wilds of Trinidad and Orinoco • W.H.G. Kingston
... chunks of wood or bone so big that the expanded lobes reached the shoulders. In the lower lips they carried "peleles," that is, wooden or bony rings as large as saucers. The more distinguished warriors and their wives had around their throats collars of iron or brass wire so high and stiff that they ...
— In Desert and Wilderness • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... lily in the bloom at home," Quoth one, "and by the blessed Sabbath day I'll pluck my lily in its pride, and come And read a lesson upon vain array;— And when stiff silks are rustling up, and some Give place, I'll shake it in proud eyes and say— Making my reverence,—'Ladies, an you please, King Solomon's not half so ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... body, mind and soul, enfeebling and distorting the body, producing depraved stomachs, whimsical nerves, peevish tempers, indolent minds, and depraved morals. They become but wrecks of what they were when they first entered the school. This has been called "the stiff and starched system of muslin education," and is the nursery of pale, ...
— The Christian Home • Samuel Philips
... gin, which was his sovereign prescription against all distempers: whether he was at this time too sparing, or took an overdose of his cordial, certain it is, he departed in the night, without any ceremony, which indeed was a thing he always despised, and was found stiff next morning, to the no small satisfaction of Crampley, who succeeded to the command of the vessel. For that very reason, Mr. Tomlins and I had no cause to rejoice at this event, fearing that the tyranny of ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... believe her ears, let him go without a word, and in a dazed fashion stood at the door and watched him up the lane. When the captain came in a little later she was sitting in a stiff and uncomfortable attitude ...
— Dialstone Lane, Complete • W.W. Jacobs
... seigniors abandon laces, embroideries, red heels and the sword, except when in full dress. People appear in the streets "dressed a la Franklin, in coarse cloth, with a knotty cane and thick shoes."[2315] The taste no longer runs on cascades, statues and stiff and pompous decorations; the preference is for the English garden.[2316] The queen arranges a village for herself at the Trianon, where, "dressed in a frock of white cambric muslin and a gauze neck-handkerchief, and with a straw hat," she fishes in the lake and ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... signalling is on the scud before a stiff breeze, with all sail set, stays taut, not ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid
... think he might have looked at the stalks, and have seen which looked stiff like wire, and which were bent down by the ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... face, which showed as many patches as that of a court lady in King George's times, was jubilant. Tired! not a bit of it! A little stiff, just enough to need "limbering out," ...
— The Green Satin Gown • Laura E. Richards
... consented to see him he would take it as a permission to press his claim, and the idea was not to be borne. She wrote him therefore a stiff letter, telling him the house was at his service, but he must ...
— The Elect Lady • George MacDonald
... stiff-backed chair and tried to remember how many days one could live without food and water. When that grew monotonous and rather painful, I got up and, according to the time-honored rule for people shut ...
— The Circular Staircase • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... was to improve on his appearance a little, to take away a thread from his clothes here, to blow away some dust there and pull his tie straight. And then he had to bend his head; she made a parting again in his stiff obstinate hair, that never would remain straight. And then she could not restrain herself, but took his round face between both her hands and pressed a quick kiss ...
— The Son of His Mother • Clara Viebig
... were the problems presented. I doubt if there was much washing in cold water before parade, and, as for shaving, I know a portion of the breakfast tea was often used for this purpose. Sponge and shaving brush froze stiff as matters of habit. To secure fuel provided constant occupation and frequent stumbling-blocks. On our arrival most rigid orders had been issued not to burn our neighbours' fences and I am able to say that the fences survived our stay. Temptation ...
— The Story of the 2/4th Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry • G. K. Rose
... Stout, stiff, and surprisingly springy wire of the same peculiar metal. It was that metallic ammonium which chemists have deduced must exist because of the chemical behavior of the compound NH3, but which Denham alone had managed to procure. Tommy ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science January 1931 • Various
... With added years came the burden of clothing, much resented by the wearer, but accepted with philosophic submission, as harder things would be later on. Toys are few and simple. The palmyra rattle is exchanged for the stiff wooden doll, painted in gaudy colors, and the collection of tiny vessels in which sand and stones and seeds provide the equivalent of mud pies in repasts of imaginary rice and curry. Household duties ...
— Lighted to Lighten: The Hope of India • Alice B. Van Doren
... better and be more serviceable at the period when he needed them. As we looked shudderingly at these forlorn little creatures, and expressed our commiseration at their fate, the younger brother stepped forward, and, examining one of the cages, in which sat hunched up in one corner a stiff lump of feathers, coolly announced that ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 107, September, 1866 • Various
... sent the ram forth from him, and when we had gone but a little way from the cave and from the yard, first I loosed myself from under the ram and then I set my fellows free. And swiftly we drave on those stiff-shanked sheep, so rich in fat, and often turned to look about, till we came to the ship. And a glad sight to our fellows were we that had fled from death, but the others they would have bemoaned with ...
— DONE INTO ENGLISH PROSE • S. H. BUTCHER, M.A.
... child little is known, but that little is characteristic. He himself tells us that he was "stiff, moody, and of violent temper." His mother said of him that he was the only one of her children about whom she felt any anxiety,—for she was sure that he would be remarkable for good or evil. Once, in resentment at some fancied injury, he resolved to kill himself but his heart failed him. ...
— Among My Books • James Russell Lowell
... cramped for room, and were obliged to manage so that half their number should lie down in the bottom of the boat or upon a chest, while the others sat up and kept watch; their limbs became so stiff from being constantly wet, and from want of space to stretch them in, that after a few hours' sleep they ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... in this posture when launching day dawned fair. The Minnie Williams stood ready on the ways, dressed in her international code flags, which flew from all trucks. Sails of stiff new duck were bent to the booms, anchor chains had been roused up and laid on the windlass wildcat, a fire was kindled in the galley and a collation laid in the saloon. ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1919 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... amusement some of his silly countryfolk who were talking to him quite naturally, but suddenly froze and stiffened at the approach of English friends whose national manner they wished to assume. In England we are not conscious of having a stiff frozen manner, and we never dream that everyone has the same manner. It takes a foreigner to perceive this; and so in Germany it takes a foreigner to appreciate and even to see the characteristic trifles that give a nation a complexion ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... of discord: the house of an English bookseller at the foot of the Row had grown more attractive than his own to Hubert, because of a certain Mistress Margaret who lived there with her father. The bookseller was old, narrow-minded, and stiff for presbytery; he approved of no people but Englishmen, and had a special prejudice against German Lutherans. His daughter believed firmly in his wisdom, and had been from infancy the old man's darling. She was fair, good, and clever; but the girl had a wayward pride, and a wit that was ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 432 - Volume 17, New Series, April 10, 1852 • Various
... over the Supreme Court at Washington, took the several Justices of the Court for a run down Chesapeake Bay. A stiff wind sprang up, and Justice Gray was getting decidedly the worst of it. As he leaned over the rail in great distress, Chief Justice Matthews touched him on the shoulder and said in a tone of deepest sympathy: "Is there anything I can do ...
— Good Stories from The Ladies Home Journal • Various
... intelligent. His hair was iron-gray, carefully brushed round at the temples. His cheeks and chin were in the bluest bloom of smooth shaving; his nose was short Roman; his lips long, thin, and supple, curled up at the corners with a mildly-humorous smile. His white cravat was high, stiff, and dingy; the collar, higher, stiffer, and dingier, projected its rigid points on either side beyond his chin. Lower down, the lithe little figure of the man was arrayed throughout in sober-shabby black. His frock-coat was buttoned tight round the waist, and left ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... and my gold turned to earthenware, and my pictures turned to splotches. In my hand everything I touch feels awkward. A pen—a pen—to talk of that? If one could use it while in the land of the Singing Mouse—then it might do. I think the pens there are not of wood and iron, stiff things of torture to reader and writer. I have a notion—though I have not examined the pens there—that they are made from plumes of an angel's wing; and that if they chose they could talk, and say things which would make you and me ashamed and afraid. Pens such as these ...
— The Singing Mouse Stories • Emerson Hough
... ways, and wisdom and order passing the wit of man. And we may die here upon it, and never see the masters who must be—ruling over these things! We may freeze and die here, and the air will freeze and thaw upon us, and then—! Then they will come upon us, come on our stiff and silent bodies, and find the sphere we cannot find, and they will understand at last too late all the thought and effort that ...
— The First Men In The Moon • H. G. Wells
... politeness—and to these he made much pretension—it was not his custom to receive lady visitors standing. In the upright attitude the artificial leg made him look stiff, and he preferred stowing it away under the table. Besides, there was his dignity, as the grand figure-head of the nation, which he now wished to have its full effect. Leaning forward, he gave a downward blow to the spring of the table bell; then assuming an attitude ...
— The Free Lances - A Romance of the Mexican Valley • Mayne Reid
... this hill we changed our course to 309 degrees to a saddle in the next range. At four miles halted at a gum creek, with plenty of green feed. Made a very short journey to-day in consequence of the horses being quite lame. In addition to their want of shoes, a stiff, tenacious brown clay adhered to the hoof, and picked up the small round stones, which pressed on the frog of the foot. These pebbles were as firmly packed as if they had been put in with cement, so that we had hard work ...
— Explorations in Australia, The Journals of John McDouall Stuart • John McDouall Stuart
... the present juncture. I simply procured a stiff portion of brandy neat, drank it at a gulp, purchased a few articles of clothing from an accommodating waiter, dressed myself with all speed, and set off to the principal railway station, ...
— The House by the Lock • C. N. Williamson
... further to do an' less to be said. That cavalcade, erstwhile so gala an' buoyant, drags itself wearily homeward, the exhausted dogs in the r'ar walkin' stiff an' sore like their laigs is wood. For more'n a mile the complainin' howls of the hysterical yeller dog is wafted to our years. Then they ceases; an' we figgers his sympathizin' master has done took him into the shanty an' ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various
... much, you transparent jackass!" I roared. "Let me see how a stiff nor'easter suits your ...
— Ghosts I have Met and Some Others • John Kendrick Bangs
... does not like me, pays me court the same as any one else. Being very jealous of the pretty Comte de Vermandois and his brother, the Duc du Maine, he tries to imitate their elegant manner, but is too stiff to succeed. The Duc du Maine shows him the respect inspired by his governess, but the Comte de Vermandois, long separated from his mother, has been less coached in this respect, and being thoroughly candid and sincere, shows little restraint. Often, instead of styling him "Monseigneur," he ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... the meanest slave owner I ever knowed. He would beat his slaves and everybody else's he caught in the road. He was so mean 'til God let him freeze to death. He come to town and got drunk and when he was going back home in his buggy, he froze stiff going up Race Creek Hill. White and colored was glad ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Georgia Narratives, Part 4 • Works Projects Administration
... or visitor's room, just under the lantern. I was absolutely a prisoner there during those three weeks, for boats seldom visited the rock, and it need scarcely be said that ships kept well out of our way. By good fortune there came on a pretty stiff gale at the time, and Stevenson's thrilling narrative was read to the tune of whistling winds and roaring seas, many of which sent the spray right up to the lantern and caused the building, more than once, to quiver to ...
— Personal Reminiscences in Book Making - and Some Short Stories • R.M. Ballantyne
... I tried to protect my face, for my sou'wester only protected well the back of my head. The hail was succeeded by sleet, the rigging and mast were covered with ice; our garments and sou'westers were stiff, and we looked like big icy things. The captain, looking at me with a smile,—for he saw I did not like this sort of weather, said: "This weather is the forerunner of spring in these high latitudes; the sun is getting higher at its meridian ...
— The Land of the Long Night • Paul du Chaillu
... house one day, deep sleep fell upon her, and in a dream or vision she saw a chariot in the air, going south, and empty, but soon it returned, and lying in it, cold and stiff, was the body of a young lady of whom Harriet was very fond, whose home was in Auburn, but who had gone to Washington with her father, a distinguished officer of ...
— Harriet, The Moses of Her People • Sarah H. Bradford
... to go: all his limbs still seemed quite stiff with his long sleep, especially his neck, for he could not move his head easily, and he laughed at his own stupidity at being still so drowsy that he kept knocking his nose against the wall or cupboards. The squirrels and guinea pigs ran whimpering after him, as though they would ...
— The Violet Fairy Book • Various
... dignity and severe etiquette necessary to impress the visiting Princes and Chiefs and Rajahs of the great Presidency of Bombay, His Royal Highness stood or sat for hours in the intense heat, clad in a stiff uniform, laden with lace and buttoned up to the throat. With him were the Duke of Sutherland, Major-General Lord Alfred Paget, Sir Bartle Frere, Lord Suffield, Lord Charles Beresford and the rest ...
— The Life of King Edward VII - with a sketch of the career of King George V • J. Castell Hopkins
... is fashioning a sword for Siegfried,—still another sword, after ever so many,—realising even as he works that no sword he can forge but will break in the lad's strong hands. "The best sword I ever forged, which in the hands of a giant would stand stiff, the insignificant stripling for whom it was shaped he whacks and snaps it in two, as if I had made him a child's plaything!" It is sober fact to Mime that he cannot use Siegfried for his purposes until he have equipped him with a sword. "A sword there is," he continues his meditation, ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... sullens, and hath not fat enough for her porridge, or butter enough for her bread, and she hath a little help of the epilepsy or cramp, to teach her to roll her eyes, wry her mouth, gnash her teeth, startle with her body, hold her arms and hands stiff, &c.; and then, when an old Mother Nobs hath by chance called her an idle young housewife, or bid the Devil scratch her, then no doubt but Mother Nobs is the witch, and the young girl is owl blasted, &c. They that have their brains baited and their fancies distempered with the imaginations and ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham
... into the vile and trembling slave of the priest. In the confessional, man and woman attain to the highest degree of popish perfection: they become as dry sticks, as dead branches, as silent corpses, in the hands of their confessors. Their spirits are destroyed, their consciences are stiff, ...
— The Priest, The Woman And The Confessional • Father Chiniquy
... soon dry, but her boots took longer, and were somewhat stiff when she put them on. They were some which her mamma had brought her from Paris, and were not very well suited for walking in ...
— Norman Vallery - How to Overcome Evil with Good • W.H.G. Kingston
... Rue des Nonaindieres, a very well-dressed bourgeois, who had a prominent belly, a sonorous voice, a bald head, a lofty brow, a black beard, and one of these stiff mustaches which will not lie flat, offered ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... note, dated fifteen years before, acknowledging the receipt of three hundred and sixty dollars, being the semi-annual interest on notes given by Mr. Montgomery. It had been written from Medford, and it bore the stiff ...
— The Rushton Boys at Treasure Cove - Or, The Missing Chest of Gold • Spencer Davenport
... having convinced the animal that resistance will be ill vain. But just as he begins to do this the animal gets down its head, arches up its back, something after the manner of an angry cat, leaps into the air and comes down on the ground with its four legs drawn together under it, perfectly stiff and straight. The rider seldom knows how it happened. He only knows that it felt as though a cannon ball had struck him, and that he fell ...
— My Native Land • James Cox
... term is applied to a group of affections of which lumbago is the best-known example. The group includes lumbago, stiff-neck, and pleurodynia—conditions which have this in common, that sudden and severe pain is excited by movement of the affected part. The lesion consists in inflammatory hyperplasia of the connective tissue; the new tissue differs from normal fibrous ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles
... fascinated suspense over the rim of the gorge. Sometimes the wheels on that side of the vehicle passed within a few inches of the edge. The brakes squeaked, the wheels slid; and she could hear the scrape of the iron-shod hoofs of the horses as they held back stiff legged, obedient to the wary ...
— The Call of the Canyon • Zane Grey
... out of Sainte-Menehould, a corporal of the line, who had been forced to sit up as stiff as a poker for several hours, stretched himself at length on the compartment seat with a sigh of relief. But the jerks and jolts of the carriage, the hard seat, made sleep impossible: the epaulettes of his uniform were an added source of discomfort. The corporal sat up, rubbed the musty ...
— A Nest of Spies • Pierre Souvestre
... iron work is the grille that surrounds the tomb of the Scaligers in Verolla. It is not a hard stiff structure, but is composed of circular forms, each made separately, and linked together with narrow bands, so that the construction is flexible, and is more like a gigantic piece of chain mail than an ...
— Arts and Crafts in the Middle Ages • Julia De Wolf Addison
... of all that this great lesson: that it is, to begin with, a mere matter of temperament, or what William Law would call a mere matter of complexion and sensibility, whether, to begin with, a man is hard, and dry, and narrow, and stiff, and proud, and scornful, and cruel; or again, whether he is soft and tender, broad and open, and full of sympathy and of the milk of human kindness. At first, and to begin with, there is neither praise nor blame as yet in the matter. A man is hard just as ...
— Bunyan Characters - Third Series - The Holy War • Alexander Whyte
... in beds, from the generous feather cover of the Germans to the canopy of state couch of England, but to-night my couch was minus covering of any kind. Calling to Vandy, I found he was in the same predicament. Each had instead a long, stiff bolster lying lengthwise in the middle of the mattress, the use of which neither of us could make out. We soon discovered that there was no need of covering at the Equator; but this bolster must have some use, if we could only find it. Upon inquiring next day we ascertained ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie
... their bosoms and find his perch on "the big ha' bible," if he would,—and as he did. So did the music of Emerson's words and life steal into the hearts of our stern New England theologians, and soften them to a temper which would have seemed treasonable weakness to their stiff-kneed forefathers. When a man lives a life commended by all the Christian virtues, enlightened persons are not so apt to cavil at his particular beliefs or unbeliefs as in former generations. We do, however, ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... terror; he heard the last struggle of John; his agony was short. Rutler heard him make several convulsive shudders and that was all. His companion was dead. Then Rutler advanced and seized the sailor's leg. The leg was already cold and stiff; for the venom of ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... that he unhorsed 5 his opponent. A fearful battle on foot ensued, each striving hard to accomplish the death of the other. But at last the fresh young energy of Roland conquered, and his terrible foe fell to the ground in agony. A minute later his corpse lay stiff on the field, leaving the victory in the ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell
... 1843, when Kurnaul suffered so seriously ... the greater part of the evils observed had not been the necessary and unavoidable results of canal irrigation, but were due to interference with the natural drainage of the country, to the saturation of stiff and retentive soils, and to natural disadvantages of site, enhanced by excess of moisture. As regarded the Ganges Canal, they were of opinion that, with due attention to drainage, improvement rather than injury to the general ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... character, charm of manner, attractiveness and graciousness of expression, a godlike bearing, are our birthrights. Yet how ugly, stiff, coarse, and harsh in appearance and bearing many of us are! No one can afford to disregard his good looks ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... of giving expression to its thought. This imitation, moreover, is, as a rule, unconscious, which accounts for the fact that it is perfect. The modern painters who copy the pale colouring and the stiff attitudes of some of the Primitives are scarcely alive to the source of their inspiration. They believe in their own sincerity, whereas, if an eminent master had not revived this form of art, people would have continued ...
— The Crowd • Gustave le Bon
... they had to skirt round the marshy borders of various bogs. Spring was happier, being able to stop and lap whenever he would, and the whole scene was less unfriendly to them. But they scarcely made speed enough, for they were still among tall whins and stiff scrub of heather when the sun began to get low, gorgeously lighting the tall plumes of golden broom, and they had their doubts whether they might not be off the track; but in such weather, there was nothing alarming in spending a night out of doors, if only they had something for supper. Stephen ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge
... behaved as became the son of a good family, was respectful but not stiff, and answered her friendly questions briefly ...
— The Indian Lily and Other Stories • Hermann Sudermann
... sector, yet the state still plays a major role in basic industry, banking, transport, and communication. The largest industrial sector is textiles and clothing, which accounts for one-third of industrial employment; it faces stiff competition in international markets with the end of the global quota system. However, other sectors, notably the automotive and electronics industries, are rising in importance within Turkey's export mix. Real GNP growth has exceeded ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... still, stiff and cold. Then little Gerda wept hot tears, that fell upon his breast; they penetrated into his heart, they thawed the lump of ice, and consumed the little piece of glass in it. He looked at her, and ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V2 • Charles H. Sylvester
... had gone down to a stiff sailin' breeze, and the old Debby S. slapped along afore it. Sometimes there was twelve foot under her keel and sometimes eight or nine. Once 'twas only seven and a half. Zach and 'Bije both looked at each other, but ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... as if her limbs were stiff with cold; but she could stand, and walk with his arm round her; and so these two moved slowly along the deserted passages toward the room where the ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... with equal magnanimity he might refund the forty-six pounds that had found its way from my pocket to his, but I bowed with stiff politeness, and made my exit with as much dignity as the attachment to my heels of the crestfallen ...
— Simon the Jester • William J. Locke
... seemed interminable and she found herself contrasting the stiff formality with the genial hospitality of her father's table. She saw again the softly lighted room with its open windows through which the flowers peeped, and heard his gay badinage and his low, sweet laugh. Could she be the same Evadne, or was it ...
— A Beautiful Possibility • Edith Ferguson Black
... sleeping, while the hours of the warm summer afternoon slipped away, ripples on the ocean of the lovely, changeless eternity, the consciousness of God. For a time the watching sister was absorbed in King Lear; then she fell to wondering whether Cordelia was not unkindly stiff toward her old father, but perceived at length that, with such sisters listening, she could not have spoken otherwise. Then she wondered whether there could be women so bad as Goneril and Regan, concluding that Shakspere must know better than ...
— Heather and Snow • George MacDonald
... for the next carriage. 'Do they come down pretty stiff?' he inquired, and then, pulling forth a roll of bank-notes from the pocket of his pea-jacket, he ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... said unto him, I have spoken unto thee several times, saying, I have seen this people, and behold it is a stiff- necked people: let me therefore destroy them, and put out their name from under heaven. And I will make unto thee a great and a wonderful nation, that shall ...
— The Forbidden Gospels and Epistles, Complete • Archbishop Wake
... God. This end was not the material prosperity of Israel, but the preparation of the nation for its high office as the medium through which the gospel should afterwards be given to the world. The people were rebellious and stiff-necked, and surrounded by polytheism and idolatry. Their training required severity, and all the severity employed by God brought forth at last its appropriate fruits. The laws imposed upon them were stern and burdensome from their multiplicity. ...
— Companion to the Bible • E. P. Barrows
... Stubbs, Hal," said Chester. "Just keep a stiff upper lip and we'll come through this thing ...
— The Boy Allies in the Balkan Campaign - The Struggle to Save a Nation • Clair W. Hayes
... these pictures were not stiff and formal like Egyptian decorative art, but executed by Greek artists with such liveliness and truth that they seemed about to speak; and Melissa could have fancied many times that they were moving toward her from the ceiling ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... "The part I have to play is unique: I am a general-in-chief subordinated; sometimes with everything to do, and sometimes nothing; I am esteemed, respected, beloved, envied, hated; I pass for proud, supple, stiff, yielding, polite, devout, gallant, etc.; and I ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman
... M. de Cymier should have asked for the part of the husband, a local magistrate, stiff and self-important, whom everybody laughed at. Jacqueline alone knew why he had chosen it: it would give him the opportunity of giving her two kisses. Of course those kisses were to be reserved for the representation, but whether intentionally or otherwise, the young husband ventured ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... before I moved from my hiding-place, and started for home, surprised to find my limbs stiff and my clothes bathed ...
— Love Among the Chickens • P. G. Wodehouse
... blow to the case against the accused. It was a pretty stiff one, you will admit. Already it had begun to collapse like a house of cards. Still, there was the assignation, and the undisputed meeting between Smethurst and Kershaw, and those two and a half hours of a foggy evening to satisfactorily ...
— The Old Man in the Corner • Baroness Orczy
... in the morning, and when Tom finally opened his eyes, feeling a bit stiff in his joints, he had to collect his thoughts to remember where he was. Like a flash, everything came back, and he jumped up to dress and find out how ...
— Polly's Business Venture • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... his drink this time, and a pretty stiff one it was, but I fancy my own must have run it hard. In my case it cast a merciful haze over much of the next hour, which I can truthfully describe as one of the most painful of my whole existence. I can have known ...
— Raffles - Further Adventures of the Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung
... May, Stony Hills, Mulga Scrub. Feel very stiff and ill. Started at daylight, and passed through three belts of thick mulga scrub, between which there were low stony hills. At three miles passed a small gum creek, emptying itself into the scrub. ...
— Explorations in Australia, The Journals of John McDouall Stuart • John McDouall Stuart
... until all the cavalrymen had gone away with their horses, and then he crawled cautiously out of the stream. His limbs were cold and stiff, but his enforced exercise in crawling soon brought back their flexibility. He passed between the pickets again, and, when he was safely beyond their hearing, he rose and stretched himself ...
— The Sword of Antietam • Joseph A. Altsheler
... the carriage passed Swiss Cottage station and ten minutes later when they had climbed the stiff hill to the Heath. Alban had not often ridden in a carriage, but he would have found his sensations very difficult to set down. The glossy cushions, the fine ivory and silver fittings, were ornaments to ...
— Aladdin of London - or Lodestar • Sir Max Pemberton
... accepting Darby's assertion of innocence and dismissing him with honor, came to De Lacy like a blow in the face. Had he been within reach when Darby flaunted him, not even the royal presence would have held his arm. As it was, with a stiff bow he was withdrawing, ...
— Beatrix of Clare • John Reed Scott |
