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Predatory   Listen
adjective
Predatory  adj.  
1.
Characterized by plundering; practicing rapine; plundering; pillaging; as, a predatory excursion; a predatory party. "A predatory war."
2.
Hungry; ravenous; as, predatory spirits. (Obs.) "Exercise... maketh the spirits more hot and predatory."
3.
(Zool.) Living by preying upon other animals; carnivorous.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Predatory" Quotes from Famous Books



... signal given by a cornu or tuba. To make the former known throughout an army required some time, but not so the latter. Signa afterwards are the standards of the maniples, cohorts, and legions. [538] Latrocinium, 'a predatory attack,' as opposed to a regular battle. [539] Obtruncare in opposition to caedere (cut down) signifies 'to mutilate by cutting off a limb or limbs.' The word multos is chosen here only for variety's sake, instead of alios. [540] ...
— De Bello Catilinario et Jugurthino • Caius Sallustii Crispi (Sallustius)

... time in our nation's history we have consistently maintained in peacetime, military forces of a magnitude sufficient to deter and if need be to destroy predatory forces ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Dwight D. Eisenhower • Dwight D. Eisenhower

... the battered console of The Luck, Pop watched his passenger. He knew Kane, of course. Or rather, he knew of him. A killer. The kind that thrives and grows fat on the frontiers. The bulky frame, the cropped black hair, the predatory eyes that looked like two blaster muzzles. They were all familiar to Pop. Kane was all steel and meanness. The kind of carrion bird that took what others had worked for. Not big time, you understand. In another age he'd have been a torpedo—a hireling ...
— Turnover Point • Alfred Coppel

... The chaplain of Horsemongerlane Gaol, in his annual report to the Surrey justices, thus states the result of his careful study of the causes of dishonesty: "From my experience of predatory crime, founded upon careful study of the character of a great variety of prisoners, I conclude that habitual dishonesty is to be referred neither to ignorance, nor to drunkenness, nor to poverty, nor to overcrowding in towns, nor to temptation from surrounding wealth—nor, indeed, ...
— Character • Samuel Smiles

... attributed to a less poetical cause; namely, from the mud-loving disposition of the tench, it is enabled to keep itself so completely concealed at the bottom of its aqueous haunts, that it remains secure from the attacks of its predatory neighbour. ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton

... by shepherds to call their flocks together; and I have only to persist in blowing it to collect all the cows, that graze in these mountains, about me. Did you not hear the cattle this minute? The wolves also, and bears, and other predatory animals, do not like its note; and when they hear it, will crouch to the ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross

... hurried to avoid her, but before long could but note that she was walking parallel and turning her face towards him. Her gloved hand seemed to make a beckoning movement, and perceiving at once that he was the object of that predatory instinct which he knew from the many letters and protests in his journals to be one of the most distressing features of the War, he would have broken into a run if he had not been travelling up-hill; being deprived of this means of escape, his public nature prevailed, and he saw that ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... nature and at all times unfit for food; others are useless at particular seasons. Every one who has watched the operations of fishermen on the shore is familiar with the appearance of star-fish and other low forms of marine life, which are drawn out by the nets, and cast away upon the sand. Large predatory fishes of a low type are also sometimes caught, when they venture too near in search of prey. In some instances, moreover, fishes that are dead and partially decayed are brought up in company with the living, and these are of ...
— The Parables of Our Lord • William Arnot

... When the Dogs Barked 'Treed', University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, 1946. Mainly on mountain lions, but firsthand observations on other predatory animals also. Before he became state game warden, the author was for years with the ...
— Guide to Life and Literature of the Southwest • J. Frank Dobie

... trorapida. Precipitation trorapideco. Precise preciza. Precisely gxuste. Precision precizeco, akurateco. Preclude eksigi, malhelpi. Precocious frumatura. Precocity frumaturo—eco. Precursor antauxulo. Predatory rabadega. Predecessor antauxulo. Predestination sortdifino. Predetermination antauxdecido. Predict antauxdiri, profetadi. Prediction antauxdiro. Predisposition inklino. Predominate superregi. Preface antauxparolo. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes

... fleet of 260 sail, went up the Seine, and attacked the Normans in the isle of Oiselle: after a long and obstinate resistance, they were obliged to capitulate; and having paid 6000 pounds of gold and silver, by way of ransom, had leave to join their victors. The riches thus acquired rendered a predatory life so popular, that the pirates were continually increasing in number, so that under a "sea-king" called Eric, they made a descent in the Elbe and the Weser, pillaged Hamburg, penetrated far into Germany, ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms

... the girl, and he brought a cloying odor of frangipani, bergamot and vervain. His nostrils quivered, his face had taken on an odd pinched look, for all that he smiled as over some occult jest. Graciosa was a little frightened by his bearing, which was both furtive and predatory. ...
— The Certain Hour • James Branch Cabell

... pastoral hordes, like those rude and migratory people, half shepherd, half warrior, who, with their flocks and herds, roam the plains of upper Asia; but others, it is to be apprehended, will become predatory bands, mounted on the fleet steeds of the prairies, with the open plains for their marauding grounds, and the mountains for their retreats and lurking places. There they may resemble those great hordes ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn

... Conajee Angria died. He left two legitimate sons, Sakhajee and Sumbhajee; three illegitimate sons, Toolajee, Mannajee, and Yessajee. Sakhajee established himself at Colaba, while Sumbhajee Angria remained at Severndroog, to carry on the predatory policy of their father. In March, 1734, Sakhajee died, and Mannajee and Yessajee were sent to hold Colaba for Sumbhajee. Before long, Mannajee quarrelled with Sumbhajee and Yessajee, and fled to Chaul. The Portuguese espoused his quarrel, and furnished him with ...
— The Pirates of Malabar, and An Englishwoman in India Two Hundred Years Ago • John Biddulph

... Perseus and Andromeda, Ceres drawn by dragons, Bacchus and Ariadne by panthers, and finally the education of Achilles. Then followed a ballet of the famous lovers of ancient times, with a troop of nymphs, which was interrupted by an attack of predatory centaurs, who in their turn were vanquished and put to flight by Hercules. The fact, in itself a trifle, may be mentioned as characteristic of the taste of the time, that the human beings who at all festivals appeared as statues in niches or on pillars and triumphal arches, and then showed ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt

... head waters of the Missouri to St. Louis in a small canoe. This distance of three thousand miles he had accomplished in thirty days. Colter kept with the party all the morning. He had many particulars to give them concerning the Blackfeet Indians, a restless and predatory tribe, who had conceived an implacable hostility to the white men, in consequence of one of their warriors having been killed by Captain Lewis, while attempting to steal horses. Through the country infested by these savages ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving

... notes, I find that this was not my first idea. The distracting intervening woman was to have been of a commoner type, intellectual indeed rather than sensuous, but yet of the predatory type and class, which delights in the capture of man. When I began to write the first scene in which Eugenie was to appear, she was still nebulous and uncertain. Then she did appear—suddenly!—as though the mists parted. It was not the woman I had been expecting and preparing ...
— Fenwick's Career • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... his full height and flung out his long arms, his face turned to the southern skies. The movement shot panic into the heart of a swan that had drawn nearer with amiably predatory designs. Its consequent abrupt retreat collided it with a stout old lady, who squealed and dropped her bag of peanuts. ...
— The Red One • Jack London

... heartless thing for us, who call ourselves civilized, to destroy so completely any species of animal or plant that not one of its kind remains alive? No species which we destroy will ever come back again, and its place will always remain empty. There are a few predatory animals and birds that destroy vast numbers of useful ones. We should keep these in check by every means in our power, but for our thoughtless destruction of the valuable ones the world will ...
— Conservation Reader • Harold W. Fairbanks

... known to you that some of the Western tribes of Indians, roaming through the extensive prairies west of Arkansas and Missouri, particularly the Camanches and Kiowas, have, for some years, interrupted the peace of that quarter, by predatory attacks upon our citizens, and upon the indigenous and emigrant Indians whom we are under obligations to protect. Their war parties have annoyed our citizens in their intercourse with the Mexican States, and have rendered the communication difficult and hazardous. It became necessary to put ...
— Impressions of America - During The Years 1833, 1834, and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Tyrone Power

... suppressed eagerness and the suspense with which I waited to learn each morning what the results of his past night's toil had been—how many tramps he had gathered in and what the chances were for convicting them. And so it was, when later, as a tramp, I succeeded in eluding some predatory constable, I could not but feel sorry for the little boys and girls at home in that constable's house; it seemed to me in a way that I was defrauding those little boys and girls of some of ...
— The Road • Jack London

... were always predatory; he went forth always to seek food. With all the beautiful world from which to elect and choose, he sought out only those places where eating was studied and elevated to an art. These visits were much ...
— The Exiles and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis

... denounce Great Britain in still more unmeasured terms. The British, he declared, had only one interest in Mexico, and that was oil. The Foreign Office had simply handed its Mexican policy over to the "oil barons" for predatory purposes. ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume I • Burton J. Hendrick

... possibility that he might meet some trespassing lacklander who might have to be impressed with the resources of the master of Kira Barra. He knew of more than one instance wherein a Master Protector had been overcome by some predatory lackland wanderer, who had then managed by one means or another to secure his own accession to the estates of his victim. ...
— The Weakling • Everett B. Cole

... for the benefit of the people, and not for the benefit of the pockets of a political aristocracy. The public service is a guardian, not a predatory organization. In our country when a man can do nothing else he becomes a public servant; in Germany he can only become a public servant after severe examinations and ample proofs of fitness. The superiority of one service over the other is ...
— Germany and the Germans - From an American Point of View (1913) • Price Collier

... the seventeenth of June, Rupert darted out of Oxford with his cavalry on a predatory expedition. At three in the morning of the following day, he attacked and dispersed a few parliamentary soldiers who lay at Postcombe. He then flew to Chinnor, burned the village, killed or took all the troops who were quartered there, and prepared to hurry back with his booty ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... honey appears to be referred to, and twenty-two times in that section of the second part, Plates I* to X*, relating to bees. He also appears to take an active part in the manufacture of idols, engages in painting, aids in the culture or gathering of cacao, engages in predatory excursions, and acts in various other relations. In the left compartment of Plate XXIV*a he bears on his head the head of a bird. In the remarkable double plate (41-42) of the Cortesian Codex he is twice figured, in the central area and at the east (top), and in each ...
— Aids to the Study of the Maya Codices • Cyrus Thomas

... predilection for which had hitherto been an abnormal failing on his part. So changed, indeed, became the old cat that he did not possess spirit enough to put up his tail and "phit" and "fiz" at Burgher Jans' terrier, when that predatory animal made an occasional excursion into the parlour at meal times, to see what he could pick up, either on the sly or in that sneaking, fawning fashion which a well-trained dog would have despised. This continued almost to the end of the month; but then came a bright ...
— Fritz and Eric - The Brother Crusoes • John Conroy Hutcheson

... first given, probably, to the insurgents of La Vendee, in order to insinuate a belief that the disorders were but of a slight and predatory nature. ...
— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady

... desire for mastery over the inferior animals, wild and domestic, including cockchafers, neighbors' dogs, and small sisters, which in all ages has been an attribute of so much promise for the fortunes of our race. Now, Mr. Pullet never rode anything taller than a low pony, and was the least predatory of men, considering firearms dangerous, as apt to go off of themselves by nobody's particular desire. So that Tom was not without strong reasons when, in confidential talk with a chum, he had described uncle Pullet as a nincompoop, ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot

... this recital of perplexing conditions confronting the inventor, there must not be forgotten the commercial "shark," whose predatory instincts are ever keenly alert for tender victims. In the wake of every newly developed art of world-wide importance there is sure to follow a number of unscrupulous adventurers, who hasten to take advantage of general ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin

... altogether so rapidly accomplished, or so entirely successful. The circumstances were in some degree different and less simple. In the first place the frontier was 800 miles long, and was inhabited by Afghan tribes, who were more predatory and intractable than the Beloochees; they were not only independent of each other, but for the most part acknowledged no allegiance to the Ameer of Cabul. Border disputes therefore had to be settled with individual chiefs; and no opportunity was offered for our mediation in ...
— Indian Frontier Policy • General Sir John Ayde

... constitutional; here it represents Squatter-Sovereignty, and there the power of Congress over the Territories; but, under whatever name, its nature remains unchanged, and its instincts are none the less predatory and destructive. ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell

... was their only reason for staying, they could have left long ago and had nothing to fear, as they have been for many years at peace with their ancient enemy the predatory Navajo. But rather than go they have chosen to remain in their old home where they have always lived, and will continue to live so long as they ...
— Arizona Sketches • Joseph A. Munk

... called another class of younger scholars. This class practically took all of her attention and she did not observe the four boys who carried on a warfare with "snappers" and "spitballs" in the back seats; of the predatory campaign of the lanky, white-haired youth who slid from seat to seat of the smaller boys, capturing tops, marbles, and other small possessions dear to childish hearts, threatening by gesture and writhing lips a "slaughter of the innocents" if one ...
— Janice Day at Poketown • Helen Beecher Long

... furnishes additional reasons, I regret to say, of a painful character, for the recommendation heretofore made to provide for increasing the military force employed in the Territory inhabited by the Indians. The settlers on the frontier have suffered much from the incursions of predatory bands, and large parties of emigrants to our Pacific possessions have been massacred with impunity. The recurrence of such scenes can only be prevented by teaching these wild tribes the power of and their ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 4) of Volume 5: Franklin Pierce • James D. Richardson

... a leader of predatory horse, has been justly described as 'one of the most atrocious villains that India ever produced'. He first came into notice in 1804, as an officer in Holkar's service, and in the following year opposed Lord Lake ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman

... favor he found in the eyes and the heart of his beloved. As gathered from the narrations of the last chapter, he was now on a visit to the wilderness home of his betrothed, to arrange for the nuptials, which were to be solemnized on Christmas Eve, the winter season being deemed most safe from the predatory excursions of the Indians. All these particulars their bitter adversary was familiar with; and he so exulted over the sad termination of their plans, he could scarcely command his feelings, or act with ...
— Ellen Walton - The Villain and His Victims • Alvin Addison

... founded on alien force and aiming at its own magnificence is often more efficient in defending its subjects than is a government expressing only the people's energies, as the predatory shepherd and his dog prove better guardians for a flock than its own wethers. The robbers that at their first incursion brought terror to merchant and peasant may become almost immediately representative organs of society—an army and a judiciary. Disputes between subjects ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana

... gives a lively description of the wandering and predatory life of the Saracens, who stretched from the confines of Assyria to the cataracts of the Nile. It appears from the adventures of Malchus, which Jerom has related in so entertaining a manner, that the high ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon

... to avoid molestation from any of their brethren, who might be tempted, by guessing the nature of their freight, to sally out and pick off any stragglers. The truth is, that the whole of this magnificent archipelago was given up to anarchy and predatory warfare, the strong on all points preying on the weak; they in their turn, as they became enfeebled by their own victories, succumbing to other tribes, who had in the meantime risen to power, while even their commerce was ...
— Mark Seaworth • William H.G. Kingston

... been to Early and his followers to note the panic and confusion into which McCausland's predatory riders once more threw the capital and the border States, this absurd freak produced far-reaching consequences that were not in the thoughts of any one on either side. Its first effect was to stop ...
— History of the Nineteenth Army Corps • Richard Biddle Irwin

... painted with amazing skill and insight. All the beauty was there, the exquisite tinting of flesh, the beautiful curve of cheek and throat and shoulder. But, behind the lovely physical presentment, Nan felt she could detect the woman's soul—predatory, feline, and unscrupulous. It was rather original of Maryon to have done that, she thought—painted both body and spirit—and it was just like that cynical cleverness of his to have discerned so exactly the soulless type of woman ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler

... amount, Athenians, because it is impossible for us now to raise an army capable of meeting him in the field: we must plunder [Footnote: Make predatory incursions, as Livy says, "popula bundi magis quam justo more belli." Jacobs: den Krieg als Freibeuter fahren. Another German: Streifzuge zu machen (guerilla warfare). Leland: "harass him with depredations." Wilson, an old English translator: "rob and spoil upon him."] ...
— The Olynthiacs and the Phillippics of Demosthenes • Demosthenes

... alone, he stood again contemplating the evidence of Snorky Green's predatory progress among the ladies. He examined the ...
— Skippy Bedelle - His Sentimental Progress From the Urchin to the Complete - Man of the World • Owen Johnson

... his habits. A few youth of his own age sometimes called upon him, but they eventually became abusive, and their visits were more strictly predatory incursions for old bottles and junk which formed the staple of McGinnis's Court. Overcome by loneliness one day, Melons inveigled a blind harper into the court. For two hours did that wretched man prosecute his unhallowed calling, unrecompensed, and ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various

... money aristocracy. A surfeit of money brings power, but it does not carry with it a recognized position among a titled aristocracy. The next step is marriage with title. The titled descendants of the predatory barons of the feudal ages having, generation after generation, squandered and mortgaged the estates gotten centuries ago by force and robbery, stand in need of funds. On the other hand, the feminine possessors of American ...
— History of the Great American Fortunes, Vol. I - Conditions in Settlement and Colonial Times • Myers Gustavus

... whom new countries are old, who had trod the edge of things all his life. There was a hint of the meat-eating animal about him; his nose was keen and hawk-like, his walk and movements those of the predatory beast, and as he passed by, Burrell observed that his eyes were of a peculiar cruelty that went well with his thin lips. He was older by far than Runnion, but, while the latter was mean-visaged and swaggering, the stranger's manner was noticeable ...
— The Barrier • Rex Beach

... of protection, one thinks, must also be afforded against a predatory class of Indian traders, the back rooms of whose stores are often barrooms, gambling-dens, and houses of assignation, and headquarters and harbourage for the white degenerates—even if the government go the length of setting up co-operative Indian stores ...
— Ten Thousand Miles with a Dog Sled - A Narrative of Winter Travel in Interior Alaska • Hudson Stuck

... was born in a fishing village at a period of time when all the energies of the Akasava were devoted to checking and defeating the predatory raidings of the N'gombi, under that warlike chief G'osimalino, who also kept other nations on the defensive, and held the river basin, from the White River, by the old king's territory, to as far south as the islands of ...
— Bones - Being Further Adventures in Mr. Commissioner Sanders' Country • Edgar Wallace

... dozing in my sleeping car, I heard her chirping voice, "Bappa, come here. I need you." The memory of her small soft body, her trusting eyes, the arch of her brows, made me impatient of my lecture tours. She was my incentive, my chief reason for living and working, and from each of my predatory sorties, I returned to her with a thankfulness which was almost maudlin—in Fuller's eyes. To have her joyous face lifted to mine, to hear her clear voice repeating my mother's songs, restored my faith ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland

... pikes come the perches, also predatory fishes. The European perch (Perca fluviatilis) has a place by itself in the affections of anglers. When young it is easy to catch by almost any method of fishing, and a large number of Walton's disciples have been initiated into the art with its help. Worms and small live-baits are ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 2, Part 1, Slice 1 • Various

... and military force that overawes him, yet serenely leaving the protection of that military force, and placing life and property alike within the absolute power of that very foreigner against whose predatory tendencies we spend millions ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various

... connection, as it does not express the idea. The result was not brought about by armed bodies of men animated by hostile intentions or bent on extermination, although forays of this kind are too common in later pueblo history, but rather by predatory bands, bent on robbery and not indisposed to incidental killing. The pueblos, with their fixed habitations and their stores of food, were the natural prey of such bands, and they suffered, just as did, at ...
— The Cliff Ruins of Canyon de Chelly, Arizona • Cosmos Mindeleff

... offer, the supreme opportunity of exercising influence, the main chance of what is clumsily called self-effectuation. The old proverb says that all women are match-makers; and Mr. Bernard Shaw goes further and maintains that they act from a kind of predatory instinct, however much that instinct may ...
— The Silent Isle • Arthur Christopher Benson

... easy to see from whom Maddalena had inherited her Eastern appearance. She reproduced, on a diminished scale, her father's outline of face, but that which was gentle, mysterious, and alluring in her, in him was informed with a rugged wildness. There was something bird-like and predatory in his boldly curving nose with its narrow nostrils, in his hard-lipped mouth, full of splendid teeth, in his sharp and pushing chin. His whole body, wide-shouldered and deep-chested, as befitted a man of the sea, looked savage and fierce, but full of an intensity ...
— The Call of the Blood • Robert Smythe Hichens

... men of true vision. Now and then I've been able to give them a useful hint—the slightest, mind you, and only where I could divert suspicion from some of my friends in the underworld. I always try to be of assistance to predatory genius; there are clever crooks and stupid ones; the kind who stoop to vulgar gun-work when their own stupidity gets them into a tight pinch don't appeal to me. My artistic sensibilities are affronted by ...
— The Madness of May • Meredith Nicholson

... the animal world seems to be the view of the Aryan races generally. With them, as with us, the fox is the embodiment of cunning, the ass of stupidity, and the bear of clumsy strength and good-humored simplicity. If they can be said to have a favorite animal, it is the wolf, whose predatory life, ferocity when at bay and ability to die fighting and in silence comprise all that in a mountaineer's eyes is most worthy of admiration. "Short-eared wolf" is a Caucasian girl's pet name for her lover, and "wolf of the North" ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, November, 1878 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various

... possessed of nobler traits than usually belong to his race. His manners were dignified and courteous, and upon the field he showed himself a brave and cautious leader. It is said that he instructed his people in their predatory excursions to spare the women and children. "It is not," said he, "upon them that we make war and draw the scalping-knife. It is upon men. Let us act ...
— Southern Literature From 1579-1895 • Louise Manly

... there is growing up a generation of boys who morally "cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand"—this through no fault of theirs, for they are but a product. If they are unlovely, "smart," sophisticated, ungrateful, and predatory, what has made them so? Who has inverted the prophetic promise and given them ashes for beauty and the spirit of heaviness for the garment of praise? As matters now stand it is not the ninety and nine who are safe and the one in peril. That ratio tends to be reversed, ...
— The Minister and the Boy • Allan Hoben

... to the new moon of Ramazan (see note, Vol. I. p. 71 {see Vol. 1 FN26}). The meaning here is the same, the allusion being apparently to the eagerness with which the pagan Arabs may be supposed to have watched for the appearance of the new moon of Shaaban, as giving the signal for the renewal of predatory excursions, after the enforced close-time or Treve de Dieu of ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume IV • Anonymous

... maintained a show of independent authority over the other great Maratha chieftains, Sindhia, Holkar, and the Raja of Nagpur or Berar. But the real military power of the Marathas rested with these leaders, and their predatory troops of horsemen terrorised all Central India. Happily for Wellesley's purpose, they were often at feud with each other, and the Peshwa, though aided by Sindhia, was utterly defeated by Jaswant Rao Holkar. He fled to ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick

... dingoes were suspected, but none were seen. Then other sheep—men began to lose lambs, and a close watch was set, with the result that iguanas, which are very numerous in this part of the country, were discovered to be the murderers of the little "baa-baa's." The cause of this new departure in the predatory habits of the "goanner"—which hitherto had confined his evil deeds to nocturnal visits to the fowl-yards—is stated to be the extermination of the opossum, which has driven the cunning reptile to seek for ...
— By Rock and Pool on an Austral Shore, and Other Stories • Louis Becke

... for receiving and distributing information, as well as for concerting measures for the aid of the cause of freedom, and for depositing supplies for friends in the field. The Brushy Mountains were but a few miles distant, and were infested with Tories, who made predatory incursions into this part of Iredell, carrying off stock, devastating farms, and ambuscading and shooting Whigs, who ...
— Sketches of Western North Carolina, Historical and Biographical • C. L. Hunter

... were given nothing to eat; provision must be found by foraging. If they were captured on these predatory expeditions, they were roughly beaten. A Spartiate boy who had stolen a little fox and had hidden it under his mantle, rather than betray himself let the animal gnaw out his vitals. They were to learn how to escape from ...
— History Of Ancient Civilization • Charles Seignobos

... ease and naturally indolent disposition, seemed more fitted to take his seat in the council than to lead his warriors to battle. Yet was he not, in reality, the inactive character be appeared, and more than once, subsequently, he was engaged in expeditions of a predatory nature, carrying off the customary spoils. We cannot import a better idea of the head of the warrior, than by stating, that we never recal that of the gigantic Memnon, in the British Museum, without being forcibly reminded of Split-log's. The Indian, however, was notorious ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson

... hostility toward Prussia. A war between Austria and Prussia would be the unavoidable consequence; the whole of Germany would dissolve itself into parties favorable or hostile to us, and this state of affairs would give France an opportunity and a pretext to carry out her own predatory designs against Germany; and, while we would be fighting battles perhaps in Silesia and Bavaria, to seize the left ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach

... Peterborough's momentary absence, did her work. Nothing could save the unhappy gentleman from a distracting scene and much archaic English. The squire's power of vituperation was notorious: he could be more than a match for roadside navvies and predatory tramps in cogency of epithet. Peterborough came to me drenched, and wailing that he had never heard such language,—never dreamed of it. And to find himself the object of it!—and, worse, to be unable to conscientiously defend himself! The pain to him was in the conscience,—which ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... Indian Ocean, so that there was an Oriental fragrance breathing through his talk and an odor of the Spice Islands still lingering in his garments. He had much to say of the delightful qualities of the Malay pirates, who, indeed, carry on a predatory warfare against the ships of all civilized nations, and cut every Christian throat among their prisoners; but (except for deeds of that character, which are the rule and habit of their life, and matter of religion and conscience with them) they are a gentle-natured ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... would enable him—should the king opportunely die—to seize upon the vacant throne of Poland;—that he had numerous and powerful friends among the nobility;—that he had already drawn together his Lithuanians, under pretence of protecting the frontier from the incursion of predatory bands;—that he intended immediately to place himself at their head, and march towards Cracow. Now, if at this moment the throne should suddenly become vacant, what power on earth could prevent him from ascending ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various

... climes of the East to the snowy mountains of Norway and the howling ridges of Iceland, obtained a fresh development, with numerous modifications and strange additions, from the new life, climate, scenery, and customs to which they were there exposed. The temptation to predatory habits and strife, the necessity for an intense though fitful activity arising from their geographical situation, the fierce spirit nourished in them by their actual life, the tremendous phenomena of the Arctic world around them, all these influences break out to our view ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger

... little testily. "I was just trying to get all thought of this most perilous voyage out of my mind, with the help of a novel here. From which do you seriously consider we have most to fear," he went on, "mines, submarines, or predatory vessels of the type ...
— The Box with Broken Seals • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... movement. 'Let goo!' he said imperiously, and, throwing himself round, while one foot slipped into the water, he caught her hand, with its thin predatory fingers, and pulled the ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... seen afterwards, in the account of the West India Islands, and the Continent of Guiana, that there are many warlike tribes of Caribs, or Caraibs, constantly engaged in predatory warfare; whose women, when their husbands are absent in search of prisoners for food, take arms for the protection of themselves and children; whence they have been reported as nations of ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. II • Robert Kerr

... contemplation and depth of insight into the Infinite, or if you intend to become a Brahmin, and seek in your navel the dyspeptic divinity who there wields his sceptre, while your despised body is given up to the predatory ravages of genus pediculus, well and good. Follow your hest, go on and conquer the [Greek: gnosis] and when you have got it, just inform me what it looks like, and whether you will be more able to make use of it than the fellow was of the elephant he bought at auction. But if you desire ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various

... subdolous, pale-green eyes, with their predatory restlessness, at the square-blocked, flaccid jaw, and the beefy, animal-like massiveness of the strong neck, at the huge form odorous of gin and cigar smoke, and the great, hairy hands marked with their purplish veinings. It seemed like a ghost out of ...
— Phantom Wires - A Novel • Arthur Stringer

... Wiley Holman. Wiley had refused half the mine, but that only proved that half of the mine did not appeal to him—perhaps he would take it all. Samuel J. had been a student for a good many years in the school of predatory business and he had learned the rules of the game. He knew that the buyer always decried the goods and magnified each tiny defect, whereas the seller by as natural a process played up every virtue to the limit. But any man who inspected the goods was a potential buyer ...
— Shadow Mountain • Dane Coolidge

... the night following the dance Cad Sills put herself in his path for the second time and this time she gave him short shrift. He was pushing forward, near sundown, to take the impulse of an eddy at the edge of Pull-an'-be-Damned when he saw that predatory, songful woman balanced knee-deep in rushing water, ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... presence, and yet I hold my peace.' A great awe fell on all who heard, and the king and multitudes of his people were converted. Shortly after this, Alla wedded Constance with great richness and solemnity. At length he was called to defend his border against the predatory Scots, and in his absence a man-child was born. A messenger was sent with the blissful tidings to the king's camp; but, on his way, the messenger turned aside to the dwelling of Donegild, the king's mother, and said, 'Be blithe, madam; the ...
— Dreamthorp - A Book of Essays Written in the Country • Alexander Smith

... of the force, men of Athens, is determined by the fact that we cannot at present provide an army capable of meeting Philip in the open field; we must make plundering forays, and our warfare must at first be of a predatory nature. Consequently the force must not be over-big—we could then neither pay nor feed it—any more than it must be wholly insignificant. {24} The presence of citizens in the force that sails I require for the following reasons. I am told that Athens once maintained a mercenary ...
— The Public Orations of Demosthenes, volume 1 • Demosthenes

... since then had been of another sort, chaining me to stool and desk. I was much in need of a change, and when a friend, who was also a ranch-owner on the Currumpaw, asked me to come to New Mexico and try if I could do anything with this predatory pack, I accepted the invitation and, eager to make the acquaintance of its king, was as soon as possible among the mesas of that region. I spent some time riding about to learn the country, and at intervals my guide ...
— Wild Animals I Have Known • Ernest Thompson Seton

... rulers, supported by the Church and the commons, bestirred themselves to slay the many-headed Hydra. Feudalism was not extirpated, but it was brought under the law. In many districts it defied repression. To the end of the Middle Ages the Knights of Suabia and the Rhineland maintained the predatory traditions of the Dark Ages; and everywhere feudalism remained a force inimical to national unity. But the great feudatories who survived into the age of Machiavelli and of the new despotisms had usually ...
— Medieval Europe • H. W. C. Davis

... will descend with a rush and rise carrying a rat or other delicacy in its claws; but these interruptions of the pattern are only momentary. For the rest of the time they swirl and circle and never cease to watch. Bombay also has its predatory crows, who are so bold that it is unsafe to leave any bright article on the veranda table. Spectacles, for example, set up a longing in their hearts which they make no effort to control. But these birds are everywhere. At a wayside station ...
— Roving East and Roving West • E.V. Lucas

... of the desert, tempted by the weak condition to which the Assyrian conquest had reduced Samaria, made raids, it appears, into the territory at their pleasure, and carried off plunder. Sargon determined to chastise these predatory bands, and made an expedition into the interior, where "he subdued the uncultivated plains of the remote Arabia, which had never before given tribute to Assyria," and brought under subjection the Thamudites, ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 2. (of 7): Assyria • George Rawlinson

... of Archibald Cameron is interesting. As the youngest son of old Lochiel, he, with his famous brother 'the gentle Lochiel,' set about reforming the predatory habits of their clan, with considerable success. Archibald went to Glasgow University, and read Moral Philosophy 'under the ingenious Dr. Hutchinson.' He studied Medicine in Edinburgh and in France; then settled in Lochaber, and married a lady of the clan ...
— Pickle the Spy • Andrew Lang

... visitors; but he was too unfavourable a contrast to his gifted sister to win much grace in Cornelia's eyes. Agias, who was living with Cleomenes, nominally for the purpose of learning the latter's business, preparatory to becoming a partner on capital to come from his predatory cousin, as a matter of fact spent a great part of his time at the palace also, dancing attendance upon his Roman friends. Pratinas, indeed, was on hand, not really to distress them, but to vex by the mere knowledge of his presence. Cornelia met the Greek with ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis

... gulls will clean up a "manga" of locusts; they devour them by thousands, and will then go to a neighbouring laguna, take a little water, and throw up all they have eaten, and at a given signal go off again to fill up with more locusts, only to repeat the operation time after time. Predatory insects of other orders also attack them, especially when in the unwinged state. They have still more deadly foes in parasites, some of which attack the fully developed locust, but the greater number adopt the more insidious method of ...
— Argentina From A British Point Of View • Various

... passed over the young woodsman's face at these signs. He prided himself on his skill in trailing, and the primeval predatory elation thrilled his nerves. At a swift but easy lope he took up that clear trail, and followed it back through the grass toward the woods. It entered the woods not ten paces from the point where the hunter himself had emerged, ran parallel with ...
— The House in the Water - A Book of Animal Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts

... to be found in the forests. It was the land for hunters rather than for tillers of the soil, and most of its early explorers were men who were skillful marksmen, and versed in forest lore. But occasionally women joined these predatory expeditions against the denizens of ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler

... them slept stertorously in their holes by day, by night they were as wakeful as owls, and not less predatory. Life in the trenches is one long struggle for existence, and in the course of it they developed those acquired characteristics whereby the birds of the air and the beasts of the field maintain themselves in a world of carnage. ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan

... fathers—that men of wisdom and genius are the true fathers of the Fatherland, not the groups of predatory men. True fathers would die for their children. To me it has been blasphemy, when the nations of the past have called themselves Fatherlands. I would have the peasants fathered by men who realize that the peasants are the strength and salt of the ...
— Red Fleece • Will Levington Comfort

... original tories, politically speaking, belonged to no party whatever. They were simply thieves, robbers, and murderers on their own account. Every man's hand was against them, and certainly their hands were against every man. The fact is, that in consequence of the predatory nature of Irish warfare, which plundered, burned, and devastated as it went along, it was impossible that thousands of the wretched Irish should not themselves be driven by the most cruel necessity, for the preservation of their lives and of those of their ...
— The Evil Eye; Or, The Black Spector - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton

... displume[obs3], impoverish, eat out of house and home; drain, drain to the dregs; gut, dry, exhaust, swallow up; absorb &c. (suck in) 296; draw off; suck the blood of, suck like a leech. retake, resume; recover &c. 775. Adj. taking &c.v.; privative[obs3], prehensile; predaceous, predal[obs3], predatory, predatorial[obs3]; lupine, rapacious, raptorial; ravenous; parasitic. bereft &c. 776. Adv. at one fell swoop. Phr. give an ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... not come about easily. At first they had to fight tooth and nail. The conditions of the times were crude, the code merciless. As soon as the firm showed its head above the financial horizon, it was swooped upon. Business was predatory. They had to fight for what they got; had to fight harder to hold it. Cathcart was involved continually in a maze of intricate banking transactions; Gates resisted aggression within and without, often with his own two ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White

... force of the same kind might, however inferior in strength, make an inroad, or raid, upon the territory thus held, might burn a village or waste a few miles of borderland, might even cut off a convoy at times, without, in a military sense, endangering the communications. Such predatory operations have been carried on in all ages by the weaker maritime belligerent, but they by no means warrant the inference, irreconcilable with the known facts, "that neither Rome nor Carthage could be said to have undisputed mastery ...
— The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 • A. T. Mahan

... behaved men of Cascade and Longridge were often to be found filling up the cells which might otherwise have been set apart for the custody of some of the grosser criminals who were tried at the assizes.... The convicts selected as constables were like a ruthless band of predatory assailants, seizing their fellow-prisoners under any and every pretence, in order to have 'cases for the police-office!' A first-class officer overheard the following speech uttered by a convict policeman:—'I have no case for court this morning—what will Mr. —— ...
— The History of Tasmania , Volume II (of 2) • John West

... got his fleet, Napoleon's imagination—which had a strong predatory bias—hesitated betwixt two uses to which it could be turned. One was to make a dash on Lisbon, and require, under threat of an instant bombardment, the delivery of all British ships and goods lying there. This ingenious plan, it was reckoned, would fill French pockets with cash and adorn French ...
— Deeds that Won the Empire - Historic Battle Scenes • W. H. Fitchett

... of the Arabians before the time of Mahomet, we have few and imperfect accounts; but from the remotest ages they led the same unsettled and predatory life which they do at this day, dispersed in hordes, and dwelling under tents. It was not to those wild and wandering tribes that the superb Palmyra owed its rise and grandeur, though situated in ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 5 of 8 • Various

... life with its predatory instinct of exploitation has developed into a great civilisation. It is immensely proud and strong, killing leisure and pursuing opportunities. It minimises the claims of personal relationship and is ...
— Creative Unity • Rabindranath Tagore

... pictures of the good old mediaeval times, can make out a fair case for the argument that in those days the spoils were won by a better kind of conqueror, who was likely to make a better use of his victory. In times when man was chiefly a predatory animal and the way to success in life was by military prowess, readiness in attack and a downright stroke in defence, it is easy to fancy that the folk who came to the top of the world, or maintained a position there, were necessarily possessed of courage and bodily vigour and ...
— War-Time Financial Problems • Hartley Withers

... philosophy was simply a translation into intellectual terms of her brutality, her appetites, and her vices. So, too, in most cases, doctrines are the means by which nations and individuals seek to explain what they are and what they do. Germany, having finally become a predatory nation, invokes Hegel as witness; just as a Germany enamoured of moral beauty would have declared herself faithful to Kant, just as a sentimental Germany would have found her tutelary genius in Jacobi or Schopenhauer. Had ...
— The Meaning of the War - Life & Matter in Conflict • Henri Bergson

... Isaac, who sold his birthright to Jacob for a mess of lentils; led a predatory life, and was the forefather of ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... of the two chiefs, who seldom stood firm in the face of difficulties, the members of the predatory gang which concealed its alien origin under Magyar nationality and its criminal propensities[155] under a political mask had been enabled to go on playing an odious comedy, to the disgust of sensible people and the detriment ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon

... way, The Globe tells us that the KAISER was once known to his English relatives as "The Tin Soldier." In view of his passion for raising tin by these predatory methods ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, September 9, 1914 • Various

... the sudden change from the heat of the Kachi to the cold above is most trying to the strongest constitutions. Notwithstanding the difficulties of the road, the absence of supplies and fuel, and the hostile character of the predatory tribes around, this route has been always most in favor as the great commercial and military communication from Persia, Central Asia, and ...
— Afghanistan and the Anglo-Russian Dispute • Theo. F. Rodenbough

... shore, and the innumerable salt marshes and lagoons to the south of Trincomalie. These, and the profusion of perching birds, fly-catchers, finches, and thrushes, which appear in the open country, afford sufficient quarry for the raptorial and predatory species—eagles, hawks, and falcons—whose daring sweeps and effortless undulations are striking ...
— Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and • James Emerson Tennent

... special creation it is unintelligible why the phenomena of protective colouring should be of such general occurrence. For, in as far as protective colouring is of advantage to the species which present it, it is of corresponding disadvantage to those other species against the predatory nature of which it acts as a defence. And, of course, the same applies to yet other species, if they serve as prey. Moreover, the more minutely this subject is investigated in all its details, the more exactly is it found to harmonise with the ...
— Darwin, and After Darwin (Vol. 1 and 3, of 3) • George John Romanes

... wail, For one step upward on the crags you scale. Brave is the Age wherein the word will rust, Which means our soul asleep or body's lust, Until from warmth of many breasts, that beat A temperate common music, sunlike heat The happiness not predatory sheds! ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... Count, inherited in an unmodified degree the more predatory and uncivilized instincts of his forefathers. Illiterate, brutal, and cunning, the thin veneer laid by the nineteenth century upon his coarse-grained nature was apt to rub off on the very slightest friction, bringing the original savage ...
— A Modern Mercenary • Kate Prichard and Hesketh Vernon Hesketh-Prichard

... he promised, which were equal to any they could obtain by going farther in search of them. While they were thus friendly and ready to protect him and his family, there were others at a distance beyond his influence, who were as savage as the generality of the Kaffir tribes, and addicted to predatory excursions on the property of their neighbours. The captain was an old soldier, and when building his house, had had an eye to its defence. He therefore had enclosed the acre or so of ground in which it stood with a high palisade, on the outside of which ran a deep ditch, and this could ...
— Hendricks the Hunter - The Border Farm, a Tale of Zululand • W.H.G. Kingston

... all right to talk, if yuh feel like talking," Big Medicine retorted savagely. "I don't." He made a catlike spring at the foremost man, who happened to be Oleson, and got a merciless grip with his fingers on his throat, snarling like a predatory animal over its kill. From behind, Andy, with Weary to help, pulled ...
— Flying U Ranch • B. M. Bower

... nobly before the world as one who loved and worshipped the Master Christ. Under his sway the Church rose again to instruct and guide the people, and when he died he left the English land a united Christian nation. The Danes, who after years of predatory invasion were become settlers over a large part of England, were brought into the Church; and the British Church in Cornwall was brought nearer to unity with the English, a union which ...
— The Church and the Barbarians - Being an Outline of the History of the Church from A.D. 461 to A.D. 1003 • William Holden Hutton

... or the wolf, which the Lenni Lenape pretended released mankind from the dark bowels of the earth by scratching away the soil. They should rather be interpreted by the curious custom of the Toukaways, a wild people in Texas, of predatory and unruly disposition. They celebrate their origin by a grand annual dance. One of them, naked as he was born, is buried in the earth. The others, clothed in wolf-skins, walk over him, snuff around him, howl in lupine style, and ...
— The Myths of the New World - A Treatise on the Symbolism and Mythology of the Red Race of America • Daniel G. Brinton

... destruction of their property, but it would be something much more fatal to the general interests of the country, for the editors of the present respectable papers would not be able to compete with these predatory publications, and would be compelled to forego that extent of information which was then so accurately given. We should have the newspaper press"—mark this, ye omnivorous readers of to-day, who commence with The Times, adjourn to the Telegraph, peruse ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt

... perfumes. Most of the men were direct from the fields with the soil of the day's work upon their rough overalls—and often on their faces and grimy hands. The men who ran the games were in their shirt sleeves, alert, sweatingly busy; some of them grim, a few predatory, but more of them easily good-natured. The whole thing was swift, direct, businesslike. Men were trying to win money from the house; and the house was winning money from them. This was raw gambling, raw drinking, raw vice. It was the old Bret ...
— The Desert Fiddler • William H. Hamby

... which he dug by the light of the moon. He had no question of responsibility; his pioneer training had not included coroners' inquests in its experience; in giving the body a speedy and secure burial from predatory animals he did what one frontiersman would do for another—what he hoped might be done for him. If his previous unaccountable feelings returned occasionally, it was not from that; but rather from some uneasiness in regard to his late guest's possible feelings, and a regret that he had not ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte

... ended in his defeat. By such conduct the eagerness of Jugurtha was not at all allayed; for he had now, indeed, in imagination, possessed himself of all Adherbal's dominions. He therefore renewed hostilities, not, as before, with a predatory band, but at the head of a large army which he had collected, and openly aspired to the sovereignty of all Numidia. Wherever he marched, he ravaged the towns and the fields, drove off booty, and raised confidence in his own men and dismay ...
— Conspiracy of Catiline and The Jurgurthine War • Sallust

... said to have brought about the marriage, at least he had given it his suffrages when proposed by Portugal, which was anxious to establish an alliance with England as some protection against the predatory designs of Spain. He had been influenced by the dowry offered—five hundred thousand pounds in money, Tangier, which would give England a commanding position on the Mediterranean, and the Island of Bombay. Without yet foreseeing that the possession of Bombay, and the freedom to trade in the East ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini

... housing problem is not so easily nor so successfully solved. He is usually between the devil of the speculative builder and the deep sea of the predatory landlord, each intent upon taking from him the limit that the law allows and giving him as little as possible for his money. Going down the scale of indigence we find an itinerancy amounting almost to homelessness, or ...
— Architecture and Democracy • Claude Fayette Bragdon

... rhinoceros, giraffe, and eland. In German East Africa Dr. von Wissmann, the Administrator of that territory, has recently (1896) gone further, and ordained restrictions on the slaughter of all the larger animals, except predatory ones. The governments of the two British colonies and the two Boer republics, which have already done well in trying to preserve some of the rarest and finest beasts, ought to go thoroughly into ...
— Impressions of South Africa • James Bryce

... indeed great; he had rescued Ireland from a very oppressive and predatory invasion, and the popularity which he had gained he was diligent to keep, by appearing forward and zealous on every occasion where the public interest was supposed to be involved. Nor did he much scruple to boast his influence; for when, ...
— Lives of the Poets: Addison, Savage, and Swift • Samuel Johnson

... even the rude Goths inhabiting Moesia and Thrace were partially brought under its influence. The circumstances which led to the conversion of these barbarians are somewhat remarkable. On the occasion of one of their predatory incursions into the Empire, they carried away captive some Christian presbyters; but the parties thus unexpectedly reduced to bondage did not neglect the duties of their spiritual calling, and commended their cause so successfully to those by whom they had ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen

... his "Nelly's grave," in a way that overflowed the eyes of the listener. A sparrow-hawk, fresh from his sixth victim, possibly recognizing in Mr. Hamlin a kindred spirit, stared at him in surprise, and was fain to confess the superiority of man. With a superior predatory capacity ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte

... a gale and she thought nervously of fringed napkins and pillow slips—the wind always gave her the "blues" anyway, and now it reminded her of winter, which was close, with its bitter cold—of snow driven across trackless wastes, of gaunt predatory animals, of cattle and horses starving in draws and gulches, and all the other things which winter meant in that barren country. She slept after a time, to find the next morning that the wind still howled and the fringe on her laundry ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart

... defined, the shark makes no distinction in favour of the ray when in pursuit of food. Indeed, certain members of the predatory family seem to delight chiefly in a diet of rays, and perhaps as a result of this persistent pursuit has the shape of the latter been evolved, since it enables them to take refuge in water so shallow that even a small shark would inevitably be stranded. Timorous by nature, the ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield

... learned that we can never dig a hole so deep that it would be safe against predatory animals. We have also learned that if we do not pull the fangs of the predatory animals of this world, they will multiply and grow in strength—and they will be at our throats again once more ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... There stood, near the spot where they first permanently encamped, a castle, called in the language of the country, Hung-var, which the strangers won, and converted into a sort of capital. As often as they sallied forth from that castle on predatory or other expeditions, the Slavonians were accustomed to exclaim, "Here come the Hung-varians," and the title thus given at first as a term of mere derision or hostility, came, by-and-by, to be accepted ...
— Germany, Bohemia, and Hungary, Visited in 1837. Vol. II • G. R. Gleig

... vigorous protests it was also due that the great leaved doors were thrown wide to the amber sunshine: while the curios came out of one of his Eastern packing-cases, which he had had unpacked by Gaston for Bernard to take what he liked. Lawrence's instincts were acquisitive, not to say predatory. Wherever he went he amassed native treasures which seemed to stick to his fingers, and which in nine cases out of ten, thanks to his racial tact, would have fetched at Christie's more than he gave for them. Coming fresh from foreign soil, they were a godsend ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde

... composed his history, it was called Luxovium; and soon after it became Lixovium, and Lizovium, which, gallicised, naturally passed into Lyzieulx, or, as it is now written, Lisieux. The city was ravaged by the Normans about the year 877, in the course of one of their predatory excursions from Bayeux: it again felt their vengeance early in the following century, when Rollo, after taking Bayeux by storm, sacked Lisieux at the head of his army on his way to Rouen. The conqueror was not put in possession ...
— Account of a Tour in Normandy, Vol. II. (of 2) • Dawson Turner

... have not yet submitted to the bit and bridle of civilization—and they can be numbered on the fingers of one's two hands—Borneo is the most intractable. Of all the regions which the predatory European has claimed for his own, it is the least submissive, the least civilized, the least exploited and the least known. Its interior remains as untamed as before the first white man set foot on its shores four hundred years ago. The exploits of those ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell

... reside in the vicinity, and frequent these establishments, is that of the Crees, or Knisteneaux. They were formerly a powerful and numerous nation, which ranged over a very extensive country, and were very successful in their predatory excursions against their neighbours, particularly the northern Indians, and some tribes on the Saskatchawan and Beaver Rivers; but they have long ceased to be held in any fear, and are now perhaps, the most harmless and inoffensive of the whole ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the Years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 1 • John Franklin

... Charter there is a provision in favour of the Welsh, who were allied with the Barons in insurrection against the Crown. The Barons were fighting for the Charter, the Welshmen only for their barbarous and predatory independence. But the struggle for Welsh independence helped those who were struggling for the Charter; and the remark may be extended in substance to the general influence of Wales on the political ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith

... piece of web in which they were immeshed, and letting them drop on to the ground beneath, merely as a short way of getting rid of them from her premises. I always rather despised Lucy. She hadn't even the one redeeming virtue of most carnivorous or predatory races—an ...
— Science in Arcady • Grant Allen

... Linz and farther, terrifying Vienna itself; and driving all the Court to Presburg, with (fabulous) "MORIAMUR PRO REGE NOSTRO MARIA THERESIA," but with actual armament of Tolpatches, Pandours, Warasdins, Uscocks and the like unsightly beings of a predatory centaur nature. Which fine Hungarian Armament, and others still more ominous, have been diligently going on, while Karl Albert sat enjoying his Homagings at Linz, his Pisgah-views Vienna-ward; and asking himself, "Shall we venture ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... For smaller predatory expeditions, the borderers had signals, and places of rendezvous, peculiar to each tribe. If the party set forward before all the members had joined, a mark, cut in the turf, or on the bark of a tree, pointed ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish border (3rd ed) (1 of 3) • Walter Scott

... same dietary problem: finding enough nutrition to build and maintain their bodies within the limits of their digestive capacity. Rarely in nature (except for predatory carnivores) is there any significant restriction on the number of calories or serious limitation of the amount of low-nutrition foods available to eat. There's rarely any shortage of natural junk food on Earth. Except for domesticated house pets, animals ...
— How and When to Be Your Own Doctor • Dr. Isabelle A. Moser with Steve Solomon

... night. Then Jim came face to face with the man who carried the lantern, and saw who he was—Deacon Amos Whittle. To Jim's mind, the man resembled a fox, skulking along the road, although Deacon Amos Whittle was not predatory. He was a small, thin, wiry man with a queer swirl of white whisker, ...
— An Alabaster Box • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman and Florence Morse Kingsley

... body; she, Nancy, possessed his soul—a precious thing that she would shield and bear away up in her arms—as if Leonora were a hungry dog, trying to spring up at a lamb that she was carrying. Yes, she felt as if Edward's love were a precious lamb that she were bearing away from a cruel and predatory beast. For, at that time, Leonora appeared to her as a cruel and predatory beast. Leonora, Leonora with her hunger, with her cruelty had driven Edward to madness. He must be sheltered by his love for her and by her love—her love from a great distance and unspoken, enveloping him, surrounding ...
— The Good Soldier • Ford Madox Ford

... footpad at the door of his old master to rob him of his trade and living; and day by day he counted the customers passing in and out of the old shop, but none came his way. As he stared across the street at his rival's shop, his face changed; it was like a hawk's, threatening and predatory, indifferent to the agony of the downy breast and fluttering wings that it is about ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone

... another time he put to the most inhuman torture a leader who had opposed his cause; in repeated instances he instigated the crime of assassination.[103] In early life he had been engaged in a peaceful caravan trade, and all his influence had been cast in favor of universal security as against the predatory habits of the heathen Arabs; but on coming to power he himself resorted to robbery to enrich his exchequer. Sales mentions twenty-seven of these predatory expeditions against caravans, in which Mohammed ...
— Oriental Religions and Christianity • Frank F. Ellinwood

... machine-gunners are called up, to cover the gap until darkness falls and the gaping wound can be stanched with fresh sandbags. A mine has been exploded upon your front, leaving a crater into which predatory Boches will certainly creep at night. You summon a posse of bombers to occupy the cavity and discourage any such enterprise. The heavens open, and there is a sudden deluge. Immediately it is a case of ...
— All In It K(1) Carries On - A Continuation of the First Hundred Thousand • John Hay Beith (AKA: Ian Hay)

... the dotted foliage of a birch-tree. My rod stuck upright from the turf at my elbow, and, whenever I turned my head, neatly bisected the countenance and upper half of Seth Truscott, an indigenous gentleman of miscellaneous habits and a predatory past, who had followed me that morning to ...
— Noughts and Crosses • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... earliest reasons why war ought to exist, is because under any mode of suppressing war, virtually it will exist. Banish war as now administered, and it will revolve upon us in a worse shape, that is, in a shape of predatory and ruffian war, more and more licentious, as it enjoys no privilege or sufferance, by the supposition, under the national laws. Will the causes of war die away because war is forbidden? Certainly not; and the only result of the prohibition would be to throw back the exercise of war from ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey

... Obviously, this is where the pickings come in. My grandfather started this paper on two hundred and fifty dollars, fifty dollars of which, I have heard, was his own. I could knock off for life as an idle member of the predatory classes, I suppose, but after all, I was made for an editor. In years past, I have, of course, had my offers from New York. Two of them were left open forever, and a little while ago, I telegraphed down and took the best. A grateful wire came in five minutes ahead of you. And that," he concluded ...
— Captivating Mary Carstairs • Henry Sydnor Harrison

... the Indians proved most effectual, for the portion of the nation to which they belonged had never before encountered disciplined troops; and so stern was the lesson they received, that, though predatory parties were seen from time to time, it was quite a year before any other serious encounter ...
— The Silver Canyon - A Tale of the Western Plains • George Manville Fenn

... arrangement. As I said, Boruck and Waterman in warmest pain Crackled and sizzed with all their might and main. For, when on earth, they'd freed a scurvy host Of crooks from the State prison, who again Had robbed and ravaged the Pacific Coast And (such the felon's predatory nature) Even ...
— Black Beetles in Amber • Ambrose Bierce

... rising to his feet, after his pleasant nap, at the slowing of the car, had been aware of that predatory hand; as it groped for the bag. Now, from puppyhood, Lad had been taught to regard everything in the car as under his own careful guardianship. Hence, he lunged forward and sank his terrible white teeth deep ...
— Further Adventures of Lad • Albert Payson Terhune

... by way of getting on familiar footing, I opened my cigar case. Dr. Schmidt translated our conversation, the Persian speaking Russian very fairly. His story was curious and interesting. He was captured in 1858 near Herat, by a party of predatory Turcomans. His captors sold him to a merchant at Balkh where he remained sometime. From Balkh he was sold to Khiva, and from Khiva to Bokhara, whence he escaped with a fellow captive. I asked if he was compelled to labor during ...
— Overland through Asia; Pictures of Siberian, Chinese, and Tartar - Life • Thomas Wallace Knox

... one of those mysterious laws that govern boydom, the two were inseparable companions, waging open war on all adjoining neighborhoods, engaging in predatory expeditions in their own, and, when interest in ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice

... to the highest bidder at public auction—in lots small enough to afford persons in moderate circumstances the opportunity of being bidders. The annexation of Texas and our treaty with Mexico, have added about 124,000 Indians to our population; many of them are fierce in their disposition and predatory in their habits. Further legislation for the protection of our people from them has become necessary. The Secretary urges the necessity of a highway to the Pacific; whether a railway, a plank road, or a turnpike would be most expedient, he says, can only be determined after a careful ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various

... States and they also prey on some species of bird life. The Federal and some State governments now employ professional hunters to trap and shoot these marauders. Each year the hunters kill thousands of predatory animals, thus saving the farmers and cattle and sheep owners many thousands ...
— The School Book of Forestry • Charles Lathrop Pack

... April General Washington moved to New York and prepared to defend that city. Meantime Lord Dunmore, royal governor of Virginia, after endeavoring to excite an insurrection of the slaves, had been conducting a predatory and incendiary warfare against the colony, until driven away by the militia, when he sailed off in a fleet loaded with plunder. In North Carolina, where an association of patriots had declared for independence at Mecklenburg as early ...
— The Land We Live In - The Story of Our Country • Henry Mann

... Manley studied the man himself, the detective type. He was about five feet eight, broad-shouldered out of proportion to that height, but thin. He had an uncommonly good forehead, a square, strong chin, a hooked nose and thin, set lips, which gave him a rather predatory air, belied rather by his pleasant blue eyes. The sun wrinkles round their corners and his sallow complexion gave Mr. Manley the impression that he had spent some years in the tropics ...
— The Loudwater Mystery • Edgar Jepson

... impossible; if he fled through the town and got clear of Angria's territory he would almost certainly fall into the hands of the Peshwa's {the prime minister and real ruler of the Maratha kingdom} people, and although the Peshwa was nominally an ally of the Company, his subjects—a lawless, turbulent, predatory race—were not likely to be specially friendly to a solitary English lad. A half-felt hope that he might be able to reach Suwarndrug, lately captured by Commodore James, was dashed by the news that that fort had been handed over by him to the Marathas. Moreover, such was the rivalry ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang

... support of these contentions; for now that the Directory threw away the scabbard, England felt the need of the stout Bretons, whose armies had become mere predatory bands. The last predictions of Burke were therefore justified. That once mighty intellect expended its last flickering powers in undignified gibes at the expense of Pitt and his regicide peace. Fate denied to him the privilege of seeing Malmesbury again expelled ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose

... two bottles apiece. The drive home, through the cool air beneath the bright stars, amid the twinkling lights, and the cries and 'chatterification' of birds going to bed, as well as the flutter of flying-foxes skimming overhead as they hurried forth on their nocturnal predatory expeditions, was really the pleasantest part ...
— The Last Voyage - to India and Australia, in the 'Sunbeam' • Lady (Annie Allnutt) Brassey

... to find that the colonel had made all arrangements, and that for the previous two days he had been planning a predatory raid ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace

... tend camels in the hills; but when the Turcomans discovered my abilities as a barber and a surgeon, I became a general favourite, and gained the confidence of the chief of the tribe himself. Finally, he determined to permit me to accompany him on a predatory excursion into Persia—a permission which I hoped would lead to my escaping. I was the more ready to do so, in that I secretly possessed fifty ducats. These had been concealed by my master, Osman ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VI. • Various

... of imitative origin had risen for a time and fallen rapidly into decay, but these were all gangs of predatory activity and outrage. ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck

... the rich learn more quickly to guard than their women. The aristocrats of all ages have jealously housed and protected their women from entangling sexual relations, while permitting the greatest license to their predatory males. The reasons are obvious enough to the mature intelligence, but difficult for the young ...
— Clark's Field • Robert Herrick

... inherited circumference, and had prided herself during the war upon ignoring its existence. She was as luxurious and as dainty as a cat and one of the most ardent sportswomen in America. She looked as if she had just stepped out of a stained-glass window, and she was a hard, subtle, predatory flirt; too much in love with her beautiful body to give it wholly to any man. She had never really fallen in love with Clavering until she had lost him, and he, his brief enthusiasm for her unique beauty and somewhat demoniac charm having subsided, had avoided her ever since; ...
— Black Oxen • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton



Words linked to "Predatory" :   vulturine, raptorial, predacious, acquisitive, ravening, raiding, predaceous, vulturous, marauding, rapacious, offensive, predatory animal



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