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Probe   Listen
noun
Probe  n.  (Surg.) An instrument for examining the depth or other circumstances of a wound, ulcer, or cavity, or the direction of a sinus, of for exploring for bullets, for stones in the bladder, etc.
Probe scissors, or Probe-pointed scissors (Surg.), scissors used to open wounds, the blade of which, to be thrust into the orifice, has a button at the end.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Probe" Quotes from Famous Books



... there is life there is hope, But do not give yourself up to a premature joy that might render your grief more bitter afterwards. I only say that the Duke of Vallombreuse has not yet breathed his last; that is all. Now, I am going to probe the wound, which perhaps is not fatal, as it did not ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier

... life hanging by the slenderest thread. When the medecin-chef of the hospital near Rouen took his first look at the boy after his arrival, he had him put under the influence of an anaesthetic in order that he could the more readily and effectively examine, probe and dress the wound, and remove any irritating splinters of bone that might be the cause of the continuous leakage from the lungs. But when he had finished his delicate and strenuous task he turned to the nurse at his side ...
— The Flag • Homer Greene

... thoughtlessly cruel: forgive me, for you are the first one to whom I have dared, as yet, to mention her name. Let me not probe your wounds further, but tell you at once what I know. I have heard from Laura through the medium of her father only. The day after her shameful immolation, he communicated his daughter's marriage to the king; and, the evening after, gave a grand ball in honor of the event. He excused her ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach

... night. She had arranged to meet him again two days hence in order to repeat to him what she had heard the while of Sir Marmaduke's movements, and when she was like to be free to go to Dover. During those intervening two days she tried hard to probe her own thoughts; her mind, her feelings: but what she found buried in the innermost recesses of her heart frightened her so, that she ...
— The Nest of the Sparrowhawk • Baroness Orczy

... and a great success. But there were no more tete-a-tetes. Mrs. Morrell managed to convey the idea that she was displeased, and Keith was of a sufficiently generous and ingenuous disposition to be intrigued by the fact. He had no chance to probe the matter. In a moment or so Mrs. Morrell rose and strolled toward the drawing-room. The others straggled after her. She rather liked thus to emphasize her lack of convention as a hostess, making a pose of never remembering the proper thing to do. Now she moved ...
— The Gray Dawn • Stewart Edward White

... but to press on, to probe the secrets of atomic power to the uttermost of our capacity, to maintain, if we could, our initial superiority in the atomic field. At the same time, we sought persistently for some avenue, some formula, for reaching an agreement with the Soviet rulers that would place this new form of ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... as a robe, Which seemed, by its supernal charm, To shield from every poisoned probe Of earthly pain and earthly harm This one choice creature of ...
— The Mistress of the Manse • J. G. Holland

... broken heart, to probe thy wound; cut deep and do not spare! Herself—the crowning ...
— Polyuecte • Pierre Corneille

... Search out and probe, Gehazi, As thou of all canst try The truthful, well-weighed answer That tells the blacker lie: The loud, uneasy virtue, The anger feigned at will, To overbear a witness And ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward

... the hooked probe nor hum of whirring file, The fearful forceps nor the needled lance Will wholly banish my expectant smile That greets "the foaming ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, May 26, 1920 • Various

... various regions who enjoy no parallel felicity. I confess my reflections are couleur de rose at present. I did not much expect to live to see peace, without far more extensive ruin than has fallen on us. I will not probe futurity in search of less agreeable conjectures. Prognosticators may see many seeds of dusky hue; but I am too old to look forwards. Without any omens, common sense tells one, that in the revolution of ages nations must have unprosperous periods. But why should I torment myself for ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole

... embattled make, When they afflict this earthly globe; But such as with their terrors shake Man's breast, and to the bottom probe; They make the hypocrite disrobe, They try us all, if false or true; For this one Devil had power on Job; And I was long ...
— Miscellaneous Poems • George Crabbe

... He sent me up here. I've found what he wants. Shoot me now, and when they probe you Dan will know I found it, and you won't be around for ...
— Martyr • Alan Edward Nourse

... drive globe dean craze creed tribe drone bean shape steep brine stone bead state sleek spire probe beam crape fleet bride shore lean fume smite blame clear mope spume spite flame drear mold fluke quite slate blear tore flume whine spade spear robe ...
— McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book • W. H. McGuffey

... that Lucy discovered these things. There was no one whom she could consult, and she had to devise some mode of conduct by herself. It was all a matter of supposition, and she knew almost nothing for certain. She made up her mind that she would probe no deeper. But since such knowledge as she had came to her only by degrees, she was able the better to adapt her behaviour to it. The pride which for so long had been a characteristic of the Allertons, but had unaccountably missed Fred, in her enjoyed ...
— The Explorer • W. Somerset Maugham

... of you! To seek a reason for friendship is as inhuman as to probe for the causes of love. Don't, for goodness' sake, let your intellect triumph over your humanity, Valentine. Of all modern vices, that seems to me the most loathsome. But you could never fall into anything loathsome. You are sheeted against that ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens

... came to his swinging table, where Doc took a probe, poked into the wound, wrapped cotton around the probe, soaked it in iodine, jabbed it in, twisted it around, swabbed it out, dressed it down, slapped the patient on the chest, said "Next," and did it all ...
— The U-boat hunters • James B. Connolly

... however, it was Murray who decided. He took upon himself the position of leader in his partner's absence, and claimed the right to probe the trouble to its depths. The priest and Ailsa yielded reluctantly. They, at least, understood the risk of his inexperience. But Murray forcefully rejected any denial, and, with characteristic energy, and no little skill, he gathered an outfit ...
— The Triumph of John Kars - A Story of the Yukon • Ridgwell Cullum

... She did not want to marry him, or anybody else, just yet. Of course her father had hinted approval of his lordship's obvious intentions. Countess of Ventnor! Yes, it was a nice title. Still, she wanted another couple of years of careless freedom; in any event, why should Lady Tozer pry and probe? ...
— The Wings of the Morning • Louis Tracy

... num numero mi in mentem fuit, 180 dis advenientem gratias pro meritis agere atque alloqui? ne illi edepol si merito meo referre studeant gratiam, aliquem hominem allegent qui mihi advenienti os occillet probe, quoniam bene quae in me fecerunt ingrata ...
— Amphitryo, Asinaria, Aulularia, Bacchides, Captivi • Plautus Titus Maccius

... not till the afternoon that he determined to call on his relative, Miss Aldclyffe, and cautiously probe her knowledge of the subject occupying him so thoroughly. Cytherea, he knew, was still beloved by this solitary woman. Miss Aldclyffe had made several private inquiries concerning her former companion, and there was ever ...
— Desperate Remedies • Thomas Hardy

... syllables on hands and knees, And stumble often, yet pass me with ease And reach the spring upon the summit steep. Oh, I could lay me down, dear child, and weep These charr'd orbs out, but that you then might cease Your upward effort, and with inquiries Stoop down and probe my heart too deep, too deep! I thirst for Knowledge. Oh, for an endless drink Your goblet leaks the whole way from the spring— No matter, to its rim a few drops cling, And these refresh me with the joy to think That you, my darling, have the morning's wing To ...
— Freedom, Truth and Beauty • Edward Doyle

... capital mimic, he knows how to put on, turn and turn about, the smiles of persuasion, satisfaction, and good-nature, or drop them for the normal expression of his natural man. He is compelled to be an observer of a certain sort in the interests of his trade. He must probe men with a glance and guess their habits, wants, and above all their solvency. To economize time he must come to quick decisions as to his chances of success,—a practice that makes him more or less a man of judgment; on the strength ...
— The Illustrious Gaudissart • Honore de Balzac

... easier for Cecil, also? Claire felt that if positions had been reversed, she would crave above all things to be alone, hidden from the eyes of even the most sympathising of friends; but Cecil's nature was of a different type. Having heard the one abhorrent fact, she would wish to probe further, to be told details, to ask a score of trifling questions. However full a letter might be, she would not be satisfied without an interview. "But I might write first, and see her afterwards!" poor Claire said to herself. "It would not be quite so bad, when she ...
— The Independence of Claire • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... upon. Father and daughter would start for New York without delay and probe the matter to the bottom. The news could not wholly be kept from the stepmother, but she was enjoined to maintain a strict silence on the subject until further light should be thrown upon it. Master Reginald was temporarily left in ...
— The Gerrard Street Mystery and Other Weird Tales • John Charles Dent

... of the subjects dealt with in this book is that we are designedly left in ignorance of the unseen world by a Wise Creator, and therefore that it is grossly presumptuous, not to say impious, on the part of man to make any attempt to probe into questions which he has not been intended to study. Which is equivalent to saying that it is impious to ride a bicycle, because man was obviously created a pedestrian. This might be true if we were confined within a self-contained world which had, and could have, no connection with ...
— True Irish Ghost Stories • St John D Seymour

... saidst and what thou didst, 570 Our long and terrible journey through, And all thou art ready to say and do In the trials that remain: I trace them the vein and the other vein That meet on thy brow and part again, 575 Making our rapid mystic mark; And I bid my people prove and probe Each eye's profound and glorious globe Till they detect the kindred spark In those depths so dear and dark, 580 Like the spots that snap and burst and flee, Circling over the midnight sea. And on that ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning

... probe too deeply into primal causes, we may still be regardful of the effects. Mr. Farley's bid for public sympathy was not without results. True, there were those who hinted that the veteran promoter was only paving the way for a coup de grace which should obliterate the Gordons, ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde

... even written for it; nay, that some of that description have themselves been actors, further argument may well be thought superfluous: yet we will not rest the matter there, but taking those along with us as authorities, go on and probe the error to which we allude, even ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Volume I, Number 1 • Stephen Cullen Carpenter

... him from being seen from the shore. The dogs stopped at the shore, and bayed after the disappearing prey. The Rebels with them, who had seen Tom spring in, came up and made a pretty thorough search for him. As they did not think to probe around the drift wood this was unsuccessful, and they came to the conclusion that Tom had been drowned. Wirz marched the other two back and, for a wonder, did not punish them, probably because he was so rejoiced at his success in capturing them. He ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy

... conditions, of the Triple Alliance. I remember that Andrea was three hours with the King that day, and our reply was unacceptable in Berlin. It may have helped to keep the peace. One cannot tell. The Kaiser's present letter is simply a repetition of his feverish attempt to probe our intentions." ...
— The Double Traitor • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... behind in order to buy a complete set of charts, but he checked his confidences at that point, nor did Royson endeavor to probe further into the recent history of ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy

... of the disputant; the other on the part of his hearers. On the part of the disputant, we must consider his intention. For if he were to dispute as though he had doubts about the faith, and did not hold the truth of faith for certain, and as though he intended to probe it with arguments, without doubt he would sin, as being doubtful of the faith and an unbeliever. On the other hand, it is praiseworthy to dispute about the faith in order to confute ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas

... Helena so pleased—a longer tete-a-tete before him, and a more generous opportunity, even, than the gods had given him on the lake. His pulses leapt; goaded, however, by alternate hope and fear. But at least he had the chance to probe the situation a little deeper; even if prudence should ultimately forbid him ...
— Helena • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... and he had been taken on an ammunition waggon along rough roads to the fortress called the Iron Gates of Transylvania, whence this letter was written, and sent by the messenger who was to summon the Elector of Saxony to the aid of the remnant of the army. It had not yet been possible to probe the wound, but Charles gave a personal message, begging his parents not to despond but to believe him recovering, so long as they did not see his servant return without him, and he added sundry tender and dutiful messages ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge

... to regard or to reply to his soliloquy; but they quietly awaited the moment when he was to commence his examination. This now took place, and Dunwoodie stood looking the operator in the face, with an expression that seemed to read his soul. The patient shrank from the application of the probe, and a smile stole over the features of the ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper

... with The Curate, however, is the same as the problem with all of Lloyd's satires except The Methodist, and the same as the problem with almost all satires between Pope and Burns or Blake. The satirist seems unwilling to probe, to find out what are the political, ethical, psychological, or aesthetic forces that cause the problems which the satirist condemns, and to recommend what can be done to change these forces. If the ...
— The Methodist - A Poem • Evan Lloyd

... beak is more slender and curving than those of his brethren, and he has an extremely long, barbed tongue, which, he uses to probe ant-hills. The sticky substance in the bird's mouth covers the little barbs on its tongue, and thus he is able to catch a great many ants at a time. He is one ...
— Citizen Bird • Mabel Osgood Wright and Elliott Coues

... study of plays in manuscript was the analytical quality. He could feel that certain scenes and speeches would have an emotional appeal, but he could not probe down beneath the surface for the why and the wherefore. For analysis, as for details, he had scant time. He accepted plays ...
— Charles Frohman: Manager and Man • Isaac Frederick Marcosson and Daniel Frohman

... originally to the Roman religious mind? There is no more difficult question than this in our whole subject; as we probe carefully in those dark ages she baffles us continually. Undoubtedly she was a woman's deity, and we may aptly say of her "varium et mutabile semper femina." The most singular fact we know about her cult is that women used to speak of their Juno as men ...
— The Religious Experience of the Roman People - From the Earliest Times to the Age of Augustus • W. Warde Fowler

... the Cingalese at Trincomalee. These ladies wish to see you with reference to a most extraordinary case, an inexplicable mystery, which both they and I believe no man but yourself can satisfactorily probe. ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew

... the cure, not sympathy. Labour is the only radical cure for rooted sorrow. The society of a calm, serenely cheerful companion—such as Ellen—soothes pain like a soft opiate, but I find it does not probe or heal the wound; sharper, more severe means, are necessary to make a remedy. Total change might do much; where that cannot be obtained, work is ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter

... present, and votes gave me the practice. It was certainly very amusing to witness the struggle between virtue and necessity, and the operation was so far satisfactory that I succeeded in extracting one of the balls. The other ball, however, was so deeply imbedded I could not find a probe that would reach it. Fortunately it was not fired in a dangerous direction, and the ball being small, I thought it would not occasion her any serious inconvenience. In short, I set their minds easy on that score, though it did not keep their tongues ...
— What Led To The Discovery of the Source Of The Nile • John Hanning Speke

... stayed a week, and left Gus well on the way to a perfect cure, with no scars remaining as a record of his awkwardness. She often talked with the lad, finding it easy to probe him. He talked ardently of his one love, the study of architecture, showing her many plans, and explaining how he saved every penny to spend it in lessons at the Institute, and in materials for ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry

... beautiful provision of nature it has been that, for the most part, our womankind are not endowed with the faculty of finding us out! THEY don't doubt, and probe, and weigh, and take your measure. Lay down this paper, my benevolent friend and reader, go into your drawing-room now, and utter a joke ever so old, and I wager sixpence the ladies there will all begin to laugh. Go to Brown's house, and tell Mrs. Brown and the young ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.

... undefined: Such might he be that none could truly tell, Too close inquiry his stern glance could quell. There breathed but few whose aspect could defy The full encounter of his searching eye; He had the skill, when cunning gaze to seek To probe his heart and watch his changing cheek, At once the observer's purpose to espy, And on himself roll back his scrutiny, Lest he to Conrad rather should betray Some secret thought, than drag that ...
— The Life of Lord Byron • John Galt

... her away from him and staring into her eyes as if to probe into her soul—slowly.] If your oath is no proper oath at all, I'll have to be taking your naked word for it and have you anyway, I'm ...
— Anna Christie • Eugene O'Neill

... received on the convexity of the one beneath, which is placed transversely with reference to the former, and so is effectually hindered from getting any farther. And this I have frequently experienced in my dissections of veins. If I attempted to pass a probe from the trunk of the veins into one of the smaller branches, whatever care I took I found it impossible to introduce it far any way by reason of the valves; whilst, on the contrary, it was most easy to push it along in ...
— The World's Greatest Books - Volume 15 - Science • Various

... Je suis probe, mon bien ne doit rien personne, Mais j'usurpe le pain qui dans mes bls frissonne, Hritier, sans labour, ...
— French Lyrics • Arthur Graves Canfield

... time to probe further, as the brougham stopped at her door. He handed her out with the deference so often met with in big men, remarking width an old-fashioned air that suited him ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page

... death, the walls of the whole of the right extremity of the stomach were found in a scirrhous and cancerous condition, and thickened to the extent of about two inches. The cavity of the organ was so far obliterated as scarcely to admit the passage of a probe from the left to the right extremity, and the opening which remained was so unequal and irregular as to render it evident that but little of the nourishment he had received could have passed the lower orifice of the ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society

... Zari['c], the Bishop of Split, saw the former Russian Foreign Minister, M. Sazonov, in Paris in the spring of 1919, this gentleman was in a state of such dejection that the Bishop, out of pity, did not try to probe the matter. "Sometimes," said Sazonov, "sometimes the circumstances are too much opposed to you and you have to act against your inclinations."[25] The French and British statesmen gave the Bishop the impression that they were ashamed of the Treaty. He read to them in turn a memorandum in which he ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 2 • Henry Baerlein

... fish, betwixt the skin and the body of it, draw out that wire or arming of your hook at another scar near to his : the then tie him about it with thread, but no harder than of necessity, to prevent hurting the fish; and the better to avoid hurting the fish, some have a kind of probe to open the way for the more easy entrance and passage of your wire or arming: but as for these, time and a little experience will teach you better than I can by words. Therefore I will for the present say no more of this; but come next to give you some directions ...
— The Complete Angler • Izaak Walton

... far away that he was rarely aware that he was thinking. It was only by an effort that he occasionally responded. And yet this was Joe, whom he had always liked. But Joe was too keen with life. The boisterous impact of it on Martin's jaded mind was a hurt. It was an aching probe to his tired sensitiveness. When Joe reminded him that sometime in the future they were going to put on the gloves together, he could almost ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London

... of the sad indecision which afflicted him. To state the case roughly, he had too much knowledge for his will. Busy people reason by instinct with sufficient accuracy, but with this man no conviction was for five minutes free from the probe of a metaphysical argument. Yet from glimpses I had obtained of that overwhelming System of Things elaborated by the two Vannelles, I could understand the condition in which its partial apprehension had left Clifton. The more I considered certain statements, authoritatively ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various

... he withdrew in the same second, afraid of revelation. But as he returned to probe delicately, ready to flee at the first hint that the other suspected, his belief in temporary safety grew. To his disappointment he could not pierce beyond the outer wall of identity. There was a living creature ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton

... India should at stated intervals determine the further stages of advance towards the final goal of self-government. Such a Commission, armed with power to examine witnesses, would not only enlighten British public opinion, but also probe Indian opinion in a much more searching way than can be done by impassioned and irresponsible arguments and counter-arguments in the press and on platforms. It would, above all, assist Parliament to master from time to time the many-sided problem whose ...
— India, Old and New • Sir Valentine Chirol

... that lead to Ch'u Shall teem with travellers as thick as clouds, A thousand miles away. For the Five Orders of Nobility Shall summon sages to assist the King And with godlike discrimination choose The wise in council; by their aid to probe The hidden discontents of humble men And help the lonely poor. O Soul come back ...
— More Translations from the Chinese • Various

... blue eyes or brown, whether it was a blond or a brunette. He wondered if Daney had seen it and wondering, at length he asked. Yes, Mr. Daney had seen the youngster several times, but beyond that statement he would not go and The Laird's dignity forbade too direct a probe. He longed to throttle Mr. Daney, who he now regarded as the most unsympathetic, prosaic, dull-witted old ...
— Kindred of the Dust • Peter B. Kyne

... When the surgeons came to examine him for the bullet, they found that it had struck the broad brass plate of his cross-belt fairly in the middle, penetrating it and shattering his breast bone. But after torturing him vilely with the probe, they were about to give up the search in despair, when he told them he felt a pain in his back. Examining the spot indicated by him, they found a bullet just beneath the skin, which a touch with the knife allowed to tumble out. Further examination revealed the strange fact that the bullet, ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen

... lost half a crown at rackets on the same day, and been more mortified at the latter than the former. That which is lasting we share with the future, we defer the consideration of till to-morrow: that which belongs to the moment we drink up in all its bitterness, before the spirit evaporates. We probe minute mischiefs to the quick; we lacerate, tear, and mangle our bosoms with misfortune's finest, brittlest point, and wreak our vengeance on ourselves and it for good and all. Small pains are more manageable, ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt

... following the river-like current of his conjectures, for in these moods thought is like a stream flowing through many countries. Magistrates, in love with truth, are like jealous women; they give way to a thousand hypotheses, and probe them with the dagger-point of suspicion, as the sacrificing priest of old eviscerated his victims; thus they arrive, not perhaps at truth, but at probability, and at last see the truth beyond. A woman ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac

... I went to what was then a favorite hotel for Americans,—Morley's in Trafalgar Square. The remark of the ship-captain interested me, and I resolved to probe the matter a little by calling on a gentleman with whom I had conversed more freely than with any other passenger. He was a lawyer from Portland, who in his younger days had taught school in Mississippi. He was stopping at a near-by hotel on the Strand. ...
— The Supplies for the Confederate Army - How they were obtained in Europe and how paid for. • Caleb Huse

... before this revelation of an inconceivable wickedness, yet steadily resolved to probe it to the very depths. "What did you hope to gain by this deliberate plan of destruction? The girl's death, or simply ...
— The Mill Mystery • Anna Katharine Green

... avail, more gentle means will often succeed, and so it proved in the present case; for, though a spade be too boisterous and rough an implement, a pliant stalk of grass, gently insinuated into the caverns, will probe their windings to the bottom, and quickly bring out the inhabitant; and thus the humane inquirer may gratify his curiosity without injuring the object of it. It is remarkable, that though these insects are furnished with long legs behind, and ...
— The Natural History of Selborne, Vol. 2 • Gilbert White

... Comes, vir nobilissimi generis, et vtroque iure eruditus, in albo illustrium virorum a me merito ponendus venit. Ita probe omnes adolescentiae suae annos legibus tum humanis tum diuinis consecrauit, vt non prius in hominem pet aetatem euaserit, quam nomen decusque ab insigni eruditione sibi comparauerit. Cum profecti essent Francorum Heroes Ptolemaidem, inito cum Ioanne Brenno Hierosolymorum rege ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries - of the English Nation. v. 8 - Asia, Part I. • Richard Hakluyt

... believe seriously, Moran, that you were sent for a purpose?' Moran didn't answer, and his silence irritated Father Oliver, and, determined to probe his curate's conscience, he said: 'Aren't you satisfied now that it was only an idea of your own? You thought to find me gone, and here I am sitting before you.' After waiting for some time for Moran to speak, he said: 'You haven't ...
— The Lake • George Moore

... me a proof which he maintains is invincible, I can keep silence while I compel him merely to prove in due form all the enunciations that he brings forward, and such as appear to me in the slightest degree doubtful. For the purpose of doubting only, I need not at all probe to the heart of the matter; on the contrary, the more ignorant I am the more shall I be justified in ...
— Theodicy - Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil • G. W. Leibniz

... with the dreams of it—why, then, that gold was half Mark King's and half Ben Gaynor's! And it might be that now, at this very instant, Mark King was finding it; was standing over it, staring down at it by the ghostly flare of a smoking torch. She sat, tense and still, listening, trying to probe with tired but suddenly bright eyes through ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory

... white under the water. I could not see distinctly. I thought it was a piece of broken ware—the bottom of a basin. I had picked up the ash stick and was going to probe the deeper water with it. Then I saw that the ...
— The Wonder • J. D. Beresford

... before, he saw his opportunity and seized it. For the past week he had done little else but probe the affairs of the Boulevard Railway scheme, scarcely eating or sleeping while he pursued the case with all the eagerness of a hound after his first fox. Gertrude Van Deusen could not have found a better ally than Robert Joyce, and she knew it. He had already secured evidence and managed ...
— A Woman for Mayor - A Novel of To-day • Helen M. Winslow

... sinking down to be added to the weight of cruel injuries. There was no complaint; Sophy obeyed all orders with her old form of dismal submission, but everything proposed to her was distasteful, and her answers were in the ancient surly style. If attempts were made to probe the malady, her reserve was impenetrable—nothing was the matter, she wanted nothing, was vexed at nothing. She pursued her usual occupations, but as if they were hardships; she was sullen towards her mamma, snappishly brief with her aunt and sister, and so ungracious and indifferent ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge

... soft pillows and clean bed-clothes for Lisbeth and she placed toothsome dishes before Lisbeth; and it was Lisbeth's way to probe with a fork all the dishes that Olwen had made and to say "It's badly burnt," or "You didn't give much for this," or "Of course you ...
— My Neighbors - Stories of the Welsh People • Caradoc Evans

... will be no harm to be ready; but take no step till I come back,' said the doctor, who had stuffed a great roll of lint and plaister, and some other medicinals, into one pocket, and his leather case of instruments, forceps, probe, scissors, and all the other steel and silver horrors, into the other; so he strutted forth in his great coat, unnaturally broad about the hips; and the major, 'devilish uncomfortable,' accompanied him at a smart pace to the great gate of Brandon. He did not care to enter, feeling a little guilty, ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... his case of instruments, and, withdrawing a probe, he with little difficulty removed the film off both of the man's eyes, which proved to be nothing more nor less than the thin membrane found inside an egg, which the convict had artfully introduced, and renewed from time to time. Of course he was reduced to the fifth ...
— Prisoners Their Own Warders - A Record of the Convict Prison at Singapore in the Straits - Settlements Established 1825 • J. F. A. McNair

... against Mormon's temple. It seemed as if the skull split open and a jagged, red-hot probe searched through his brain. He threw up his head in agony, his chin exposed, but instinct still awake to fling out both hands, catch the oncoming blow, his fingers clamping deep about the wrist above the hand that held the rock—some ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn

... credible; probabil'ity; improb'able; pro'bate, the proof of a will; proba'tion, the act of trying; proba'tioner; proba'tionary; probe, to try by an instrument; prob'ity, tried integrity; approba'tion, commendation; rep'robate (adj. literally, ...
— New Word-Analysis - Or, School Etymology of English Derivative Words • William Swinton

... pictorial effect,—but who bring to the picture out of themselves only a noble indignation against baseness. They contemn; he uses. They cry, "Fie!" upon unclean substances; he ploughs the offence into the soil, and sows wheat over it. They see the world as it is; he sees it, and through it. They probe sores; he leads forth into the air and the sunshine. They tinge the cheek with blushes of honorable shame; he paints it with the glow of wholesome activity. Their point of view is that of pathology; his, that of physiology. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 96, October 1865 • Various

... frown, and probably Varia added this last sentence in order to probe his thought. However, at this moment, the ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... allowed it to wander over such an unbounded field. The most difficult and mysterious questions of theology were discussed and fearlessly analyzed; far from exercising that blind and easy credulity which mark the religious conduct of the old monastic orders, they were disposed to probe and examine every article of their faith. To such an extent were their disputations carried, that sometimes it shook their faith in the orthodoxy of Rome, and often aroused the pious fears of the more timid of ...
— Bibliomania in the Middle Ages • Frederick Somner Merryweather

... and much less. The gibbet, a mighty trouble in the rudiment of comprehension, nascent in his mind, still seemed to him an apparition; but a trouble overcome is strength gained, and he felt himself stronger. Had he been of an age to probe self, he would have detected within him a thousand other germs of meditation; but the reflection of children is shapeless, and the utmost they feel is the bitter aftertaste of that which, obscure to them, the man later on calls indignation. ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo

... mother-in-law, were besides but little to my taste. I quitted my birthplace, therefore, repaired to Toledo to exercise my art, and succeeded in it to admiration; for there is not a reliquary suspended to the dress, not a pocket, however carefully concealed, but my fingers shall probe its contents, or my scissors snip it off, though the owner were guarded by the ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

... pinna or external ear, a small orifice, like a slit, representing that organ. To quote the precise language of Murie in the Proceedings of the London Zoological Society, vol. 8, p. 188: "In the absence of pinna, a small orifice, a line in diameter, into which a probe could be passed, alone represents the external meatus." In the dried museum specimen this slit is wholly invisible, and even in the live or freshly killed animal it is by no means readily apparent. Keen observer of natural objects, as savage and barbaric man certainly ...
— Animal Carvings from Mounds of the Mississippi Valley • Henry W. Henshaw

... customs, for our municipal affairs, for our State questions, for all that we believe, and all that we do, and everything that we build. We are not in haste to be born in respect to any feature of life. We say—probe it, question it, put fire to it. We ask the experience of the past to sit and try it. We ask the ripest wisdom of the present to test and analyze it. We ask enemies to plead all they know against it. We challenge the whole world of ideas, and the great deep of human interests to ...
— Conflict of Northern and Southern Theories of Man and Society - Great Speech, Delivered in New York City • Henry Ward Beecher

... eine Abhandlung des ordentlichen Lehrers G. Zinsser: Der 'Kampf Beowulfs mit Grendel,' als Probe einer metrischen Uebersetzung des angelschsischen Epos 'Bevulf.' Saarbrcken. Druck von Gebrder Hofer. 1881. 4to, pp. 18, double ...
— The Translations of Beowulf - A Critical Biography • Chauncey Brewster Tinker

... ranks of her acquaintance (of course below that of a countess) she visits the slightest dereliction from female propriety with unrelenting bitterness. Woe be to the trespasser, high or low! The weapon is always ready to probe and gash and lacerate; the lash is constantly raised, "swift to smite and never to spare." But who would venture to speak a word against the decorum of Lady Straitlace? If she goes out in the dark, 'tis to visit a sick friend; if she encourages ...
— Kate Coventry - An Autobiography • G. J. Whyte-Melville

... to the first method, they commence by extracting the brain from the nostrils with a curved iron probe, partly clearing the head by this means, and partly by pouring in certain drugs; then, making an incision in the side with a sharp Ethiopian stone, they draw out the intestines through the aperture. Having cleansed and washed them with palm wine they ...
— Practical Taxidermy • Montagu Browne

... Then he began to probe the darkness in every direction; with every glance he allowed his head to dart out a little. The movement was like a chicken pecking at imaginary grains of corn. But eventually he satisfied himself that his quarry lay in the forward end of the ...
— Gunman's Reckoning • Max Brand

... his consulting-room to read character, temperament, shrewdly, to probe for more than mere bodily symptoms. Would Doctor Hartley act out of his fear or out of his subjection to women? In leaving the Loulia Isaacson had really trusted him to act out of his fear. But suppose Isaacson had misjudged him! Suppose Mrs. Armine again used her influence, ...
— Bella Donna - A Novel • Robert Hichens

... you like to have a probe rammed through your hand twice a day?" demanded James with a smile. "But it's all part of the game. Comforts for Tommy. Everyone has their own way of making us happy, not forgetting the dear lady what sent us three hundred little lavender bags, with pretty little bows on ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, April 5, 1916 • Various

... Josephus, he says, aims at the careful unraveling of events and at sobriety of speech, but he lacks faith (religio) and truth; "and so we have been at pains, relying not on intellectual force but on the promptings of faith, to probe for the inner meaning of Jewish history and to extract from it more of value to our posterity." Josephus is often mentioned by name as authority for the statements, but at the same time considerable additions are made from other Roman sources. Some have thought that there was a compiler named Hegesippus, ...
— Josephus • Norman Bentwich

... but it was not her way to seek to probe mysteries. She smiled as she said, "I have yet to discover that you are ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell

... too delicate to ask another question that might probe a sorrow which he divined to be recent. Romola, who knew well what were the fibres that Tito's voice had stirred in her father, felt that this new acquaintance had with wonderful suddenness got within the barrier that lay between them ...
— Romola • George Eliot

... symphonies where the whole is reared on a smallest significant phrase. The first strain (of basses) is indeed the essence of the following melody and in turn of the main Allegro theme. But, to probe still further, we cannot help feeling an ultimate, briefest motive of single ascending tone against intrinsic obstacle, wonderfully expressed in the harmony, with a mingled sense of resolution and regret. ...
— Symphonies and Their Meaning; Third Series, Modern Symphonies • Philip H. Goepp

... may have been one minute, or fifteen, before the drum, passing over my head, through the boards again, commenced a slow march around the shanty. When it had finished the first, and was about commencing the second round, I shook off my stupor, and determined to probe the mystery. Opening the door, I advanced in an opposite direction to meet it. Again the sound passed close beside my head, but I could see nothing, touch nothing. Again it entered the shanty, and I followed. I stirred up the fire, casting a strong illumination into the darkest corners; ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 45, July, 1861 • Various

... against one the voice is conveyed through the string, solely by mechanical vibration, to the other. Gray employed electricity, and varied the strength of the current in conformity with the voice by causing the diaphragm in vibrating to dip a metal probe attached to its centre more or less deep into a well of conducting liquid in circuit with the line. As the current passed from the probe through the liquid to the line a greater or less thickness of liquid intervened ...
— Heroes of the Telegraph • J. Munro

... at her keenly, until she sat silent under his scrutiny. He was not deceived. Nevertheless he humored her for the moment, knowing that she was no match for his astuteness when the time came to probe ...
— A Man of Two Countries • Alice Harriman

... two years ago; and the girl still loved this weakly soul with all her heart, found his language unlike that of any other man she had seen or heard, and even took some slight softening edge of culture into herself from him. Her common sense was absolutely powerless to probe even the crust of Clement's nature; but she was satisfied that his poetry must be a thing as marketable as that in printed books. Indeed, in an elated moment he had assured her that it was so. During the earlier stages of their attachment, she pestered ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts

... another scar neer to his tail; then tye him about it with thred, but no harder then of necessitie you must to prevent hurting the fish; and the better to avoid hurting the fish, some have a kind of probe to open the way, for the more easie entrance and passage of your wyer or arming: but as for these, time and a little experience will teach you better then I can by words; for of this I will for the present say no more, but come ...
— The Complete Angler 1653 • Isaak Walton

... surprised, Ada," he remarked. "Well, I cannot wonder at it. I should have been surprised myself if I had been told that I was so sensitive to vascular influences. For, after all, all disturbances are vascular if you probe them deep enough. I ...
— Round the Red Lamp - Being Facts and Fancies of Medical Life • Arthur Conan Doyle

... Investigating Commission. Brutal officers, incompetent quartermasters and ignorant doctors were tried before a jury of their peers. Every department which was conducted without the help of women has been for months writhing under the probe of an official investigation, and is still writhing under the ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various

... in a sort of parabolic curve and he dodged it. By a neat evasion he got the topic switched to sociology, from that to philosophy, to heredity, literature, journalism, art, and finally prenatalism. Every effort I made to probe him on public finance was met by some calm and smiling barrage of eclectic interest. For an hour we played conversational pingpong in the most amiable style. And when Mr. White urbanely confessed that ...
— The Masques of Ottawa • Domino

... for dissection show that he was a master of the art. In dissecting out the portal vein and its ramifications, for instance, he advises that a probe should be inserted into the vein, and the point of the probe gradually advanced as the surrounding tissue is cut away, so that finally the minute branches are exposed; and he describes the use of the blowpipe, and other instruments used in dissection. He carried ...
— Outlines of Greek and Roman Medicine • James Sands Elliott

... glow in the surrounding blackness, gone in the twinkling of an eye. But, strangely enough, one grows to understand the Mountain better from a distance and by watching its moods from afar, like the Neapolitans themselves, who never ascend to probe its mysteries, except a few vulgar guides and touts who batten on the ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan

... probe far enough, we'll find this same Mexican controversy at the bottom of it. Cheney has been immensely interested in the fuel problem. He's given signal help ...
— The Enchanted Canyon • Honore Willsie Morrow

... administration, nor a hoot for prosperity or peace or happiness. Liberty and the right to rule, the right to go risk one's neck ... to climb a mountain or cross a desert or explore a swamp, the right to aim one's sights at distant stars, to fling a taunting challenge into the teeth of space, to probe with clumsy fingers and force nature to lay bare her secrets ... that was what mankind wanted. That was what those men out on Mars and Venus and in the Jovian worlds were fighting for. Not against Spencer Chambers or Ludwig Stutsman or Interplanetary Power, but for the thing that drove man on and ...
— Empire • Clifford Donald Simak

... So was her spectacularly filled halter. So were her tight short-shorts, her lipstick, and the lacquer on her finger-and toe-nails. As she strolled into the Main of the starship, followed hesitantly by the other girl, she drove a mental probe at the black-haired, powerfully-built man seated at ...
— The Galaxy Primes • Edward Elmer Smith

... thinking I would try to gain his confidence. I know he has a hidden sorrow. I must, for his sake, probe the wound; but I fancy it is ...
— The Rector of St. Mark's • Mary J. Holmes

... he could undoubtedly have extended his rights to the stopping of a train for his wife or son, he wisely reserved this for himself, lest it should lose prestige. There was sufficient glory already (to probe his mind to the bottom) for Lady Ashbridge in being his wife; it was sufficient also for Michael that he ...
— Michael • E. F. Benson

... photographer to the autopsy on Whitmore," he said. "Please don't cut the body or probe the wound until he has taken a picture of the bullet hole. It is most important. Also, let me have a copy of your report on the autopsy ...
— The Substitute Prisoner • Max Marcin

... hard to bear! harder than the surgeon's probe which had gone before. It was hard at the same time not to fall on my knees to give thanks; or to break out into a shout of glad praise. I suppose I showed nothing of it, only stood still - and pale by the side of the bed; till Mr. Thorold asked me for something, and I knew that ...
— Daisy in the Field • Elizabeth Wetherell

... heat of the day, busy or half busy with a book, a sound of humming-bird's wings now and then fell on my ear, and, as I looked toward the honeysuckle vine, I began after a while to remark that the visitor was invariably a female. I watched her probe the scarlet tubes and dart away, and then returned to my page. She might have a nest somewhere near; but if she had there was small likelihood of my finding it, and, besides, I was just now not concerned with ...
— The Foot-path Way • Bradford Torrey

... I pulled the oar out of the crevice, and found it would make me a good pole to probe my way with and support myself by up the slope. The boat was now held by the mast, which I shook and found very firm. I put an empty beer-bottle in my pocket, meaning to see if I could fill it, if the snow above was sweet enough to be well-tasted, and then with a final look at the ...
— The Frozen Pirate • W. Clark Russell

... depth; deepness &c adj.; profundity, depression &c (concavity) 252. hollow, pit, shaft, well, crater; gulf &c 198; bowels of the earth, botttomless pit^, hell. soundings, depth of water, water, draught, submersion; plummet, sound, probe; sounding rod, sounding line; lead. bathymetry. [instrument to measure depth] sonar, side-looking sonar; bathometer^. V. be deep &c adj.; render deep &c adj.; deepen. plunge &c 310; sound, fathom, plumb, cast the lead, heave the ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... transfer of meaning. In the colloquial use of "funny" we have an extension of its literary sense. The same is true of "splendid," "jolly," "lovely," and "awfully," and of such Latin words as "lepidus," "probe," and "pulchre." When we speak of "a splendid sun," we are using splendid in its proper sense of shining or bright, but when we say, "a splendid fellow," the adjective is used as a general epithet expressing admiration. ...
— The Common People of Ancient Rome - Studies of Roman Life and Literature • Frank Frost Abbott

... close to hers, and his keen blue eyes seemed to probe the recesses of her soul. If she answered, would the steel springs of some trap ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson

... You will divorce the favor of the pope, Without whose help you may not hope to stand. Plead with your lord again to probe our claim, And find therein some wise and prudent reason To give us aid,—and thereby keep ...
— Semiramis and Other Plays - Semiramis, Carlotta And The Poet • Olive Tilford Dargan

... into the town of his day, its Lupuses and Muciuses, and broke his jaw-tooth on them. Horace, the rogue, manages to probe every fault while making his friend laugh; he gains his entrance and plays about the heartstrings with a sly talent for tossing up his nose and catching ...
— Post-Augustan Poetry - From Seneca to Juvenal • H.E. Butler

... particular place where the animal is sucking, whereby access to the capillary system is secured at any part of the body. It is apparent, from the whole structure of the instrument, that it is by no means calculated on being used as a sting, but is rather to be compared to a delicate elastic probe, in the use of which the terminal lobes probably serve as feelers. As soon as the capillary system is reached, the blood will at once ascend into the narrow tube, after which the current is continued with increasing rapidity by means ...
— Our Common Insects - A Popular Account of the Insects of Our Fields, Forests, - Gardens and Houses • Alpheus Spring Packard

... mine, but the self on whose creation I was enthusiastically determined. But I felt like a murderer when I turned to leave the place which I had so suddenly, and I could not but think unjustly, become possessed of. And now, as I probe this poignant psychological moment, I find that, although I perfectly well realised that all pleasures were then in my reach—women, elegant dress, theatres, and supper-rooms, I hardly thought at all of them, and much more of certain drawings from the plaster cast. I would be an artist. ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore

... a protest, the involuntary startled outcry of the patient under the probe. Crowther's hand grasped his more closely. "I'll go with you on that understanding, Piers," he said. ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell

... only, and I doubt not that now and in times past the thinkers whom your Highness follows have done much to raise the condition of their fellows; but I would have you observe that, where they have done so, it has been because, at bottom, their aims coincided with the Church's. The deeper you probe into her secret sources of power, the more you find there, in the germ if you will, but still potentially active, all those humanising energies which work together for the lifting of the race. In her ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton

... accents towards my lady breath'd From that blest ardour, soon as it was stay'd: To whom she thus: "O everlasting light Of him, within whose mighty grasp our Lord Did leave the keys, which of this wondrous bliss He bare below! tent this man, as thou wilt, With lighter probe or deep, touching the faith, By the which thou didst on the billows walk. If he in love, in hope, and in belief, Be steadfast, is not hid from thee: for thou Hast there thy ken, where all things are beheld In liveliest portraiture. But since true faith Has peopled this fair ...
— The Divine Comedy • Dante

... the borders of rivers. Their usual time for seeking their food is early in the morning and during the twilight of the evening. They subsist principally upon insects and worms; for these they search among the decayed leaves, and probe the mud and ooze with their lengthened bills. When alarmed, they generally lie close to the ground, or among the grass, or, suddenly starting on the wing, escape by flight, which is short but elevated, rapid, and irregular. ...
— Chatterbox Stories of Natural History • Anonymous

... looked from one to the other of us, and if he could not probe the situation it was perhaps no wonder. We had forgotten him, and we sat like dead people. For once his tremendous, compelling presence was ignored, yet my tongue replied to him courteously, and I could not but admit the perfection of his attitude. He deplored the necessity that took his cousin ...
— Montlivet • Alice Prescott Smith

... strident, 'I wouldn't go out of my way to look for him. But if there did happen to come along a highly attractive individual of sufficient means—well—' she tailed off ironically. Then she looked searchingly at Ursula, as if to probe her. 'Don't you find yourself getting bored?' she asked of her sister. 'Don't you find, that things fail to materialise? NOTHING MATERIALISES! Everything ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence

... her in the least, unless she still had more to do, and thought to hold his friendship, perhaps for Searle's protection. He forced himself to probe in that direction. ...
— The Furnace of Gold • Philip Verrill Mighels

... man to stop," said Tollemache, vanishing down the companion. The Spaniard was left alone on the bridge. He paced to and fro, deep in thought. He scarce dared probe his own communings. So complex were they, such a queer amalgam of noble fear and base expectation, that he could have cried aloud in his anguish. Big drops of perspiration stood on his forehead when ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy

... to probe the ground, To watch the Heavens, to speak the word, The fathoms of the deep to sound, And send ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... were utterly unknown. And yet, the natural selfishness of all human beings, reinforced by the selfishness peculiar to the priesthood and that of the narrow life of the provinces had insensibly, and unknown to himself, developed within him. If any one had felt enough interest in the good man to probe his spirit and prove to him that in the numerous petty details of his life and in the minute duties of his daily existence he was essentially lacking in the self-sacrifice he professed, he would have punished and ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac

... being no further interested in the proceedings, was openly watching the mask-like face. It was as though a suspicious mind, aroused by the vigorous and unsustained charges, had, as a reflex, determined to probe the motives to their devious sources. Too subtle to display the uneasiness he felt at this surveillance, Josef appeared the personification of ...
— Trusia - A Princess of Krovitch • Davis Brinton

... whose willingness to betray the house he served, where Madonna was concerned, was by no means difficult to probe, I descended to the ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini

... this morning as they moved forward he seemed like one undergoing a peculiar examination. That his war record had made a deep impression upon Weston he was well aware. But the man did not yet seem satisfied. He evidently wished to probe to the very soul of the one who ...
— Glen of the High North • H. A. Cody

... think of my photograph having been exposed in every London shop-window, and of anonymous slanderers being permitted to indite such scandal as this about an innocent woman. But, at any rate, it had the effect of sealing my fate. If I meant even before to probe this mystery to the bottom, I felt now no other course was possibly open to me. For the sake of my own credit, for the sake of my own good fame, I must find out ...
— Recalled to Life • Grant Allen

... went quite close to Catice, and offered his head. Catice raised his hand, and after holding the flint poised for a moment, brought it down with adroitness and force upon the left-hand probe. Maskull cried out with the pain. The blood streamed down, and the function of the organ ...
— A Voyage to Arcturus • David Lindsay

... minds; and could we take the mightiest intellect that ever awed and controlled the world, and unravel his powers, and return their constituent particles to the multitudinous objects whence they were derived, the last probe of our analysis, after we had stripped him of all his faculties, would touch that unquenchable fiery atom of personality which had organized round itself such a colossal body of mind, and which, in its simple naked energy, would still be capable ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 7, May, 1858 • Various

... who do straight banking should regard themselves as naturally the first men to probe and understand our monetary system—instead of being content with the mastery of local banking-house methods; and if they would deprive the gamblers in bank balances of the name of "banker" and oust them once for all from the place of influence ...
— My Life and Work • Henry Ford



Words linked to "Probe" :   investigation, perforate, space probe, enquiry, hear, re-examine, inquiry, dig into, surgical instrument, enquire



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