"Clap" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Clap, commonly called Mother Clap, kept a house in Field Lane, Holborn, which was a noted resort of the homosexual. To Mother Clap's Molly-house 30 or 40 clients would resort every night; on Sunday there might be as many as 50, for, as in Berlin and other cities today, that was the ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... prayers in a high key; on the other a girl was twanging a samisen, a species of guitar; the house was full of talking and splashing, drums and tom-toms were beaten outside; there were street cries innumerable, and the whistling of the blind shampooers, and the resonant clap of the fire-watchman who perambulates all Japanese villages, and beats two pieces of wood together in token of his vigilance, were intolerable. It was a life of which I knew nothing, and the mystery was more alarming than attractive; my money was lying about, and nothing seemed ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird
... Horse of Pleasure, these following Lessons are to be learnt. As first to Bound aloft, to do which: Trot him some sixteen yards, then stop, and make him twice advance; then straighten your Bridle-hand; then clap briskly both your Spurs even together to him, and he will rise, tho' it may at first amaze him; if he does it, cherish him, and repeat it ...
— The School of Recreation (1696 edition) • Robert Howlett
... day by day, I re-wrote the play, and whenever I felt a thing to be utterly impossible and false I put it down with a grin. And every character I made to talk clap-trap sentiment while Pyramids purred, and I took care that everyone of my puppets did that which was right in the eyes of the lady with the lorgnettes in the second row of the dress circle; and old Hewson says the play will run ...
— Sketches in Lavender, Blue and Green • Jerome K. Jerome
... frequent wounds; by which, the giant being roused and feeling himself almost covered by the multitude, he suddenly perceives the smarting of the stabs, and sent forth a roar which sounded like a terrific clap of thunder; and placing his hands on the ground he raised his terrible face: and having lifted one hand to his head he found it full of men and rabble sticking to it like the minute creatures which not unfrequently are found there; wherefore with a shake of his head he sends the ...
— The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, Complete • Leonardo Da Vinci
... the missionaries that the practice of handshaking has been introduced in the Congo. Formerly the custom was to clap hands when exchanging greetings. The blacks saw the Anglo-Saxons grasp hands when they met and being apt imitators in many things, they started to do likewise. One of the first things that impressed me in Africa was the extraordinary amount of handshaking ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson
... Instinctively I drew back. Naturally my nerves were in a very excited state after all that had occurred. I expected to see him, like the giants in fairy stories, rush forward and try to seize me by the nape of the neck, to clap me into his pockets, or his caldron or cavern, or any ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... his supper at the table, and they could plainly hear how he pulled the dish to him. Immediately he set it, as though in ill humour, hard down again, laid hold of the can, pressed up the lid, but straightway let it clap sharply to again. He now fell to his work; he wiped the table, next the legs of the table, carefully down, and then swept, as with a besom, the door diligently. When this was done, he returned to visit ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... took it up, were mere trade editions, badly and carelessly printed on vile paper and got up in the style of chap-books intended only for popular use, with, in most instances, uncouth illustrations and clap-trap ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... making a tap on the board as one proceeds through the column. Concert work of this sort seems to have the effect of speeding up those who would ordinarily lag, even though they might get the right result. The most skillful teachers of typewriting count or clap their hands or use the phonograph for the sake of speeding up their students. They have discovered that the same amount of time devoted to typewriting practice will produce anywhere from twenty-five to one hundred per cent more speed under such artificial stimulation as they were in the habit of ...
— How to Teach • George Drayton Strayer and Naomi Norsworthy
... description of the picture. We pass on to—"Not long ago, I was slowly descending this very bit of carriage road, the first turn after you leave Albano;—it had been wild weather when I left Rome, and all across the Campagna the clouds were sweeping in sulphurous blue, with a clap of thunder or two, and breaking gleams of sun along the Claudian aqueduct, lighting up the infinity of its arches like the bridge of Chaos. But as I climbed the long slope of the Alban mount, the storm swept finally to the north, and the noble outline of the domes of Albano, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXVI. October, 1843. Vol. LIV. • Various
... me, and I practise as such, collecting herbs and curing the diseases of those that come to me, telling fortunes, and making predictions. In return I receive what each can afford, and if they do not pay according to their means, I clap on a curse to make them wither. It's a lean enough living when wars and the pestilence have left so few poor folk to ...
— The Lost Continent • C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne
... off the top of Grantham Steeple, and clap it on Pauls, and after these, a Lenvoy to the ...
— Wit Without Money - The Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher • Francis Beaumont
... so very rich, you see," he explained, when they gazed at him uncomprehendingly. Then he gave the little brown-eyed boy who clings to his mother's skirt in one of the tableaux five pfennigs to see him clap his hands twice and bob his yellow head, which is the way Tyrolese children ...
— Abroad with the Jimmies • Lilian Bell
... be added that he proposed to dispense with politicians, or that, when "the boys" presently counted him into their party team for campaign haranguing, he let them clap the harness upon him and splashed along in the mud with an ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... buildings echoed to his feet Clap-clapping on the pavement as he ran. Across moon-misted squares clamoured his fleet And terror-winged steps. His heart began To labour at the speed. And still no sign, No flutter of a leaf against the sky. And this should be the garden wall, and round The corner, the old gate. ...
— Sword Blades and Poppy Seed • Amy Lowell
... in this state of mind, I suddenly felt some one clap me on the shoulder, and heard a voice say: 'Ha! comrade of the dingle, what chance has brought you into these parts?' I turned round, and beheld a man in the dress of a postillion, whom I instantly recognised as he to whom ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... clap a pistol to your head, and uncivilly demand your money, or your life; they present themselves humbly, and say: "Good elder brother, I am weary of walking; please to lend me thy horse?... I am without money; be so good as to lend me thy purse?... It is very cold to-day; wilt ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 3, March, 1852 • Various
... said Bumpus, "suppose we light two torches. I'll take one in one hand, and this here cutlash in the other; and you'll take t'other torch in one hand and your pistol in the other, and clap that bit of a broken sword 'tween yer teeth, and we'll give a horrid screech, and rush in pell-mell—all of a heap like. You could fire yer pistol straight before you on chance, (it's wonderful wot a chance shot will do sometimes), an' if it don't do nothin', fling it right into the ...
— Gascoyne, the Sandal-Wood Trader • R.M. Ballantyne
... as that which this phrase, pronounced in a very resonant tone, evoked within me. In leaving M. Gottofrey's presence the words "You are not a Christian" sounded all night in my ear like a clap of thunder. The next day I confided my troubles to M. Gosselin, who kindly reassured me, and who could not or would not see anything wrong. He made no effort, even, to conceal from me how surprised and annoyed he was at this ill-timed attempt upon ...
— Recollections of My Youth • Ernest Renan
... her brother, "when you see the herd making for the ravine, shout and and, clap your hands, and they will turn either to the ten right or to the left. Do not let them land, or we shall lose them. We must trust to Wolfe for their not escaping to the island. Wolfe is well trained, he knows ...
— Canadian Crusoes - A Tale of The Rice Lake Plains • Catharine Parr Traill
... made for Hippolytus d'Este, Cardinal of Ferrara, representations of sundry birds setting on the tops of trees, which, by hydraulic art and secret conveyance of water through the trunks and branches of the trees, were made to sing and clap their wings; but, at the sudden appearance of an owl out of a bush of the same artifice, they immediately ...
— Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889 • Barkham Burroughs
... minded to attempt to call for Jennie, when again a low, pitiful moan came as an echo to a terrific thunder clap. ...
— The Girl Scouts at Bellaire - Or Maid Mary's Awakening • Lilian C. McNamara Garis
... larger dimensions. The answer from London is delayed for some days: these few days appear as many centuries to him. When the answer arrives, the price that the optician demands proves to be much beyond the pecuniary resources of a mere organist. To any other man this would have been a clap of thunder. This unexpected difficulty on the contrary, inspired Herschel with fresh energy; he cannot buy a telescope, then he will construct one with his own hands. The musician of the Octagon Chapel rushes immediately into a multitude of experiments, on metallic alloys that reflect light ...
— Biographies of Distinguished Scientific Men • Francois Arago
... corner, to be as quiet and disinterested and kindly as he can, choosing what is honest and pure, and rejecting what is base and vile; and this is after all the socialism of Christ; only we are all in such a hurry, and think it more effective to clap a ruffian into gaol than to suffer his violence—the result of which process is to make men sympathise with the ruffian—while, if we endure his violence, we touch a spring in the hearts of ruffian and spectators alike, ...
— At Large • Arthur Christopher Benson
... clap nearly drowned her words, then followed crash on crash; the rain came down in torrents—the wind, which had suddenly risen to almost a hurricane, dashing it with fury against walls and windows; the darkness became intense except as ever and anon the lurid glare of the lightning ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley
... going to sing," announced Jack. "Then I shall have a chance to clap my hands at pretty Mabel," and he went, through one of those inimitable boys' pranks, neither funny nor tragic, but ...
— The Motor Girls On Cedar Lake - The Hermit of Fern Island • Margaret Penrose
... much frightened; but I told him not to be scared, I would protect him. So when the dogs came near us I commenced to clap my hands and shouted as though the fox was just ahead of us; this caused the dogs to rush on and leave us in safety. In this way we escaped injury from the pack of ten or more dogs that the Methodist had put on ...
— The Mormon Menace - The Confessions of John Doyle Lee, Danite • John Doyle Lee
... there ain't; and why clap on the blinkers, my dear? You that has a face like a rose, and with a cove like Jerry Hunt, that might be your born father? (But all this don't tell me ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XV • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Imbros. Gouraud, a sympathetic guest, left for French Headquarters in one of our destroyers at 3.30 p.m. He is a real Sahib; a tower of strength. The Asiatic guns have upset his men a good deal. He hopes soon to clap on an extinguisher to their fire by planting down two fine big fellows of his own Morto Bay way: we mean to add a couple of old naval six-inchers to this battery. During his stay we have very thoroughly threshed out ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume I • Ian Hamilton
... into his purse, and thrust under his girdle againe: she proceeded to a very sound discourse, whereto he listened with no little attention. The time serving fit for the fellows purpose, he came behind the Gentleman, and as many times one friend wil familiarly with another, clap his hands over his eyes to make him guesse who he is, so did this companion, holding his hands fast over the Gentlemans eyes, sayde: who am I: twise or thrise, in which time the drab had gotten the purse and put it up. The Gentleman thinking it ...
— The Third And Last Part Of Conny-Catching. (1592) - With the new deuised knauish arte of Foole-taking • R. G.
... history of France after his famous battle of Aboukir, where with a single division he routed the grand army of the Turks, twenty-five thousand strong, and jostled more than half of them into the sea, rrrah! without losing more than three hundred of his own men. That was his last thunder-clap in Egypt. He said to himself, seeing that all was lost down there, "I know that I am the saviour of France, and to ...
— The Napoleon of the People • Honore de Balzac
... Cobhurst with the wealth of the Bannisters was a project which, as I told you, had grown dear to my heart, and for which I was thinking and dreaming and working. All this you knew, and without a word to me, and if you speak the truth, all for the sake of your wretched stomach, you clap into Cobhurst a girl who will be engaged to Ralph Haverley in less ...
— The Girl at Cobhurst • Frank Richard Stockton
... our two. You, sir, take your blue coat off this deck or you'll bring trouble upon us. The Lord will look after His own if they'll only keep from foolishness. Get these hatches off, Tomlinson. So! Where's Jim Sturt and Hiram Jefferson? Let them stand by to clap them on again when I whistle. Starboard! Starboard! Keep her as full as she'll draw. Now, Amos, and you, Tomlinson, come here until I have a ...
— The Refugees • Arthur Conan Doyle
... from the heart; of the people, for they seemed never weary of repeating them; and it was not till a tremendous clap of thunder shook the very walls that several were silent and looked up with increasing alarm. The moment's pause was seized on to begin the fight. Caesar bit his lip in powerless fury, and his hatred of the towns-people, who had thus so plainly given him to understand their sentiments, was ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... its heid. It turned roond wi' a vegabon'-like look aye when Sandy gaed near't. He got up on the front efter a while, an' ga'e the reinds a tit, an' Princie began to do a bit jeeg, garrin' Sandy bowse aboot on the front o' the cairt like's he was foo. Sandy ga'e him a clap on the hurdles to quieten him, but aye the hent feet o' him played skelp on the boddom o' the cairt, till I thocht he wudda haen't ca'd a' to bits. Syne awa' he gaed full bung a' o' a sudden, wi' Sandy rowin' aboot amon' the tatties, an' hingin' in by the ...
— My Man Sandy • J. B. Salmond
... slow in returning, and she spent much of the day sitting in the garden with her baby. It came to be Benoix' habit to stop there for a while coming or going from his house beyond. The baby knew the pit-a-patter of his racking horse, and had learned to clap her hands and crow when she heard it. The Creole had the same grave simplicity for children, as for his equals. It ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... stands: "It came to pass while this Bishop Roger stood mitred [infulatus] before the high altar, ready to begin the Divine mysteries, there came on such a dense cloud that men could scarcely discern one another; and presently a fearful clap of thunder followed, and such a blaze of lightning and intolerable smell, that all who stood by fled hastily, expecting nothing less than death. The Bishop and one deacon only bravely remained, and when the air was at length purified ...
— Old St. Paul's Cathedral • William Benham
... to clap her hands, but wrung them instead, remembering with a sudden pang that the battle was not over yet, and it was much too soon ...
— Rose in Bloom - A Sequel to "Eight Cousins" • Louisa May Alcott
... atmospheric mysteries. The other day a Yorkshire girl, when asked why she was not afraid of thunder, replied because it was only her Father's voice; what knew she of the rushing together of air to fill the vacuum caused by the transit of the electric fluid? to her the thunder-clap was the utterance of the Almighty. Still in North Germany does the peasant say of thunder, that the angels are playing skittles aloft, and of the snow, that they are shaking up ...
— The Book of Were-Wolves • Sabine Baring-Gould
... he borrowed the very accent of the angel of mercy to say them in, and you should have seen that vast house rise to its feet; and you should have heard the hurricane that followed. That's the only test! People may shout, clap their hands, stamp, wave their napkins, but none but the master can make them ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... the edge of the drive, paused, listening with every faculty alert. There was no sound but the muted soughing of the night wind in the trees—not a footfall, not the clap of a hoof or the echo of a motor's whine. She moved on a yard or two, and found herself suddenly in the harsh glare of an arc-lamp. This decided her; she might as well go forward as retreat, now that she had shown herself. She darted at a run across the road and gained the paved path, paused ...
— The Bandbox • Louis Joseph Vance
... The occurrence of a sensation or image does not in itself constitute knowledge but any sensation or image may come to be known if the conditions are suitable. When a sensation—like the hearing of a clap of thunder—is normally correlated with closely similar sensations in our neighbours, we regard it as giving knowledge of the external world, since we regard the whole set of similar sensations as due to a common external cause. But images and ...
— The Analysis of Mind • Bertrand Russell
... escape even in this instance. A woman seized me by the arm, and pulled me towards her; had it not been for one of the quarter-masters I should have been separated from my party; but, just as they dragged me away, she caught hold of me by the leg, and stopped them. "Clap on here, Peg," cried the woman to another, "and let's have this little midshipmite; I wants a baby to dry nurse." Two more women came to her assistance, catching hold of my other arm, and they would have dragged me out of ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat
... been ill a long time, Irene, and have kept it from me. That was not right; you should have been honest in your letters. A pretty figure you will cut nursing sick folks! Work in my sight, indeed! If you say work to me again, I will clap you into a lunatic asylum and keep you there till the war is over. Turn ...
— Macaria • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... whiles you overset the pillar, I will clap the dome on my shoulders and hale it down to ...
— The Merrie Tales Of Jacques Tournebroche - 1909 • Anatole France
... stoutly withstanding three foul knaves unwashed and ragged. Then shouted Beltane, and fell upon them right joyously and smote them gleefully and laughed to see them reel and scatter before his sudden onset; whereon, beholding Sir Fidelis pale and scant of breath, he stayed to clap him ...
— Beltane The Smith • Jeffery Farnol
... rising from the broomy lea, And every fairy wheel and thread Of cobweb dew-bediamonded. When daisies go, shall winter time Silver the simple grass with rime; Autumnal frosts enchant the pool And make the cart-ruts beautiful; And when snow-bright the moor expands, How shall your children clap their hands! To make this earth our hermitage, A cheerful and a changeful page, God's bright and intricate device Of ...
— Underwoods • Robert Louis Stevenson
... a clap of thunder in a blue sky. Many great personages had acquired vast manorial tracts by processes that could not endure the scrutiny of the Kiroku-jo (registrar's office). Yorimichi, the kwampaku, was a conspicuous example. On receipt of the order to ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... said Burke. "But what I'd like would be to meet a first-class, double-quick steamer, and buy her, put our treasure on board, and then clap on ...
— The Adventures of Captain Horn • Frank Richard Stockton
... The Indiarubber Man counted. ". . . Eight—twelve! Hallo! Six absentees—— No, Corney, you can't steer, because I'm going to clap you all below hatches the moment we get outside." He raised his voice, hailing the picket-boat. "All right, Torps?" The Torpedo Lieutenant signified that they were all aboard the lugger, and ...
— A Tall Ship - On Other Naval Occasions • Sir Lewis Anselm da Costa Ritchie
... they reached the yard they were just in time to see the man who was working on the boat clap his hand to the back of his neck ...
— The Ocean Wireless Boys And The Naval Code • John Henry Goldfrap, AKA Captain Wilbur Lawton
... the foe sprung his mine many times, and it chanced on a day Soon as the blast of that underground thunder-clap echoed away, Dark thro' the smoke and the sulphur, like so many fiends in their hell, Cannon-shot, musket-shot, volley on volley, and yell upon yell— Fiercely on all the defenses our myriad enemy fell. ...
— Ten Englishmen of the Nineteenth Century • James Richard Joy
... to enter a house, you do not knock at the door (an act that would be considered great rudeness), but clap your hands, and you are most courteously invited to enter. The good woman at once sets to work to serve you with mt, and quickly rolls a cigar, which she hands to you from her mouth, where she has already lighted it by a live ember of ...
— Through Five Republics on Horseback • G. Whitfield Ray
... fervor; and do not laugh, dear reader; for it is only on the stage that the graceful altogether elegant curtain-drop comes; but the old frontiersman had somehow got himself outside the screen door, and immediately on that kiss came through the mosquito wire such a thunder clap of pulpit artillery as is the peculiar prerogative of some large gentlemen when they blow their nose. MacDonald and Eleanor both burst out laughing; and Eleanor noticed it was a large red cotton one, two for ten they sold ...
— The Freebooters of the Wilderness • Agnes C. Laut
... to him and held her close. As far as he could estimate by the interval between lightning and thunder-clap, the heart of the storm was still some distance off, so he felt no present concern for their safety. Still, it was apparent that the course of the storm was moving swiftly in their direction. The lightning flashes came faster and faster and closer together; the ...
— The Lair of the White Worm • Bram Stoker
... sparkling, and brilliant works of humour, without a trace of vulgarity, ever written in America. It had originally some such title as "Studios and Mountains," but the publisher, thinking that the miserable clap-trap title of "Americans in Rome" would create an impression that there was "gossip," and possibly scandal, in it, insisted on that. It was published in the weary panic of 1862 in the war, and fell dead from the press. Though he never really laughed, and was generally absolutely grave, my brother ...
— Memoirs • Charles Godfrey Leland
... perceptible effort, rather as if swayed by a light wind, like the pendent moss in the woods. She had just begun to dance when John entered, and the company was standing against the wall in silence; but in a few moments the young men began to mutter, then to clap and stamp, then to shout, and finally they plunged their hands wildly into their pockets and flung gold and silver at her feet. But she took no notice beyond a flutter of nostril, and continued to dance like a thing of ...
— The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories • Gertrude Atherton
... will," rejoined Shotbolt; "so I will. If I don't, you shall clap me in the Condemned Hold in his stead. Good-bye, for the pressent—ha! ha!" And, laughing loudly at his own facetiousness, ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... objects strike, unless parties are formed for or against them. I remember many years ago advising some acquaintance of mine, who were engaged in the direction of the Opera, to raise a competition between two of their singers, and have papers written pro and con.; for then numbers would go to clap and hiss the rivals respectively, who would not go to be pleased ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... began to move again an' cam' slowly towards Mr. Soulis whaur he stood under the saughs. A' the life o' his body, a' the strength o' his speerit, were glowerin' frae his een. It seemed she was gaun to speak, but wanted words, an' made a sign wi' the left hand. There cam' a clap o' wund, like a cat's fuff; oot gaed the can'le, the saughs skreighed like folk; and Mr. Soulis kenned that, live or die, this ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 5 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... said Fezziwig, "No more work to-night. Christmas Eve, Dick, Christmas, Ebenezer. Let's have the shutters up," cried old Fezziwig, with a sharp clap of his hands, "before a ...
— A Budget of Christmas Tales by Charles Dickens and Others • Various
... horses, and bounding chariots, the horsemen mounting, and the flashing sword, and the glittering spear, and a multitude of slain, and a great heap of corpses, and there is no end of the bodies. There is no assuaging of the hurt; thy wound is grievous; all that hear the report of thee clap their hands over thee: for upon whom hath not thy wickedness passed continually?" And another prophet had uttered the curse: "The pelican and the porcupine shall lodge in the capitals thereof; their voice shall sound in the windows; desolation shall ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIV • John Lord
... goes well they may want us for a month or six weeks," the man said. "Just think, maybe I'll get fifty or sixty dollars! and Baby will get well right off," cried Jimmy, in an arithmetical sort of rapture, as he leaned above Kitty, who tried to clap her little hands without quite knowing what the ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag, Vol. 5 - Jimmy's Cruise in the Pinafore, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... be a good trick!" said Teddy at length. "We could dress Trouble up funny like, and have him come in driving Turnover and Skyrocket. The people would clap ...
— The Curlytops and Their Pets - or Uncle Toby's Strange Collection • Howard R. Garis
... (Buddhistic term for heart), is likewise no stand; and as, in fact, they do not constitute any tangible objects, how could they be contaminated by particles of dust?' Whereupon the fifth founder at once took his robe and clap-dish and handed them to him. Well, the text now of this enigma presents too this identical idea, for the simple fact is that those lines full of subtleties of a short while back are not, as yet, perfected or ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... and their place is not known where they are. Thy shepherds slumber, O King of Assyria: thy worthies are at rest: thy people are scattered upon the mountains, and there is none to gather them. There is no assuaging of thy hurt; thy wound is grievous: all that hear the bruit of thee clap the hands over thee; for upon whom hath ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 8 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... Barrace, who hadn't before heard this term applied, recognised its bearing with a clap of her gemmed hands. "Now I do know why he's not banal. But I do prevent him all the same—and if you saw what he sometimes selects—from buying. I save him hundreds and ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... or, at least, firm ground by which it is possible to cross this devil's keg. It must be so. Cattle can't be spirited away. Unless, of course—but no, a man don't duff cattle to drown 'em in a swamp. They've crossed this pernicious mire, boys. We may nab our friend, Retief, but we'll never clap eyes ...
— The Story of the Foss River Ranch • Ridgwell Cullum
... of Tom Ayrton's name was like a clap of thunder. Ayrton had started up quickly and grasped his revolver. A report was heard, and Glenarvan fell wounded by a ball. Gunshots resounded at the same ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne
... the case with the obvious witnesses—police, doctor, and so on. Then the thing hardened down. Then Sabre saw what was coming at him—saw it at a clap and never had remotely dreamt of it; saw it like a tiger coming down the street to devour him; saw it like the lid of hell slowly slipping away before his eyes. Saw it! I was watching him. He saw it; and things—age, ...
— If Winter Comes • A.S.M. Hutchinson
... himself along with weary steps beneath a blazing sun, he felt all hope and courage vanishing from his heart, he was but a beast in that belated, straggling herd that filled the roads and fields. It was the reaction after the terrible disasters at Wissembourg and Froeschwiller, the echo of the thunder-clap that had burst in the remote distance, leagues and leagues away, rattling at the heels of those panic-stricken men who were flying before they had ever seen an enemy. What was there to hope for now? Was it not all ended? They were beaten; all that was left ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... they looked surly, and his Indian soldiers called them treacherous dogs, as some of them would sometimes do, all the notice he would take of it would only be to clap them on the back and say, 'Come, come, you look wild and surly, and mutter; but that signifies nothing. These, my soldiers, were a little while ago as wild and surly as you are now. By the time you have been one ...
— King Philip - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
... companion of a waddling gull, used to listen to the conferences, with one leg tucked under his wing, and its head on one side, with one watchful, beady eye fixed on the figures in khaki—until suddenly it would clap its long bill rapidly in a wonderful imitation of machine-gun fire—"Curse the bloody bird!" said officers startled by this evil and reminiscent noise—and caper with ridiculous postures round the imperturbable gull... Beyond ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs
... the island and starve them. Will Atkins therefore, who, notwithstanding his wound, kept always with them, proved the best counsellor in this case. His advice was, to take the advantage that offered, and clap in between them and their boats, and so deprive them of the capacity of ever returning any more to plague ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808) • Daniel Defoe
... the variety. The same may be said of the wit and humor that belong to Georgia. An old man—Uncle Tom Norris he was called, on account of his gray hairs—was once heard to say (speaking professionally), "Let me clap a drop of the low-wines to my tongue, and I'll tell you what branch the fire was kindled on." He was a distiller, and knew his business. One need not be an expert to say the same of Georgia humor. It is almost possible to tell the very militia district in which it originated. ...
— Stories Of Georgia - 1896 • Joel Chandler Harris
... that, as his Majesty, on finishing the speech, put on his plumed hat, and the Noblesse according to custom imitated him, our Tiers-Etat Deputies did mostly, not without a shade of fierceness, in like manner clap-on, and even crush on their slouched hats; and stand there awaiting the issue. (Histoire Parlementaire (i. 356). Mercier, Nouveau Paris, &c.) Thick buzz among them, between majority and minority of Couvrezvous, Decrouvrez-vous (Hats off, Hats on)! To which his Majesty puts end, by taking ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... uttered the words before the darkness was rent by the most terrifically vivid flash of lightning that he had ever seen, while simultaneously the air was shattered by a clap of thunder of such frightful volume that the cruiser jarred and shivered from stem to stern, as though she had taken the ground at full speed; indeed, for some seconds Frobisher was not at all sure that they ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... matters were soon lost sight of in the excitement of the Civil War. This thing which changed all our lives the way war does, came upon me like a clap of thunder. I was living like a hermit, and working like a horse, not trying to make any splurge, as I might have done, even having given up the idea of getting me a team of horses, which I had been thinking of for a while back with ...
— Vandemark's Folly • Herbert Quick
... little amused to see Jack even clap it close to his ear. He knew the reason of his doing this, for time was crawling on so slowly in the estimation of the impatient one that he even suspected the faithful little watch had ceased to go, though its steady ticking must have speedily ...
— Air Service Boys Over the Atlantic • Charles Amory Beach
... he; and Mike went to work with his lesson, which he had been conning as he went. Scarcely was the last word of this impious incantation uttered, when a roaring clap of thunder burst above him, and the arch enemy of mankind ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... decently clothed, he would become like other boys, when I saw Juno come slowly towards Shock, wagging her tail and showing her teeth as if asking for more bones, but she suddenly whisked round and darted away, as, with a noise like a dull clap of thunder, something seemed to shut out the scene from the mouth of the hole, I felt a puff of heat and smoke in my face, and all ...
— Brownsmith's Boy - A Romance in a Garden • George Manville Fenn
... The tremendous thunder-clap of sound from the camp had quickened the return of the superintendent and his men, already reached and warned by the doctor. More, it had startled even the drunken workmen so that when some one shouted that the dam had been blown up the ...
— In the Shadow of the Hills • George C. Shedd
... and then stood motionless, waiting for the next move of the unseen enemy. Forthwith, a second noose dropped smoothly around his neck; it was at once drawn taut, and Constans was obliged to stretch himself to his full height to avoid being strangled. He heard Esmay clap her hands, and steps descending from the gallery; then his captor stood before him. He was a boy of Constans's own age, but of shorter, sturdier build. A pleasant, ingenuous face it was, flushed now ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen
... evils, which threaten the whole species, can disturb the calm sleep of the philosopher, and force him from his bed. One man may with impunity murder another under his windows; he has nothing to do but clap his hands to his ears, argue a little with himself to hinder nature, that startles within him, from identifying him with the unhappy sufferer. Savage man wants this admirable talent; and for want of wisdom ...
— A Discourse Upon The Origin And The Foundation Of - The Inequality Among Mankind • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... inside Elizabeth Ann's head stirred and moved. It came to her, like a clap, that she needn't know which was right or left at all. If she just pulled the way she wanted them to go— the horses would never know whether it was the right or ...
— Understood Betsy • Dorothy Canfield
... and a miscellany of furniture followed. Then overtaking them came a huge white flame. The trees about the building swayed and whirled and tore themselves to pieces, that sprang towards the flare. My ears were smitten with a clap of thunder that left me deaf on one side for life, and all ...
— The First Men In The Moon • H. G. Wells
... gone before you finish with me,' replied his companion with a grin. 'Clap it in the bill, my boy. "For total loss of reputation, six and eightpence." But,' continued Mr Wickham with more seriousness, 'could I be bowled out of the Commission for this little jest? I know it's small, but I like to be a JP. Speaking ...
— The Wrong Box • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... days when that sacred apartment had been desecrated by the irreverent city boarders, during the Howes regime, had its walls echoed to such whoops and shouts of laughter. The children played "Post Office" and "Copenhagen" and "Clap in, Clap out," while the grown folks ...
— Cy Whittaker's Place • Joseph C. Lincoln
... "Well, they're goin' to clap 'em into jail the minute they git home, an' keep 'em there till they can hang 'em," ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... Florida dawn. Dawns of many sorts he had seen—the ghastly ashy, clanging dawns of cities, the gray, creeping dawns of Northern winter, the bluish dawns of the Western mountains—but a dawn which came flaring up from the sea like a clap of ...
— The Plunderer • Henry Oyen
... Paul Revere, John Hancock, Dr. Warren—all come with us. I've run ahead to tell you they'll meet us on the way. Give me disguises. (They clap an Indian robe across his shoulders, and he takes an armful of Indian finery.) John Hancock says there's a boat and oars at the foot of the wharves, and Paul Revere will lead ...
— Patriotic Plays and Pageants for Young People • Constance D'Arcy Mackay
... my bed than a clap of thunder!" the words came tumbling from Cottard, who had for some time been waiting in vain until Forcheville should pause for breath, so that he might get in his hoary old joke, a chance for which might not, he feared, come again, if the conversation should take a different turn; and ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... and another appears to have taken the part of a despairing lover, but the lady has a very pretty voice, and warbles on and on, like a nightingale. Occasionally a group of listeners in the street below clap them applause, for as the windows are always open, the whole neighborhood can enjoy ...
— Views a-foot • J. Bayard Taylor
... salvation and thou shalt be saved from the wrath of the King Almighty in sway, Creator of Night and Day." Therewith his father waxed wroth and said, "O son of adultery, dost confront me with these words?" Then he bade clap him in prison and turning to Gharib, said to him, "O wretch of a mortal, how hast thou abused my son's wit and seduced him from his Faith?" Quoth Gharib, "Indeed, I have brought him out of wrongousness into the way of righteousness, ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 7 • Richard F. Burton
... the rhythmic movement of a flywheel and was thrilled by the harmonious movement of cogs and eccentrics, pistons and connecting-rods, all "singing like the morning stars for joy that they are made." As a child visiting a printing office he used to clap his hands with delight at the sight of "the wheels all turning." For engines of all sorts he had a passion. At Plymouth he loved to watch the great G.W.R. locomotives steaming into Millbay terminus, and would often engage the driver or stoker in conversation. After our ...
— War Letters of a Public-School Boy • Henry Paul Mainwaring Jones
... to him all yer can. It ain't no ust ter hurry matters, with your father flat on his back. Powell will remain here and Vorlange will be with the cavalry, so yer will know whar ter clap eyes on ter both of 'em ...
— The Boy Land Boomer - Dick Arbuckle's Adventures in Oklahoma • Ralph Bonehill
... while climbing Fuji's cinder-beds and lava-blocks, "I am a man of Omi"? Why, when quenching their thirst with the melted snow-water of Fuji crater, do they cry out "I am drinking from Lake Biwa"? Why do the children clap their hands, as they row or sail over Biwa's blue surface, and say: "I am on top of ...
— Japanese Fairy World - Stories from the Wonder-Lore of Japan • William Elliot Griffis
... thunder-clap appeared; Howe'er, she in her purpose persevered. Said she, this treatment doubtless I deserve; But still, from truth my tongue can never swerve, And if I may presume my thoughts to speak, The plan which I've pursued your love to seek, Had never proved injurious to my cause, If still ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine
... declared, to a man, that they would not fire a gun till they were paid. Cornwallis, on receiving this declaration, caused all hands to be called on deck, and thus addressed them: "My lads, the money cannot be paid till we return to port, and as to your not fighting, that is mere nonsense:—I'll clap you alongside the first large ship of the enemy I see, and I know that the devil himself will not be able to keep you from it." The tars were so pleased with this compliment that they all returned to their duty, ...
— The Book of Three Hundred Anecdotes - Historical, Literary, and Humorous—A New Selection • Various
... for anything. See, they are pulling in the cart now, and the shiny man is all ready with his gun. Will he shoot any of them, Ben?" asked Bab, nestling nearer with a little shiver of apprehension, for the sharp crack of a rifle startled her more than the loudest thunder-clap she ever heard. ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, Nov 1877-Nov 1878 - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... junk, if they've got any sense. Think of paying nickel after nickel to see Lee Milligan rush to the girl's door, knock, learn the fatal news, stagger back and clap his hand to his brow and say 'Great Heaven! GONE!'" Jean, stirred to combat by the sarcasm of Robert Grant Burns, did the stagger and the hand-to-brow and great-heaven scene with a realism that made Pete Lowry turn his back suddenly. "They've seen Gil abduct me or Muriel ...
— Jean of the Lazy A • B. M. Bower
... there be in the land), do suck from the intoxicated drugs of conformity, the softer milk which makes them grow in error. And who can be ignorant what a large spread Popery, Arminianism and reconciliation with Rome, have taken among the arch urgers of the ceremonies? What marvel that Papists clap their hands! for they see the day coming which they wish for. Woe to thee, O land, which bears professed Papists and avouched Atheists, but cannot bear them who desire to "abstain from all appearance of evil," 1 Thes. ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie
... fell into a kind sleep, from which I was aroused by a terrific clap of thunder and such a deluge of rain as I had never witnessed. Heretofore I had always disliked lightning, but nature's present "pyrotechnical display" challenged naught but my most enthusiastic admiration. When it was over supper was announced, and soon afterward ...
— Six Days on the Hurricane Deck of a Mule - An account of a journey made on mule back in Honduras, - C.A. in August, 1891 • Almira Stillwell Cole
... but which rather outrages grandmamma's ideas of decorum, until grandpapa says, that when he was just thirteen years and three months old, he kissed grandmamma under a mistletoe too, on which the children clap their hands, and laugh very heartily, as do aunt George and uncle George; and grandmamma looks pleased, and says, with a benevolent smile, that grandpapa was an impudent young dog, on which the children laugh very heartily ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... himself in his own drama that, if I remember right, as he sat in the upper gallery, he accompanied the players by audible recitation, till a friendly hint frighted him to silence. Pope countenanced Agamemnon by coming to it, the first night, and was welcomed to the theatre by a general clap; he had much regard for Thomson, and once expressed it in a poetical epistle sent to Italy, of which, however, he abated the value by transplanting some of the lines into his Epistle ...
— Lives of the Poets: Gay, Thomson, Young, and Others • Samuel Johnson
... but I did not see who went up, neither did I hear what was said. At last, my name was called: it came like a clap of thunder—as a great surprise, a shock. I clutched the desk, struggled to my feet, passed down the aisle, the sound of my shoes echoing through the silence like the strokes of a maul. The blood seemed ready to burst from ...
— Little Journeys To the Homes of the Great, Volume 3 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... cool Patkasa's fire. I shall bring you the broiled venison. Watch closely. When you see the black coals rise to the surface of the water, clap your hands and shout aloud, for soon after that sign I shall return to you with ...
— Old Indian Legends • Zitkala-Sa
... feet wide and over one hundred feet high, and then, again, that a space of two hundred feet is cut out of it, through which is rushing over seven hundred acres of water, and you can have only a faint conception of the terrible force of the blow that came upon the people of this vicinity like a clap of thunder out of a clear sky. It was irresistible in its power and carried everything before it. After seeing the lake and the opening through the dam it can be readily understood how that outbreak came to be so destructive in ...
— The Johnstown Horror • James Herbert Walker
... a harsh voice, that fell upon the turmoil like a thunder-clap, and there stood Sir James Lee. Instantly the struggle ceased, and the combatants scrambled to ...
— Men of Iron • Ernie Howard Pyle
... on board we felt quite happy, and, for the first time since leaving America, we had a little singing. Shall I be laughed at when I confess that our musical efforts were confined to Sankey's hymns? Maybe, but I do not care. Cheap and clap-trap as the music may be, it tasted "real good," as Abner said, and I am quite sure that that Sunday night was the best that any of us had spent ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... we shall see if there is any truth in what that swab of a doctor said. Come, my boy, and clap on all sail, and see who can ...
— Beyond the City • Arthur Conan Doyle
... her and she tried not to notice it. So absorbed was she in trying to appear unconcerned that she did not see the approach of the storm; in fact, there was a supercharge of restraint on all three of them, and it startlingly broke upon them in a clap of thunder that sounded as if it had smashed a tree ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... had been so beneficent. As to General Grant, I believe now, as I believed then, that his election was a great blessing, and that he was one of the noblest, purest, and most capable men who have ever sat in the Presidency. The cheap, clap-trap antithesis which has at times been made between Grant the soldier and Grant the statesman is, I am convinced, utterly without foundation. The qualities which made him a great soldier made him an effective statesman. This fact was clearly recognized ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... breath of flutes will float around you, And glorious sunshine, such as ours, you'll see, And myrtle groves, and happy bands who clap Their hands in triumph, men and ...
— The Frogs • Aristophanes
... the midst of the family, and Tamoszius would sit there with his hat between his knees, never saying more than half a dozen words at a time, and turning red in the face before he managed to say those; until finally Jurgis would clap him upon the back, in his hearty way, crying, "Come now, brother, give us a tune." And then Tamoszius' face would light up and he would get out his fiddle, tuck it under his chin, and play. And forthwith the soul of him would flame up and become eloquent—it ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... out far and wide, and showered down upon the gas-holders. Then came a concussion that shook the air like a thunder-clap as the escaping gas mixed with the air, took fire, and exploded. Seven of the twelve aerostats instantly collapsed and plunged back again to the earth, spending the collective force of their explosives on the slopes of Muswell Hill. Meanwhile the second ...
— The Angel of the Revolution - A Tale of the Coming Terror • George Griffith
... was soon over. The whole nation was, at that time, on fire with faction. The whigs applauded every line in which liberty was mentioned, as a satire on the tories; and the tories echoed every clap, to show that the satire was unfelt. The story of Bolingbroke is well known. He called Booth to his box, and gave him fifty guineas for defending the cause of liberty so well against a perpetual dictator[178]. The whigs, says Pope, design ...
— Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1 • Samuel Johnson
... from shuttered windows, lights burned in upper rooms. There were a thousand pretty secrets in the ways of people to each other. Then, too, there were ideas, as thick as sparrows in an ivied wall. One had but to clap one's hands and cry out, and there was a fluttering {195} of innumerable wings; life was as full of bubbles, forming, rising into amber foam, as a ...
— The Moral Economy • Ralph Barton Perry
... the Arabs, and the Indian troops, were celebrating the Mohammedan feast of Ramadhan. During the feast, which lasts a month, night is turned into day. No food is allowed, in theory, from sunrise to sunset. Drums beat, dogs howl, cocks crow and the revellers shout and wail and clap their hands in long, rhythmic, staccato periods, and explosions of powder occur ...
— In Mesopotamia • Martin Swayne
... affair and the Westminster election, with the exception of a trifling after-clap or two, such as the High Bailiff sending me in a bill for my third share of the hustings, amounting to upwards of two hundred and fifty pounds (I think that was the sum). I refused the payment of it, and he commenced ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 3 • Henry Hunt
... purple hunch. A nice, judicious, little second-hand staging out of the warehouse and a few weeks' road try-out for the failure will cost about ten thousand. I'll let Denny have five thousand worth of fun mussing around with it to cut his eye teeth, and then we'll clap Violet into 'The Rosie Posie Girl,' weeping with gratitude to have her face saved after being slapped first. Get the parts out to-morrow and you and Chambers begin to cast it. I'll see actors here from three to five Friday. I'll open it September tenth. Now ...
— Blue-grass and Broadway • Maria Thompson Daviess
... joy inspired by this event, one cannot forbear some pain at the some who clap their hands do not sufficiently understand the condition they are leaving or that ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... were at meeting Over Waterloo; Cocks had sung their earliest greeting; Faint and low they crew, For no paly beam yet shone On the heights of Mount Saint John; Tempest-clouds prolonged the sway Of timeless darkness over day; Whirlwind, thunder-clap, and shower Marked it a predestined hour. Broad and frequent through the night Flashed the sheets of levin-light: Muskets, glancing lightnings back, Showed the dreary bivouac Where the soldier lay, Chill and stiff, and drenched with rain, Wishing dawn of morn ...
— Some Poems by Sir Walter Scott • Sir Walter Scott
... The legend was that once a year on a certain night a sable horse and cloaked horseman rode across that great apartment, flames snorting from the horse's nostrils, and into the fireplace, disappearing with a clap of thunder. She brought me, too, an owl from the coach-houses, holding the bird by the legs firmly, her hand defended by ...
— The Amateur Poacher • Richard Jefferies
... to the impossibility of getting our great army into existence. All those people who write and talk so glibly in favour of conscription seem to forget that to take a common man, and more particularly a townsman, clap him into a uniform and put a rifle in his hand does not make a soldier. He has to be taught not only the use of his weapons, but the methods of a strange and unfamiliar life out of doors; he has to be not simply ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... and so they did, and Paul, he led that colt—the kickinest and ugliest young beast you ever see in your life—up to the place where his master, as he calls him, and he lives. What does that Kirkwood do but clap on a couple of long spurs and jump on to that colt's back, and off the beast goes, tail up, heels flying, standing up on end, trying all sorts of capers, and at last going it full run for a couple of miles, till he'd got about ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... Bill—as he sometimes did, when excited—elapsed into the vulgar, but expressive idiom of the family. "Shet yer head, can't ye?" And he lifted a hand, with intent to clap it smartly upon the part the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 83, September, 1864 • Various
... not permit them to sing a merry song of sixpence as they trip down the streets, there is some danger of the fire of merriment dying for want of fuel. Vivacity in printed books, therefore, has been encouraged, so that the mind at least, if not the body, may skip about and clap its hands. A portly gentleman with a solemn face, reading his 'Punch' in the club, is, after all, giving play to precisely those same humours which in ancient days might have led him, like Georgy Porgy, to kiss the girls or to perform any other merry joke. It is necessary, ...
— The Treasury of Ancient Egypt - Miscellaneous Chapters on Ancient Egyptian History and Archaeology • Arthur E. P. B. Weigall
... marchioness, indeed, for some Dick Swiveller of the Sahibs,) shuffles rheumatically with her feet, or impotently dislocates her slender arms, or pounds insanely on a cracked tomtom, or jangles her clumsy cymbals, while the squatting bearers cry, "Wah wah!" and clap their sweaty hands,—our poor old glee-maiden of Cossitollah strums her two-stringed guitar, letting the baby slide, and creaks corkscrewishly her ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... your face, like me?' began Shubin. 'It's ever so much nicer so; especially when you kick up your heels and clap them together—like this. You have the grass under your nose; when you're sick of staring at the landscape you can watch a fat beetle crawling on a blade of grass, or an ant fussing about. It's really ...
— On the Eve • Ivan Turgenev
... boy,' returned Master Southall, sending, in the plenitude of his satisfaction, a jet of smoke towards us with astonishing force. 'And, I say, Jem, I'll tell ee what I'll do; I'll clap on ten guineas more upon what I offered ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 440 - Volume 17, New Series, June 5, 1852 • Various
... Lyons, or rather the English government, objects and protests against the instructions given to our cruisers, which instructions are intrinsically faultless. Mr. Lincoln jumps up and writes a clap-trap dispatch, wholly contrary to our statutes. Mr. Seward promises what he cannot perform, and this time the upshot is that his dispatch came before the Cabinet and was quashed, or, at ...
— Diary from November 12, 1862, to October 18, 1863 • Adam Gurowski
... and then said, "There ought to be a fast horse or so in your father's stables, eh? Well then, if there are, why not take one for your own riding? Then at night, when you are supposed to be snug between the sheets, creep down to the stable, clap a bridle on the horse, and, hey, presto! you are in Poitiers. Put on the clothes suitable to the handsome young noble you are, and have a joyous carouse with your many companions; and if you do, next day, not choose to go ...
— The Champdoce Mystery • Emile Gaboriau
... front and store of mimic drums and halberds for the martial little burghers; here are the fruiteress with her stall of grapes and melons, the rat-catcher with his string of trophies, the fowler and his clap-net, the furrier ...
— A Wanderer in Holland • E. V. Lucas
... sometimes fail. Then I'll think of you. I love you a thousand times better than my country, Liz.—Wicked? So much the worse. It's the truth. But if I find your memory makes a milksop of me, I shall thrust you out of the way, without ceremony,—I shall clap you into my box or between the leaves of my Bible, and only ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... moment and its perpetuation to the end of time. Till the end of time she would have had nothing altered, but still continue delightedly to serve her idol, and be repaid (say twice in the month) with a clap on ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of her, Night's daughter, Ignorance, hath wrapt, and wrap All round us; we but feel our way to err: The ocean hath its chart, the stars their map; And knowledge spreads them on her ample lap; But Rome is as the desert, where we steer Stumbling o'er recollections: now we clap Our hands, and cry, 'Eureka!' it is clear - When but some false ...
— Childe Harold's Pilgrimage • Lord Byron
... deafening roar of the weapon in her ears, a revulsion, swift, sickening, overcame her. The report reverberated hideously; she seemed to hear a thousand of them. And the smoke billowed around her, strong, pungent. Through it she saw Chavis stagger, clap one hand to his chest and tumble headlong, face down, at her feet. The interior of the cabin whirled in mad circles; the floor seemed to be rising to meet her, and she sank to it, the six-shooter striking the bare boards with a thud ...
— The Range Boss • Charles Alden Seltzer
... our hope, fame o[u]r reward. To make the generall liking to concurre With others (ours?) were even to strike him in his shame Or (as he thinks) his glory, on the stage, And so too truly make't a Tragedy; When all the people cannot chuse but clap So sweet a close, and 'twill not Caesar be That shall be slaine, a Roman Prince; Twill be ...
— Old English Plays, Vol. I - A Collection of Old English Plays • Various
... burdens, passed in endless procession through the village. Masses of rushing men swept like shadowy phantoms through the fitfully-illumined darkness. Beneath that everlasting barking, Joan would hear, now the piercing wail of a child; now a clap of thunder that for the moment would drown all other sounds, followed by a faint, low, rumbling crash, like the shooting of coals into a cellar. The wounded on their beds lay with wide-open, terrified eyes, moving feverishly from side ...
— All Roads Lead to Calvary • Jerome K. Jerome
... broad daylight, and the child still slept. A wan ray of the December sun penetrated the window of the attic and lay upon the ceiling in long threads of light and shade. All at once a heavily laden carrier's cart, which was passing along the boulevard, shook the frail bed, like a clap of thunder, and made it quiver from ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... supply their needs. As a bee settles on another flower, the stigma is calculated to touch the pollen on his under side before he gets dusted with more; thus cross-pollination is effected. Three stamens furnish a visitor with food, two others clap pollen on him. Numerous flies assist in removing the ...
— Wild Flowers, An Aid to Knowledge of Our Wild Flowers and - Their Insect Visitors - - Title: Nature's Garden • Neltje Blanchan
... a place I have desired long to see: have you not good tippling houses there? May not a man have a lusty fire there, a good pot of ale, a pair of cards, a swinging piece of chalk, and a brown toast that will clap a white waistcoat on a ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... have no sentiments or feelings of her own, and that she should simply use every emotion as a bit of something to impose on the public—a bit of her trade, an exposure of her own feelings to make people clap their hands—I have sat still and wondered at myself that I did not jump up and catch him by the throat, and shake the life out of his ...
— Macleod of Dare • William Black
... occur which it is impossible to listen to without becoming excited—we are carried away by admiration, and are forced to applaud with hand and mouth. The Frenchmen here cannot restrain their transports in soft adagios; they will clap their hands in loud applause and thus ...
— Haydn • J. Cuthbert Hadden
... went on, and as the water was sprinkled, and as the prayers were said, Caldigate felt thankful that so much had been allowed to be done before the great trouble had disclosed itself. The doubt whether even the ceremony could be performed before the clap of thunder had been heard through all Cambridge had been in itself a distinct sorrow to him. Had Crinkett showed himself at Chesterton, neither Mrs. Bolton nor Daniel Bolton would have been standing then at ...
— John Caldigate • Anthony Trollope
... wax stronger with the lapse of years, But he shall fade into a feebler age; Feebler, yet subtler. He shall weave his snares, And spring them on thy careless steps, and clap His withered hands, and from their ambush call His hordes to fall upon thee. He shall send Quaint maskers, wearing fair and gallant forms, To catch thy gaze, and uttering graceful words To charm thy ear; while his sly imps, by stealth, Twine round thee threads ...
— Poems • William Cullen Bryant
... I stood up against this clap o' misery. It was near getting the better o' me. For a time I really hated the very name and the sight o' man, and I said, as ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume VI • Various
... the mountain-forests, fishers and raftsmen sang them on the rivers. He composed the Song of the Sickle which cuts at a stroke the corn in its ripeness and the wild flower in its bloom, and the Song of the Mill-wheel, with its long creak and quick clap, and the melodious rush of water from the buckets of the wheel, and many another which it would take long to tell of; but that which to himself was sweetest and dearest was Golden Apples and Roses Red, the song in which he told the legend of ...
— A Child's Book of Saints • William Canton
... sound that made him clap his hands with joy. CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! Galloping down the street came the splendid big fire-horses drawing the hook-and-ladder. CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! Down the street came the fire-engine, the hose carriage, and the ...
— All About Johnnie Jones • Carolyn Verhoeff
... employ similar titles; indeed, Masonry, as the oldest association, seems to have been copied after by the rest. The Odd-fellows have almost the same parades, shows, and titles as the Masons. They have their aprons, ribbons, rosettes, and drawn swords; and they endeavor, by these and other clap-trap means, to recommend their association as a grand affair. They, too, have their Right Worthy Grand Lodge, Most Worthy Grand Master, Right Worthy Grand Secretary, Right Worthy Grand Treasurer, Right Worthy ...
— Secret Societies • David MacDill, Jonathan Blanchard, and Edward Beecher
... in that Particular, though, at the same time, he owned he should have been very glad to have seen the little Boy, who, says he, must needs be a very fine Child by the Account that is given of him. Upon Hermione's going off with a Menace to Pyrrhus, the Audience gave a loud Clap; to which Sir Roger added, On my ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... "Scart as he can be, Janice," he whispered. "'By goodness, yes!' I believe if we had the time, we could march old Red Vest back over the Border and clap ...
— The Mission of Janice Day • Helen Beecher Long
... spectators, gaily and nobly clad, and the centre filled with hundreds of children, brought there from their different schools to be examined. A murmur of applause ran through the assemblage as the Queen took Mrs. Fry by the hand. The murmur was followed by a clap and a shout, which was taken up by the multitudes without till it died away in ...
— Reviews • Oscar Wilde
... Polly was when, that same evening, Uncle John took me with him to tell her of her father's safety. I kept fancying all the way that when she heard the news she would dance and shriek with joy, and clap her hands; but, instead of that, she just sat quietly down on a stool by the fire. What a white face she had, and how her lips trembled! Even Uncle John was struck by her appearance, and must have been afraid the sudden news had been too much for her. 'Come, come, Polly, this will ...
— Bluff Crag - or, A Good Word Costs Nothing • Mrs. George Cupples
... cheering, groaning, swaying to and fro, under the speeches of their favourite orators. Then in this Pagan temple may be seen a living specimen of a Brummagem Jupiter, with a cross of Vulcan, lion-faced, hairy, bearded, deep-mouthed swaggering, fluent in frank nonsense and bullying clap-trap, loved by the mob for his strength, and by the middle classes for his money. The lofty roof ...
— Rides on Railways • Samuel Sidney
... phial, containing only common air, I force a quantity of nitrous air at random, out of a bladder, and instantly clap my finger on the mouth of the bottle. I then immerse the neck of it into water, a small quantity of which I suffer to enter, which squirts into it with violence; and immediately replacing my finger, remove the phial. The water contained in it is already very acid, and it becomes more ...
— Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air • Joseph Priestley
... "I shall clap for you, though," Betty told her, "and I hope you'll get a chance to play. The other Georgia wasn't a bit athletic, so your basket-ball record will ...
— Betty Wales Senior • Margaret Warde
... whirlwind, and felt that never through all his life could he banish that image from his vision. His love had grown to vastness; its flower had suddenly burst, like those plants which open their blossoms with a clap of thunder. To master his passion were henceforth a thing impossible: as well counsel the empurpled waves which Poseidon lifts with his trident to lie tranquilly in their bed of sand and cease to foam upon the rocks of the shore. Gyges was ...
— King Candaules • Theophile Gautier |
