"Contraction" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... at him, clinging with both hands to the seat. The skiff creaked and danced upon the river. She could not close her eyes, a frightful contraction kept them wide open riveted on the hideous struggle. She remained rigid ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola
... independence—achieved without trouble or thought to the Imperial Government. For, beyond the usual orders on the departure of the squadron, not a single instruction was given—all being left to my discretion, and accomplished on my sole responsibility. Even the favourable contraction of a loan in England—the acknowledgment of Brazilian independence by European states—and the establishment of permanent peace—were the direct consequences of my services, but for which Brazil might still have presented the ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 2 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald
... l'ancre a Quebec, qui est vn destroict de laditt riuiere de Canadas. These words very clearly define the meaning of Quebec, which is an Indian word, signifying a narrowing or a contraction.—Vide Vol. II. p. 175, note 309. The breadth of the river at this point is underestimated It is not far from 1320 feet, or three-quarters of ...
— Voyages of Samuel de Champlain, Vol. 1 • Samuel de Champlain
... elaborate essay published in 1835, Prof. Sedgwick proposed the theory that cleavage is due to the action of crystalline or polar forces subsequent to the consolidation of the rock. 'We may affirm,' he says, 'that no retreat of the parts, no contraction of dimensions in passing to a solid state, can explain such phenomena. They appear to me only resolvable on the supposition that crystalline or polar forces acted upon the whole mass simultaneously in one direction and with adequate force.' And again, ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... rejoined us before long. We urged him to take some nourishment. He peremptorily refused. He felt the contraction of the stomach which is so common in those parts, and ...
— A Winter Amid the Ice - and Other Thrilling Stories • Jules Verne
... ever; and that, since they could not swell if they did not contract, since without the black there could not be the white, nor pleasure without pain, nor virtue without vice, nor criminals without judges; even contraction, or the black, or pain, or vice, or judges, are not 'the bad,' but only negatives; and that all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds. They are Voltairean optimists masquerading to an unsuspecting population as pessimists. 'Eternal ...
— Another Sheaf • John Galsworthy
... as we are most rationally allowed to, that Mars has undergone a progressive secularization in cooling, that contraction has acted upon its surface as it has on ours, that water has accumulated in basins and depressed troughs, that atmospheric currents have been started, that meteorological changes in consequence have followed, and that the range of physical conditions embraces phases ...
— The Certainty of a Future Life in Mars • L. P. Gratacap
... incident to orifices of moisture—muscosi fontes, &c." Nor the cause rendered, that "the firmness of hides is for the armour of the body against extremities of heat or cold," doth not impugn the cause rendered, that "contraction of pores is incident to the outwardest parts, in regard of their adjacence to foreign or unlike bodies;" and so of the rest, both causes being true and compatible, the one declaring an intention, the other a consequence only. Neither doth this call in ...
— The Advancement of Learning • Francis Bacon
... contraction of the heart told Sylvia that she was listening to what he said. "Felix Morrison!" she cried in stern, angry protest. "I don't know what you're talking about—but if you think that Aunt Victoria—if you think Felix Morrison—" She was ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... place was nauseating, and yet the atmosphere was bitingly cold. The warm-wrapped visitors could see rows and rows of discoloured backs and elbows, and caps, and stringy kerchiefs. They could almost feel the contraction of thousands of muscles in an involuntary effort to squeeze out the chill from all these bodies; not a score of overcoats could be discerned in the whole theatre, and many of the jackets were thin and ragged; but ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... ways in which we usually distinguish the forms of words in reference to gender. 1st. By words which are different; as boy, girl; uncle, aunt; father, mother. 2d. By a different termination of the same word; as instructor, instructress; lion, lioness; poet, poetess. Ess is a contraction from the hebrew essa, a female. 3d. By prefixing another word; as, a male child, a female child; a man servant, a maid ...
— Lectures on Language - As Particularly Connected with English Grammar. • William S. Balch
... into the mould formed by the bodies, and then the mould was broken up, leaving the plaster-cast whole. Thus one touching incident in the terrible tragedy of eighteen centuries ago has been preserved for the admiration and respect of posterity. The arms and legs of the child showed a contraction and emaciation which could only result from illness. Of the mother only the right arm was preserved; she fell upon the ashes, and the remaining portion of her body was consumed. But the right hand still clasped the legs of the child; on ...
— How to Succeed - or, Stepping-Stones to Fame and Fortune • Orison Swett Marden
... aloud?"—"Certainly, Sire." The letter was then handed to Barre, who read it. An individual who was present on the occasion described to me the impression which the reading of the letter produced on Napoleon. His countenance exhibited that violent contraction of the features which I have often remarked when his mind was disturbed. However, he did not lose his self-command, which indeed never forsook him when policy or vanity required that he should retain it; and when the reading of Beurnonville's letter was ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... grasped the doctor and forced him into the chair and Slavatsky started the generator. The violet light bathed Dr. Bird's head and he felt a stiffness and contraction of his neck muscles, and as he tried to shout out his knowledge of Slavatsky's treachery, he found that his vocal chords were paralyzed. Through a gathering haze he could see Carson approaching with an anesthesia cone and the sweet ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, October, 1930 • Various
... was Ranald's contraction for Lizette, the name of the French horse-trainer and breeder, Jules La Rocque, gave to her mother, who in her day was queen of the ice at L'Original ...
— The Man From Glengarry - A Tale Of The Ottawa • Ralph Connor
... far beneath the slave-holding aristocracy, at least he more nearly belonged to this lower order than to any other. She fixed his status relentlessly as something to be remembered when they should meet again. At last, with a little puckering of the brows and a firm contraction of the lips, she dismissed ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester
... chair stood like a faithful sentinel close to the open window, and as his eyes rested on it he was conscious of a pained contraction of the heart, for it stood exactly where it had stood when last he watched the stars and rambled through his dreams and ideals, with the boy for listener. The thought came quick and sharp, goading him as many a puzzled thought had goaded him in his ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... Eyne, a contraction of eyen, is the plural number of eye. It is not more probable that an ancient writer should have used the expressions here quoted, than that any one now should say—In every eyes;—With such ...
— The Rowley Poems • Thomas Chatterton
... shut off from IMF and World Bank support in the mid-1980s because of its huge debt arrears. An austerity program implemented shortly after the FUJIMORI government took office in July 1990 contributed to a third consecutive yearly contraction of economic activity, but the slide halted late that year, and output rose 2.4% in 1991. After a burst of inflation as the austerity program eliminated government price subsidies, monthly price increases eased to the single-digit level and by December 1991 dropped to the lowest increase since ...
— The 1993 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... mere black spots on a field of green, the horses and carriages are reduced to toys and the houses to the dimensions of the blocks children use at play. While all detail is disappearing there is a seeming contraction of larger objects. Streets have drawn nearer to each other: it is but a few steps from one extremity of a town to the other, and remote places are brought within slight distances of the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 26, August, 1880 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various
... inward. They rush and swirl in vast cyclones, thousands of miles in extent. The centre grows compact, heat is evolved by impact, as will be explained in Chapter II. Dull red light begins to look like coming dawn. Centuries go by; contraction goes on; light blazes in insufferable brightness; tornadoes, whirlpools, and tempests scarcely signify anything as applied to ...
— Recreations in Astronomy - With Directions for Practical Experiments and Telescopic Work • Henry Warren
... to the nebular hypothesis, and Helmholtz's contraction theory, accounting for the regular supply of heat from the sun, the sun itself is not likely more than 20,000,000 years old, and, of course, the earth is much younger. Both of these theories are quite ...
— The Evolution Of Man Scientifically Disproved • William A. Williams
... other way. If they are three-cornered, it is probable that the object glass is subjected to undue pressure in its cell. This, if the telescope has been brought out on a cool night from a warm room, may arise from the unequal contraction of the metal work and the glass as they cool off. In fact, no good star image can be got while a telescope is assuming the temperature of the surrounding atmosphere. Even the air inclosed in the tube is capable of making much trouble until its temperature has sunk to the level ...
— Pleasures of the telescope • Garrett Serviss
... was addressing an inquiry to Mrs Clennam on the subject of her health, coupled with the remark that, 'happening to find himself in that direction,' he had looked in to inquire, on behalf of his proprietor, how she found herself. Mrs Clennam, with a deep contraction of her brows, was ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... scientist has employed as a unit the least particle, physically indivisible and qualitatively homogeneous. Look for the atom in the body of science, and you will find it in physical laws governing expansion and contraction, and in chemical formulas. There the real responsibility of science ends. But whether through the need of popular exposition, or the undisciplined imagination of the investigator himself, atoms have figured in the history of thought as round corpuscles of a grayish hue scurrying hither and thither, ...
— The Approach to Philosophy • Ralph Barton Perry
... noticed when we entered Nikolaus's room was the time—a quarter to 10. Could that be correct? Only such a few minutes to live! I felt a contraction at my heart. Nikolaus jumped up and gave us a glad welcome. He was in good spirits over his plannings for his party and ...
— The Mysterious Stranger and Other Stories • Mark Twain
... the little room where he sat in the morning, with the library hard by, that he might have his books at hand. But Sir Philip was not reading now; on the contrary, he was in a fit of thought; and, if one might judge by the contraction of his brow, and the drawing down of the corners of his lips, it was not a very ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... "Ayoh" which is here, I hold, a corruption of "I (or Ayy) h""yes indeed he." [I take "aywah" (as I would read the word) to be a different spelling for "aywa"yes indeed, which according to Spitta Bey, Gr. p. 168 is a contraction of "Ay (I) wa'llhi," yes by Allah. "What? thy lover?" asks the husband, and she emphatically affirms the fact, to frighten the ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... Only of this Writer's Objections, which, I think, carries Weight, is That, which advises some little Contraction of the Prayers, and Appeals to the Deity. I say little Contraction: for they are nobly and sincerely pathetic. And I say it only in Fear, lest, if fansied too long, by the fashionably Averse to the Subject, Minds, which most want the purpos'd Impression, might hazard the Loss of its Benefit, ...
— Samuel Richardson's Introduction to Pamela • Samuel Richardson
... impediment in feeding[1]; and in more than one instance in the Government studs, tusks which had so grown as to approach and cross one another at the extremities, have had to be removed by the saw; the contraction of space between them so impeding the free action of the trunk as to prevent the animal from conveying ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent
... both arms and several ribs were also broken. We went into one of the female wards, where sixteen broken legs were being successfully treated, and I could not but admire a very simple contrivance which remedies the contraction which often succeeds broken limbs, and produces permanent lameness. Two long straps of plaister were glued from above the knee to the ankle, and were then fixed to a wooden bar, with a screw and handle, so that the tension could be regulated at pleasure. ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... me so?" asked she, with a slight contraction of her brow. "It is such a strange cold word! It does not at all belong to me, and it is only within the last few months that I have been thus addressed. With wise and tender forbearance, Paulo long delayed informing me that I was a princess, and that was beautiful in him. To ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach
... onwards any weight suspended from them; (4th), to the action of the air on the under surfaces of the wings; (5th), to the ever-varying power with which the wings are urged, this being greatest at the beginning of the down-stroke, and least at the end of the up one; (6th), to the contraction of the voluntary muscles and elastic ligaments, and to the effect produced by the various inclined surfaces formed by the wings during their oscillations; (7th), to the weight of the bird—weight itself, when acting upon wings, ...
— Love's Meinie - Three Lectures on Greek and English Birds • John Ruskin
... replied the old man, 'to the Castle wall. When you are tied up, you see its stones expanding and contracting violently, and a similar expansion and contraction seem to take place in your own head and breast. Then, there is a rush of fire and an earthquake, and the Castle springs into the air, and you ...
— The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices • Charles Dickens
... till he believed it. This process is easy. But he saw very well that he could not rise from the lee of the whin bush without being in full view of this eminently practical and absurdly attractive young woman. So he turned to his Hebrew Lexicon with a sigh, and a grim contraction of determined brows which recalled his father. A country girl was nothing to the hunter after curious roots and the amateur of finely shaded ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... heart is caused by its alternate expansion and contraction, as it receives and expels the blood. With one throb, the blood is sent from the right ventricle into the lungs, and from the left ventricle into ...
— A Treatise on Domestic Economy - For the Use of Young Ladies at Home and at School • Catherine Esther Beecher
... Breath and spungy Gums, livid Spots and fungous Ulcers[113] on his Legs, with Pains and Weakness all over. The fourth had also spungy Gums and a foetid Breath, Pains of the Legs and Arms, livid Blotches on his Legs, great Hardness and Contraction of the right Ham, and a livid hard Swelling on the Outside of the left Thigh, ...
— An Account of the Diseases which were most frequent in the British military hospitals in Germany • Donald Monro
... later, usually after months or years, the disease ends in resolution and recovery, or in marked atrophic changes, causing contraction and deformity. As a rule, the general health ...
— Essentials of Diseases of the Skin • Henry Weightman Stelwagon
... decked and somewhat loudly laughing group, Glenfernie with a painter of landscape, Deschamps, and an Oriental, member of some mission to the West. Meeting so, they stopped short. Their nostrils dilated, there seemed to come a stirring over their bodies. Inwardly they felt a painful constriction, a contraction to something hard, intent, and fanged. This was the more strongly felt by Alexander, but Ian felt it, too. Did Glenfernie mean to dog him through life—think that he would be let to do so? Alone in a forest, very far back, they might, at this point, have flown at each other's throat. But they had ...
— Foes • Mary Johnston
... Before its contraction, and in view of its convenience and protection from storms, the East River was the harbor proper of New York. Most of the docks were on that side, and just above Catherine street lay the ship-yards, where at times, in colonial days, an eight-hundred-ton West Indiaman ...
— The Campaign of 1776 around New York and Brooklyn • Henry P. Johnston
... its lost ratio with gold. Our attempt to accomplish this by the free coinage of silver at a ratio differing widely from actual relative values would be the signal for the complete departure of gold from our circulation, the immediate and large contraction of our circulating medium, and a shrinkage in the real value and monetary efficiency of all other forms of currency as they settled to the level of silver monometallism. Everyone who receives a fixed ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Volume 8, Section 2 (of 2): Grover Cleveland • Grover Cleveland
... six miles to the north. It was still loose on the following morning, and I had the boiler pumped up with the intention of attempting to clear the propeller; but one of the manholes developed a leak, the packing being perished by cold or loosened by contraction, and the boiler had to be ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... it sometimes acts on the organism so briskly as to depress and destroy its powers with astonishing rapidity. As the action of cold is most frequently slow and death does not take place until after several hours' exposure, the contraction that diminishes the caliber of the vessels more and more deeply, repels the blood toward the cavities of the head, chest, and abdomen; it causes, in the circulation of the lungs, and in that of the venous system of the head, ...
— Napoleon's Campaign in Russia Anno 1812 • Achilles Rose
... complete thermometer. The water in the glass tube is caused to rise and fall by the expansion and contraction of the air in the tin box. A ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics
... Department looking up problems for their classes for the next day. A physics teacher may be found in the blacksmithing shop digging up problems about the tractive strength of wires and the expansion and contraction of metals under heat and cold. A teacher of chemistry may be found in the kitchen of the cooking school unearthing problems relating to the chemistry of food for her class the next day. If, on the other hand, you go ...
— Booker T. Washington - Builder of a Civilization • Emmett J. Scott and Lyman Beecher Stowe
... the pupil of the eye to dilate, but if he thinks merely of the dilation of the pupil, to have that volition will profit him nothing, because Nature has not connected a motion of the gland which serves to impel the animal spirits towards the optic nerve in a way suitable for dilation or contraction of the pupil with the volition or dilation or contraction, but only with the volition of beholding objects afar off or close at hand. Finally, he maintained that although each motion of this gland appears to be connected by Nature from the commencement ...
— The Philosophy of Spinoza • Baruch de Spinoza
... more active duty. The reverses sustained by the Confederate arms were not to be disguised, nor were our convictions of great danger to the country to be removed by the politic proclamation issued by the Confederate Government, to the effect that a contraction of the lines could exercise no material influence upon the issue of the war. But as it was deemed necessary by the military authorities to abandon the situation, we were not at all sorry to depart; for although we had seen no active service, insatiate ...
— The Narrative of a Blockade-Runner • John Wilkinson
... contraction of Mr. Blunt's facial muscles. Very slight; but I, staring at the narrator after the manner of all simple souls, noticed it; the twitch of a pain which surely must have been mental. There was also a suggestion of effort before he went on: "I suppose you know how he got hold of her?" ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... said, 'Do you not see that the child is suffering from Opisthotonos?' whereupon the first physician stood as one dazed, as if I were trying to trouble his wits by my hard words. But Della Croce at once swept aside all uncertainty by saying, 'He means the backward contraction of the muscles.' I confirmed his words, and added, 'I will show you what I mean.' Whereupon I raised the boy's head, which the doctors and all the rest believed was hanging down through weakness, and by its ...
— Jerome Cardan - A Biographical Study • William George Waters
... languages, still its meaning is the same, and is ever in opposition to bad. We say from the Saxon, good; the Dane, god; the Goth, gods; the German, gut; the Dutch, goed; the Latin, bonus; the Greek, kalos; the Hebrew, tob; the Egyptian, mo. Hence, with the addition of more, or the contraction mor, we have the word Mormon, which means ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... the bow-string, this knotting of the muscles, this contraction before the spring, that makes an audience feel—almost see—the reserve power in a speaker. In some really wonderful way it is more what a speaker does not say and do that reveals the dynamo within. Anything ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein
... contained all that Raikes held dear in the world; every spasm of fear, each contraction of the heart, always began and concluded with the button which moved ...
— The Flaw in the Sapphire • Charles M. Snyder
... of the tube, and retains that calibre until it reaches the point where the cylinder subsides into the mouth-piece, when it contracts gradually to one-tenth of an inch. The inner surface of the tube is perfectly smooth till within a short distance of the point of contraction. For the remaining distance the circular striae, formed by the drill in boring, are distinctly marked. The carving upon it ...
— The Antediluvian World • Ignatius Donnelly
... still wet nestling. All except his ears. They poised at the sides of Leon's shaved head of black bristles, as if butterflies had just lighted there, whispering, with very spread wings, their message, and presently would fly off again. By some sort of muscular contraction, he could wiggle these ears at will, and would do so for a penny, a whistle, and upon one occasion for his brother Rudolph's dead rat, so devised as to dangle from string and window before the unhappy passer-by. They were quivering now, these ears, but because the ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various
... were powerless to reach the plain: they resembled nothing so much as the gutterings of a candle hardening on the outside of its upright shaft. Evidently they had flowed down the slope in a half fluid state, and had been broken by contraction when cooling. In places, too, the surface was streaked with light yellow patches, probably ...
— To the Gold Coast for Gold - A Personal Narrative in Two Volumes.—Vol. I • Richard F. Burton
... have an influence on our behaviour and conduct in society, but even on our ideas of vice and virtue; so as to make us regard any remarkable transgression of such a degree of partiality, either by too great an enlargement, or contraction of the affections, as vicious and immoral. This we may observe in our common judgments concerning actions, where we blame a person, who either centers all his affections in his family, or is so regardless of ...
— A Treatise of Human Nature • David Hume
... mediaeval builders did this with a view of counteracting the "crawl" of the lead. Lead, under the variations of temperature of the atmosphere, expands and contracts considerably; and from its own weight, and the steepness of the roofs, the contraction takes place in a downward direction, and starts the joints, letting in the weather. This raking of the vertical rolls was a device whereby the old builders in some measure got over their difficulty by inducing a ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Norwich - A Description of Its Fabric and A Brief History of the Episcopal See • C. H. B. Quennell
... I was frightened still more, for, as if in answer to my summons, but, of course, because of some muscular contraction following on death, the dead lips slightly parted, and they looked as if they were grinning at me. At that I lost what nerve I had left, and let out a cry, and turned to run back into the room where we had talked. But as I turned there were ...
— Dead Men's Money • J. S. Fletcher
... the top of him. One quiver, one contraction of the claws (in poor Scroope's leg) and all was over. There it lay as though it were asleep, and ...
— Allan and the Holy Flower • H. Rider Haggard
... Overcoming a nervous contraction of the windpipe, I had managed to exclaim "Captain Falk!" His start of surprise was perfectly genuine, but afterwards he neither smiled nor scowled. He simply waited. Then, when I had said, "I must have a talk with you," and had pointed to a chair at my table, ...
— Falk • Joseph Conrad
... syllable, e. g., papapa, occurs far more often than the alternation of a distinctly spoken syllable with, another distinctly spoken one, like pata. In the mean time it is certain that the child during his various movements of lips and tongue, along with contraction and expansion of the opening of the mouth, readily starts with surprise when he notices such a change of acoustic effect. It seems as if he were himself taking pleasure in practicing regularly all sorts of symmetrical and asymmetrical positions of the mouth, ...
— The Mind of the Child, Part II • W. Preyer
... twenty years of age. Her condition was the state of double consciousness, thus aggravated, that when she was not in the trance, she suffered from spasmodic contraction of the limbs. In her alternate state of trance-waking, she was composed and apparently well; but the expression of her countenance was slightly altered, and there was some peculiarity in her mode of speaking. She would mispronounce certain letters, or introduce consonants into words ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 379, May, 1847 • Various
... may be attributed to the scarcity of labour brought about especially by the Black Death. When men could not be had in sufficient number, the necessary consequences was the expansion of pasture and the contraction of tillage; and this dual process was assisted by the stampede of labourers to the towns and the policy of enclosure to which landowners resorted as a remedy. Deprived of their quit-rents, and not having resources for ...
— The Customs of Old England • F. J. Snell
... G with the small t stands for 'Gesellschaft,' which is the German for 'Company.' It is a customary contraction like our 'Co.' P, of course, stands for 'Papier.' Now for the Eg. Let us glance at our 'Continental Gazetteer'." He took down a heavy brown volume from his shelves. "Eglow, Eglonitz—here we are, Egria. It is in a German-speaking country—in Bohemia, not far ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... a god if I should see one. I have said before, and I say again, the brain thinks in spite of me, and I am not responsible for my thought. No more can I control the beating of my heart, the expansion and contraction of my lungs for a moment; no more can I stop the blood that flows through the rivers of the veins. And yet I am held responsible for my belief. Then why does not the God give me the evidence? They say He has. In what? In an inspired book. ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - Latest • Robert Green Ingersoll
... some curious globular and annular objects, which I have nowhere seen explained. Very soon after the sample from the pan is placed upon glass for observation, the surface becomes cooled and somewhat hardened. As the cooling proceeds below the surface, contraction ensues, and consequently a wrinkling of the surface, causing a shimmer of the light in a very attractive manner. This, too, is likely to attract more attention than the delicate, thin cloud of crystals, and may be even confounded with the reflection and refraction of light, by which alone ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 633, February 18, 1888 • Various
... hard, brittle surface of the other Echinoderms; on the contrary, their envelope is tough and leathery, capable of great contraction and dilatation. No idea can be formed of the beauty of these animals either from dried specimens or from those preserved in alcohol. Of course, in either case, they lose their color, become shrunken, and the movable appendages about the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... difficulty is by no means an easy task and will require considerable attention. Permit all the fresh air possible during winter, being careful to keep the piano out of cold drafts, as this will cause a sudden contraction of the varnish and cause it to check or crack. Plants in the room are desirable and vessels of water of any kind will be of assistance. The most potent means of avoiding extreme dryness is to place a single-loaf bread-pan half full of water in the lower part of the piano, taking out the lower panel ...
— The Handy Cyclopedia of Things Worth Knowing - A Manual of Ready Reference • Joseph Triemens
... the slight contraction of the heavy brows at the mention of Sophie Chotek's name, but she went ...
— The Secret Witness • George Gibbs
... sacrifices. The greatest joy of all was to hide from the one beloved the cost of her desires. I can reveal these secrets to you now, for when you hold this paper, heavy with love, I shall be far away. Though I lose the treasures of your gratitude, I do not suffer that contraction of the heart which would disable me if I spoke to you of these matters. Besides, my own beloved, is there not a tender calculation in thus revealing to you the history of the past? Does it not extend our love into the future?—But we need no such supports! ...
— The Marriage Contract • Honore de Balzac
... standard gauge, so that, in reality, the tensile strain is sometimes as high as 18,000 pounds. The mean diameter of the pipe was 1.416 feet. The entrance into the pen-stock was tapered, so that the coefficient of contraction was about 0.92. For pressures not exceeding say 380 feet, the joints were put together stove-pipe fashion. For greater pressures, the joints were made by an inner sleeve riveted on one end of the joint, with an outer lap-welded band, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 455, September 20, 1884 • Various
... another, either on the part of the object (as when they have the same object), or at least on the part of the movement, for joy is with expansion [*Cf. I-II, Q. 33, A. 1] of the heart, whereas sorrow is with contraction; and it is in this sense that the Philosopher speaks in Ethic. ix. Secondly, we may speak of joy and sorrow as being simple acts of the will, to which something is pleasing or displeasing. Accordingly, ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... he is identified with the place, the character of the god is a general and not a special one. The full form of his name appears to have been Ner-unu-gal, of which Nergal, furnished by the Old Testament passage referred to, would then be a contraction or a somewhat corrupt form. The three elements composing his name signify "the mighty one of the great dwelling-place," but it is, again, an open question whether this is a mere play upon the character of the god, as in the ...
— The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria • Morris Jastrow
... any difference in our treatment of him. We had him stripped and wrapped in blankets, and then well rubbed; and we soon had the satisfaction of seeing the livid appearance of his skin wear off, and after several deep respirations, his features lost their sharp contraction, and his lips began to move, and he opened his eyes. He then looked steadfastly at me, and a smile of satisfaction played round his mouth, while he made a strong effort to speak. As he did so, I felt almost certain that I recognised the well-known countenance of my old school-fellow, John Prior. ...
— Mark Seaworth • William H.G. Kingston
... loss of memory, melancholy, sallow complexion, indigestion, loss of appetite, nervous symptoms. Spasmodic muscular contraction of the external sphincter. The bowel contents press upon it; spasm of this sphincter muscle is frequently brought on by the presence of a crack in the mucous membrane, caused by injury inflicted during expulsion of hardened feces. Instead of aiding a bowel movement, the muscles ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... Kaimoon, we turned aside from the road, for taking refreshment under a large oak halfway up that hill, where wild holly-oaks were springing from the ground to mingle with the sombre yet shining boughs of the tree. This was at the sudden contraction of the country into a narrow neck leading to the Plain of Acre. This strait is bounded on one side by Carmel, and on the other by the Galilean hills, both sides clothed with abundance of growing timber; and through its midst is the channel ...
— Byeways in Palestine • James Finn
... state of equilibrium. Its internal heat and the centrifugal force due to its rotation about an axis are trying to expand it. Its own gravitational power is trying to draw all of its materials to the center. Until there is a loss of heat no contraction can occur; but just as soon as there is such a loss gravity proceeds to diminish the stellar volume. Contraction will proceed more slowly than we should at first thought expect, because in the process of contraction ...
— Popular Science Monthly Volume 86
... Celtic saints, the name of this one has been changed by the addition of particles expressive of reverence. The original form was Ernin; the Scottish name is a contraction of the Gaelic words Mo-Ernin-og (my little Ernin). He is considered by some writers to have been of Irish nationality, but this is by no means established. St. Marnock laboured as a missionary in Moray, being specially noted for his zeal in preaching. He died at Aberchirder in Banffshire, ...
— A Calendar of Scottish Saints • Michael Barrett
... There was a contraction of his hand as he pressed the switch over, and then, for perhaps a half second, nothing happened. Just for an instant Tom feared something had gone wrong that the electric current had failed, or that the wires had become disconnected—perhaps ...
— Tom Swift and his Big Tunnel - or, The Hidden City of the Andes • Victor Appleton
... motionless face Schinner breathed in the smoke of his cigar and let it out through his nose without the slightest contraction of feature. Then he took another whiff, kept the smoke in his throat, removed the cigar from his lips, and allowed the smoke slowly ...
— A Start in Life • Honore de Balzac
... laid it aside with a groan of anguish. Then there was handed to him my poor and commonplace work; and he opened the pages and began to read. I soon perceived that an interest was awakened in his mind. Gradually the contraction of his brow grew less severe, and, in a little while, he had ...
— Heart-Histories and Life-Pictures • T. S. Arthur
... Hougues, which are always situated on a rising ground. The word has evidently originated from the German hoch, from which is derived our English high. A hougue, therefore, means a mound or hillock, and in the present instance, the addition of bye is obviously a contraction of Hambye; and, in accordance with the foregoing tradition, means literally the barrow or tomb of ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 396, Saturday, October 31, 1829. • Various
... her," rejoined the earl, the contraction on his brow standing out more plainly. "That comes of your thoughtless runaway marriages. I fell in love with General Conway's daughter, and she ran away with me, like a fool; that is, we were both fools together for our pains. The general objected ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... down slightly, and sound a note or two of the hooter? Suppose another car were—well, that was all right: the road was clear; but at the next turning, when our car neither slackened nor hooted and WAS for an instant full on the wrong side of the road, I had within me a contraction which (at thought of what must have been if—) lasted though all was well. Loath to betray fear, I hadn't turned my face to Pethel. Eyes front! And how about that wagon ahead, huge hay-wagon plodding with its back to us, seeming ...
— James Pethel • Max Beerbohm
... the family is founded on the continual contraction of the circle, originally comprising the whole tribe, within which marital intercourse between both sexes was general. By the continual exclusion, first of near, then of ever remoter relatives, including finally even ...
— Women As Sex Vendors - or, Why Women Are Conservative (Being a View of the Economic - Status of Woman) • R. B. Tobias
... constipation afterwards is unfounded; it does not do so more than other aperients. All aperients quicken for a time what is termed the peristaltic action of the bowels; that is to say, their constant movement in a direction from the stomach to the lower bowel, which, as well as a contraction on themselves, is constantly going on in every living animal, and continues even for some time after death. The bowels stimulated to greater activity of movement by the aperient, become for a time more sluggish afterwards; they rest for a while, just as after a long walk the muscles ...
— The Mother's Manual of Children's Diseases • Charles West, M.D.
... building shook with the great pedal notes, but that does not altogether account for what she felt and enjoyed. The vibration of the air as the organ notes swelled made her sway in answer. Sometimes she puts her hand on a singer's throat to feel the muscular thrill and contraction, and from this she gets genuine pleasure. No one knows, however, just what her sensations are. It is amusing to read in one of the magazines of 1895 that Miss Keller "has a just and intelligent appreciation ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller
... note that the rabble first changed their title, and were called the mob, in the assemblies of this club. It was their beast of burthen, and called first mobile vulgus, but fell naturally into the contraction of one syllable, and ever since is become proper English."—Examen, part III. ch. ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 217, December 24, 1853 • Various
... sitting in this chair, in this study, at ten o'clock at night, longing to die, weary of incessant insight and foresight, without delusions and without hope. Just as I am watching a tongue of blue flame rising in the fire, and my lamp is burning low, the horrible contraction will begin at my chest. I shall only have time to reach the bell, and pull it violently, before the sense of suffocation will come. No one will answer my bell. I know why. My two servants are lovers, and will have ...
— The Lifted Veil • George Eliot
... motor nerve discharge follows which produces ejaculation of the seminal fluid and is for the male the climax of the orgasm. The female is, however, by no means passive; motor nerve discharges take place leading to rhythmic contraction of the vagina, and she experiences, or should experience, a similar orgasm to the male. The climax is followed in both by a feeling of satisfaction and repose which generally issues in refreshing sleep. It is to be noted, ...
— Men, Women, and God • A. Herbert Gray
... whip stroking across his naked back. His muscles corded and heaved up in horrible contraction, but no sound broke from him; again and again the hide whip licked about him until he felt the warm blood running down his legs, and then with merciful suddenness all things went black, and he ...
— Nuala O'Malley • H. Bedford-Jones
... point of work frequently exceeded 85 deg.; and the temperature of the concrete while setting was much higher. This abnormal heat, due to chemical action in the cement, soon passed away, and, with the approach of winter, the contraction of the concrete resulted in transverse cracks. By the middle of the winter these had developed quite uniformly at the ends of each 30-ft. section of concrete arch as placed, and frequently finer cracks showed at about the center of each ...
— Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, vol. LXVIII, Sept. 1910 • James H. Brace, Francis Mason and S. H. Woodard
... nightingale sings when its soul is burdened with love. The passionate tremor that shakes the bird's throat at mating-time seemed to shake the unseen instruments that now discoursed strange melody, and Gervase, listening dreamily, felt a curious contraction and aching at his heart and a sense of suffocation in his throat, combined with an insatiate desire to seize in his arms the mysterious Ziska, with her dark fathomless eyes and slight, yet voluptuous, form,—to drag her to his breast and ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... to comply. She only drew herself together with the nervous contraction of one about to face ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... want, Pannell?" I said, giving him a touch on the arm; but the hammer rose and fell still by the contraction of his right hand, and went on ...
— Patience Wins - War in the Works • George Manville Fenn
... hours. They are accompanied with expectorations of a muddy viscous water, brought away by violent efforts. Sometimes streaks of blood have been observed in this fluid. These convulsions are characterised by the precipitous, involuntary motion of all the limbs, and of the whole body; by the contraction of the throat—by the leaping motions of the hypochondria and the epigastrium—by the dimness and wandering of the eyes—by piercing shrieks, tears, sobbing, and immoderate laughter. They are preceded or followed ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... not a state to be won and kept without much vigorous, conscious effort. The nuts in a machine work loose; the knots in a rope 'come untied,' as the children say. The hand that clasps anything, by slow and imperceptible degrees, loses muscular contraction, and the grip of the fingers becomes slacker. Our minds and affections and wills have that same tendency to slacken their hold of what they grasp. Unless we tighten up the machine it will work loose; and unless we make conscious efforts to keep ourselves in touch with God, His ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... more or less continuous and as a result, these glands secret continuously and become periodically distended as described above. The motor impulses pass to the muscles within the walls of the vesicles, causing a strong spasmodic contraction of these muscles at the moment of emission of semen, thus throwing the contents of the vesicles into the urethra at the same moment when the epididymis the vas deferens and the ducts of the prostate are emptying their secreted contents ...
— The Biology, Physiology and Sociology of Reproduction - Also Sexual Hygiene with Special Reference to the Male • Winfield S. Hall
... dialogue thus recommenced, we are enabled to take a farther glance into the history of Forrester's early life. He was, as he phrased it, from "old So. Ca." pronouncing the name of the state in the abridged form of its written contraction. In one of the lower districts he still held, in fee, a small but inefficient patrimony; the profits of which were put to the use of a young sister. Times, however, had grown hard, and with the impatience and restlessness ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... the same happens in other languages; thus 'armbrust', a crossbow, looks German enough, and yet has nothing to do with 'arm' or 'brust', being a contraction of 'arcubalista', but a contraction under these influences. As little has 'abenteuer' anything to do with 'abend' or 'theuer', however it may seem to be connected with them, being indeed the Provencal 'adventura'. ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench
... the knower. Hence it is manifest that the nature of a non-intelligent being is more contracted and limited; whereas the nature of intelligent beings has a greater amplitude and extension; therefore the Philosopher says (De Anima iii) that "the soul is in a sense all things." Now the contraction of the form comes from the matter. Hence, as we have said above (Q. 7, A. 1) forms according as they are the more immaterial, approach more nearly to a kind of infinity. Therefore it is clear that the immateriality of a thing is the reason why it is cognitive; ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... passages and vestibules, but for comfort having a covering of wood in the audience room. The roof was of iron and masonry, the outer covering of slate being secured to masonry blocks. The iron roof beams of over one hundred feet span, were mounted on rollers to allow for contraction and expansion. The ceiling of the audience room was of iron. The ornamental work of the proscenium, the tier balustrades, and the frames of the partitions between the boxes were all of metal. The stage ...
— Chapters of Opera • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... functional stimuli involved in flying are obviously adaptations, and in my opinion are only to be explained as the hereditary effects of functional stimulation, like all skeleto-muscular adaptations. The strains produced in bones by muscular contraction produce hypertrophy of the part of the bone to which the muscles are attached and thus we can understand the origin of the carina of the sternum in flying birds, and its absence in flightless forms. In bats and in pterodactyls also the sternum is produced into a carina ...
— Hormones and Heredity • J. T. Cunningham
... of dissatisfaction finally began to appear, and, after the nature of such things, they developed with marvellous rapidity. People began to grumble about "contraction of the currency." In every country there arose a party which demanded "free money." Demagogues pointed to the brief reign of paper money after the demonetization of gold as a happy period, when the people had enjoyed their rights, and the "money barons"—borrowing ...
— The Moon Metal • Garrett P. Serviss
... doorway—even Big Louie, whose wits were not particularly keen—knew from the expression which passed over his superior's face that this heavy envelope which he had brought had not contained good news. The quick contraction of muscles which tightened his jaw was too much like a spasm of pain. For her first letter, so the sentence ran, was to be her last; she wrote "less kindly than she would have wished to write," that she and Mr. Wickersham had decided upon the first of May, and after the silence had become ...
— Then I'll Come Back to You • Larry Evans
... subject, but should be glad to hear other opinions; so I again put the question to your correspondents. In conclusion I would observe to "GASTROS" that they must be very late MSS. indeed in which such a contraction as pisan for partisan can be found. If you have room, and think it worth while, I will from time to time send you some corrections of the more flagrant ...
— Notes and Queries 1850.02.23 • Various
... That blurres the grace and blush of Modestie, Cals Vertue Hypocrite, takes off the Rose From the faire forehead of an innocent loue, And makes a blister there. Makes marriage vowes As false as Dicers Oathes. Oh such a deed, As from the body of Contraction pluckes The very soule, and sweete Religion makes A rapsidie of words. Heauens face doth glow, Yea this solidity and compound masse, With tristfull visage as against the doome, Is thought-sicke ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... to an inflammation of the tendons back of the ankle and a drawing up or contraction in consequence. Put on heel calks one inch, no toe, to rest and relieve the back tendons from strain. Apply the following liniment at night, after which put on cold-water swabs and let them remain all night: Soap liniment, 8 ounces; tincture iodine, 2 ounces; oil cedar, ...
— One Thousand Questions in California Agriculture Answered • E.J. Wickson
... wider, or expansion, Drawing nearer, or contraction, Falling, rising, Slanting, crossing, Convex, concave, curved lines, ...
— The Infant System - For Developing the Intellectual and Moral Powers of all Children, - from One to Seven years of Age • Samuel Wilderspin
... correlatives are often used in poetry for neither ... nor (Shakespeare often omitting the former altogether), and are equally correct. Nor is only a contraction of neither, and the first may as well be ...
— Milton's Comus • John Milton
... mechanical action of salt upon the composition of the cartilage, the oyster opens when placed in salt water. Iron, however, exercises an electro-magnetic influence upon the composition forming the body of the bivalve, causing a sudden contraction—so that, on a knife being introduced into the shell, the latter closes in the most natural way. We manufacture pearls on the premises, and advertise that one oyster in every gross taken from our beds contains a pearl of more or less value; and there's a greater ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 27, March 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... texture. The great elasticity of any kind of texture produced by knitting is the chief feature that distinguishes hosiery from woven stuffs. The nature of the loop formed by the knitting needle favors elongation and contraction without marring in the least the general structure of the goods. Builders of weavers' looms have at times endeavored to secure this elastic effect by certain manipulations of the mechanism of the loom, but as yet nothing approaching ...
— Textiles • William H. Dooley
... up to her sofa, and she was taking her afternoon tea. It was rather painful to see her lifting her tea-cup slowly and carefully with her left hand, but that was all. The dark eyes still flashed with the old eagle glance, the lines of the lips were as proud and firm as ever. All sign of contraction or distortion had passed away. In hours of calm her ladyship's beauty was unimpaired; but with any strong emotion there came a convulsive working of the features, and the face was momentarily drawn and distorted, as it had been at the ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... the Forminiere and what does it do? The name is a contraction of Societe Internationale Forestiere & Miniere du Congo. In the Congo, where companies have long titles, it is the fashion to reduce them to the dimensions of a cable code-word. Thus the high-sounding Compagnie ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson |
