"Ell" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... took in your sleep, George," he said; "where'd you be then? You jest think of that me boy." By this time I was thoroughly miserable and frightened, and this suggestion unnerved me dreadfully but I kept up an impenitent front. "To wake in 'ell," said Uncle Nicodemus, in gentle tones. "You don't want to wake in 'ell, George, burnin' and screamin' for ever, do ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... "Enthusiastic? We-ell, I can't say I know much about it. Of course, I know the sort of putrid tosh he'll sling at them, but what I want is to see him ...
— Mr. Waddington of Wyck • May Sinclair
... the inseparable quid in his cheek, and slyly drawled out, "W-ell, if ye must, ye must! I a'n't a-goin' ter stand in the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... legs shrivelled up, and became thin and red; the beautiful yellow slippers of the caliph and his companion turned into clumsy stork-feet; their arms became wings; their necks stretched out from their shoulders, and were an ell long; their beards disappeared, and their bodies were covered with soft feathers, instead ...
— What the Animals Do and Say • Eliza Lee Follen
... with the joy of fighting and sought to deal with him roughly and bigly. Then he cast aside his spear and drew sword, and as Martimor walloped toward him, he lightly swerved, and with one stroke cut in twain the young fir-tree, so that not above an ell was ...
— The Blue Flower, and Others • Henry van Dyke
... expectant. No, there was no sound of brisk, springy footsteps on the elastic wooden walk. Already men had noted that quick, alert, soldierly gait of the new officer. But "shut up" was repeated when audible murmurs were made. "There's more fellows a-horseback up yonder. Who in 'ell's out to-night?" queried the citizen with the keenest ears. "Jimmy, boy, run up there and scout—I'll give ...
— A Wounded Name • Charles King
... peculiar people destined, one day or other, by hook or by crook, to get possession of it. In truth, they are a wonderful and all-prevalent people; of that class who only require an inch to gain an ell; or a halter to gain a horse. From the time they first gained a foothold on Plymouth Rock, they began to migrate, progressing and progressing from place to place, and land to land, making a little here and a little there, and ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... responded Wade, wiping the perspiration from his forehead. He pushed his way past the drooping branches of an overgrown syringa, tripped over a box-bush, and passed around the left of the house, following the remains of a path which led him to a door in an ell. Back here there were gnarled apple and pear and cherry trees, a tropical clump of rhubarb, and traces of what had evidently been at one time a kitchen garden. Old-fashioned perennials blossomed here and there; lupins and Sweet Williams and other sturdy things which had resisted the encroachment ...
— The Lilac Girl • Ralph Henry Barbour
... us with a racing stud," lisps the gunner, "but, by G——, they'll shy chaff enough at us to keep all the bloomin' horses between 'ere and 'ell, and the girls will send us a kid's feedin' bottle, as a mark of feelin' and esteem, every Valentine's Day for ten years to come, because of the glorious name we made for Australia on the bloody fields of war ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... stray word, you for each inch take an ell. Lightly all laws and ties trammel me, I ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... Element elemento. Elementary elementa. Elephant elefanto. Elevate altigi. Elevation (height) altajxo. Elf koboldo, feino. Elicit eltiri. Elide elizii. Eligible elektebla. Eligibility elektebleco. Eliminate elmeti. Elision elizio. Elite eminentularo. Ell ulno. Ellipse elipso. Elm ulmo. Elocution parolscienco. Eloquence elokventeco. Eloquent elokventa. Elope forkuri. Else alie. Elsewhere aliloke. Elude lerte eviti. Emaciated malgrasega. Emanate deveni. Emancipate liberigi. Embalm balzamumi. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... the later time. Now it is true, and must be conceded, that this mode of representation is here employed to an extent greater than it is anywhere else in the Old Testament. But, in matters of this kind, measuring by the ell is quite out of place. In other respects also, the second part of Isaiah stands out as quite unique. There is, in the whole Old Testament, no other continuous prophecy which has so absolutely and pre-eminently proceeded from cura posteritatis. ...
— Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions. Vol. 2 • Ernst Hengstenberg
... blessed her stars that Andrew's risk was o'er That she had thus the dire return received, And saved the man for whom her bosom grieved. So much emotion William seemed to feel, No grace he gave, but all performed with zeal; Retaliated ev'ry way so well, He measure gave for measure:—ell for ell. How true the adage, that revenge is sweet! The plan he followed clearly was discrete; For since he wished his honour to repair:— Of any better way I'm ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine
... th' 'ell's that? 'Ere! Give us it in points! None o' yer bloomin' degrees aboard square-sail, ...
— The Brassbounder - A Tale of the Sea • David W. Bone
... linen-draper, declaring his own unpopular name, and appealing to the linen-draper's feelings of hospitality; whereupon the linen-draper, utterly forgetful of all party rancour, nobly responded to the appeal, and telling his wife to conduct his lordship upstairs, jumped over the counter, with his ell in his hand, and placing himself with half-a-dozen of his assistants at the door of his boutique, manfully confronted the mob, telling them that he would allow himself to be torn to a thousand pieces ere he would permit them to injure a ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... the Iroquois proposed to incorporate into the Confederacy the remnants of the Hurons, the Jesuits discerned nothing in the plan but the most excellent means to convert pagan Iroquois by Christian Hurons. Having gained an inch, the Iroquois demanded the proverbial ell. They asked that a French settlement be made in the Iroquois country. The Indians wanted a supply of firearms to war against all enemies; and with a French settlement miles away from help, the Iroquois ...
— Pathfinders of the West • A. C. Laut
... inch," said Jared hardily, "and then you went to work to take me down an ell. You've tried to harm me all you could; you've tried to ruin me. But it couldn't be done. Let me tell you this: I've sold seventeen hundred dollars' worth of my work here, and the first of the month I'm going East with a lot ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller
... thou'rt—what thou art. Set wigs of million curls upon thy head, to raise thee, Wear shoes an ell in height,—the truth betrays thee, And thou ...
— Faust • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... cases of books. At the far end of the room, toward the rear of the house, was another door. Duvall stole over to it, listened carefully, then slowly opened it and looked within. The room proved to be the doctor's private office, and he saw at once that it was built in a sort of ell, and could not be entered except through the room in which he stood. There was a door, it is true, in the right-hand wall, which had once given entrance to the hall, but against this a heavy instrument case, ...
— The Ivory Snuff Box • Arnold Fredericks
... intently and then pushed Duke Lane back. "Don't like that—sounds like a crack on the head. Hey, Jim! Say something!" he called softly. The three knocks were repeated, but Boggs was suspicious and he shook his head decisively. "To 'ell with the knocking—say something!" ...
— Bar-20 Days • Clarence E. Mulford
... were orders of the General Court forbidding 'short sleeves whereby the nakedness of the arms may be discovered.' Women's sleeves were not to be more than half an ell wide. There were to be no 'immoderate great sleeves, immoderate ... knots of ryban, broad shoulder bands and rayles, silk ruses, double ruffles and cuffs.' The women were complained of because of their 'wearing borders of hair and their cutting, ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday
... lay with my bouncing Nell, I gave her an Inch, and she took an Ell: But I think in this Case it was damnable hard, When I gave her an Inch, she'd want ...
— The Merry-Thought: or the Glass-Window and Bog-House Miscellany - Parts 2, 3 and 4 • Hurlo Thrumbo (pseudonym)
... "How 'n 'ell did he git here—the doctor?" he demanded, making a great effort to hold his voice down to a whisper, and forgetting now and then. "How'd he know Brit rolled off'n the grade? Us here, we never knowed it, and I was tryin' to send him back when ...
— The Quirt • B.M. Bower
... hasten it by a moment. Time is nothing. I'm even beginning to believe there's no such thing; there is so little difference, la-bas, between a year and a day. And as for space—dear me, an inch is as as an ell! ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... could be agitating the mind of the usually imperturbable little Jean. When she caught eight of Grace, she threw up her arms with a loud, bitter wail that rang among the old elms, echoing through their arching branches, and startling the birds that had just gone to roost. "Oh, Miss Cam'ell! Geordie, Geordie!—he's hurt; he's dyin'; ...
— Geordie's Tryst - A Tale of Scottish Life • Mrs. Milne Rae
... clad in white and red, and bearing as a present to the delighted foresters a hundred bows of the finest quality, each with its sheaf of arrows, with burnished points, peacock feathers, and notched with silver. Each shaft was an ell long. ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 4 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... except the home-dwellers. And now there's bicycles and motor cars almost every day. Most on 'em just pokes their noses round, and then off they goes. Some wants to see the tomb inside, and then there's a big stone over an old doorway at the back o' the church, what they calls ''Arrowing o' 'Ell,' though I don't know what it means. You've 'eard on it? Well, I suppose it's something wonderful; but I could nivver see no 'Arrow ...
— Mad Shepherds - and Other Human Studies • L. P. Jacks
... "We-ell," said the school chaplain slowly, "I don't know what Corkran's appreciation of your style may be, but young McTurk reads Ruskin ...
— Stalky & Co. • Rudyard Kipling
... to New South Wales, Nor hunt for glory at the Pole— To feed the sharks, or catch the whales, Or tempt a Lapland lady's soul. I'll never willing stir an ell Beyond old England's chalky border, To steal or smuggle, buy or sell, To drink cheap wine, or ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 290 - Volume X. No. 290. Saturday, December 29, 1827. • Various
... and the house goes back in a surprising brick ell that is not seen from the street. The exterior presents the appearance of a story-and-a-half cottage. Two windows, with their uncommon blinds, break the wood-shingled roof. The blinds' slats are wide and heavy, and the shutters are held in place when opened by the traditional molded ...
— Seaport in Virginia - George Washington's Alexandria • Gay Montague Moore
... bearing, speech, and dress of the members of their community. Yet we may thank them for having done so; it was a wise precaution; they knew the frailties of the flesh, and how easily license takes an ell if an inch be given it. Nothing less iron than was their self-restraint could have provided material stanch enough to build up the framework of our nation. One might not have enjoyed living with them; but we may ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... city, mounted on horses superbly caparisoned, and attended by slaves, meet, commonly on Sunday morning, on their playground. Each of the riders is furnished with one or two djerids, straight white sticks, a little thinner than an umbrella-stick, less at one end than at the other and about an ell in length, together with a thin cane crooked at the head. The horsemen, perhaps a hundred in number, gallop about in as narrow a space as possible, throwing the djerids at each other and shouting. Each man then selects an opponent who ...
— The Life of Lord Byron • John Galt
... circling round and round, one fold upon another, which gradually increased to the size of my wrist in the middle, and then as gradually decreased till it terminated in a point again at the contrary extreme; all which spiral, if it were fairly extended in length, might be a yard or an ell long. I surveyed this strange vegetable very attentively; it had a rind, or crust, which I could not break with my hand, but taking my knife and making an opening therewith in the shell, there issued out a sort of milky liquor in great ...
— Life And Adventures Of Peter Wilkins, Vol. I. (of II.) • Robert Paltock
... great run, and smiteth him in the broad of the breast and thrusted his spear half an ell into his body, and beareth him to the ground, both him and his horse all in a heap, and draweth his spear back to him and looketh at the knight that lay as dead and leaveth him in the launde, and draweth him towards the ...
— High History of the Holy Graal • Unknown
... body I shall never stir him again from beside his fire, nor follow as he leads the way through the labyrinth of his house; but in spirit, at times, I still steal back, and I always find the same kind welcome awaiting me in the guest room in the ell, and the same bright smile of morning to gild the tiny garden court. The only things beyond the grasp of change are our own ...
— Noto, An Unexplored Corner of Japan • Percival Lowell
... 'ell else am I trying to do for you, lydy?" the man answered with pathos; but the ...
— Actions and Reactions • Rudyard Kipling
... your savings on a dress suit?" Cappy exploded. "Whadja mean by courting my Florry, eh? Tell me that! Give you an inch and you'll take an ell! Infernal young scoundrel!" ...
— Cappy Ricks • Peter B. Kyne
... experience, that three quarters of a Pound of Thread worth 12 d. per Pound spinning, will make one Ell of Cloth worth 2 s. per Ell; which Three quarters of a Pound two Spinners may spin in one day; Hence ...
— Proposals For Building, In Every County, A Working-Alms-House or Hospital • Richard Haines
... yesterday, at a merchant's in Cheapside, three new shifts, that cost fourteen pence an ell, and I am to have a pair of new stuff shoes, for my Lord of Norfolk's ball, which will ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott
... a pepperbox. Marked "Ell's Patent." The cataloguer has never before seen a pistol of this type. Good condition. .31 Cal. Purchased in a Philadelphia pawn-shop, and said to be a favorite arm of the Negroes in that ...
— A Catalogue of Early Pennsylvania and Other Firearms and Edged Weapons at "Restless Oaks" • Henry W. Shoemaker
... thousand influences that wrap you about only to soothe and delight. The reception that has been harsh and unfriendly bears no manner of proportion to that which has been genial and generous. So where you have given me an inch I take an ell, and commission this bright morning—shine to bear to you my thanks. For every kind word, whether it have come to me through the highways or the by-ways, from far or near, from known or unknown, I pray you receive my grateful acknowledgment. And do not fail to remember, that ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... quietly—I and an old landlady who is now dead. How my heart aches to remember her, for she was a good woman, and never overcharged for her rooms. Her whole time was spent in making patchwork quilts with knitting-needles that were an arshin [An ell.] long. Oftentimes we shared the same candle and board. Also she had a granddaughter, Masha—a girl who was then a mere baby, but must now be a girl of thirteen. This little piece of mischief, how she used to make us laugh the day long! We lived together, a happy family of three. ...
— Poor Folk • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... helped to trace more definitely for nearly forty years. The house was a small cottage of the humblest New England type. It had a little cobbler's-shop, or what had formerly been a cobbler's-shop, for an ell. Besides that, there were three rooms on the ground-floor—the kitchen, the sitting-room, and a little bedroom which Henry and Sylvia occupied. Sylvia had cooking-stoves in both the old shop and the kitchen. The kitchen stove was kept well polished, ...
— The Shoulders of Atlas - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... of the sixteenth century. But Ibn Batuta, in the 14th, states it at 11 spans, or more than the modern report. [Ibn Khordadhbeh at 70 cubits.—H.C.] Marignolli, on the other hand, says that he measured it and found it to be 2-1/2 palms, or about half a Prague ell, which corresponds in a general way with Hardy's tradition. Valentyn calls it 1-1/2 ell in length; Knox says 2 feet; Herman Bree (De Bry ?), quoted by Fabricius, 8-1/2 spans; a Chinese account, quoted below, 8 feet. These discrepancies remind one of the ancient Buddhist ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... "We're all sinners, you and me, but Jesus can save us. 'E loves sinners. 'E bears their sins; your sins an' my sins, dear brethren; 'e bears the sins of the 'ole world. Why, that's wot 'e came inter the world for—to save sinners. Ter save 'em from death an' everlasting 'ell! That's wot ...
— The Tysons - (Mr. and Mrs. Nevill Tyson) • May Sinclair
... a fresh-faced lad chirps up: "T' 'ell wif yer Lonnon an' yer whuskey. Gimme a jug o' cider on the sunny side of a 'ay rick in old Surrey. Gimme a happle tart to go wif it. Gawd, I'm fed up on ...
— A Yankee in the Trenches • R. Derby Holmes
... it is 'orrible 'Enery 'Emms, And I 'ails from a 'ell of a 'ole! The things I 'ave thought an' the deeds I 'ave did Are remarkable lawless an' better kep' hid, So if Morgan you think of, an' Sharkey an' Kidd, Forget 'em! To name such beginners as them's An insult, so shivver my soul! Yow! In every port o' the whole seven seas I 'ave two or three ...
— The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy
... melted with self-love. There was a kirtle of a mingled colour, and the blue shot into the green, and the green lightened from the blue, as the colours play in the ocean between deeps and shallows: she thought she could endure to live no longer and not wear it. There was a bracelet of an ell long, wrought like a serpent and with fiery jewels for the eyes; she saw it shine on her white arm and her head grew dizzy with desire. "Ah!" she thought, "never were fine lendings better met with a fair wearer." ...
— The Waif Woman • Robert Louis Stevenson
... some cabbage-salad with snorkery-snickery ell-grass dressing on it, some water-lily cake, and some moss covered eggs for your breakfast," said the fish. "And I wish you good luck ...
— Uncle Wiggily's Adventures • Howard R. Garis
... raining a-softly now and he hurried along. His office was in a little ell part in a rather inviting looking house, and he took his meals with the tenant. The office boy was on the lookout for him, it ...
— A Modern Cinderella • Amanda M. Douglas
... furnish those approximate measures which satisfied men's needs in ruder ages, but they furnished also the standard measures required in later times. One instance occurs in our own history. To remedy the irregularities then prevailing, Henry I. commanded that the ulna, or ancient ell, which answers to the modern yard, should be made of the exact length ...
— Essays on Education and Kindred Subjects - Everyman's Library • Herbert Spencer
... an' trottin' from the other place over here day in an' day out. An' when his Uncle Nat died, two year ago, then was the time for him to come over here an' marry 'Mandy an' carry on the farm. But no, he'd rather hang round the old place, an' sleep in the ell-chamber, an' do their chores for his board, an' keep on a-runnin' over here.' An' when young Nat married, I says to myself, 'That'll make him speak.' But it didn't—an' you 're a laughin'-stock, 'Mandy ...
— Meadow Grass - Tales of New England Life • Alice Brown
... thinking about?' answered the scoundrel. 'Am I then—. Where do you buy your calico?' the scoundrel began after a pause. 'How much do you pay an ell? Where do you buy your linen cloth? How high does it come by the ell? Where do you buy your ...
— Armenian Literature • Anonymous
... Palace the Releevants creep,— A hundred poor old women, nigh their end, Wearing their black cloth gowns, and on each head An ell of snow-white holland which, some said, Afterwards they might keep, —Ah, Toll!—with nine new shillings each to spend, For all the trouble that they had, and all The sorrow of ...
— Collected Poems - Volume Two (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... any degree successful were Elias Schlegel, and afterwards Cronegk and Weisse. I know not whether their labours, if translated into good French verse, would then appear as frigid as they now do in German. It is insufferable to us to read verses of an ell long, in which the style seldom rises above watery prose; for a true poetic language was not formed in German until a subsequent period. The Alexandrine, which in no language can be a good metre, is doubly stiff and heavy ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... boarding with anyone but Jerry Longworthy she would have gone at once but Jerry Longworthy was very apt to forget that she preferred work to love. If she went to his back yard he would be sure to think that her coming was an inch and proceed to make an ell out of it. It would be far wiser to stay away. So she shook her head. "Not now, Mary Rose," she ...
— Mary Rose of Mifflin • Frances R. Sterrett
... "we-e-ell—" and stopped. Countless times he had punished Big Tom in his own way; and had looked ahead to the hour when, grown-up, and the longshoreman's physical equal, he could measure out to the latter punishment of a substantial kind. Yet now that Mr. Perkins had done just this, ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... fairly large one, situated in an ell at the rear of the building. Of its two windows, one, as has already been pointed out, overlooked the court between the apartment building and the house next door. The other faced toward the rear. Duvall placed his kit of tools upon the floor, and began an ...
— The Film of Fear • Arnold Fredericks
... unhealthy diet; so that there cannot be any thing more erroneous than the magnificent ideas formed of "the roast beef of old England." We must entertain as mean an idea of its cleanliness. Only seventy ells of linen, at eightpence an ell, are annually allowed for this great family. No sheets were used. This linen was made into eight table-cloths for my lord's table, and one table-cloth for the knights, (p.16.) This last, I suppose, was washed only once a month. Only forty shillings ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume
... forbade continuance of her instruction; telling her, in the first place, that the thing itself was unlawful; that it was also unsafe, and could only lead to mischief. To use{114} his own words, further, he said, "if you give a nigger an inch, he will take an ell;" "he should know nothing but the will of his master, and learn to obey it." "if you teach that nigger—speaking of myself—how to read the bible, there will be no keeping him;" "it would forever unfit him for the duties of a slave;" and "as to ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass
... put young Bassett back instead of him. Sey-mour's. Buck up, Seymour's. We-ell played! There, did you ever see anything like ...
— The Gold Bat • P. G. Wodehouse
... would do so, and never again be summoned for a similar offence. He left the Court and returned to his cure, and as soon as he came there, he called the draper and the tailor, and he had a gown made which trailed three quarters of an ell on the ground; for he told the tailor how he had been reproved for wearing a short gown, and ordered ...
— One Hundred Merrie And Delightsome Stories - Les Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles • Various
... the long, low living-room of the farmhouse where they were sitting. Louise had gone to direct her maid in packing for her flitting to the seaside in the morning; Matt could see a light in the ell-chamber where Maxwell was probably writing. "The self-made man can never be the society equal of the society-made man. He may have more brains, more money, more virtue, but he's a kind of inferior, and he betrays his inferiority ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells
... 196. line, bar, rule, stripe, streak, spoke, radius. lengthening &c v.; prolongation, production, protraction; tension, tensure^; extension. [Measures of length] line, nail, inch, hand, palm, foot, cubit, yard, ell, fathom, rood, pole, furlong, mile, league; chain, link; arpent^, handbreadth^, jornada [U.S.], kos^, vara^. [astronomical units of distance] astronomical unit, AU, light- year, parsec. [metric units of length] nanometer, nm, micron, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... with the King for their cargo, and the King engaged to give them whatever there was in the country for their money, and they settled to give for the bahar of cloves fourteen ells of yellow cloth of seventy-seven tem, which are worth in Castile a ducat the ell; of red cloth of the same kind ten ells; they also gave thirty ells of Britanny linen cloth, and for each of these quantities they received a bahar of cloves; likewise for thirty knives, eight bahars. Having thus settled all the above mentioned prices, the inhabitants of the country ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various
... argued. But the fact is, I stayed because I couldn't go away. Of course, it was an abominable position, but I assure you it felt like heaven when it didn't feel like 'ell." ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... with macron [a,] a with ogonek (tail) ['c] c with acute accent [vc] c with caron [-e] e with macron [ve] e with caron [e,] e with ogonek [)e] e with breve [-i] i with macron [)i] i with breve [/l] ell with stroke ['m] m with acute accent ['n] n with acute accent [vn] n with caron [-o] o with macron [vr] r with caron [.r] r with dot over ['s] s with acute accent [vs] s with caron [-u] u with macron ['z] z with acute accent ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron
... Upon this occasion she wore a skirt vast in width, of a pattern then much in vogue. The sleeves also were preposterously large, in accordance with the custom of the times. About her neck a beautiful white linen ruff stood out at least the eighth part of an ell. The day had been damp and cold, and the room in which she had been sitting was chilly. For that reason, most fortunately, she had thrown over her shoulders a wide sable cloak broad enough to enfold her many times and long enough ...
— Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall • Charles Major
... his joke or his word about Mr. Raeburn," said the cook in an injured voice. "And last Sunday when I went to the minister to show my lines, he said a member ought to be ashamed to take service with a hatheist and that I was in an 'ouse of 'ell. Those was his very words, miss, an 'ouse of ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... other, and Jack, in 'is free-'anded way, 'e give 'er a five-pun' note. Next week she come agen for somethin' else, and stopped and talked to 'im about 'is soul in the passage. She told 'im as 'e was a-goin' straight to 'ell, and that 'e oughter give up the bookmakin' and settle down to a respec'ble, God-fearin' business. At fust 'e only laughed, but she lammed in tracts at 'im full of the most awful language; and one day she fetched 'im round to ...
— Sketches in Lavender, Blue and Green • Jerome K. Jerome
... "'Fraid he'd get mad's 'ell an' quit me," said Breede. "Only st'nogfer ever found gimme minute's peace. Dunno why—talk aw ri'. He un'stan's me; ...
— Bunker Bean • Harry Leon Wilson
... studious life at Valence was soon ended. Early in August, 1786, a little rebellion, known as the "Two-cent Revolt," broke out in Lyons over a strike of the silk-weavers for two cents an ell more pay and the revolt of the tavern-keepers against the enforcement of the "Banvin," an ancient feudal right levying a heavy tax on the sale of wine. The neighboring garrisons were ordered to furnish their ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. I. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... with a thread on each end and a coupling screwed on one end. The lengths come in bundles up to 1-1/2-inches and in single lengths over that size. Screw pipe fittings, it will be noted, are called by a different name than cast-iron ones. The fittings in common use today are the 90 degree ell, 45, 22, and 16-2/3. The Y and TY, tucker fittings, and inverted Ys are used in practically the same way as the cast-iron fittings. The 90 degree ell, 45, 22, and 16-2/3 are used to change the run of pipe that many degrees. ...
— Elements of Plumbing • Samuel Dibble
... The houses generally have wounded soldiers in them, and these play croquet with a nurse on the lawn, or smoke in the sun. None of them want to go back to fight. They seem tired, and talk of the trenches as "proper 'ell." ...
— My War Experiences in Two Continents • Sarah Macnaughtan
... computation will Never afford us a standard by which we may judge of proportions. No one will ever be able to determine by an exact numeration, that an inch has fewer points than a foot, or a foot fewer than an ell or any greater measure: for which reason we seldom or never consider this as the standard of equality ...
— A Treatise of Human Nature • David Hume
... Hale and Stout, Comely enough,—so said Mistress Prue and many other damsels,—with a Military Education, an approved reputation for Valour, and very little else besides. A gentleman at large, with a purse well-nigh as slender as an ell-wand, and as wobegone as a dried eel-skin. But I was never one that wanted many Superfluities; and having no Friends in the world, was of a most ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 3 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... with such a look about the long lip of him as my Lord of Buckingham might have if his scullion made free with him. His aunt, the Duchess of Savoy, is a merry dame, and a wise! She and our King can talk by the ell, but as for the Emperor, he speaketh to none willingly save Queen Katharine, who is of his own stiff Spanish humour, and he hath eyes for none save Queen Mary, who would have been his empress had high folk ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge
... aged printer, "think you you can fill one of these news sheets in a few days! Where indeed if you search the whole realm will you find talk enough in a single week to fill out this great sheet half an ell wide!" ...
— Moonbeams From the Larger Lunacy • Stephen Leacock
... binder, who was going to use the MS. to patch his books withal." Rossi, who may have seen Naude at work, tells us how he would enter a shop with a yard-measure in his hand, buying books, we are sorry to say, by the ell. "The stalls where he had passed were like the towns through which Attila or the Tartars had swept, with ruin in their train,—ut non hominis unius sedulitas, sed calamitas quaedam per omnes bibliopolarum tabernas pervasisse videatur!" Naude had sorrows ...
— Books and Bookmen • Andrew Lang
... is proved to be of imported brick by the bills which are still existing for the purchase and transportation of the brick. A later form of many houses was two stories or two stories and a half in front, with a peaked roof that sloped down nearly to the ground in the back over an ell covering the kitchen, added in the shape known as a lean-to, or, as it was called by country folk, the linter. This sloping roof gave the one element of unconscious picturesqueness which redeemed the prosaic ugliness of these bare-walled ...
— Home Life in Colonial Days • Alice Morse Earle
... radishes—not the short kind—surrounded by long, green leaves and tied with a yellow cord; while on mine were roses as big as a baby's head, interlaced with leaves and buds and gathered into bouquets graced with a blue ribbon. It was ten dollars an ell; but, as the petticoats were very short, six ells was enough for each. At that time real hats were unknown. For driving or for evening they placed on top of the high, powdered hair what they called ...
— Strange True Stories of Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... doest thou complaine of me and of destinie? Doe we offer thee any wrong? is it for thee to direct us, or for us to governe thee? Although thy age be not come to her period, thy life is. A little man is a whole man as well as a great man. Neither men nor their lives are measured by the Ell. Chiron refused immortalitie, being informed of the conditions thereof, even by the God of time and of continuance, Saturne his father. Imagine truly how much an ever-during life would be lesse tolerable and more painfull to a man, than is the life which I have given him. Had you not ...
— Literary and Philosophical Essays • Various
... the white farmhouse, nestling among the apple trees, the front to the west and facing on the lane that led up to a farm above. The house had a one-story ell on the end toward him, containing the kitchen and pantry—this ell projected back almost to the smokehouse. On the opposite side, but hidden from his view, there was a wide porch running the full length of house and ell, and in the angle formed by the porch, stood the ...
— Hidden Treasure • John Thomas Simpson
... proue that this cru- ell and wicked beest had a great cause to slee Milo / yf he wolde brynge his ma- ters that he we[n]t about to passe / and great hope if he were ones gone / nat to be letted ...
— The Art or Crafte of Rhetoryke • Leonard Cox
... it upon record, that his great surprise was, that so small a pistol could kill so big a man. These are the words of that venerable biographer, whose trade had not taught him by experience, that an inch was as good as an ell. "He," (Francis Gordon) "got a shot in his head out of a pocket-pistol, rather fit for diverting a boy than killing such a furious, mad, brisk man, which notwithstanding ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... because in fact it never does. And where Irene seems hard and cruel, as in the Bois de Boulogne, or the Goupenor Gallery, she is but wisely realistic—knowing that the least concession is the inch which precedes the impossible, the repulsive ell. ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... Ambitious. They are parsimonious in their Diet, as the Holy Fathers were in their frugal life in the Desert, known by the name of Eremites. They go naked, having no other Covering but what conceals their Pudends from publick sight. An hairy Plad, or loose Coat, about an Ell, or a coarse woven Cloth at most Two Ells long serves them for the warmest Winter Garment. They lye on a coarse Rug or Matt, and those that have the most plentiful Estate or Fortunes, the better sort, use Net-work, knotted ...
— A Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies • Bartolome de las Casas
... S'estoient vestuz d'un manteau precieux A raiz ardens de diverse couleur: Tout estoit plein de beaute, de bonheur, La mer tranquille, et le vent gracieulx, Quand celle la nasquit en ces bas lieux Qui a pille du monde tout l'honneur. Ell' prist son teint des beux lyz blanchissans, Son chef de l'or, ses deux levres des rozes, Et du soleil ses yeux resplandissans: Le ciel usant de liberalite, Mist en l'esprit ses semences encloses, Son ...
— The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry • Walter Horatio Pater
... old Jasper would croak triumphantly. "Oh! 'e were a gen'us were my bye Jarge. 'Ell come a-marchin' back to 'is old feyther, some day, wi' 'is pockets stuffed full o' money an' bank-notes—I knaw—I knaw, old Jasper ...
— My Lady Caprice • Jeffrey Farnol
... getting a fresh breakfast for the three men he said to Mead, "It's mighty lucky you've come 'ome, sir. There's been merry 'ell 'erself between our boys and the Fillmore boys, and they're likely to be killin' each other off at Alamo Springs to-day. They 'ad shots over a maverick yesterday, and the swearin' they've been doin' 'ad enough fire and brimstone in ...
— With Hoops of Steel • Florence Finch Kelly
... "'Where in 'ell are we?' shouts 'er skipper as we comed nosing through the fog. 'I ain't seen the sun ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, December 8, 1920 • Various
... immediately obeyed by the servile Chinaman, each of the two guards who stood by him seized one of the plaited tails of hair, which was nearly an ell in length, and pulled up his head from the floor. The Chinaman then remained cross-legged, with his eyes ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Frederick Marryat
... edition of Dr. ——ell's "Antient and Modern Geography," says Nicholls, was published by an association of respectable booksellers, who about the year 1719 entered into an especial partnership, for the purpose of printing some ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... gulfs to dilating, shadowing, quickening windows of thought. "Russ-ell Archi-bald Sittell," she echoed. "Ranger! Secret aid ...
— The Rustlers of Pecos County • Zane Grey
... first school, kept by his life-long friend, Joshua Coffin, to whom he addressed the poem, "To My Old Schoolmaster." As I happened to be a nephew of Coffin, he told me stories of his first school. It was kept in an unfinished ell of a farmhouse; but the room had been transformed into a neatly furnished kitchen when we visited it. In the poem referred to he alludes to the quarrels of the good man and his tipsy wife heard through "the cracked and crazy wall." He told this ...
— Whittier-land - A Handbook of North Essex • Samuel T. Pickard
... enough to take care of the wench when thy mother was ill; there was reason for that. And the child is a nice child enough, when she is not cross; but still there are some folks, it seems, who, if you give them an inch, will take an ell. Where's Bessy, that she can't mind ...
— The Grey Woman and other Tales • Mrs. (Elizabeth) Gaskell
... that," replied the man, "but I'll tell you what I'll do with you,—I'll lay you two to one, in fives or fifties if you like, that you knew before you axed, and that Thunderbolt don't win the Riddlesworth." "Really," said Mr. Jorrocks, "I'm not a betting man." "Then, wot the 'ell business have you at Newmarket?" was all the answer he got. Disgusted with such inhospitable impertinence, Mr. Jorrocks turned on his heel and walked away. Before the "White Hart" Inn was a smartish pony phaeton, in charge of a ...
— Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities • Robert Smith Surtees
... boldly with hatchets and pikes to kill a few of these monsters to take home, but it was harder work than they thought. The wind suddenly rose, too, and rent the ice into great pieces, so they had to content themselves by getting a few of their ivory teeth, which they reported to be half an ell long. With these and other treasures Barents was now forced to return from these high latitudes, and he sailed safely into the Texel after three and a half ...
— A Book of Discovery - The History of the World's Exploration, From the Earliest - Times to the Finding of the South Pole • Margaret Bertha (M. B.) Synge
... are but two years or so between thine age and mine. When thou wert poring over the crabbed text, and pattering Latin by the ell, dost thou not remember a lack-grace good-for-naught, Robert Hilyard, who was always setting the school in an uproar, and was finally outlawed from that boy-world, as he hath been since from the man's world, for inciting the weak to ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... principio abitare Queste montagne, benche sieno oscure Come tu vedi, pur si potea stare Sanza sospetto, ch' ell' eran sicure: Sol da le fiere t'avevi a guardare: Fernoci spesso di brutte paure; Or ci bisogna, se vogliamo starci, Da ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Volume 1 • Leigh Hunt
... slowly up High Street. Passers-by turned to stare, but otherwise she was unrecognized. There was a new five-and-ten-cent store, and Finley Brothers had added an ell. High Street was paved. She made a foray down into the little side street where she had spent those queerly remote first seventeen years of her life. How dim her aunt seemed! The little unpainted frame house was gone. There was a lumber yard on the site. ...
— The Vertical City • Fannie Hurst
... out in my own mind like. Now Timbs, the grocer an' 'aberdashery man, when 'is wife died, he wouldn't let me 'ave my own way about the moniment at all. 'Put 'er down,' sez 'e—'Put 'er down as the Dearly-Beloved Wife of Samuel Timbs.' 'Now, Timbs,' sez I—'don't ye go foolin' with 'ell-fire! Ye know she wor'nt yer Dearly Beloved, forbye that she used to throw wet dish-clouts at yer 'ed, screechin' at ye for all she was wuth, an' there ain't no Dearly Beloved in that. Why do ye want to put a lie on a stone for the Lord to read?' But 'e was ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... the mountains of Cashmeer there is an image of ice, which makes its appearance thus: Two days before the new moon there appears a bubble of ice, which increases in size every day till the fifteenth, by which time it is an ell or more in height;—then as the moon wanes, the image decreases till ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge
... was 'nosethirle'. Now 'to thrill' is the same as to drill or pierce; it is plain then here at once that the word signifies the orifice or opening with which the nose is thrilled, drilled, or pierced. We might have read the word for ever in our modern spelling without being taught this. 'Ell' tells us nothing about itself; but in 'eln' used in Holland's translation of Camden, ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench
... gave them birth, in the conception of sensual gratification, and they seek no more. Tens of thousands are overwhelmed by the burdens of craft and trade; by the weight of the hammer, the ell, or the crane, and they are no more. But I know a man, who did seek more; the joy of simplicity dwelt in his heart, and he had faith in mankind such as few men have; his soul was made for friendship; ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... I got in bed with Pa. I had heard Pa blame Ma about her cold feet, so I got a piece of ice about as big as a raisin box, just zactly like one of Ma's feet, and laid it right against the small of Pa's back. I couldn't help laffing, but pretty soon Pa began to squirm and he said, 'Why'n 'ell don't you warm them feet before you come to bed,' and then he hauled back his leg and kicked me clear out in the middle of the floor, and said if he married again he would marry a woman who had lost both her feet in a railroad accident. Then I put the ice ...
— Peck's Compendium of Fun • George W. Peck
... that the composer should neglect beat, measure and rhythm, in his effort to realize a well-developed and intelligible design in the whole, or any part, of his composition. The beats and measures and phrases are the barley-corn, inch and ell of the musical draughtsman, and without these units of measurement and proportion, neither the vital condition of Symmetry nor the equally important condition of well-regulated Contrast could be ...
— Lessons in Music Form - A Manual of Analysis of All the Structural Factors and - Designs Employed in Musical Composition • Percy Goetschius
... and was glad that a summons of 'my daughter' from the Princess of Conde interrupted these strange communications. I understood them better when we were called upon to ell the old Marchioness the names of every one whom we had met at the Hotel de Rambouillet, and on hearing of the presence of Mademoiselle de Bourbon she said: 'Ah! yes, a marriage is arranged for the young lady ...
— Stray Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the Moors; and the women as having "handsome limbs, slender arms, pretty hands, and when they sing they have a pleasant tange in their voices. The men shaved their hair on the right side, the women acting as barbers, and left the hair full length on the left side, with a lock an ell long." A Puritan divine—"New England's Plantation, 1630"—says of the Indians about him, "their hair is generally black, and cut before like our gentlewomen, and one lock longer than the rest, much like to our gentlemen, which fashion I think ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... I was not satisfied so easily and many more peaceful moments I would have had if I had never pried further as I did. After all, I only asked one question and that early the next morning. In the house next to ours a brick ell was built way out to the alleyway along half the yard. The kitchen windows looked out on the passage. There was a maid in that house,—a second girl, as they call them in this country,—and I knew she was a great person for staying up late, telling her own fortune with cards ...
— The Blue Wall - A Story of Strangeness and Struggle • Richard Washburn Child
... clips, not ignorant to check His coursers at the first but with tight rein 410 Ruling his own, and watching those before. Now mark; I will describe so plain the goal That thou shalt know it surely. A dry stump Extant above the ground an ell in height Stands yonder; either oak it is, or pine 415 More likely, which the weather least impairs. Two stones, both white, flank it on either hand. The way is narrow there, but smooth the course On ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer
... windows in Philip's study partly open. But that did not prove anything, although a man might have crawled in and out again through that window from an ell of the parsonage, the roof of which ran near enough to the window so that an active person could gain entrance that way. The whole affair remained more or less a mystery to Philip. However, the letters and the knife were real. He took them down town next ...
— The Crucifixion of Philip Strong • Charles M. Sheldon
... absolute distress. Junot often used to speak of the six months they passed together in Paris at this time. When they took an evening stroll on the Boulevard, which used to be the resort of young men, mounted on fine horses, and displaying ell the luxury which they were permitted to show at that time, Bonaparte would declaim against fate, and express his contempt for the dandies with their whiskers and their 'orielles de chiene', who, as they rode Past, were eulogising in ecstasy the manner in which Madame Scio ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... no better than card-boxes. They seem to be built of bamboos, with wicker-work and plants. Each of them has a veranda in front, which is a nice place to sit and read, with a kind of ell at each end. I think I should like to live in one of them for a week ...
— Four Young Explorers - Sight-Seeing in the Tropics • Oliver Optic
... winter was coming on, and that soon we must sleep without a roof, in the snow. We might well be silent, as we were, save the quartermaster Poitevin. He was a veteran,—sallow, wrinkled, with hollow cheeks, mustaches an ell long, and a red nose, like all brandy drinkers. He had a lofty way of speaking, which he interspersed with barrack slang. When the rain came down faster than ever, he cried, with a strange burst of laughter: "Ay, ay, Poitevin, this will teach you to ...
— The Conscript - A Story of the French war of 1813 • Emile Erckmann
... the conversation, By many windings to their clever clinch; And secondly, must let slip no occasion, Nor bate (abate) their hearers of an inch,[mt] But take an ell—and make a great sensation, If possible; and thirdly, never flinch When some smart talker puts them to the test, But seize the last word, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... hymn the music came to a sudden stop. There was a solemn pause, and then the clerk was seen to make his way to the front of the singing gallery, and was heard addressing the vicar in a loud tone, saying, "Please, sor, an-ell 'as coom off." The handle had come off the instrument. At another church, in Huntingdonshire, the organ was hidden from view by drawn curtains, behind which the clerk used to retire when he had given out the Psalm. On one occasion, however, no sound of ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... years old: it was fairy tale. These earliest recollections went back to herself as a very tiny child living with her mother and grandmother in a big white house with green window-shutters, in Lexington—so big that she knew only the two or three rooms in one ell. Her mother wore mourning for her father, and was always drawing her to her bosom and leaving tears on her face or lilylike hands. One day—she could not remember very well—but the house had been darkened and the ...
— The Reign of Law - A Tale of the Kentucky Hemp Fields • James Lane Allen
... blind if this ayn't gratitude for yer! 'Ere you come, a pore mis'rable specimen of 'uman scum, an' I tykes yer into my galley an' treats yer 'ansom, an' this is wot I get for it. Nex' time you can go to 'ell, say I, an' I've a good mind to give ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... recover &c 775. Adj. taking &c v.; privative^, prehensile; predaceous, predal^, predatory, predatorial^; lupine, rapacious, raptorial; ravenous; parasitic. bereft &c 776. Adv. at one fell swoop. Phr. give an inch and take an ell. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... was in a hackney cabriolet, for Jonas Chuzzlewit had said 'Spare no expense.' Mankind is evil in its thoughts and in its base constructions, and Jonas was resolved it should not have an inch to stretch into an ell against him. It never should be charged upon his father's son that he had grudged the money for his father's funeral. Hence, until the obsequies should be concluded, Jonas had taken for his motto 'Spend, and ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... dressed as you like it, a la Matignon. Pepi has built a tower upon your head at least three quarters of an ell high, and above that is a blue ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... It is improper after January, the Sap then ascending into the Trunk, and expanding it self over all the Branches. See that your Stocks be Taper-grown, and your Tops of the best Ground-Hazle, that can be had, smooth, slender, and straight, of an Ell-long, pliant, and bending; and yet of a strength, that a reasonable jerk cannot break it, but it will return to its first straightness; lest otherwise you endanger your Line. Keep them two full years, before you use them; having preserved them from Worm-eating, or Rotting, by thrice ...
— The School of Recreation (1684 edition) • Robert Howlett
... had said to the Israelites, "Go and sweep and clean our houses, our courtyards, and our streets," He changed the dust of the air into lice, so that the vermin lay piled up in heaps an ell high, and when the Egyptians put on fresh garments, they were at once ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg
... follow my directions. The house need not be so expensive; one big dining-room, with turn-up tables like those ironing-board seat-tables, you know—then they can dance there. Small reception room and office, hall, kitchen and laundry, and thirty bedrooms, forty by thirty, with an "ell" for the laundry, ought to do it, ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... sniper, his eye still fixed to the telescope. "Three 'undred yards, and 'e ducked like 'ell. It wasn't far off 'is nibs, but one can't tell for sure." He got down and stretched himself. "I've waited 'alf an 'our for the perisher, too, without no breakfast." He grinned and scrambled over the broken-down trench to remedy the latter deficiency, while once more the Sapper walked ...
— No Man's Land • H. C. McNeile
... old boy, throwing his head back, and swaying with the fullness of his mirth. "What an 'ell of a joke." Mac, too, chuckled as he sat ...
— The Tale of a Trooper • Clutha N. Mackenzie
... dottel of his pipe on the back of the hairy fist. 'They say 'Ell's 'otter than that,' said he, as Mulvaney swore aloud. 'You be warned so. Look yonder!'—he pointed across the river to a ruined temple—'Me an' you an' 'im'—he indicated me by a jerk of his head—'was there one day when Hi made ...
— Soldiers Three • Rudyard Kipling
... swung forward his body. The end of the race came sooner than any one expected. A police barge nosed round an ell; by the time Pompeo was off again, the ferrule of the pursuing gondola scraped past Pompeo's blade. Pompeo called and Achille answered. There was a war of words, figure of a dog, name of a pig. Achille was in the wrong, but ten lire were ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... Poulainia) and prohibited by royal ordinances (see letter of Charles V., 17 October, 1367, regarding the garments of the women of Montpellier). Great lords and ladies continued, however, to wear poulaines." In Louis XL's court they were still worn of a quarter of an ell in length. ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 5 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... bite dust for that! As for Le Gardeur, poor boy, overlook his fault—pity him, forgive him. He is not so much to blame, Pierre, as those plundering thieves of the Friponne, who shall find that La Corne St. Luc's sword is longer by half an ell than is good for some of ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... wonder," she returned, still at her task. Then she rose, holding a bulb in her hands, and said: "It's a funny kind of relation. Her father and mother egging her on—and you know that kind of a man; give him an inch and he'll take an ell. I wonder how far he has got." She took the bulb to a pile near the rear of the house. "Those are the nice big yellow ones I'm saving for Mrs. Barclay. But I'm sure of one thing, Molly has no notion of marrying Brownwell." ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... had written: "It matters nothing to me whether King Heinz or Kunz, the Devil or Hell itself, has composed this book. He who lies is a liar—therefore I fear him not. It seems to me that King Henry has provided an ell or two of coarse stuff for this mantle, and that the poisonous fellow Leus (Leo X), who wrote against Erasmus, or someone of his sort, has cut and lined the hood. But I will help them—please God—by ironing it and ...
— Historical Miniatures • August Strindberg
... came upon this pinch, And wish'd the dog in hell, Should we give this same Wood an inch, We know he'd take an ell. O Dublin, &c. ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... the colonial. "That's where it's 'ell. Listen naow. He goes ashore along o' us, quiet and peaceable like, never battin' a eye, we givin' him a bit o' jolly, y' know, to keep him chirked up as ye might s'y. But so soon as ever he sets foot on shore, abaout faice he gaoes, plumb into the Custom's orfice. ...
— A Deal in Wheat - And Other Stories of the New and Old West • Frank Norris
... home ten days or a fortnight after our arrest, bringing with him his precious silks, velvets, and laces to the last ell. As he had predicted, they were quadrupled in value, and their increase made the good burgher ...
— Yolanda: Maid of Burgundy • Charles Major
... 'ark an' 'eed, you rookies, which is always grumblin' sore, There's worser things than marchin' from Umballa to Cawnpore; An' if your 'eels are blistered an' they feels to 'urt like 'ell, You drop some tallow in your socks an' that will make 'em well. For it's best ...
— Barrack-Room Ballads • Rudyard Kipling
... to be something else. Three minutes later the second bus in trouble turns tail. Its engine has been missing on one cylinder since the start, and is not in a fit state for a trip over enemy country. Again I call to the leader, and again hear a word ending in "ell." The two remaining machines close up, and we continue. Very suddenly one of them drops out, with a rocker-arm gone. Its nose goes down, and it glides into the clouds. Yet again I call the flight-commander's ...
— Cavalry of the Clouds • Alan Bott
... and announced his intention of running for Mangareva, an uproar broke out. Against a background of throaty rumbling arose inarticulate cries of rage, with here and there a distinct curse, or word, or phrase. A shrill Cockney voice soared and dominated for a moment, crying: "Gawd! After bein' in ell for fifteen days—an' now e wants us to sail this floatin' ell to ...
— South Sea Tales • Jack London
... instinct, has its distortions. It is in the failure to see the relative importance of things, to keep the proportions, that human beings lose control of their endowment. Give an instinct an inch, and it invariably takes its ell! The instinct for clothes, from which we have learned so much in our climb from savagery, has more than once had the upper hand of us. So dangerous to the prosperity and the seriousness of peoples has its tyranny been, that laws have again and again been passed to check it; punishments have ...
— The Business of Being a Woman • Ida M. Tarbell
... "We-ell, I dunno as he's a boom companion exactly, but Nebraska and his bunch spend a pile of money in the Starlight, a pile of money. A feller would be safe in saying that Rack Slimson's sympathy is ...
— The Heart of the Range • William Patterson White
... 'alf-past four—what the bleed'n' 'ell d'they want to wake us this time of a mornin' for? Some bloody ...
— Combed Out • Fritz August Voigt
... burst in one's bosom. All alone I ascended the highest pinnacle of the minster spire, and sat in what is called the neck, under the nob or crown, for a quarter of an hour, before I would venture to step out again into the open air, where, standing upon a platform scarce an ell square, without any particular holding, one sees the boundless prospect before; while the nearest objects and ornaments conceal the church, and every thing upon and above which one stands. It is exactly as if one saw one's self carried up into the air in a balloon. Such troublesome and painful ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... replies, "I know not who is to pay the penalty. But whoever may object or disapprove, I intend to lie upon this bed and repose there at my ease." Then he at once disrobed in the bed, which was long and raised half an ell above the other two, and was covered with a yellow cloth of silk and a coverlet with gilded stars. The furs were not of skinned vair but of sable; the covering he had on him would have been fitting for a king. The mattress was not made of straw or rushes or of old mats. At midnight ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes
... and him was argling-bargling, and if ever I saw a cunning twa-faced Covenanter, it's that man. They say he has got a good word with the Prince through his Dutch wife, and where ye give that kind of man an inch, he will take an ell. It's no for me to give advice, me bein' in my place and you in yours. But I promised your honorable mither that I wouldna see you come to mischief if I could help it, and I am sair mistaken if yon man will no be ...
— Graham of Claverhouse • Ian Maclaren
... seemed, when they were first married he and his Spouse [could [1]] make but Fourscore; so may Madam Hecatissa very justly allege hereafter, That, as long-visaged as she may then be thought, upon their Wedding-day Mr. SPECTATOR and she had but Half an Ell of Face betwixt them: And this my very worthy Predecessor, Mr. Sergeant Chin, always maintained to be no more than the true oval Proportion between Man and Wife. But as this may be a new thing to you, who have hitherto ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... lads," shouted Erling, who was gasping by this time, "come back and jump in! Push off an ell ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... incident, save a casual allusion to certain sittings at the American game of poker, in which the Swedish songstress had the advantage of the policy or the luck of her companions. Out of this inch of cloth Field manufactured something better than the proverbial ell of very interesting gossip. The reconstructed item reached San Francisco as soon as Madame Nilsson, and was copied from the Tribune into the coast papers on the eve of her opening concert. Now, the madame thought that the American world looked askance at a woman ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... was. He is not afraid of people, but will ly gaping and hissing at them in the way, and will scarce stir out of it. He will come and eat Carrion with the Dogs and Jackals, and will not be feared away by them, but if they come near to bark or snap at him, with his tayl, which is about an Ell long like a whip, he will so slash them, that they will run away and howl. ...
— An Historical Relation Of The Island Ceylon In The East Indies • Robert Knox
... "What t'ell they got agin him? Ain't he the biggest man in this country to-day? Didn't he lick Spain and England both at Pensacola and didn't he finish the Red ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon
... o gorph, a'r trydydd oedd ddiweir am na wnaeth pechawd cnawdol ond unwaith a hynny drwy brovedigaeth yn yr amser yr ennillawdd ev * * o verch Brangor yr hon a vu ymerodres yn Constinobl, or honn y doeth y genhedlaeth vwyav o'r byd, ac o genhedlaeth Joseph o Arimathea y hanoeddyn ell tri, ac o lin Davydd brophwyd mal y tystiolaetha Ystoria y Greal."—(Triad lxi. ...
— Y Gododin - A Poem on the Battle of Cattraeth • Aneurin
... may believe me, as I am the elder of us two, timidity is a great sin against love. But did you not see that that beggar had holes in her stockings and a seam of filth and mud, half- an-ell high, on the ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France
... "We-ell," Little drawled, lazily lighting a cheroot, "anything you say suits me, but I'll tell you my idea right now: That Goring woman came here in this ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle
... was simplicity itself: One long, log trading-room with an ell for a storehouse, and a room—two at the most—in the rear for the accommodation of the three women. The whole to be erected in the centre of the clearing, and surrounded ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx
... lead. Firs, &c., have also been planted in the wet and bad parts of most of the other enclosures, and succeed. The nurseries we have in cultivation are the Bourts, 161 acres; Yew-tree Brake, about 5 acres; Ell Wood, 11 acres; and about 26 in the Vallets, or middle, and Sallow Vallets Nurseries, previously occupied by Mr. Driver. In these there are now about four millions of young oaks, three, two, and one year old, and about 600,000 firs and other ...
— The Forest of Dean - An Historical and Descriptive Account • H. G. Nicholls
... built of granite blocks, dates from a very remote age; it stands on the remains of the heathen temple. Each of the hills is a little mountain, yet each was raised by human hands. Letters an ell long, and whole names, are cut deep in the thin greensward, which the new sprouting grass gradually fills up. The old housewife, from the peasant's cot close by the hill, brings the silver-bound horn, a gift of Charles John XIV., ...
— Pictures of Sweden • Hans Christian Andersen
... months at the Front—you'd let the Army Service Corps alone. Not that I'm doubting you're a plucky young feller enough, but you ain't up to that. It's nerve you want for it. Well, I wouldn't take it on myself, and I'm pretty well seasoned. Why, you 'ave to go calmly into the mouth of 'ell with supplies, over the open ground, when the Infantry's safe and snug in the trenches. You ain't strong enough for it—reely ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, April 5, 1916 • Various |
