"Nag" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the consequence of his intimacy with that noble family? He quarrelled with his aunt for dining out every night. The wretch forgot his poor altogether, and killed his old nag by always riding over to Brandyball; where he revelled in the maddest passion for Lady Fanny. He ordered the neatest new clothes and ecclesiastical waistcoats from London; he appeared with corazza-shirts, lackered boots, and perfumery; ...
— The Book of Snobs • William Makepeace Thackeray
... faithful engagements-keeper of its time. Perhaps a dead-beat nowadays is a time-server; for this would be a correct derivation). From this shop the young Minuit, in a plain but reliable wagon, with a nag never fast and never slow, and indifferent to temperatures, travelled the country for a radius of forty miles—not embarrassed even by the Delaware, which he crossed once a month, and attended fully to the temporal and partly to the spiritual needs ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... how to keep our horses in good condition, as well as ride them." The trooper pointed derisively at Symonds' sorry nag standing with drooping head ...
— The Lost Despatch • Natalie Sumner Lincoln
... describe. A creaking signboard, swinging in the wind on rusty irons, directed me to the only inn of the village. It was a two-story brick building, standing a little back from the road. I drew rein at the door, and dismounted my weary nag. My loud vociferations summoned to my side a bull dog, cursed with a most unhappy disposition, and a hostler whose temper was hardly more amiable. He took my horse with an air of surly indifference, and gruffly directed me to the ...
— The Three Brides, Love in a Cottage, and Other Tales • Francis A. Durivage
... two horses were brought to the door. One was Mr. Webster's horse; the other was an old gray nag with a ...
— Fifty Famous People • James Baldwin
... needs much wise and loving care. There are inner forces awakening that move him strangely; he does not understand himself, neither do his friends seem to understand him. Sometimes they snub and nag him, sometimes they tease and make fun of him. In either case he does not find home a happy place, and frequently leaves it to seek more ...
— What a Young Woman Ought to Know • Mary Wood-Allen
... I am more than ever at your service. Let me have a cut of your venison and a feed for my horse, and I shall be at my Lord's headquarters as soon as the nag ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... be a little wider along the front than it is long from front to rear. The kitchen should always be on the right side if there is a veranda, or else behind. When an astrologer is about to found a house he calculates the direction in which Shesh Nag, the snake on whom the world reposes, is holding his head at that time, and plants the first brick or stone to the left of that direction, because snakes and elephants do not turn to the left but always to the right. Consequently the house will be more secure and less likely to be ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell
... don't nag at me like a woman at a drunken husband!" He became very serious after awhile, and added, "If it hadn't been for the loss of the Flash I would have been here three months ago, and all would have been well. No use crying over that. Don't you be uneasy, Kaspar. We will have everything ...
— An Outcast of the Islands • Joseph Conrad
... a clumsy bench, drinking what Christopher Sly would have called very sufficient small-beer with a peasant's wife, the following description of the fairy host may come more near the idea he has formed of that invisible company:—Bessie Dunlop declared that as she went to tether her nag by the side of Restalrig Loch (Lochend, near the eastern port of Edinburgh), she heard a tremendous sound of a body of riders rushing past her with such a noise as if heaven and earth would come together; that the sound swept past her and seemed to rush into ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... move quickly now. The pursuit was not yet organized, but it would begin in a space of minutes. From the group of half a dozen horses which stood before the saloon he selected the best—a tall, raw-boned nag with an ugly head. Into the saddle he swung, wondering faintly that the theft of a horse mattered so little to him. His was the greatest sin. ...
— Riders of the Silences • John Frederick
... out your hand," and Jem went rapidly through these maneuvers. "As to the grip, it's easy—slip the forefinger up the wrist. O.K.—I've got it. Say, what kind of an old tumbledown trap is that thing?" demanded Jem, as the hostler reappeared leading a sorry nag attached to an old buggy with an enormous hood and a big ...
— The Boys of Bellwood School • Frank V. Webster
... Lord! what was the use of having traveled his own quarter century along the everlasting road if it didn't make him at least silent in sheer pity of it: youth singing along to the Dark Tower, jingling spurs and caracoling nag, something it didn't quite know the feeling of shut in its nervous hand? What was it shut there? The key, that was it: the key to the Dark Tower. Youth made no doubt it was the key, easy to hold, ...
— Old Crow • Alice Brown
... in such a tactful way that his wife cannot reasonably feel permanently offended, but he must not object to his wife going to church, nor has he the right to insist on being accompanied in his outing by his wife. On the other hand, the wife must not nag or quarrel with him continuously on the subject of religion. Those little incidents will come up in the experience of every married couple. They are not serious or insurmountable in themselves, but they can be made ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol. 3 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague
... 'em out with a pin," cried Jack. "Come along, father. Haw! haw! haw! I thought he was hurt!" Then sticking his knees into his nag's side, ...
— Off to the Wilds - Being the Adventures of Two Brothers • George Manville Fenn
... was completely in the scoundrel's power, unless she could throw herself out of the saddle and defy him until we came up. At the pace they were going, to overtake them was impossible, though we urged our nag to its utmost speed, and the wheels ploughed swiftly through the dry sand. What was to be done? There straight ahead, and getting further and further,—but plainly seen in that clear sunny air,—the two horses kept up the furious pace. We could ...
— Miss Grantley's Girls - And the Stories She Told Them • Thomas Archer
... hauled off a little, and lay and glowered at each other. Each side had lost about twenty thousand men in learning that if it attacked the other it would get mashed fine. So each built a line of works and lay behind them, and tried to nag the other into coming out and attacking. At Spottsylvania our lines and those of the Johnnies weren't twelve hundred yards apart. The ground was clear and clean between them, and any force that attempted to cross it to attack would be cut to pieces, as sure as anything. ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... was cloudless and the nag, who was inclined to be frisky, would suddenly start off at a gallop every now and then. As they entered the commune of Etouvent Jeanne's heart beat so that she could ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... appeal to his pride are the most dreaded, and often have a salutary effect. A mounted trooper would rather perform picket duty all night, in any weather, than once take a stationary gallop on the wooden "bob-tailed nag," facing the other way. The soldier's crimes—nearly all—are criminal only in that they offend against military laws; and if once in a while he has a hearing before Justice M., "you should not," as he contends, ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 3, March, 1852 • Various
... singular interest in my affairs. Wanted to be considered one of the family—sort of adopted son of mine, I suppose. Of a morning, when I would go out to my stable, with what childlike good nature he would trot out my nag, 'Please sir, I think he's getting fatter and fatter.' 'But, he don't look very clean, does he?' unwilling to be downright harsh with so affectionate a lad; 'and he seems a little hollow inside the haunch there, don't he? or no, perhaps I don't see plain this morning.' 'Oh, please sir, it's ...
— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville
... eyes elevated and hands uplifted, announced that some extraordinary intelligence was agitating the public mind of the municipality of Cairnvreckan. 'There is some news,' said mine host of the Candlestick, pushing his lantern-jawed visage and bare-boned nag rudely forward into the crowd—'there is some news; and, if it please my Creator, I will forthwith ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... from yonder hill which will turn failure into success," he thought, as he dug his heels into the sides of his faithful nag. At the same time he started a "Strong Heart" song to keep his ...
— Old Indian Days • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... get his animal as quickly as possible and the driver rushed through the door only to be surrounded by a group of wild looking villagers, who questioned him both in Irish and English. Soon after Andy re-appeared coming down the village street driving a sorry looking nag. As he approached the tavern and saw Paul and the guard at the door, he shouted loudly to the crowd to separate, as though wishing to show Paul the blood in his favorite mare. He punched her with a little stick from which the sharp point of a nail protruded and by a dexterous movement dodged ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... chiefs who had joined his standard, was sitting with his sword drawn, &c. The others seemed inclined to surrender themselves, and raised the cry of "Aman!" but the Khan, springing on his feel, cried, "Aman, nag!" equivalent to "Mercy be d—d," and blew his match; but all in vain, as he immediately received about three shots, which completely did his business; the one that gave him the "coup de grace," and which went through his breast, being fired by a man of our regiment, ...
— Campaign of the Indus • T.W.E. Holdsworth
... for you and for my poor nag, on whose back you shall be in three minutes," rejoined the landlord. "I have spoken to you as I would to my own son, if I had such an incumbrance.—Here, you ragamuffin; saddle the gray, and lead him ...
— Fanshawe • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... the woebegone nag. "It's a horse," he said, surprised. "Man has been riding them ...
— Off Course • Mack Reynolds (AKA Dallas McCord Reynolds)
... all hearts rejoice!" cried the Colonel, who was mounted on a Bob-tailed nag—on which, in times of Peace, my soul, O Peace! he had ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 3 • Charles Farrar Browne
... took us the best part o' two days' walking. But it's nothing of a day's journey for anybody as has got a first-rate nag. The captain 'ud get there in nine or ten hours, I'll be bound, he's such a rider. And I shouldn't wonder if he's back again to-morrow; he's too active to rest long in that lonely place, all by himself, for there's ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot
... verses of twaddle about the Irish emigrant "sitting on the stile, Mary," or three hours of Irish patriotism in Bermondsey or the Scotland Division of Liverpool, go further with you than all the facts that stare you in the face. Why, man alive, look at me! You know the way I nag, and worry, and carp, and cavil, and disparage, and am never satisfied and never quiet, and try the patience of my ...
— John Bull's Other Island • George Bernard Shaw
... Noo Mexico about a month back, when I runs foul o' a hombre what is all in. He hadn't et fer so long thet yer could see ther bumps made by his backbone through his shirt. I hed some grub in my war bag, an' I fed an' watered him. This yer nag wuz all in, too, an' he hed a long way ter go, so when ther feller ups an' perposes ter trade ponies I give ...
— Ted Strong's Motor Car • Edward C. Taylor
... the Prince in our ramshackle old vehicle, and he took another, being apparently very anxious to arrive at the hotel before us. He spoke to his driver, who lashed the one poor nag so furiously that Maida cried out with rage, and they flashed past us, the horse galloping as if Black Care were on his back. But something happened to the harness, and they were obliged to stop; so we got ahead, and reached the wide-arcaded ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... ever rode and I named him "Jim Lane" in honor of one of the most efficient raiders that ever disgraced an army uniform. This horse a young woman was keeping for her sweetheart who had left it with her father for safety, as he feared it might be shot. As I mounted the nag, she suddenly grasped the bridle reins. The horse always, I found afterwards, had a trick of rearing up on his hind feet, when he was about to start off. Evidently the young woman was also ignorant ...
— The Story of Cole Younger, by Himself • Cole Younger
... Malanya Pavlovna was a very kind woman; she was easy to please.—"She doesn't nag you, and she doesn't sneer at you," the maids said of her.—Malanya Pavlovna was passionately fond of all sweets, and a special old woman, who occupied herself with nothing but the preserves, and therefore was called the preserve-woman, ...
— A Reckless Character - And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... am content, because it pleaseth you. My father bid I should obey your will, And yeelde my selfe to your discretion: Besides my cozen gave me yesternight, A prettie nag to ride to Padua. Of all my friends Allenso ...
— A Collection Of Old English Plays, Vol. IV. • Editor: A.H. Bullen
... solitary refuge. When Nelly climbed the ascent, and saw the mansion house, with its encumbered court, she could distinguish the sharp sound of a horse's hoof. Its rider was already out of sight on the bridle-road. Michael Armstrong, the laird's man, was mounting his own nag; Wat Pringle, the grieve, and other farm folk, stood looking after the vanished traveller; Liddel, the Tweedside retriever, paced discontentedly up and down; and old Lady Staneholme met her on the threshold, and as on the night of her arrival at Staneholme, led her up the ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... done when they drew up at the Colonel's door, and dismounted, Peter Blood surrendering his nag to one of the negro grooms, who informed them that the Colonel was from home at ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... the ideal aimed at in a good regiment. That there are some who miss that aim none but a fool would deny; the same may be said of most professions, even, I suppose, of bishops. That there are some officers who go the wrong way to work, who nag and bully and generally turn themselves into something even worse than nature intended is an undoubted fact. That there are some men who are wasters; who were born wasters and will die as such is also quite true. But I maintain that the training, the ideals, the traditions, the morale of ...
— No Man's Land • H. C. McNeile
... Paris rode along, Much like John Dory in the song, Upon a holy tide; I on an ambling nag did jet, (I trust he is not paid for yet,) And spurr'd him ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... rich: no man in this county understands seeding, cropping, and marketing better than I do: we shall improve our stock and double our rent' (it was a hundred and fifty pounds per annum) 'the first year. I shall soon meet with a smart nag, fit for the side saddle, and shall easily make you a good horse woman; and then, when the seed is in the ground, we may be allowed to take a little pleasure. Perhaps we may ride by the rector's door, and if he should not ask us in we will not break our ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... for us. The Chinese assert that women have no souls. The Mohammedan believes that women are denied entrance to paradise, and the Koran (xliii, 17) defines the woman as a creature which grows up on a soil of finery and baubles, and is always ready to nag. How well such an opinion has sustained itself, is shown by the Ottomanic Codex 355, according to which the testimony of two women is worth as much as the testimony of one man. But even so, the Koran has a higher ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden
... quite sound," I remarked, "that is if yonder old Kaffir is telling the truth. But the question is—how? We can't all three of us ride on one nag, as you are still ...
— Finished • H. Rider Haggard
... old saying, 'Never look a gift horse in the mouth.' But sayings and doings are far apart. If you can manage to sell a man a horse he'll make the best of the worst bargain; he'll nurse the nag and feed him and drive him easy and brag about his faults. He'll overlook everything from spavin to bots; he'll learn to think that a hamstrung hind leg is the poetry of motion. But a gift horse—Lord love you! If ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... Nag the basking cobra hears the careless foot of man, He will sometimes wriggle sideways and avoid it as he can. But his mate makes no such motion where she camps beside the trail. For the female of the species is more ...
— The Years Between • Rudyard Kipling
... accused of rebellion, of coming to the Parliaments with armed men, and of being in league with the Scots. Without even being allowed a hearing he was condemned to death as a traitor, and the next day, June 19, 1322, mounted on a sorry nag without a bridle, he was led to a hill outside the town, and executed with his ...
— Yorkshire Painted And Described • Gordon Home
... The nag he rode—how could it err? 'Twas the same that took, last year, That wonderful jump to Exeter With ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... not in our employ, sir. He has been chief engineer of the Arab for the past eight years, and prior to that he was chief of the Narcissus. It was Reardon who told me what ailed her. She's a hog on coal, and the Oriental steamship people used to nag him about the fuel bills. Their port engineer didn't agree with Reardon as to what was wrong with her, so he left. He assures me that if her condensers are retubed she'll burn from seven to ten tons of ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... things that fret and tease and nag so. The big things are more easily handled. But the little insectivorous details that will not down! Have you ever had this experience? You have retired on a hot summer night, tired and heavy with sleep. You are almost ...
— Quiet Talks on Service • S. D. Gordon
... changed, the nearest house is old Fairacres. But I didn't look for such a home-coming. Get up there, nag!" ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond
... nab.; a horse's head, used as a seal to a counterfeit pass. At the sign of the prancer's poll, i.e. the nag's head. ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.
... Richard Were two pretty men; They stayed in bed Till the clock struck ten. Then up starts Robin And looks at the sky: "Oh, brother Richard, The sun's very high. You go before With the bottle and bag, And I will come after On little Jack nag." ...
— Mother Goose - The Original Volland Edition • Anonymous
... pester it till you git back from puttin' up the nag," returned Laurella carelessly as she swung her light, frilled skirts and tripped across the porch. "You needn't werry about me," she called down to the old fellow where he sat speechlessly glaring. "Mavity'll show me whar I can sit, and git me a nice cool drink; ...
— The Power and the Glory • Grace MacGowan Cooke
... 'Slight, that is a new business! I understood you, a tame bird, to fly Twice in a term, or so, on Friday nights, When you had left the office, for a nag ...
— The Alchemist • Ben Jonson
... jumped on board Delila. But it was too late, for when I arrived at my hole it was already taken! Such a thing had never happened to me in three years, and it made me feel as if I were being robbed under my own eyes. I said to myself, 'Confound it all! confound it!' And then my wife began to nag at me. 'Eh! What about your Casque a meche! Get along, you drunkard! Are you satisfied, you great fool?' I could say nothing, because it was all quite true, and so I landed all the same near the spot and tried to profit by what was left. Perhaps after all the fellow might catch ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 1 (of 8) - Boule de Suif and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... vague sort of way that Chug was "running with the hired girls." The thought distressed her. She was too smart a woman to nag him ...
— Half Portions • Edna Ferber
... Another handicap checked them, for while Satan ran on alone, freely, the bunched pursuers kept a continual friction back and forth. The leaders reined in to keep back with the mass of the posse, and those in the rear by dint of hard spurring would rush up to the front in turn until some spirited nag challenged for the lead, so that there was a steady interplay among the fifteen. Their gait at the best could not be more than the pace, of their slowest member, but even that pace was diminished by the difficulties of group riding. Yet Mark Retherton refused to allow his men ...
— The Seventh Man • Max Brand
... done, the fastest pace in the trotting world; double-horse waggons of the neatest and lightest construction, gig, sulky, and saddle, all are alike borne along by trotters or pacers at a speed varying from the pair that are doing their mile in three minutes, to the sulky or saddle nag flying at the rate of a mile in two minutes, ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power
... to Moses the nag, here," laughed Jack, "because he'd be mighty happy to know his work is through for a long spell. We've fetched plenty of oats along, and mean to rope him out days, so he can eat his fill of grass. Yes, that answers the description given on my map, ...
— Jack Winters' Campmates • Mark Overton
... thrill, which was increased by the knowledge that his manners were usually excellent even to his sisters. "You let them fuss all they want to, mother," he concluded, "but your hair is a long sight better than theirs, and don't you let them nag you into ...
— Virginia • Ellen Glasgow
... a county magnate, who apes humility. He rides a sorry brown nag "not worth L5," but mounts his groom on a race-horse "twice ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... liking that use of "the." It sounded modern. Yet along came Gashwiler, as if seeking an early excuse to nag, ...
— Merton of the Movies • Harry Leon Wilson
... falling on the old stones and singing a gentle song. He had once stood there a long time with his grandmother. There lay the place before him, but it was not lonely. A big wagon was standing there, with a grey cover stretched over it. No horse stood in front of it, but a thin nag was nibbling the hedge, and this evidently belonged to the wagon. Near the old castle tower a fire was blazing merrily; a man was sitting by it, hammering with all his might. Close by him four little children were crawling around on the ground. Sami stood still at ...
— What Sami Sings with the Birds • Johanna Spyri
... tried to play the hero part, and stopped what he believed was a runaway horse, with Bessie in the vehicle, only to have her scornfully tell him to mind his own business after that, since he had spoiled her plans for proving that their old family nag still had considerable speed left ...
— Afloat on the Flood • Lawrence J. Leslie
... so prevailing upon the oak and in the Forest. I think this year it is worse than ever, and now the young plantations suffer most, the large timber being comparatively free. Park Hill, Oaken Hill, Nag's Head, Barn Hill, Stapledge, &c., and especially all the higher parts of them, are leafless, except where a beech or a chesnut shows its green foliage amidst the brown oaks. I saw a few rooks in Russell's to-day, and last year I noticed great numbers. They seem to be drawn ...
— The Forest of Dean - An Historical and Descriptive Account • H. G. Nicholls
... believe us. We cannot be at his elbow to hold back his hand when the bad moment comes. Nobody will be there, as a matter of fact; for women of this temperament—born naggers, in short, since that's what it comes to—when they are also ladies, graceful and gracious as she is; never nag at all before outsiders. To the world, they are bland; everybody says, 'What charming talkers!' They are 'angels abroad, devils at home,' as the proverb puts it. Some night she will provoke him when they are alone, ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... peasants. 460 We started at daybreak And laboured till mid-day, And then we were going To rest and have dinner, When up comes the German: ''Eh, you, lazy devils! So little work done?'' He started to nag us, Quite coolly and slowly, Without heat or hurry; 470 ...
— Who Can Be Happy And Free In Russia? • Nicholas Nekrassov
... of the woods hustle up to see what's the matter. Then there's an awful rumpus. In a minute or two she'll wave her hand and—presto! It will stop raining. But," with a distressed look out into the thick of it, "it would be a beastly joke if lightning should happen to strike that nag of mine. I'd not only have to walk to town, but I'd have to pay three prices ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... civil engineering, and indefatigable in collecting the data by which to correct the wretched maps which were our only help in understanding the theatre of operations. He was a familiar figure at the outposts, on his steadily ambling nag, armed with his prismatic compass, his odometer, and his sketch-book. The division commissary of subsistence was Captain Hentig, a faithful and competent officer who worked in full accord with Captain Day, the energetic quartermaster who ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... equipped, on piscatorial sport intent. They trudged gaily forward towards a neighbouring river, looking right and left, and around them, as sharp as two crows that have scented afar off the carcase of a defunct nag. ...
— The Sketches of Seymour (Illustrated), Complete • Robert Seymour
... be had there concerning a lost child when the schoolmaster called out: "Come on, Craig!" And away went these two toward the barn to arouse old "Blackie" out of her slumber and hitch her to a buggy. Little did that old nag ever dream, even in her palmiest days, that she could show such speed as she developed in that four-mile drive. The schoolmaster was too much wrought up to sit supinely by and see another do the driving; so he did it himself. And he drove as to ...
— Reveries of a Schoolmaster • Francis B. Pearson
... came the Couillards produced a big, raw-boned, yellowish horse, and the Martins a little, white, long-haired nag; the two horses were harnessed, and Marius, buried in an old livery of Simon's, brought the carriage round to the door. Julien, who was in his best clothes, would have looked a little like his old, elegant ...
— The works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 5 (of 8) - Une Vie and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant 1850-1893
... from other treatment. He'd been forced to remove her inflamed tonsils a few months before. She'd whined and complained because he couldn't spend all his time attending her. She was a nag, a shrew, and a totally selfish woman. But that was her ...
— Badge of Infamy • Lester del Rey
... Redding and his man stepped into a sleigh, which was barely large enough to hold them. They packed themselves up to the armpits in bearskin rugs, and then Redding gave his rough little nag a touch of the whip, which caused him to start forward with a jerk that set all the bells on his harness ringing merrily. Another minute and they dashed out at the gate, swept round the base of the beetling cliff that frowned ...
— Wrecked but not Ruined • R.M. Ballantyne
... "walk," for example, he should select a specific, picture-making word such as hurry, dash, run, race, amble, stroll, stride, shuffle, shamble, limp, strut, stalk. For the word "horse" he may substitute a definite term like sorrel, bay, percheron, nag, charger, steed, broncho, or pony. In narrative and descriptive writing particularly, it is necessary to use words that make pictures and that reproduce sounds and other sense impressions. In the effort to make his diction specific, however, the writer must ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... I took him for a brother sportsman who, too, had abandoned hope of a fox. But the second assured me of my mistake. The stranger wore a black suit of antique, clerical cut, a shovel hat, and gaiters; his nag was the sorriest of ponies, with a shaggy coat of flaring yellow, and so low in the legs that the broad flaps of its rider's coat all but trailed on the ground. A queerer turnout I shall never see again, though I ...
— Noughts and Crosses • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... heart upon it. Go he would; and he begged and pleaded so long that the King was forced to let him go. He gave Boots an old broken-down nag; but Boots did not care a pin for that, he sprang up on his sorry ...
— East O' the Sun and West O' the Moon • Gudrun Thorne-Thomsen
... after you; and give you my word, Bob, he had a grin on his face that looked as if it would never come off. Peg was happy—why? Because he had just seen you being carried like the wind out of town on a bolting nag. And I guess he wouldn't care very much if you got thrown, with some of your ribs broken ...
— The Saddle Boys of the Rockies - Lost on Thunder Mountain • James Carson
... him. It does you proud to get him for a husband. You're bound to be happy with him..." His voice sank, and his face seemed suddenly to be very old and tired as he went on anxiously. "Take warning from Sarah. Don't nag. Whatever you do, don't nag. Don't give him a perpetual-motion line of chin. Kind of let him talk once in a while. Men have some horse sense, though Sarah don't know it. Why, Sarah actually loves me, though she don't make a noise like it. The thing for you is to ...
— The Valley of the Moon • Jack London
... not hear of it? Yes they hear as well as you, and know what is done, and some have eyes upon you. Said I they will run away with the jewels. No you shall meet about three o'clock either by the Blue-Pig at Tower-Hill, or at Nag's-Head over against White-Chapel church. Nobody knows me but you, your wife, and your son who saw ...
— State Trials, Political and Social - Volume 1 (of 2) • Various
... through the inlet at Nag's Head, where, as late as 1729, twenty-five feet of water was found upon the bar. This afforded entrance to ships of considerable size. Cape Hatteras was then, as now, a place of great peril to ships, and many were wrecked upon the terrible outlying sand bars; but this did not deter the brave ...
— School History of North Carolina • John W. Moore
... in which they performed should be fireproof; the wife of the mining engineer fell in love with the barytone, and her husband hired a number of hoodlums to take their places in the gallery and hoot and hiss when the time came. And those who nag under any circumstances requested more cheerfulness. They found the "Czar and Zimmermann" too dull, the "Muette de Portici" too hackneyed. They insisted on "Madame Angot" and "Orpheus in the ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... horses would strive for the prize—a big field, and the pace would be killing. From the West came Sweet Silver, a gray, gallant, and fearless in jumping. A rakish old nag who walked over the sticks, had been sent for the Cup from Kentucky; On a bay, Little Jack, who was fast, they had put but a hundred and thirty. But I knew that North Star, a big brown—even the Black was no gamer- With a pull of ...
— Thoroughbreds • W. A. Fraser
... and invigorate the spirits of their young guest, and every one there seemed to vie which should love him the most. Still his especial favourite was Mr. Spencer: for Spencer never went out without bringing back cakes and toys; and Spencer gave him his pony; and Spencer rode a little crop-eared nag by his side; and Spencer, in short, was associated with his every comfort and caprice. He told them his little history; and when he said how Philip had left him alone for long hours together, and how Philip had forced him to his last and nearly fatal journey, the old maids groaned, and the old ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... detected in this rather unmilitary predicament. He was going up to Port—au—Prince to take his turn of duty with his regiment. Presently up came another half—naked black fellow, with the same kind of glazed hat and handkerchief under it; but he was mounted, and his nag was not a bad one by any means. It was Colonel Gabaroche's Captain of Grenadiers, Papotiere by name. He was introduced to us, and we all moved jabbering along. At the time I write of, the military force of the Haytian Republic was composed of one ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... Robin were two pretty men; They laid abed till the clock struck ten; Robin starts up and looks at the sky, Oh ho! brother Richard, the sun's very high, Do you go before with the bottle and bag, And I'll follow after on little Jack Nag. ...
— The Only True Mother Goose Melodies - Without Addition or Abridgement • Munroe and Francis
... "Your time is your own nag here, to amble, pad, or gallop as you choose. Have I your permission to wait upon you in ...
— The Lady of Loyalty House - A Novel • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... had every reason to regret that things had turned out as they had, for the seventeen miles of travel in taking the girl home and returning to town proved too much for the old nag, and I did not reach my hotel until after nine o'clock that morning. I was at a loss to know how to fix things with the Doctor so as to make matters smooth, and have him ...
— Twenty Years of Hus'ling • J. P. Johnston
... autumn day three persons had been seen riding from Carlisle towards the Scottish border, two gentlemen in front, one of whom had a club foot, and the third behind, as their groom, mounted on a sorry nag, and leading a spare horse. The two gentlemen were a Colonel Sibbald and a lame Major Rollo, intimate friends of Montrose, and the supposed groom was Montrose himself. [Footnote: Wishart, 56-64; Napier 396-413; ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... the two old men home. On the way up Main Street they overhauled Neal Ward. Mrs. Brownwell turned in to the sidewalk and called, "Neal, can you run over to the house a moment this evening?" And when he answered in the affirmative, she let the old nag amble gently ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... way, distinctly audible, utters the cabalistic words, "Two forty." Another voice, as audible, asks, "Which'll you bet on?" It was not soothing. It did seem as if the imp of the perverse had taken possession of that terrible nag to go and make such a display at such a moment. But as his will rose, so did mine, and my will went up, my whip went with it; but before it came down, Halicarnassus made shift to drone out, "Wouldn't Flora go faster, if she ...
— Gala-days • Gail Hamilton
... poke-root for Tobe's knee-j'ints," mused Mrs. Cullum, as she turned into the lane which led to her own door-yard. "Pore Tobe! them j'ints o' his'n is mighty uncertain. Why, Tobe!" she exclaimed, aloud, as her nag stopped and neighed a friendly greeting to the object of her own solicitude, "where air ...
— Southern Lights and Shadows • Edited by William Dean Howells & Henry Mills Alden
... a-drivin' the hills an' dales across; But, scannin' the lines of his poetry, he dropped the lines of his hoss. The nag ran fleet and fleeter, in quite irregular metre; An' when we got Tom's leg set, an' had fixed him so he could speak, He muttered that that adventur' would ...
— Farm Ballads • Will Carleton
... hitch your hoss up to that there buckboard," he drawled. "My old nag is dead two year since. You go in, miss, an' dress in them clothes a-hangin' onto that peg by the bed," he added, with an effort. "Use 'em ...
— Special Messenger • Robert W. Chambers
... the people of the inn, burst open the door with a thrust of his shoulder, made for a sack of oats, emptied a bottle of sweet cider into the manger, and again mounted his nag, whose feet struck fire as ...
— Madame Bovary • Gustave Flaubert
... chavies o' mine are allus a-quarrellin' now, an' it's allus about the same thing. 'Tain't the quarrellin' as I mind so much,—women an' sparrows, they say, must cherrup an' quarrel,—but they needn't allus keep a-nag-naggin' about the ...
— Aylwin • Theodore Watts-Dunton
... liveryman to send over his best nag and a cutter this morning," said Albert at breakfast the next day to his friend, "and you and Alice can take a sleigh-ride and see Sandgate snow-clad. I have some business matters ...
— Uncle Terry - A Story of the Maine Coast • Charles Clark Munn
... nipped feet and hands, which a cup of hot coffee, 'with,' speedily corrected, and were en route at 4.30 A.M. Formerly animals were left at the lower estancia; now they are readily taken on to Alta Vista. My wife rode a sure-footed black nag, I a mule which was perfect whilst the foot-long lever acting curb lay loose on its neck. Returning, we were amazed at the places they had passed during the ...
— To the Gold Coast for Gold - A Personal Narrative in Two Volumes.—Vol. I • Richard F. Burton
... it is! And painters at work on it, too!" she exclaimed, just as Michael added a vigorous jerk of the reins to the "Whoa!" with which he stopped his nag in front ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, July 1878, No. 9 • Various
... times I wanted my handkerchief I didn't seem to care; I got along, and said never mind, it isn't any matter, and dropped it out of my mind. But now it was different; I wanted it all the time; it was nag, nag, nag, right along, and no rest; I couldn't get it out of my mind; and so at last I lost my temper and said hang a man that would make a suit of armor without any pockets in it. You see I had my handkerchief in my helmet; and some other things; but it was that kind of a helmet ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... show him. But Miller told himself he'd show her instead. Coward, eh? Maybe this would teach her a lesson! Hell of a lot of help she'd been! Nag at him every time he took a drink. Holler bloody murder when he put twenty-five bucks on a horse, with a chance to make five hundred. What man wouldn't ...
— The Day Time Stopped Moving • Bradner Buckner
... that I looked round and saw myself reduced to command such people. There was scarcely one whole unpatched garment among us, and three of my squires had but a spur apiece. To make up for this deficiency we mustered two black eyes, Fresnoy's included, and a broken nose. Matthew's nag lacked a tail, and, more remarkable still, its rider, as I presently discovered, was stone-deaf; while Mark's sword was innocent of a scabbard, and his bridle was plain rope. One thing, indeed, I observed with pleasure. The two men who had ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman
... envelop'd in other furs, for a ride. The sleigh was drawn by as fine a team of horses as I ever saw. (You needn't think all the best animals are brought up nowadays; never was such horseflesh as fifty years ago on Long Island, or south, or in New York city; folks look'd for spirit and mettle in a nag, not tame speed merely.) Well, I, a boy of perhaps 13 or 14, stopp'd and gazed long at the spectacle of that fur-swathed old man, surrounded by friends and servants, and the careful seating of him in the sleigh. I remember the spirited, champing horses, the driver ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... their horses quite philosophically. One old farmer, whose wheezy nag tried to climb the ...
— Two Thousand Miles On An Automobile • Arthur Jerome Eddy
... going on, be able to tell the probable rent-roll of every village for miles around, know whether the ryots are lazy and discontented, or are industrious and hard-working. Up in the early morning, before the hot blazing sun has climbed on high, he is off on his trusty nag, through his Zeraats, with his greyhounds and terriers panting behind him. As he nears a village, the farm-servant in charge of that particular bit of cultivation, comes out with a low salaam, to report progress, or complain that ...
— Sport and Work on the Nepaul Frontier - Twelve Years Sporting Reminiscences of an Indigo Planter • James Inglis
... and without any particular enterprise. But this tumult behind made his horse prick up his ears and snort. When the nag mended his pace and began to lash out with straddling legs, the ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... I suppose so. Hmm. Yes. Thee is the little girl that's had such a story-paper kind of life, isn't thee? Don't remember me, but I do thee. Gave me a ride once after that little piebald nag thee swopped Oliver's calf for. Thee sees I know thee, if thee has forgot me and how my floury clothes hit the black jacket thee wore, that day, and dusted it well, 'Dusty miller' thee laughed and called ...
— Dorothy's House Party • Evelyn Raymond
... partly my fault," she said; "but we've never had a minute's comfort since the little lad went. And things get worse and worse. I don't care no more to keep the place nice, and I ups and speaks sharp to Darvell, and he goes off to the 'Nag's Head.'" ...
— Our Frank - and other stories • Amy Walton
... poem. Even those who can not abide the poet make an exception here; and your thorough-going Browningite never outgrows this piece. It is the greatest horseback poem in the literature of the world: compared to this, Paul Revere's Ride is the amble of a splayfooted nag. It sounds as though it had been written in the saddle: but it was really composed during a hot day on the deck of a vessel in the Mediterranean, and written off on the flyleaf of a printed book that the poet held in his hand. Poets are always most present with the distant, as Mrs. Browning ...
— Robert Browning: How To Know Him • William Lyon Phelps
... point. Now supposin' you was in for a hoss race, which I hope ain't no offense, seein' it ain't likely but suppose, and to take first money you had to perdoose a two-fifteen gait. 'Purty good lick,' says you; 'now where will I get the nag?' Then you sets down and thinks, and, says you, 'By gum, which of course you wouldn't, but supposin' says you, 'a Blue Grass bred is the hoss for that gait'; and you begin to inquire around, but there ain't no Blue Grass bred stock in the country, and that race is creepin' ...
— The Man From Glengarry - A Tale Of The Ottawa • Ralph Connor
... Doria, Place de Venise. The cab that time started off leisurely, for the man comprehended that the mad desire to arrive hastily no longer possessed his fare. By a sudden metamorphosis, the swift Roman steed became a common nag, and the vehicle a heavy machine which rumbled along the streets. Boleslas yielded to depression, the inevitable reaction of an excess of violence such as he had just experienced. His composure could not last. The studio, in which was Madame Steno, began ...
— Cosmopolis, Complete • Paul Bourget
... of the unemployed," he answered. "You see, I have been almost converted to opinions which cut away the ground from under my own feet. I have lived so far a delightful life, and now my conscience is beginning to nag me. The question is whether I am enjoying myself at some poor ...
— Enter Bridget • Thomas Cobb
... can by the fire be separated from it. And lest you should doubt whether he means by the vertues of things those that are Medical; he has in one place[27] this ingenuous confession; Credo (sayes he) simplicia in sua simplicitate esse sufficientia pro sanatione omnium morborum. Nag. [Errata: Nay,] Barthias, even in a Comment upon Beguinus,[28] scruples not to make this acknowledgment; Valde absurdum est (sayes he) ex omnibus rebus extracta facere, salia, quintas essentias; praesertim ex substantiis ...
— The Sceptical Chymist • Robert Boyle
... dangerous business; but if his worship was very anxious, why, for a good horse from the ducal stables, he might dare it, since his own nag had fallen lame." ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... old Chancellor Whitelocke presented a hogshead of good Canary wine, and a sober, handsome, strong, well-paced English pad nag, and one of his richest saddles. To Wrangel he gave an English gelding; to Tott another; to Wittenberg another; to Steinberg another; to Douglas another; and to such of the great men as the Queen directed. To Lagerfeldt he ...
— A Journal of the Swedish Embassy in the Years 1653 and 1654, Vol II. • Bulstrode Whitelocke
... expected was the matter; there's a horse taken the bit between his teeth, and is running away. I can see a boy sprinting after him, and that's his voice we get. Now, I wonder what it's up to us to do; step aside and let the runaway nag pass by; or try something to stop him? What say, Fred; can we block the road, and make him hold up, without taking ...
— Fred Fenton on the Track - or, The Athletes of Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... to Cornice House; but found your nag here, and concluded to wait. I've been waiting the best part of an hour. What in thunder have you been ...
— Wandering Heath • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... you never heard me nag for trips. The going's too good at home. Did you, pop, ever hear ...
— Every Soul Hath Its Song • Fannie Hurst
... boys called her the fifteen-minute nag, but that was only in fun, you know, because, of course, she was faster than that—and he used to win money on that horse, for all she was so slow and always had the asthma, or the distemper, or the consumption, or something of that ...
— Humorous Masterpieces from American Literature • Various
... bring a little nag for her, if she can ride—if she can not, she must ride in the cart which ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat
... nag." he said wistfully, and his voice sounded strange in the great silence. "Maybe you can find 'em—and it you can, I'll sure be grateful; you can paw the stars out uh high heaven and I won't take my quirt off my saddle-horn; hope I ...
— The Lonesome Trail and Other Stories • B. M. Bower
... leather-coloured skin, did not arouse any curiosity or interest in me. The middle-class merchant or clerk from the big towns is repugnant to me, whether well or ill. I would exchange a curt salute with those liverish parties and go my way on my old nag. ...
— Caesar or Nothing • Pio Baroja Baroja
... was the mosquitoes. Night and day they never ceased to nag us. We wore veils and had gloves on our hands, so that under our armour we were able to grin defiance at them. But on the other side of that netting they buzzed in an angry grey cloud. To raise our veils and take a drink was to be assaulted ferociously. As we walked we could feel them resisting ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... prosperity I had abandoned in Paris under the patronage of that marvellous King Francis, where I had abundance of all kinds, and here had everything to want for. Many a time I had it in my soul to cast myself away for lost. One day on one of these occasions, I mounted a nice nag I had, put a hundred crowns in my purse, and went to Fiesole to visit a natural son of mine there, who was at nurse with my gossip, the wife of one of my workpeople. When I reached the house, I found the boy in good health, ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... with it?" Lise demanded. "It ain't Commonwealth Avenue, but it's got Fillmore Street beat a mile. There ain't no whistles hereto get you out of bed at six a.m., for one thing. There ain't no geezers, like Walters, to nag you 'round all day long. What's ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... you wouldn't believe them yarns and I didn't intend you to. And I really did see something queer one night when I was passing the over-harbour graveyard, true's you live. I dunno whether 'twas a ghost or Sandy Crawford's old white nag, but it looked blamed queer and I tell you I scooted at the rate ...
— Rainbow Valley • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... neat depot wagon and a spirited young sorrel had replaced the ancient buggy and the apostolic nag, but these fell far short of Uncle Jimpson's dreams. A coach and four at that moment would not have compensated him for the fact that a complaisant, red-headed furnaceman, a "po' white trash" arrived but yesterday, was being ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice
... opportunity of saying. "I should have thought you would enter a little into the pleasures of hunting. I wish you would let me send over a chestnut horse for you to try. It has been trained for a lady. I saw you on Saturday cantering over the hill on a nag not worthy of you. My groom shall bring Corydon for you every day, if you ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... that night. That's out of the question. No doubt he'll sleep at the Nag's Head, as that's the lowest radical public-house in the city. Martha shall try to find him. She knows more about his doings than I do. If he chooses to come here the following morning before he goes down ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... of English seems to be to spell and to punctuate correctly, there are teachers of public speaking whose critical eye never sees farther than gesture, articulation, and emphasis. With this attitude toward their work, they become fault-finders rather than teachers. They nag, harrass, and suppress. The business of the teacher is to make the student see visions of beauty, truth and love, to open up to him these mighty fields that he may go in and possess them. To implant a yearning, an unquenchable, all-consuming desire to comprehend and to express ...
— The Speaker, No. 5: Volume II, Issue 1 - December, 1906. • Various
... tribe, with such adornment as they had stolen or adopted from intercourse with splendor-loving nations, and where long trains of camels dragged quarried stones to the building, in former times only an occasional ox-cart with creaking wheels was to be seen, an Egyptian riding an ass or a bare-backed nag, and now and then a few insolent Greek soldiers. On all sides he heard the sharper and more emphatic accent of the sons of the desert instead of the language of his forefathers and their Greek conquerors. Without the aid of the ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... she couldn't purchase the absence of the father at any price—he claimed what he called his "conzugal rights" as well as his board, lodging, washing and beer. She slaved for her children, and nag-nag-nagged them everlastingly, whether they were in the right or in the wrong, but they were hardened to it and took small notice. She had the spirit of a bullock. Her whole nature was soured. She had those "worse troubles" which she couldn't tell ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... there came round the post where the letters of our founder are, not from the way of Taunton but from the side of Lowman bridge, a very small string of horses, only two indeed (counting for one the pony), and a red-faced man on the bigger nag. ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... o' us have to be. What with loading the cart, delivering, and unloading again, and caring for the nag I find ...
— In Doublet and Hose - A Story for Girls • Lucy Foster Madison
... gobeithiol yr amserau. Am bob un o'n cydgenedl ag oedd yn deall Saesoneg yn nechreuad y ganrif hon, mae yn debyg na fethem wrth ddyweud fod ugeiniau os nad canoedd yn ei deall yn awr. O'r ochor arall, y mae rhifedi mwy nag a feddylid o'r Saeson sy'n ymweled a'n gwlad yn ystod misoedd yr haf yn gwneuthur ymdrech nid bychan i ...
— A Pocket Dictionary - Welsh-English • William Richards
... la nage sur la mer immense avec Breca quand, par bravade, vous avez tent les flots et que vous avez follement hasard votre vie dans l'eau profonde? Aucun homme, qu'il ft ami ou ennemi, ne put vous empcher d'entreprendre ce triste voyage.—Vous avez nag alors sur la mer[14], vous avez suivi les sentiers de l'ocan. L'hiver agitait les vagues[15]. Vous tes rests en dtresse pendant sept nuits sous la puissance des flots, mais il t'a vaincu dans la jote parce qu'il avait plus de force que toi. Le matin, le flot ...
— The Translations of Beowulf - A Critical Biography • Chauncey Brewster Tinker
... with Barry. Everybody's too good to him. And when I try to counteract it, Barry says that I nag. But he doesn't understand." ...
— Contrary Mary • Temple Bailey |
