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Spy   Listen
noun
Spy  n.  (pl. spies)  
1.
One who keeps a constant watch of the conduct of others. "These wretched spies of wit."
2.
(Mil.) A person sent secretly into an enemy's camp, territory, or fortifications, to inspect his works, ascertain his strength, movements, or designs, and to communicate such intelligence to the proper officer.
Spy money, money paid to a spy; the reward for private or secret intelligence regarding the enemy.
Spy Wednesday (Eccl.), the Wednesday immediately preceding the festival of Easter; so called in allusion to the betrayal of Christ by Judas Iscariot.
Synonyms: See Emissary, and Scout.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Spy" Quotes from Famous Books



... to-day something has been unsealed in her—an eye, a tongue, an ear, which have hitherto been closed. She is like a deaf and dumb person, who by a sudden fright is restored to speech and hearing. My favorite child will become the spy of my ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... and my will Is to my maker still, Whom now the currents con, the rollers steer— Lifting forlorn to spy Trailed smoke along the sky, Falling afraid lest ...
— The Seven Seas • Rudyard Kipling

... yes, senora, to the Casino," responded the other, with some confusion. "Afterward he went back to his hotel. And how my uncle scolded me because I remained out so late, playing the spy in that way! But I can't help it, and to see a person like you threatened by such dangers makes me wild. For there is no use in talking; I foresee that the day we least expect it those villains will attack the ...
— Dona Perfecta • B. Perez Galdos

... of—by one who seldom opens his lips but to ill purpose. It was not difficult for me to wade through the shallows of the man's mind, and for my friend's sake to win his base confidence. Needing a spy, and being himself a born traitor, he readily believed me at his beck; in truth he had long marked me, so I found, for a cankered soul who waited but the occasion to advance by infamy. I held the creature in my hand; I turned him over and ...
— Veranilda • George Gissing

... had the power of projecting, had lately been much exercised and nourished; it had seemed to me of late as though the body of Edward Hyde had grown in stature, as though (when I wore that form) I were conscious of a more generous tide of blood; and I began to spy a danger that, ...
— Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde • ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON

... nephew got Who waits the traitor King upon; He’ll be our spy, and privily Will send us ...
— Marsk Stig - a ballad - - - Translator: George Borrow • Thomas J. Wise

... us gradually ceased, and the whole multitude seemed to have melted away from our view. I feared some cruel deception, and at first peered out very cautiously to spy the land. But yonder in very truth a vessel came sailing into view. It was the Blue Bell Captain Hastings. I set fire to the reeds on the side of the hill to attract his attention. I put a black shawl ...
— The Story of John G. Paton - Or Thirty Years Among South Sea Cannibals • James Paton

... he did," replied the River God. "He ran as fast as he could to the Queen, but the silver cap was so uncomfortable for him to wear that I am sure he has discarded it long before this. So he gained nothing for playing the spy." ...
— Sandman's Goodnight Stories • Abbie Phillips Walker

... write more met mine eye: Within each wall were set three gates; Twelve in succession I could spy, Portals adorned with bright gold plates; Each gate a single pearl saw I, A perfect pearl, as John relates. On each a name was written high Of Israel's sons after their dates, The oldest first, as the story states. Within those streets by night or noon, Light beams that not one hour abates; They ...
— The Pearl • Sophie Jewett

... ('twas in Astraea's reign) The vernal powers renew'd their train, It happen'd that immortal Love Was ranging through the spheres above, And downward hither cast his eye The year's returning pomp to spy. 30 He saw the radiant god of day Waft in his car the rosy May; The fragrant Airs and genial Hours Were shedding round him dews and flowers; Before his wheels Aurora pass'd, And Hesper's golden lamp was last. But, fairest of the blooming throng, When Health majestic moved along, Delighted to ...
— Poetical Works of Akenside - [Edited by George Gilfillan] • Mark Akenside

... continued Bessie, more boldly, "so I had to speak first. Would you like to play, 'I spy'?" ...
— Harper's Young People, September 7, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... doing the honours of his new purchase, when he has fairly housed it. You must view it in every light, till he has found the best—placing it at this distance, and at that, but always suiting the focus of your sight to his own. You must spy at it through your fingers, to catch the aerial perspective—though you assure him that to you the landscape shows much more agreeable without that artifice. Wo be to the luckless wight, who does not only not respond ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb

... of his nurture be regarded as a gentleman! And were there no such reason against it, how could he, even to Barbara, speak of his mother's hidden pain, of his mother's humiliation! It would be treachery! He would be as a spy that had hid himself in a holy place! The thing she could not tell him, how could he tell anyone! On the other hand, if he did not let her know the sad fact, would he not be receiving and cherishing Barbara's friendship on false pretences? He was not what ...
— There & Back • George MacDonald

... dreaming. Madness or death could be no worse than the torture of being pitilessly and unceasingly watched when she knew that she was only dreaming but could not wake. Of late the form of her dreams had changed, growing less defined; there was no longer the old accusing pair of eyes to reproach and spy on her as soon as the room was in darkness, but she was conscious of vague presences which she could not clearly see. After fainting in the train a month before, she had heard Eric's voice in her sleep, though she could not recognize a face ...
— The Education of Eric Lane • Stephen McKenna

... of September for my Corsican expedition, and therefore begged of him to send me the letter of introduction, which if he refused, I should certainly go without it, and probably be hanged as a spy. So let him ...
— Boswell's Correspondence with the Honourable Andrew Erskine, and His Journal of a Tour to Corsica • James Boswell

... boasting of his perfect purity; he was transferred, like a mere dependent, from the Whigs to the Tories and back again. In the reign of George I. he consented to abandon his character in order to act as a spy upon unlucky Jacobite colleagues. It is to the credit of Harley's acuteness that he was the first English minister to make a systematic use of the press and was the patron both of Swift and De Foe. But to use the press was then to make a mere tool of the author. ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen

... have tried it. Our house is watched. He promised me he would not wear the British red." She shuddered. "Anything but that—to have him executed as a spy. He would not risk that, but wear merely a long ...
— Astounding Stories, April, 1931 • Various

... cant term in the French Revolution for a spy under the jailers.—C. Dickens, A Tale of ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer

... councillor, or inquisitor—was beyond their reach. Secretly they pronounced a doom; and ere long the stiletto or the poison cup had done its work, or the dark waters of the lagoon had closed over a life. The spy was everywhere. No man dared to speak out, for his most intimate companions might be on the watch to betray him. Bronze vases, shaped like a lion's mouth, gaped at the corner of every square to receive the names of suspected persons. Gloom ...
— Masques & Phases • Robert Ross

... the little girl to her old nurse, and the next half-hour was spent in satisfying her hunger. As she was returning, with laggard step, she happened to spy, from the window, a beautiful butterfly fluttering about the rose-bushes in the garden; and, quite forgetting her unfinished exercise, away she flew in chase ...
— Parker's Second Reader • Richard G. Parker

... him was Fear, all arm'd from top to toe, Yet thought himself not safe enough thereby: But fear'd each sudden movement to and fro; And his own arms when glittering he did spy, Or clashing heard, he fast away did fly, As ashes pale of hue and wingy heel'd; And evermore on Danger fix'd his eye, 'Gainst whom he always bent a brazen shield, Which his right hand unarmed fearfully did wield. Faery Queen, B. iii. c. 12, ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli

... no joking about your ill-natured speeches. I tell you now, once for all, that I never did and never shall blow upon any boy in this school. You know as well as I do that the Doctor treats me as a scholar here, and not as a spy or a relative, and if ever you charge me again with tale-bearing, I'll answer you ...
— St. Nicholas, Vol. 5, No. 5, March, 1878 • Various

... to work. Anton sat at the desk and copied letters, while Itzig, having brushed the collective boots and shoes of the Ehrenthal family, stationed himself as a spy at the door of the principal hotel, to watch a certain gentleman who was discontented with his master, and suspected of applying to ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag

... the tug went back to mainland with two of the doctors, isn't it possible that some spy may have concluded that all the doctors ...
— The Motor Boat Club and The Wireless - The Dot, Dash and Dare Cruise • H. Irving Hancock

... beauty looked almost ethereal under the circumstances; and Papa Ravinet, when he saw her, remained fixed by admiration, standing upon the threshold of the open door. But it occurred to him at once that he might be looked upon as a spy, and that his feelings would be sure to be misinterpreted. He coughed, therefore, to give ...
— The Clique of Gold • Emile Gaboriau

... Injun try. War-paint no good; no whiskey buy; Treaty no want; treaty all lie. Great Father's whiskey Injun no spy. ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 14, July 2, 1870 • Various

... "Chief Spy in Particular to the Fairy Queen," answered the grasshopper. "It's very hard work, I can tell you; some days I haven't a moment to myself. Of course, I find out a great deal that nobody else knows, which is always ...
— All the Way to Fairyland - Fairy Stories • Evelyn Sharp

... his cigarette out of the window, while Marishka gazed straight before her, trying to think clearly of Hugh Renwick. A Serbian spy! It was impossible. And yet every word that this man spoke hurt her cruelly. Renwick had been in Sarajevo and Belgrade, for he had told her so. He alone of all persons outside the Secret Government of Austria had been in a position to know the details of ...
— The Secret Witness • George Gibbs

... signals to lure him into an ambuscade. On the use of the flag and uniform of an enemy for purposes of deception there has been some controversy, but it is supported by high military authority.[29] The use of spies is fully authorised, but the spy, if discovered, is excluded from the rights of war and liable to ...
— The Map of Life - Conduct and Character • William Edward Hartpole Lecky

... the office, where my Lord Brouncker (newly come to town from his being at Chatham and Harwich to spy enormities): and at noon I with him and his lady, Williams, to Captain Cocke's; where a good dinner, and very merry. Good news to-day upon the Exchange, that our Hamburgh fleet is got in; and good hopes that we will soon have the like of our Gottenburgh, and then we shall be well for this winter. ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys

... spy-glass, Dan, and let us see some of your magnified pollywogs and annymalcumisms as you call 'em," said Jack, who felt so uncomfortable during this scene that he would have slipped away if Emil ...
— Little Men - Life at Plumfield With Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott

... had "rifled" the body of Dubrosc found a paper upon him which proved that the Frenchman was a spy in the service of Santa Anna. He had thrown himself into the company at New Orleans with the intention of gaining information, and then deserting on his arrival at Mexico. This he succeeded in ...
— The Rifle Rangers • Captain Mayne Reid

... composed of four, who attended St. Cuthbert's both morning and evening, when they came one Sabbath day to spy out the land. ...
— St. Cuthbert's • Robert E. Knowles

... too. A couple of years later, came the big row in the Balkans, and the war had hardly started before dad was arrested as a spy.' ...
— On Land And Sea At The Dardanelles • Thomas Charles Bridges

... time), and allow me to station myself some fifty miles further down the coast. My request was granted, and away I went. This time, instead of taking shelter under an island, I ensconced my little force behind a point of land which enabled me by mounting on the rocks to sweep the horizon with a spy-glass, so that I could discover any vessel approaching the land while she was yet at ...
— Sketches From My Life - By The Late Admiral Hobart Pasha • Hobart Pasha

... then we think they're not even up to the common run of men. We think other men are different because we don't know them. Yes," she returned to his question with a sigh, "Joey told me something about it—enough about it. I suppose it isn't right to let him be a spy on his father; but I have to. If I didn't he might want to go, from the talk of those fools, and get to believin' with them. He said there was boys and girls kneelin' with the rest—little children, almost, and shoutin' ...
— The Leatherwood God • William Dean Howells

... mysteriously disappeared on their voyage home to England, after shipping Malay crews on board, the English admiral on the station had conferred with the Chinese authorities, and from them learned that the Diavolo was suspected, and that a spy had discovered that an attempt would be made on the Hankow Lin, which was just loading at the time, and which had, like the other missing ships, shipped some Malay hands, in consequence of the loss of the main portion of her English crew ...
— The Penang Pirate - and, The Lost Pinnace • John Conroy Hutcheson

... as likely to be an English spy," said Madgett, in a whisper; but Humbert's gesture of impatience showed how little trust he reposed in ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various

... released, but almost immediately re-arrested on the suspicion that he had killed a Jew named Abraham, who had amassed great sums during the wars as a spy. Tortured again, in his extremity he confessed to the murder and named Heribert as his accomplice, whereupon both men were sentenced to be hanged. Just as this doom was about to be carried out a Jew who had arrived from a far country hurriedly forced his way through the crowd. It was Abraham, ...
— Hero Tales and Legends of the Rhine • Lewis Spence

... sir, he should not. Deceiuing me, Is Thisbies cue; she is to enter, and I am to spy Her through the wall. You shall see ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... latter part of the winter of 1864-65 I was detailed as president of a military commission, called to meet in Winchester to try a man charged with being a spy, a guerrilla, a dealer in contraband goods, and a bad and dangerous man. The specifications recited that the accused had been a member of the notorious Harry Gilmor's band of partisans; that he had been caught wearing citizen's clothes inside the union lines; and that he was in the habit of ...
— Personal Recollections of a Cavalryman - With Custer's Michigan Cavalry Brigade in the Civil War • J. H. (James Harvey) Kidd

... correspondent, eh," continued the general, "and walking about within my lines as free as air. He may be a spy. I'll ...
— The Boy Allies At Verdun • Clair W. Hayes

... a good hider, and was searched for far and wide before Sam's "I spy! I spy!" gave the signal that a bit of the spotty cotton had been seen peeping out from under Purday's big potato-basket in the tool-house, and the whole party flew towards home. Bessie would not aim at Papa, for if so, she would certainly catch no one; but she hunted down ...
— The Stokesley Secret • Charlotte M. Yonge

... Morrison's manner from the outset of the interview; the same perspicacity would have detected something hard under the smooth surface of Despeaux's early politeness. Mr. Despeaux was not so elaborately polite when he retorted that he did not propose to play the spy on a guest ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day

... future times, although it was but a sort of sprose to make the world laugh. Fortunately for my character, however, it did not fall out exactly in my hands, although it happened in the course of my provostry. The matter spoken of, was the affair of a Frenchman who was taken up as a spy; for the American war was then raging, and the French had taken the ...
— The Provost • John Galt

... mothers, Grim uncles and brothers, May hunt them from Janu'ry to June; They are oft to the stars, And in Venus or Mars You may spy out their air-balloon ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume XIII, No. 369, Saturday, May 9, 1829. • Various

... The primary power is the same in each case, and perhaps the untutored savage has the more brawny arm of the two. The real advantage lies in the point and polish of the swordsman's weapon; in the trained eye quick to spy out the weakness of the adversary; in the ready hand prompt to follow it on the instant. But, after all, the sword exercise is only the hewing and poking of the clubman developed ...
— Science & Education • Thomas H. Huxley

... unbroken, however. What is this that strikes upon the ear? What sound comes to break the unearthly stillness? A creeping footstep, a cautious tread, a slinking, halting, uncertain motion, belonging surely to some one who sees an enemy, a spy in every flitting shadow. Nearer and nearer it comes now into the fuller glare of the lamp-light, and stops short at the door so dreaded by ...
— The Haunted Chamber - A Novel • "The Duchess"

... gave mattresses and sheets to those who slept on straw; she went among the poor herself, followed by her maid, a girl from Auvergne whom her mother procured for her, and who attached herself body and soul to her mistress. Veronique made an honorable spy of her, sending her to discover the places where suffering could ...
— The Village Rector • Honore de Balzac

... into her rival's presence, to hide herself like a spy to see what she wished, to show fear, or hesitation, or deference, were not in the least what she contemplated. What she intended was to confront this fair, strange, cold, cruel thing, and see if she were of flesh and blood like other living beings, and do the best that could be done to outrage, ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]

... telepaths Malone and the rest of the FBI had found during their work in uncovering a telepathic spy, she had been located in an insane asylum. Months of extensive psychotherapy, including all the newest techniques and some so old that psychiatrists were a little afraid to use them, had done absolutely nothing ...
— The Impossibles • Gordon Randall Garrett

... here along of us, to help. He'd sure tell us if thar's Injuns prowlin' around. My old eyes ain't just what they used ter be for spottin' a crawlin' Redskin from afar. Now, Kiddie had eyes like spy-glasses, hadn't he, Isa? As for his sense of hearin'—well, I allow he c'd 'most hear ...
— Kiddie the Scout • Robert Leighton

... traders gave information concerning La Force the French emissary, who had beset Washington when on his mission to the frontier, and acted, as he thought, the part of a spy. He had been at Gist's new settlement beyond Laurel Hill, and was prowling about the country with four soldiers at his heels on a pretended hunt after deserters. Washington suspected him to be ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving

... his auditors, that, on General Washington's arrival at Cambridge, his first care was to reconnoitre the British troops with his spy-glass, and to examine the condition of his own army. He found that the American troops amounted to about fourteen thousand men. They were extended all round the peninsula of Boston, a space of twelve miles, from the high grounds of Roxbury on the right to Mystic River on ...
— Grandfather's Chair • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... tells what thinga tha'll do, An' booasts o' manly courage, Aw'st tell thi then, as nah aw do, Go hooam an' get thi porrige." "Why Jenny wor it thee," he said "Aw fancied aw could spy thi, Aw nobbut reckoned to be flaid, Aw did ...
— Yorkshire Ditties, Second Series - To which is added The Cream of Wit and Humour - from his Popular Writings • John Hartley

... about him is black as the wing of the night raven. Nothing can I spy that can mark him further; but having once seen him put forth his strength in battle, methinks I could know him again among a thousand warriors. He rushes to the fray as if he were summoned to a banquet. There is more than mere strength—there seems as if the ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester

... let down alive, and hanged again, more than once, that his arm was broken by a Lochaber axe, and that a torch was applied to the foot from which the shoe had fallen. A pamphlet of 1787 says that Robertson became a spy on smugglers in Holland, returned to London, procured a pardon through the Butcher Cumberland, and "at last died in misery in London." It is plain that Colonel Moyle might have rescued Porteous, but he was naturally cautious about entering the city gates ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... me," he raved. "They have tried all sorts of tricks. There is always some sneaking spy watching for a chance to get me, but I'll fix them. I built the business up and I can tear it down. Let them try to take anything away from me if they dare. I'll burn the Mill and the whole town before I'll give up one cent of my legal rights ...
— Helen of the Old House • Harold Bell Wright

... direct selling to the user on a broad scale. This was done in a fair spirit and with due consideration for everyone's rights. We did not ruthlessly go after the trade of our competitors and attempt to ruin it by cutting prices or instituting a spy system. We had set ourselves the task of building up as rapidly and as broadly as possible the volume of consumption. Let me try ...
— Random Reminiscences of Men and Events • John D. Rockefeller

... began in my study of the Pelham Papers in the Additional Manuscripts of the British Museum. These include the letters of Pickle the Spy and of JAMES MOHR MACGREGOR. Transcripts of them were sent by me to Mr. ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, for use in a novel, which he did not live to finish. The character of Pickle, indeed, like that of the Master of Ballantrae, is alluring to writers of historical romance. Resisting ...
— Pickle the Spy • Andrew Lang

... they admired each other, for he plainly perceived they had (as we say) fallen in love at first sight: but to try Ferdinand's constancy, he resolved to throw some difficulties in their way: therefore advancing forward, he addressed the prince with a stern air, telling him, he came to the island as a spy, to take it from him who was the lord of it. "Follow me," said he, "I will tie you neck and feet together. You shall drink sea-water; shell-fish, withered roots, and husks of acorns shall be your food." "No," said Ferdinand, "I ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 3 (of 12) - Classic Tales And Old-Fashioned Stories • Various

... said Zarah, drawing up her slight but elegant figure; "I believe it—I have gone through a trial that few indeed could have sustained. I have renounced the dear intercourse of my kind; compelled my tongue only to utter, like that of a spy, the knowledge which my ear had only collected as a base eavesdropper. This I have done for years—for years—and all for the sake of your private applause—and the hope of vengeance on a woman, who, if she did ill in murdering my father, has been bitterly repaid by nourishing ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott

... from the rock Tarpeian,[23] Could the wan burghers spy The line of blazing villages Red in the midnight sky. 125 The Fathers[24] of the City, They sat all night and day, For every hour some horseman came ...
— Narrative and Lyric Poems (first series) for use in the Lower School • O. J. Stevenson

... him in the street, then; out with you; don't stay in my house, straight and stiff as a sentry, to observe what is going on, and to make your profit of everything. I won't always have before me a spy on all my affairs; a treacherous scamp, whose cursed eyes watch all my actions, covet all I possess, and ferret about in every corner to see if there ...
— The Miser (L'Avare) • Moliere

... extremities of which two short flanks run towards the rear, leaving an open gorge; it is generally applied only in connection with other works. Prize-masters will recollect that lunette is also the French name for a spy-glass or telescope. ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth

... he said fiercely, 'is a fence—a receiver. Why do you ask me if I know a fence? Who are you? Are you a spy for the police? Hein? What should I know about receivers? Answer ...
— The Uttermost Farthing - A Savant's Vendetta • R. Austin Freeman

... if you spy but a Hen or a Chicken in a Body's House, I should be sure to hear of it to-Morrow in the Pulpit. This is the Gratitude you shew ...
— Colloquies of Erasmus, Volume I. • Erasmus

... carefully wording his hint that Padre Jose de Rincon might be a Radical spy in the ecclesiastical camp, Wenceslas found means to obtain from Rome a fairly comprehensive account of the priest's past history. He mused over this until an idea suddenly occurred to him, namely, the similarity of this account with many of the passages which he had found in a certain ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking

... head, a large red face from which a pair of little bloodshot eyes stared out truculently, and a bull neck which was several shades deeper in colour than his face. He was Superintendent Merrington, a noted executive officer of New Scotland Yard, whose handling of the most important spy case tried in London during the war had brought forth from a gracious sovereign the inevitable Order of the British Empire. Merrington was known as a detective in every capital in Europe, and because of his wide knowledge ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees

... in the woods I chanced to spy amid the brake A huntsman ride his way beside A fair and passing tranquil lake; Though velvet bucks sped here and there, He let them scamper through the green— Not one smote he, but lustily He blew his horn—what ...
— Songs and Other Verse • Eugene Field

... hath incurred his hatred for refusing to force his daughter into accepting his suit. He has now returned into the camp, and I have reported the matter to you, that you may judge whether it would not be well to send a file of pikemen and lay him by the heels lest he play the spy once more.' ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle

... sir?' asked Mr Gregsbury; 'a spy upon my privacy! A concealed voter! You have heard my answer, ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens

... dim vision was enough for her. For one moment she reeled beneath an overpowering weight of dread, for she could not doubt any longer that the man had followed her the whole way from her own door; then the desire to escape from the spy gave her strength. Unable to think clearly, she walked twice as fast as before, as if it were possible to escape from a man who of course could move much faster; and for some minutes she fled on, till, reaching a pastry-cook's ...
— An Episode Under the Terror • Honore de Balzac

... his power; he transfers all his aversions to those things which Nature commands us to avoid. His appetites are always moderate. He is indifferent whether he be thought foolish or ignorant. He observes himself with the nicety of an enemy or a spy, and looks on ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various

... turned lock so that it should sound as if it had banged to, whereas, directly the handle was released it would fall open a little way. Berrington was not going to leave anything to chance, and he had no hesitation in playing the spy. ...
— The Slave of Silence • Fred M. White

... then, it cost me an effort to keep my place. As I continued to watch them. I could see that the young girl cowered beneath the threats of this bold bawdril, who had in some way gained an ascendancy over her—perhaps appointed by Stebbins to act in the double capacity of spy and guardian? Notwithstanding the horrid imaginings to which the woman's presence had given rise, I succeeded in smothering my wrath, and remaining silent. My good star was guiding me; and soon after I was rewarded for the act ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid

... to the idea that you were his kinsman and yet served with Buonaparte, and filled instead with wonder that he should have another kinsman who was so remarkably well informed of events in France. And it now became a very disagreeable question, whether the young gentleman was not a spy? In short, sir, in seeking to disserve you, he had accumulated against himself a ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson

... not wonder at the popularity of these books; there is a freshness and variety about them, and an enthusiasm in the description of sport and adventure, which even the older folk can hardly fail to share."—Worcester Spy. ...
— Ben, the Luggage Boy; - or, Among the Wharves • Horatio Alger

... beer. The Vielhaber establishment was already suffering under the stigma of pro-Germanism put upon it by certain of the watchful towns-people. Judge Penniman, that hale old invalid, had even declared that Herman was a spy, and signalled each night to other spies by flapping a curtain of his lighted room above the saloon. The judge had found believers, though it was difficult to explain just what information Herman ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson

... will the damned now begin to look for their names in this book. Those that, when once the long-suffering of God waited on them, made light of all admonition, and slighted the counsel of making their calling and election sure: would now give thousands of treasures, that they could but spy their names, though last and least among the sons of God. But, I say, how will they fail? how will they faint? how will they die and languish in their souls? when they shall still as they look, see their names wanting. What ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... of the kind, and the horsemen pressed on, jamming their spurs into their poor beasts' steaming flanks. "If you see him, catch and hang him," they shouted, as they scoured away; "he is a Prussian spy!" ...
— Stories By English Authors: France • Various

... BRAXSCOMBE PETTER just decided that her novel could not be up to date without a German spy and so forth, or whether she really set out to do her bit for the War by commenting on the Teutonic idea of honour. Anyhow, one must admit that her Gretchen Meyer is drawn with rather uncommon skill, even if her subterranean mental processes are never exactly elucidated in Miss Velanty's ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, March 22, 1916 • Various

... him; they never learnt anything of his life and duties: he seemed sometimes as it were meditating a departure from his country. There was undoubtedly about him something mysterious and unsatisfactory. Morley was of opinion that he was a spy; Gerard, less suspicious, ultimately concluded that he was harassed by his creditors, and when at Mowedale was ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli

... a place on the headland, three hundred feet above the valley, perhaps, whereat the hill path turned and, for the first time, the island was plainly to be seen. Here at this place we stopped all together and began to spy out the woods through which we had raced for our lives six days ago. The sun had but just set then, and, short as the twilight is in these parts, there was enough of it for us to make a good observation and to be sure of many things. What ...
— The House Under the Sea - A Romance • Sir Max Pemberton

... basket, he seemed to be motioning to the breathless hordes below, the story of his failure. Then he dropped out of sight, and when we next saw him, he was reconnoitring the Confederate works through a long black spy-glass. A great laugh went up and down the lines as this cool procedure was observed, and then a cheer of applause ran from group to group. For a moment it was doubtful that the balloon would float in ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend

... high mountains off to the northwest, and a parallel range of mountains running to the south, with a narrow valley between. That, of course, must be this river, and as near as I can tell, it must have been about here that he and Mackay and the Indian hunters took to the shore to spy out the way." ...
— The Young Alaskans on the Trail • Emerson Hough

... intercourse with the King. Most patiently and minutely he kept the Advocate informed, almost from hour to hour, of every web that was spun, every conversation public or whispered in which important affairs were treated anywhere and by anybody. He was all-sufficient as a spy and intelligencer, although not entirely trustworthy as a counsellor. Still no man on the whole could scan the present or forecast the future more accurately than he was able to do from his advantageous position and his long ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... SPY: According to promise, I now write you a little about Delaware. Persons in your vicinity look upon the 'Little Diamond State' as a mere bog, or marsh, and mud and water they suppose are its chief productions; but, in my opinion, it is one of the finest little states in the ...
— Voyage of The Paper Canoe • N. H. Bishop

... staying, in the water, are based upon fancies about the embryonic life, about the sojourn in the mother's womb, and about the act of birth. The following is the dream of a young man who in his fancy has already while in embryo taken advantage of his opportunity to spy upon an act ...
— Dream Psychology - Psychoanalysis for Beginners • Sigmund Freud

... I tried to buy for one of my children the little Polish national cap, but after a vain search for it through many shops (where I was generally suspected of being a spy for the Austrian police), the cap was brought to me at night, in my private room, by shopkeepers who had been afraid to sell it openly in the day. At Wieliezhe, I, with some forty persons of various nationalities (including the usual contingent of detectives), ...
— The Drama Of Three Hundred & Sixty-Five Days - Scenes In The Great War - 1915 • Hall Caine

... Intelligence' (the report of a spy), dated from Bruges on September 29, 1656, mentions that Lilly, the astrologer of London, had written to say that the King would be restored to the throne next year, and that all the English at Bruges were delighted. But in the meantime they were very hard up ...
— Bruges and West Flanders • George W. T. Omond

... ideas; in the circle young lads of seventeen talk glibly and learnedly of women and of love, while in the presence of women they are dumb or talk to them like a book—and what do they talk about? The circle is the hot-bed of glib fluency; in the circle they spy on one another like so many police officials.... Oh, circle! thou'rt not a circle, but an enchanted ring, which has been the ruin of many ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Volume II • Ivan Turgenev

... you to the barn, and shows you the horse and the cow. Then she lets you look out of the barn-window. There you spy the kitten. ...
— The Nursery, Volume 17, No. 101, May, 1875 • Various

... said, 'whom have we here? Senor Thomas Wingfield I salute you. Look, my comrades, you see this young man whom the sea has brought to us. He is no Spaniard but an English spy. The last time that I saw him was in the streets of Seville, and there he tried to murder me because I threatened to reveal his trade to the authorities. Now he is here, upon what errand he ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard

... had two motorcycles attached to it—jackals, as one of the generals called them, in apt reference to the way in which jackals accompany a lion when hunting. The cyclists rode ahead to spy out the country and the best course to follow. When we got into action they would drop behind, and we used them to send messages back to camp. The best motorcyclist we had was a Swiss named Milson. He was of part English ...
— War in the Garden of Eden • Kermit Roosevelt

... and near, either with his own keen eyes or with powerful glasses; and he must combine patience and good sight with the ability to traverse long distances noiselessly and yet at speed. He may spend two or three hours sitting still and looking over a vast tract of country before he will suddenly spy a bear; or he may see nothing after the most careful search in a given place, and must then go on half a dozen miles to another, watching warily as he walks, and continuing this possibly for several days before getting a glimpse ...
— Hunting the Grisly and Other Sketches • Theodore Roosevelt

... rejoined, "as you are without employment just now, you must consider yourself my prisoner, for of course you cannot remain among us without passport, profession, purpose, or business of any kind. To be shot for a spy is your legitimate due just now. But we shall want surgeons soon, and newspaper correspondence is not a bad business in these times; come, I'll see what can be done ...
— In the Track of the Troops • R.M. Ballantyne

... sent off my letter to you on Monday I walked on to juniper, and entered at the same moment with Mr. jenkinson(79) and his attorney—a man whose figure strongly resembles some of Hogarth's most ill-looking, personages, and who appeared to me to be brought as a kind of spy, or witness of all that was passing. I would have retreated, fearing to interrupt business, but I was surrounded, and pressed to stay, by Madame de Stael with great empressement, and with much kindness by M. d'Arblay and all the rest. Mr. Clarke ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay

... has remained an example. For the literature of scoundrelism is as persistent in its form as in its folk-lore. As Harman's Caveat, which first saw the light in 1566, serves as a model to an unbroken series of such books, as The London Spy, so from Johnson in due course were developed the Newgate Calendar, and those innumerable records, which the latter half of the Eighteenth Century furnished us forth. The celebrated Calendar was in its origin nothing more than a list of prisoners printed ...
— A Book of Scoundrels • Charles Whibley

... inches long. The farther we went up the brook, the wilder it grew. The opposite bank was covered with pines and hemlocks, ascending high upwards, black and solemn. One knew that there must be almost a precipice behind, yet we could not see it. At the foot you could spy, a little way within the darksome shade, the roots and branches of the trees; but soon all sight was obstructed amidst the trunks. On the hither side, at first the bank was bare, then fringed with alder-bushes, bending and dipping into the stream, which, farther on, flowed through the midst of ...
— Passages From The American Notebooks, Volume 1 • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... look along the road, just then, and you spy Jake seated on a fence rail with an air of contentment, proceeding to eat the apple—what would you feel like doing and saying to him? Suppose you controlled yourself and asked him quietly why he took ...
— Heart and Soul • Victor Mapes (AKA Maveric Post)

... for example, hadn't guards been posted at Earth's most important contact point, an interstellar terminus? Did security measures start later at the towns and cities? Or was he already under some sort of surveillance, some infinitely subtle spy system that followed his every movement and apprehended him only when ready? Or was that too ...
— The Status Civilization • Robert Sheckley

... poems I had lent Alixe were there, and between the pages of one lay a letter addressed to me. It was, indeed, a daring thing to make Doltaire her messenger. But she trusted to his habits of courtesy; he had no small meannesses—he was no spy or thief. ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... that this rogue was no true "natural" at all, but was blessed, (or cursed), with as good an understanding as other folks, as was well known in the Cardinal's household, and that he had no doubt been sent to serve as a spy, so that he was to be esteemed a dangerous person, and had best be put ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge

... trembled and crimsoned. It was not seemly that a man speak to a woman thus, even though that man was a husband and the woman his wife, not even though the words were said in an open court, where the eyes of the great wife might spy and listen. And yet Dong-Yung ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1919 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... windows, one opening on the lawn, the other on the farm-yards, and both, from the thickness of the walls, looking like deep recesses. In the window that looked upon the farm-yards was the General's writing-table and seat. A spy-glass lay within reach, enabling him to overlook the yard-work without rising from his chair; and on the table were his farm-books, with the record of crops and improvements entered in regular order with his own hand. Charles Sumner, who visited La Grange ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 50, December, 1861 • Various

... extinguished for some time, for the sun had risen tolerably high before he reached the tower. Away, to some distance beyond the most remote point of land, stretched the sand-banks under the water. Beyond these, again, he perceived many ships, and among them he thought he recognised, by aid of the spy-glass, the "Karen Broenne," as his own vessel was called; and he was right. It was approaching the coast, and Clara and Joergen were on board. The Skagen lighthouse and the spire of its church looked to them like a heron and a swan upon the blue water. Clara ...
— The Sand-Hills of Jutland • Hans Christian Andersen

... visit's no ill ta'en; The father cracks of horses, pleughs, and kye.{16} The youngster's artless heart o'erflows wi' joy, But, blate and lathefu', scarce can weel behave; The mother, wi' a woman's wiles, can spy What makes the youth sae bashfu' an' sae grave; Weel pleased to think her bairn's ...
— Six Centuries of English Poetry - Tennyson to Chaucer • James Baldwin

... uneventful; he had personally investigated the saloon passenger lists, the second and third cabins and the steerage of the Lusitania, not forgetting the crew, only to be reassured by the absence of anybody aboard who even remotely suggested an Indian spy. But from the hour that the Poonah with its miscellaneous ship's company, white, yellow, brown, and black, had warped out into the Thames, he had felt he was being watched—had realised it instinctively, having nothing definite whereon to base his feeling. He was neither timorous nor ...
— The Bronze Bell • Louis Joseph Vance

... house situated at its extremity, inhabited by the harbour-master. The wind freshened, and the "Jeune-Hardie" ran swiftly under her topsails, mizzen, brigantine, gallant, and royal. There was evidently rejoicing on board as well as on land. Jean Cornbutte, spy-glass in hand, responded merrily to the questions of ...
— A Winter Amid the Ice - and Other Thrilling Stories • Jules Verne

... a traitor at one word of denunciation from an idler or an enemy, and, as in the most tyrannical days of the Spanish Inquisition one-half of the nation was set to spy upon the other, that wooden box, with its slit, is put there ready to receive denunciations from one ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy

... the hospital cleared of the charge made against her on board the "Philadelphia" of being a spy. Yet she had never given any explanation of her history. Then had followed her surprising meeting with the British officer, Colonel Dalton, and their betrayal of a former acquaintanceship. Although the ...
— The Red Cross Girls with the Russian Army • Margaret Vandercook



Words linked to "Spy" :   spot, tail, enquire, spy satellite, foreign agent, military machine, inquire, armed services, secret agent, detect, operative, espionage agent, descry, sleuth, infiltrator, comprehend, intelligence officer, intelligence agent, mole, snooper, counterspy, investigate, snoop, witness, undercover agent, sight, discover, supervise, perceive, observe



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