"Stiffen" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... conceptions and poetical notions are apt to hit with just a little sharp grating, if they are not well put. In fact, this kind of woman needs carefully to be idealized in the process of education, or she will stiffen and dry, as she grows old, into a veritable household Pharisee, a sort of domestic tyrant. She needs to be trained in artistic values and artistic weights and measures, to study all the arts and sciences of the beautiful, and then she is charming. Most useful, most needful, these little ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... saw the Russian's form stiffen, saw his eyes, as cold and steady as steel discs, fix themselves unseeingly over the man's head, who bowed awkwardly and turning hurriedly with a flushed face, stumbled ...
— Prince or Chauffeur? - A Story of Newport • Lawrence Perry
... wet the rim, and build up on that round and round with laces as before, until you have turned the saucer into a cup, about four inches across, and, maybe three inches high. Set this away to stiffen. Then finish the shape, by adding more coils, and drawing it in a little. When this has stiffened, make a "slip" or cream of clay and water, rub this all over the pot inside and out; use your fingers and a knife to make it smooth ...
— Woodland Tales • Ernest Seton-Thompson
... was a cold, clear December night, and the wet clothes of the fugitives were frozen stiff, like a harness, upon them. Trenck felt neither cold nor stiff; he carried his friend upon his shoulders, and that kept him warm; he walked so rapidly, his limbs could not stiffen. ...
— Berlin and Sans-Souci • Louise Muhlbach
... And as he climbed he heard behind him scoffs and jeers, but he kept his ears steadily closed to them. At last the noise grew so loud that he lost patience, and he stooped to pick up a stone to hurl into the midst of the clamour, when suddenly his arm seemed to stiffen, and the next moment he was ...
— The Pink Fairy Book • Various
... a man's hat. It was turned up on one side with a big breastpin. I noticed it wasn't any eight-dollar hat; she had to fix it that way to stiffen the brim in front. ...
— The Wrong Woman • Charles D. Stewart
... years ago we met," he resumed, "in the Wabash Avenue place. I noticed her when the bidding on a rocking chair started. A pretty girl. And as is often the case among women who attend auctions—a bug, a fan, a fish. You know, the kind that stiffen up when they get excited. The kind that hang on your words and breathe hard while you cut loose with the patter, and lose their heads when you swing into the ...
— A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago • Ben Hecht
... up tenderly; Lift her with care; Fashion'd so slenderly, Young, and so fair! Ere her limbs frigidly Stiffen too rigidly, Decently,—kindly,— Smooth and compose them; And her eyes, close them, ...
— Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works • Edgar Allan Poe
... gather from seeing my precious Darwanis in full flight when I got the blood out of my eyes. Their way of conducting a retreat was always to fire a volley and then run away helter-skelter, and though I had been teaching them better manners, I always knew they would break if I wasn't there to stiffen them. I was a good deal knocked about, besides the wound on the head, and before I could manage to roll into the bushes, Sher Singh's men were back. I thought it well to appear more dead than I was, especially when I saw them going round and finishing ...
— The Path to Honour • Sydney C. Grier
... into the transport, or become machine-gunners. The sedentary take post as cooks, or tailors, or officers' servants. The waster hews wood and draws water and empties swill-tubs. The great, mediocre, undistinguished majority merely go to stiffen the rank and file, and right nobly they do it. Each ...
— The First Hundred Thousand • Ian Hay
... the utmost damage an air raid is likely to inflict upon England would count materially in the exhaustion process, and the moral effect of these raids has been, and will be, to stiffen the British resolution to fight this war through to the conclusive ending of any ...
— What is Coming? • H. G. Wells
... He felt little Jennie stiffen, and draw away from him; so quickly he had to set to work to patch up the damage. "I want you to get well," he pleaded. "You're so good to everybody—you treat everybody well ...
— 100%: The Story of a Patriot • Upton Sinclair
... was on the first night that Maternus rose up! They stiffen if they stay a whole night on the cross. If he could walk to Daphne three nights later, he had not been crucified many hours. Come, let us go to the baths before the crowd gets there. If one is late those insolent attendants ...
— Caesar Dies • Talbot Mundy
... kindness, Gerty would no more have dared to define it than she would have tried to learn a butterfly's colours by knocking the dust from its wings. To seize on the wonder would be to brush off its bloom, and perhaps see it fade and stiffen in her hand: better the sense of beauty palpitating out of reach, while she held her breath and watched where it would alight. Yet Selden's manner at the Brys' had brought the flutter of wings so close that they seemed to be beating in her own heart. She had never seen him so ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... corps. That of the Meuse fell back in great disorder upon Liege; that of the Scheldt was also forced to beat a rapid retreat. Leopold, whose reign was not yet a fortnight old, joined the western corps and did all that man could do to organise and stiffen resistance. At Louvain (August 12) he made a last effort to save the capital and repeatedly exposed his life, but the Belgians were completely routed and Brussels lay at the victor's mercy. It was a terrible humiliation for the new Belgian state. But ...
— History of Holland • George Edmundson
... hand on two of the rifles near by and began surreptitiously to fill their magazines. The Nigger shook his knife free of the scabbard and sat with it in his left hand, concealed by his body. I could feel Thrackles's muscles stiffen. Another fifty paces and it would be no longer ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... stiffen the muscles, and starving a dog so as to get him ugly-tempered for a fight may make him nasty, but it's weakening to his insides, and it causes the legs ...
— Ranson's Folly • Richard Harding Davis
... silence, the clatter of a pebble struck on the girl's raw nerves and made her wince. She saw the muscles of Lynch's back stiffen and the barrel of his Colt flash up to cover the narrow entrance to the ledge. For an instant she hesitated, choked by the beating of her heart. Should she cry out? Was it the man really coming? Her dry lips parted, and then ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... sent up the day before, and she had not been in the hotel twenty minutes when he had telephoned. It had been good to hear his voice, so good that Angela had felt obliged to stiffen her resolution. Would she let him call? he asked; and she said: "Yes, come before dinner." Her impulse was to say, "Dine with me," but she would not. Instead, she added, "I dine at eight." It was now after seven, and she had dressed ...
— The Port of Adventure • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... and chilly as she made reply. The girl's eyes of scornful enquiry made her stiffen instinctively. She was prepared to bow and pass on, but for some reason Ina ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell
... weak." He tried to stiffen himself. "I have a right to be happy. Why should two be made to suffer for one who wouldn't care?" He repeated that over and over to himself ...
— The House of Toys • Henry Russell Miller
... some sort? He knew he would be shot down instantly if he did, and they would be glad of an excuse, but that would be only cutting short the agony. The veins swelled on his forehead, and he felt his limbs stiffen. He made a sudden movement, but the big breed caught his arm and whispered in his ear. It was an Indian saying which meant that until the Great Spirit Himself called, it was folly to listen to those who tempted. It was not so much the hope these ...
— The Rising of the Red Man - A Romance of the Louis Riel Rebellion • John Mackie
... the hand that held the lorgnette shook, her face seemed to stiffen and, in a low voice, she said to Reggie, who had pulled ...
— The Woman's Way • Charles Garvice
... shoemaker, would be sitting there talking to Mr. Belk, who was justice of the peace. And they would see Papa. The young men squatting on the flagstones outside the "Farmer's Arms" and the "King's Head" would see him. And Papa would stiffen and draw himself up, trying to look dignified ...
— Mary Olivier: A Life • May Sinclair
... darkness seemed to stiffen with sudden attention. The voice was like, and yet not like ...
— Lo, Michael! • Grace Livingston Hill
... and bent over her; Donnegan saw her eyes flash up—oh, heart of the south, what eyes of shadow and fire! Jack Landis trembled under the glance; yes, he was deeply in love with the girl. And Donnegan watched her face shade with suspicion, stiffen with cold anger, warm and soften again under the explanations of ...
— Gunman's Reckoning • Max Brand
... you stiffen on a bench And stoop your curls to dusty laws; Your petal fingers curve and clench In slavery to parchment saws; You suit your hearts to sallow faces In sullen places: But no pen Nor pedantry can make you men. Yours are the morning ...
— The Child Under Eight • E.R. Murray and Henrietta Brown Smith
... not introduced to any one, and, her first sensations of excited curiosity having subsided, began to feel as if she must stiffen to her chair if no one would speak to her and break the spell. It was a welcome relief ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... before leaving St. Louis. We then expected a battle, and went forth with the shadow and the sunshine of that expectation upon our hearts; but up to this time we have not seen a shot fired in earnest. Now the blast of war blows in our ears, and we instinctively "stiffen the sinews and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IX., March, 1862., No. LIII. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics, • Various
... Mickey. "If you could read the papers, you'd know. 'Sterilized,' is what they do to the milk in hot weather to save the slum kids. That's us, Lily. 'Deodorized,' is taking the bad smell out of things. 'Vulcanized,' is something they do to stiffen things. I guess it's what ...
— Michael O'Halloran • Gene Stratton-Porter
... every little white and yellow bunch and up went every little new-born nose as it sniffed at the recession of the maternal fount. One little precocious even went so far as to attempt to set his wee fore paddies against Rose Mary's knee and to stiffen a tiny plume of a tail, with a plain instinct to point the direction of the shifting base of supplies. Rose Mary gave a cry of delight and hugged the whole talented family to her breast, while Stonie and Tobe yelled and danced ...
— Rose of Old Harpeth • Maria Thompson Daviess
... was about to make his declaration, he felt his tongue stiffen at the recollection of the dead man, just put away in his grave, and a doubt seized him as to what lengths his father's benevolence might have gone. Flore, who was quite unable even to suspect his simplicity of mind, looked at her future master and waited for a time, expecting Jean-Jacques to ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... am killed I won't be losing much time on this earth," grandfather observed with cool logic. "But that ain't it. I'm worried about Tom. I'm afraid he ain't going to fight! I—I want to stiffen him up!" ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer
... fingers tightened in my hair until I thought she would pull out a lot, and I could feel her knees stiffen. Leon just whooped. Mother sprang up and ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter
... the hunted look in Glenister's face grow wilder and then stiffen into the stubbornness of a man at bay. The posse was at the door now, knocking. The three inside stood rigid and strained. Then Glenister tossed ...
— The Spoilers • Rex Beach
... English was a foreign tongue to him seems to have intensified this quality; as though the hardness and steepness of its challenge forced the latent scholarship in him to stiffen its fibres to ...
— Suspended Judgments - Essays on Books and Sensations • John Cowper Powys
... to my courting? Don't want anything to do with me at all?" His forced laugh had a harshness in it that caused the young man's muscles to stiffen. He took a sly glance at the girl and saw ...
— The Coming of the Law • Charles Alden Seltzer
... Foundation to raise the minimum standard of medical education have resulted in the elimination of the weakest medical schools. The total number fell from 150 in 1900 to 100 in 1914. Not all of these demand a high school diploma for admission, though the tendency is to stiffen entrance requirements, but all have a four-year course of study. In most institutions experience in laboratory, clinic, and hospital has superseded the old lecture system as the method of instruction. Closely associated with the progress in medicine and to ...
— College Teaching - Studies in Methods of Teaching in the College • Paul Klapper
... boat on the lake, or, at least, faster than any with which I had had an opportunity to measure paces. But it made but little difference how fast she was, as long as there was hardly wind enough to stiffen the mainsail. Mr. Parasyte ordered the men to take their places on the thwarts, and ship their oars. I saw that a little farther out from the shore there was a ripple on the water, and putting one of my oars out at the stern, ...
— Breaking Away - or The Fortunes of a Student • Oliver Optic
... the fowl run, professor," I broke in, with a moist, tingling feeling across my forehead and up my spine. I saw the professor stiffen as he walked, while his face deepened in color. Ukridge's breezy way of expressing himself is ...
— Love Among the Chickens - A Story of the Haps and Mishaps on an English Chicken Farm • P. G. Wodehouse
... percale. The first process to which the cloth is subjected is to boil it off, that is, to soak it in boiling water so as to relieve it from foreign matter that it may have gathered during the weaving, and at the same time to prepare it for dyeing. After dyeing it is sized to stiffen it, and also to increase the gloss on the cloth. After sizing it is ready for the calender. In order to give it the highest gloss the cloth is doubled lengthwise or the pieces are put together back to back, and as it passes through ...
— Textiles • William H. Dooley
... long-tusked, brazen-clawed, snaky-haired monster, but he must do it with his eyes shut, or, at least, without so much as a glance at the enemy with whom he was contending. Else, while his arm was lifted to strike, he would stiffen into stone, and stand with that uplifted arm for centuries, until time, and the wind and weather, should crumble him quite away. This would be a very sad thing to befall a young man who wanted to perform a great many brave deeds and to enjoy a great deal of happiness in this ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... vessel falling to the floor. Nothing could be more pitiable, when watched for a considerable time and when the impression forced itself upon the observer that at no single moment would that tremor ever grow still until the spoiler had completed his work, and the limbs should stiffen and straighten in the last ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford
... confidence, that but one sequence of events was permissible or even thinkable in the presence of game. The Dog at first intimation by scent must convey the fact to the Man, must proceed cautiously to locate exactly, must then stiffen to a point which he must hold staunchly, no matter how distracting events might turn out, or how long an interval might elapse. The Man must next walk up the birds; shoot at them, perhaps kill one, then command the Dog to retrieve. The Dog must on no account move from his tracks until such command ...
— African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... Or close the Wall vp with our English dead: In Peace, there's nothing so becomes a man, As modest stillnesse, and humilitie: But when the blast of Warre blowes in our eares, Then imitate the action of the Tyger: Stiffen the sinewes, commune vp the blood, Disguise faire Nature with hard-fauour'd Rage: Then lend the Eye a terrible aspect: Let it pry through the portage of the Head, Like the Brasse Cannon: let the Brow o'rewhelme it, As fearefully, as doth a galled Rocke O're-hang and iutty his ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... he replied; "tell your mother that your torngak—no, you haven't got one yet—that Ujarak's torngak—told him in a vision that a visit to the lands of the far-south would do her good, would remove the pains that sometimes stiffen her joints, and the cough that has troubled her so much. So you will incline her to obey. Go, tell her to prepare for a journey; but say nothing more, except that I will call for her soon, and take her ...
— Red Rooney - The Last of the Crew • R.M. Ballantyne
... and application of shaft tug lugs for harness, and consists in forming the said lugs with broad and long plates, properly curved to suit the curve of the pad, and connecting the latter to the under sides of the skirts and to the pads in a way to stiffen the skirt and to hold the stud securely from breaking loose, the said lugs being made solid with a screw nut at the end to confine the bearing straps, or hollow, with female screw threads near the base, and bolts screwing into ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various
... hour and a half of irritation and positive pain. Stretched out on my bunk and delivered over to the tender mercies of these personages, I stiffen myself and submit to the million imperceptible pricks they inflict. When by chance a little blood flows, confusing the outline by a stream of red, one of the artists hastens to stanch it with his lips, and I make no objections, knowing ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... fate, Have made our meeting all too late; Yet this may Argentine, As boon from ancient comrade, crave— A Christian's Mass, a soldier's grave." Bruce pressed his dying hand—its grasp Kindly replied; but, in his clasp It stiffen'd and grew cold— And, "O farewell!" the victor cried, Of chivalry the flower and pride, The arm in battle bold, The courteous mien, the noble race, The stainless faith, the manly face! Bid Ninian's ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier
... exclaimed Mr. Fulton, getting up painfully from his chair. "I'll go on down to the doctor—I expect I should have first thing, before I started to stiffen up. You go ahead to Lost Island, and see what can be done toward picking up the pieces and taking the Skyrocket over to the island. If there are enough unbroken pieces we may have a chance. I'll be ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Air on Lost Island • Gordon Stuart
... a matter of fact this ultramarine joke of yours is about east. It was blue on the Mercy G.—mighty blue, too. And it needed the inspiring hope of the gold I was soon to pick up in nuggets to stiffen my back-bone to a respectable degree of rigidity. I was about ready to wilt. But I discovered two Englishmen on board, and now I get along all right. We have formed a little temperance society—just we three, you know—to see ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 1 • Various
... hard that you cannot find an easy spot to lie on. You are always worse before storms. After sitting a little while you stiffen up, feeling much better after moving about. The tendons of your legs have a drawing sensation, and feel as if too short. There is more or less of numbness and paralysis, and a wooden sort of feeling of the leg when walking. You also have lightning-like shocks of pain through the limb, ...
— Doctor Jones' Picnic • S. E. Chapman
... was rather pale. She smiled nervously, and instinctively her hand crept out and touched Merriton's sleeve. She could feel him stiffen suddenly, and saw how proudly he threw back ...
— The Riddle of the Frozen Flame • Mary E. Hanshew
... For breath to quicken, run the smouldering ash Red right-through. What, "stone-dead" were fools so rash As style my Avison, because he lacked Modern appliance, spread out phrase unracked By modulations fit to make each hair Stiffen upon his wig? See there—and there! I sprinkle my reactives, pitch broadcast Discords and resolutions, turn aghast Melody's easy-going, jostle law With license, modulate (no Bach in awe), Change ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... tending to die out as we grow older, as we lessen in energy, and as we feel more deeply the tragi-comedy of existence. But inexpensive as it may seem to those of us who look to literature for enlightenment, for solace in the hour of need, for stimulus to stiffen the will in the never-ending struggle of life, the detective tale, as Poe contrived it, has merits of its own as distinct and as undeniable, as those of the historical novel, for example, or of the sea-tale. It may please the young rather than the old, but the pleasure it can give is ever innocent; ...
— Inquiries and Opinions • Brander Matthews
... told A tale, so fill'd with bloody circumstance, Of this damn'd deed, that stiffen'd me with horror. Vardanes seem'd to blame the hasty act, As rash, and unadvis'd, by passion urg'd, Which never yields to cool reflection's place. But, being done, resolv'd it secret, lest The multitude should take it in their wise Authority to pry into his death. Arsaces was, by assassination, ...
— The Prince of Parthia - A Tragedy • Thomas Godfrey
... the French interpreter, Drouillard, and three of the Kentuckians, and started on up the left-hand stream with one boat. The current of the river seemed to stiffen. It cost continually increasing toil to get the boat upstream. They were gone for several days, and no ...
— The Magnificent Adventure - Being the Story of the World's Greatest Exploration and - the Romance of a Very Gallant Gentleman • Emerson Hough
... watched him, she saw his features stiffen, as though a suspicion, a foreboding ran ...
— The Coryston Family • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Meldon. "If you find yourself inclined to change your mind before morning, just murmur over to yourself, 'England expects every man to do his duty.' That will stiffen ...
— The Simpkins Plot • George A. Birmingham
... King's fear of his opposition. 'I will not hear a word on that head,' James burst forth.—'Then,' said Davidson, 'we must crave help of Him that will hear us.' Not only was Melville excluded from the Assembly, but its business was not allowed to proceed till he left the town, lest he should stiffen the brethren who resorted to him for advice against the King's proposals. The royal measures were, after all, only carried by ten votes; and even that majority would not have been secured had the King not declared, with his usual disingenuousness, that he had no intention of restoring ...
— Andrew Melville - Famous Scots Series • William Morison
... early and continued late; which in the end was a good thing for the year's cut. The season was capricious, hanging for days at a time at the brink of a thaw, only to stiffen again into severe weather. This was trying on the nerves. For at each of these false alarms the six camps fell into a feverish haste to get the job finished before the break-up. It was really quite extraordinary how much was accomplished under the nagging spur of weather conditions and ...
— The Blazed Trail • Stewart Edward White
... a few moments with his back to the smouldering fire, and, being quite alone, he perhaps forgot to stiffen his neck; for his head drooped, his lips were unsteady. He ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... body stiffen as if she had been struck; he saw her bite her lip with a sudden little gasp, he saw the colour ebb from her cheeks. ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile
... 10:5 5 But because of priestcrafts and iniquities, they at Jerusalem will stiffen their necks against him, that ...
— The Book Of Mormon - An Account Written By The Hand Of Mormon Upon Plates Taken - From The Plates Of Nephi • Anonymous
... monarch as he. For the car must slack when I'm on the track, And the gripman's face gets blue, As he holds her back till his muscles crack, And he shouts, "Hey, hey! Say, you! Get out of the way with that dray!" "I won't!" "Get out of the way, I say!" But I stiffen my back, and I stay on the track, And I won't get out of ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume V. (of X.) • Various
... the air Impregnate chang'd to water. Fell the rain, And to the fosses came all that the land Contain'd not; and, as mightiest streams are wont, To the great river with such headlong sweep Rush'd, that nought stay'd its course. My stiffen'd frame Laid at his mouth the fell Archiano found, And dash'd it into Arno, from my breast Loos'ning the cross, that of myself I made When overcome with pain. He hurl'd me on, Along the banks and bottom of his course; Then in ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... of tramps in doorways; the flinching gait of barefoot children on the icy pavement; the sheen of the rainy streets towards afternoon; the meagre anatomy of the poor defined by the clinging of wet garments; the high canorous note of the North-easter on days when the very houses seem to stiffen with cold: these, and such as these, crowd back upon him, and mockingly substitute themselves for the fanciful winter scenes with which he had pleased himself a while before. He cannot be glad enough that he is where ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... had better walk for the present," suggested Tad. "We shall stiffen up if we ride in our ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Alaska - The Gold Diggers of Taku Pass • Frank Gee Patchin
... he is," said Quin cheerfully. "You see, you can't stiffen a fellow's backbone, as you call it, for one thing and not another. When he found out he could stop drinking, he decided he could do other things as well. He's started ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... who dispensed eggs and chips to hungry Tommies! Surely this must be a "bon front." I am afraid things looked vastly different after the Hun attempt to smash through the 55th division here in the following April. It was with the probability of this attack in view that the 42nd division began to stiffen the defences, and as well as holding the line we interested ourselves ...
— The Seventh Manchesters - July 1916 to March 1919 • S. J. Wilson
... snow so as to stiffen whilst the coffins are being made, and the wounded are being attended to in ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... joint gives very great pain, it is a grave mistake to put the knee in splints to prevent bending. What is wanted is to encourage bending as far as that can be done without much pain, so that the joint may not permanently stiffen. Even where, by the use of splints, permanent stiffness seems to have been brought on, the warm-water treatment recommended above will bring about a loosening and softening of the joint, which will permit first ...
— Papers on Health • John Kirk
... all very well for me to reason with myself, to stiffen my backbone, so to say; but I cannot remain at home because I know he is there. I know I shall not see him again; he will not show himself again; that is all over. But he is there, all the same, in my thoughts. He remains invisible, but that does not prevent his being there. He is ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... remembrances. He had never, from the day of his birth, been known to cry. When he was frightened or distressed the colour would pass slowly from his cheeks, and strange little gasping breaths would come from him; his body would stiffen and his hands clench. If he was angry the colour in his face would darken and his eyes half close, and it was then that he did, indeed, seem in the possession of some disastrous thraldom—but he was angry very seldom, and only with certain people; for ...
— The Golden Scarecrow • Hugh Walpole
... TO STIFFEN NEW NEEDLEWORK.—In the chapter on Irish lace, page 441, we said that new needlework of that kind had to be ironed; this should be done in the following manner: when the lace has been taken off its foundation, lay it, face downwards, on a piece of ...
— Encyclopedia of Needlework • Therese de Dillmont
... in the intestines of horses, thereby impeding and in some instances totally arresting the process of digestion. These balls, almost circular in form, are composed of minute and rather stiff hairs, and several have been found in one animal. These hairs, numerous on the heads; do not stiffen sooner than the period of full bloom; hence, until that stage is reached in the growth of the plants, the danger from feeding cured hay made from ...
— Clovers and How to Grow Them • Thomas Shaw
... stuff! It will keep up the fire. My veins would stiffen without it. It has carried me so far, and it must to the end. ...
— Wild Bill's Last Trail • Ned Buntline
... English rivals in competition as to a special kind of hat which sold well on the Continent. There are, or ought to be, three aims in the process of proofing and stiffening, all the three being of equal importance. These are: first, to waterproof the hat-forms; second, to stiffen them at the same time and by the same process; and the third, the one the importance of which I think English hat manufacturers have frequently overlooked, at least in the past, is to so proof and ...
— The Chemistry of Hat Manufacturing - Lectures Delivered Before the Hat Manufacturers' Association • Watson Smith
... right hand, have proved to him experimentally how little pain is felt at the moment of a wound; which will explain the unconscious heroism of common soldiers in battle; very little but weakness through loss of blood is ever felt until wounds stiffen: further, a blow on the head not only dazes in the present and stupefies further on, but also completely takes away all memory of a past "bad quarter of an hour." At least I remembered nothing of how my worst misadventure happened; and only know that I crawled ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... disappointed remainder. We mourn our sad lot at being left out of the detail, when presently comes a second detail: Second Lieutenant Treadwell, Sergeant Ogle, Corporal Funk, and twenty privates, of whom you, Jenkins, are one. As you get ready, you adopt stern resolves, stiffen that upper lip, and confide a short message for some one to one of the survivors, in case, as you proudly hint, you should not return. The survivor rewards you with a pressure of the hand, and a look of wonder ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 3, September 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... sight the ol' man dug up a bottle o' whiskey, an' put on a few ruffles to sort o' stiffen up his back; an' one day after dinner he sez to Barbie, "Now you just stay settin'." She was in the habit of estimatin' just how little nurishment it would take to run her to the next feed, gettin' it into her in the shortest ...
— Happy Hawkins • Robert Alexander Wason
... shut me from my kind; And, lest I stiffen into stone, I will not eat my heart alone, Nor feed with sighs ...
— Lessons in Life - A Series of Familiar Essays • Timothy Titcomb
... spiritual advantages of feasting is that it expands you beyond your common sense. One excess induces another, and a finer one. This acceptance of the ridiculous is good for you. It is particularly good for an Anglo-Saxon, who is so self-contained and self-controlled that his soul might stiffen as the unused limb of an Indian fakir stiffens, were it not for periodical excitements like that of the Christmas feast. Everybody has experienced the self-conscious reluctance which precedes the putting on of the cap, and the relief, followed by further expansion ...
— The Feast of St. Friend • Arnold Bennett
... in a few minutes, let us say ten, since that number has been used, the body has not had time to cool, nor have the blood-vessels had sufficient opportunity to stiffen so as to prevent the free effusion ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... unto the breach, dear friends, once more, Or close the wall up with our English dead. In peace there's nothing so becomes a man As modest stillness and humility; But when the blast of war blows in our ears, Then imitate the action of the tiger; Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood, Disguise fair nature with hard-favour'd rage; Then lend the eye a terrible aspect; Let it pry through the portage of the head Like the brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it As fearfully ...
— The Life of King Henry V • William Shakespeare [Tudor edition]
... to stiffen at this exordium, but he fixed himself in an attitude of anxious attention, and the doctor, after having taken two pinches of ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... catch something that might satisfy, in a measure, his burning curiosity. What was the meaning of that glance? It half angered him, for in it he thought he could distinguish annoyance, apprehension, dismay or something equally disquieting. Before he could stiffen his long frame and give vent to the dignified reconsideration that flew to his mind, the young lady dispelled all pain and displeasure, sending ...
— Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... I tried to stiffen her. I appealed to the worst in her on your behalf. But it wasn't any use. She succumbed, as you say, ...
— Hilda - A Story of Calcutta • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... The witness did not think it was necessary to have a non-Indian element in the service in order to stiffen it up, but he accepted the principle that there should be a certain small proportion ...
— Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose - His Life and Speeches • Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose
... going far, queer fellow? How's your middle leg? Got a match on you? Eh, come here till I stiffen it for you. ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... soiled linen, thereby overtaxing the delicate physical system. While feeling tired and jaded, all reeking in perspiration, they rinse and wring the clothes out of cold water and hang them upon the line with arms bare, when the atmosphere is so freezing that the garments stiffen before they finish this part of the task. Is it any wonder that acute suppressions occur or that inflammations ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce
... suffering mind stretches its hands, so to speak, toward annihilation, when the soul forms some violent resolution, there seems to be an independent physical horror in the act of touching the cold steel of some deadly weapon; the fingers stiffen in anguish, the arm grows cold and hard. Nature recoils as the condemned walks to death. I can not express what I experienced, unless it was as if my pistol had said to me: "Think what ...
— Child of a Century, Complete • Alfred de Musset
... breaths (the "Breath of Life"—Ha-i-an-pi-nan-ne—and soul are synonymous in Zuni Mythology), derived from their hearts, and breathed upon their prey, whether near or far, never fail to overcome them, piercing their hearts and causing their limbs to stiffen, and the animals themselves to lose their strength. Moreover, the roar or cry of a beast of prey is accounted its Sa-wa-ni-k'ia, or magic medicine of destruction, which, heard by the game animals, is fatal to them, because it charms ...
— Zuni Fetiches • Frank Hamilton Cushing
... around, and become a petty tyrant? If so, he would get what was coming to him. Every man's duty is measured by his knowledge and by his power. If, therefore, a man rises to leadership, and finds his elbow-room enlarging, let him stiffen his sense of duty to correspond, or there will be trouble. Degeneration by power is written ...
— The Social Principles of Jesus • Walter Rauschenbusch
... speedier through their inwards rouses up The icy currents which make their members quake. But more the oxen live by tranquil air, Nor e'er doth smoky torch of wrath applied, O'erspreading with shadows of a darkling murk, Rouse them too far; nor will they stiffen stark, Pierced through by icy javelins of fear; But have their place half-way between the two— Stags and fierce lions. Thus the race of men: Though training make them equally refined, It leaves those pristine vestiges behind ...
— Of The Nature of Things • [Titus Lucretius Carus] Lucretius
... to circle its bottom. As he did so, of his own volition he checked himself. Dead ahead he saw horses scattered about, and beyond the horses, rising limply in the noon haze, a thin column of smoke. Also, he felt both his riders stiffen. Then on the midday hush rose the crack of firearms from the direction ...
— Bred of the Desert - A Horse and a Romance • Marcus Horton
... Dorgan began to stiffen a little and his fingers clutched, as one's will when one thinks of reaching for a gun. The other man had a gun, too, but he made not the slightest movement toward it, and he spoke ...
— Injun and Whitey to the Rescue • William S. Hart
... held its breath as the girl paused before replying. Her hands shut hard at her sides, her body seemed to stiffen and rise, then she turned formidably with the fires of slumbering vengeance burning in her wonderful eyes—vengeance for her mother, for her lover, for her rescuer, for herself—she turned slowly ...
— Through the Wall • Cleveland Moffett
... then, and we thought maybe you were a sickman even if you didn't look like it, and you kept sort of sticking up for the sick corps whenever it was mentioned. Well, that's all right. New officer in charge, trying to stiffen up discipline, et cetera and so forth. But now we've got Frendon for CO. You're in the same boat as the rest of us, and you still keep insisting that the sickmen are O.K. But you're a ...
— Shock Absorber • E.G. von Wald
... out of her face, leaving her quite pale, with eyes that began to blaze. The suppleness of her seemed to stiffen. ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey
... Ladd replied. "I see no reason for delay. I'd rather tell them now than just before or after we get to Hollyhill. If we tell them now they'll have a couple of hours in which to stiffen their courage. There are eleven girls besides you two. Suppose you call them here in three lots in succession, four, four, and three, and we'll tell them quietly what has occurred and give them a little lecture as to how they should ...
— Campfire Girls in the Allegheny Mountains - or, A Christmas Success against Odds • Stella M. Francis
... the ground, then they felt it stiffen, and were again on the alert. Venning ran his fingers lightly along the jackal's back till he reached the nose, which was pointing straight up. Without a moment's delay he raised ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville
... could see Allyn stiffen as a peculiar sick look crossed Chase's dry face. And suddenly I heard all the ugly little nicknames—Subspace Chase, Gutless Gus, Cautious Charley—and the dozen others. For Chase was afraid. It was so obvious that not even the gray mask of his ...
— A Question of Courage • Jesse Franklin Bone
... likely," she told herself, "she will stiffen up again when she gets well; so I must be prepared for it, and ...
— In the High Valley - Being the fifth and last volume of the Katy Did series • Susan Coolidge
... fellow who handled the sheep so brutally. Every time he dragged one and threw it into the pit he yelled: "Ho! Ho!" Carley was impelled to look at his face, and she was amazed to meet the rawest and boldest stare from evil eyes that had ever been her misfortune to incite. She felt herself stiffen with a shock that was unfamiliar. This man was scarcely many years older than Glenn, yet he had grizzled hair, a seamed and scarred visage, coarse, thick lips, and beetling brows, from under which peered gleaming light eyes. At every turn he flashed them upon Carley's face, her neck, the swell of ...
— The Call of the Canyon • Zane Grey
... war weapon, a stone tied in a crotched stick, from the heap of wedding gifts, and smites PADAHOON to the earth, standing threateningly over him. The others stiffen into tense attitudes, drawing their blankets tighter, their eyes burning bright. PADAHOON draws the knife that hangs in a ...
— The Arrow-Maker - A Drama in Three Acts • Mary Austin
... Prudence felt the hands stiffen oddly; and again the thought came to her that perhaps this poor child's father had once been, perhaps still was, in the ...
— The Ragged Edge • Harold MacGrath
... crawled all around him and growled his terriblest. For some unexplainable reason it did not work. Cash sat stiff as though he had turned to some insensate metal. From where he sat watching—curious to see what Cash would do—Bud saw him flinch and stiffen as a man does under pain. And because Bud had a sore spot in his own heart, Bud felt a quick stab of understanding and sympathy. Cash Markham's past could not have been a blank; more likely it held too much ...
— Cabin Fever • B. M. Bower
... go through the demonstrations of Euclid's Geometry before the commencement of each Session of the early Congress. For what purpose? In order to be able to make use of geometrical knowledge in debate? Certainly not. He reviewed this study to stiffen the back-bone of his power of Attention. And he possessed this power in an extraordinary degree by nature. I am not suggesting any such severe course of self-discipline. But if the pupil whose attention was formerly weak ...
— Assimilative Memory - or, How to Attend and Never Forget • Marcus Dwight Larrowe (AKA Prof. A. Loisette)
... his. Now he felt that it was possibly at him that they would make Odette laugh. "What a fetid form of humour!" he exclaimed, twisting his mouth into an expression of disgust so violent that he could feel the muscles of his throat stiffen against his collar. "How, in God's name, can a creature made in His image find anything to laugh at in those nauseating witticisms? The least sensitive nose must be driven away in horror from such stale exhalations. It is really impossible to believe that any human being is incapable of understanding ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... her work in the kitchen Vaniman sat with the Squire in front of the fireplace and smoked his pipe, but not with his customary comfort; the tobacco seemed to be as bitter as his ponderings; he was trying to stiffen his resolution ...
— When Egypt Went Broke • Holman Day
... misused body stiffen, that when he was called it required another ten minutes and a second glass of whisky to unbend his joints and limber up ...
— Lost Face • Jack London
... began to stiffen. The first paralysis of surprise was past. The heavy guns of the enemy opened up, and from scores of machine gun nests and pill boxes came a storm of bullets. The German officers had got their troops under some semblance of control, and heavy reinforcements ...
— Army Boys in the French Trenches • Homer Randall
... national and private existence, he has a singular tenderness for the stone-incrusted institutions of the mother-country. The reason may be (though I should prefer a more generous explanation) that he recognizes the tendency of these hardened forms to stiffen her joints and fetter her ankles, in the race and rivalry of improvement. I hated to see so much as a twig of ivy wrenched away from an old wall in England. Yet change is at work, even in such a village as Whitnash. At a subsequent visit, ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... this sad procession,' said she, and mounted to a turret, whence through an open window she looked upon the funeral. Scarce had her eyes rested upon the form of Iphis stretched on the bier, when they began to stiffen, and the warm blood in her body to become cold. Endeavoring to step back, she found she could not move her feet; trying to turn away her face, she tried in vain; and by degrees all her limbs became stony like her heart. That you may not doubt the fact, the statue still remains, and ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... his war bag and brought out a roll of stout wire. "Run this from the top of the front pole on out, ten or twelve feet, and stretch it over a couple of shear poles. See? That'll stiffen the tent, and yet you can build a fire right under the wire, and it won't hurt ...
— The Young Alaskans on the Missouri • Emerson Hough
... we could hear the sails snap and stiffen as it overhauled the fleet behind us. In a jiffy it bunted our own hull and canvas, and again we began to plough the water. It grew into a smart breeze, and scattered the fleet of clouds that hovered over us. The rain passed; sunlight sparkled ...
— D'Ri and I • Irving Bacheller
... however, were unknown to Jane. If you were in a temper, you were in a temper. That was flat. And she rather wanted to rouse Nevil's. Heated opposition would stiffen ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... the very devil a-commandin' these here men. Why in —— don't you stiffen up, and hump yourself around, and make these men mind, or else belt them over the head with a capstan bar! Now I want you to 'tend to your business. ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... in," and she entered with the confident air of the morning. Directly she saw Viola, however, she seemed to stiffen with resentment, and ...
— Five Nights • Victoria Cross
... swans most eagerly eat The green weeds trailing in the moat; Inside the rotting leaky boat You see a slain man's stiffen'd feet. ...
— The Defence of Guenevere and Other Poems • William Morris
... the joy stick. Detached, feathery clouds spread across the sky, and he was climbing for them. Paula looked behind at him, and he pointed. He saw her seem to stiffen upon sight ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various
... revealed to us two scorpions with enormous bellies, and heads so small as to be almost imperceptible; all they did was to stiffen out their tails, which are composed of six divisions, the last terminating in an extremely ...
— Adventures of a Young Naturalist • Lucien Biart
... been advanced very close to the enemy's trenches, and there were no other troops in support. Under these circumstances it was imperative that the Highlanders should rally, and Major Ewart with other surviving officers rushed among the scattered ranks and strove hard to gather and to stiffen them. The men were dazed by what they had undergone, and Nature shrank back from that deadly zone where the bullets fell so thickly. But the pipes blew, and the bugles sang, and the poor tired fellows, the backs of their legs so flayed and blistered by lying in the sun that ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... butter, then put them in the oven for five minutes. When done, press between two plates till cold. Then mask each cutlet with a thick puree of tomatoes and mushrooms in which aspic jelly has been mixed, equal parts of each. Let them be put on ice to stiffen the masking. Roll in fine cracker meal, then dip into well-beaten egg, again into the meal, and then place them in a saute pan with very hot clarified butter, and cook them a fine golden brown. Dish up on a border of mashed potatoes browned with grated Parmesan; serve mushrooms in the ...
— Choice Cookery • Catherine Owen
... Stiffen your upper lip. You know Who are your friends and who your foes now; We pay for knowledge as we go; And though you get some sturdy blows now, You've a fair field—no favors crave— The storm once passed will find you braver— In virtue's cause long may you wave, And on the ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... none o' the fellers. I knowed fellers try to kiss her; but her style was to stiffen them with a clip under the ear, an' they sort o' took the hint, an' never come back. But by-'n'-by a man from the Queensland border, he bought the place next ours but one; an' our two fam'lies got ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... beside lower ten. He had reached in and was knocking valiantly. But his efforts met with no response. He winked at me over his shoulder; then he unfastened the curtains and bent forward. Behind him, I saw him stiffen, heard his muttered exclamation, saw the bluish pallor that spread over his face and neck. As he retreated a step the interior of lower ten lay ...
— The Man in Lower Ten • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... feel the feminine side of the chapel stiffen—Hogboom was the worst fusser in college. He was chronically in love with no less than four girls and was devoted to dozens at a time. We had reason to believe that he was at that time engaged to two, and spring was only half over at that. ...
— At Good Old Siwash • George Fitch
... the side of the sofa, and passing his hand beneath the boy's belly, felt his lovely prick, but it was not stiff. He separated the thighs a little, and tickled his testicles, still it would not stiffen. He then skinned it, and stooping took the head between his lips. This had no better effect. He again commenced to birch him, stopping for a moment to rub his testicles and prick with eau ...
— The Power of Mesmerism - A Highly Erotic Narrative of Voluptuous Facts and Fancies • Anonymous
... a smile and a word of cheer, from which not even the meanest packer was excluded. As the way grew darker she seemed to stiffen and gather greater strength, and when Kah-Chucte and Gowhee, who had bragged that they knew every landmark of the way as a child did the skin bails of the tepee, acknowledged that they knew not where they were, it was she who raised ...
— The Son of the Wolf • Jack London
... my queen tells me except command my tones when there is an attempt to stiffen her. She is not ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the San Gardo carried the same heavy weather from Barnegat Light to the Virginia capes. Beyond Cape Henry the blow began to stiffen and increased every hour as the freighter plowed steadily southward. Bucking head seas every mile of the way, she picked up Diamond Shoals four hours behind schedule. As she plunged past the tossing light-ship, Larry, ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... natural question. By the crudest method of reasoning we would conclude that from the form of the neck, many objects are indicated, and the material of which it is composed would give reason to turn all its powers of thought, to ask why it is so formed, as to twist, bend, straighten, stiffen and relax at will, to suit so many purposes? A very tough skin—a sheathe—surrounds the neck with blood vessels, nerves, muscles, bones, ligaments, fascia, glands great and small, throat and trachea. In bones we find a great canal for spinal cord. ...
— Philosophy of Osteopathy • Andrew T. Still
... exposed my breast to the genial influences of the refreshing sea-breeze, which at sunrise, as this was, is indescribably pleasant. But what a gloomy prospect was now before me!! I was growing weaker every minute; my limbs were beginning to stiffen and the muscles to contract, and I thought there was no help probably nearer than Ain Tarad; what was to be done? I could not travel the distance, and I must perish miserably by slow degrees, from starvation ...
— What Led To The Discovery of the Source Of The Nile • John Hanning Speke
... this up and tried to make her distinguish between the public and the private virtues. But the word "responsibility" slipped from him and he felt her stiffen. This was preaching, and she hated preaching even more than history. Her attention strayed again and he rallied his forces in a last appeal. But he knew it was a lost battle: every argument broke against the close front of her indifference. He was talking a language she had never ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... in beaded rows drops deck the spray, While Phoebus grants a momentary ray, Let but a cloud's broad shadow intervene, And stiffen'd into gems the drops are seen; And down the furrow'd oak's broad southern side Streams of dissolving rime ...
— The Farmer's Boy - A Rural Poem • Robert Bloomfield
... me from my kind, And, lest I stiffen into stone, I will not eat my heart alone, Nor feed with sighs a passing wind: . . . . . "Regret is dead, but love is more Than in the summers that are flown, For I myself with these have grown To something ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall
... arm that was round me stiffen, and there was silence for a moment, then my lord swore a great oath, and let his clenched fist fall so heavily on the table, that the red French wine which stood before him splashed right out of the beaker, a foot or two in ...
— Tales From Scottish Ballads • Elizabeth W. Grierson
... cloth first into hot water; pass the jelly through it until clear, then pour it into moulds and put them in a cool place to set. One calf's foot and one cow heel will be more economical than two calfs feet. If fruit is desired to be in the jelly, it must be put in when the jelly begins to stiffen in ...
— The Jewish Manual • Judith Cohen Montefiore
... he was beginning to think of giving up the idle venture, when suddenly he came face to face with a perpendicular and impassable wall of cliff. This curt arrest to his progress was just what was needed to stiffen his wavering resolution. He understood the defiance which his ready fancy had found in the stare of the eagle. Well, he had accepted the challenge. He would not be baffled by a rock. If he could not climb over it, he would go round it; but he would ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... opposed his far superior size; and he dealt so fearful a blow on the horned helmet, that a stream of blood rushed forth, the small man fell as if stunned, and after some frightful convulsive movements, his limbs appeared to stiffen ...
— Sintram and His Companions • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... long would it be before it was too small? How quickly he was growing, how terribly quickly. She passed her hand cautiously and lightly over the cover, and felt the boy's long body underneath it. Then he began to toss about, groan, stiffen himself like one who is struggling with something. What could be the matter with him? Then he spoke indistinctly. Of what was he dreaming so vividly? He ...
— The Son of His Mother • Clara Viebig
... the flame in the Mormon's gaze. For an instant his face worked spasmodically, only to stiffen into a stony mask. It was the old conflict once more, the never-ending war between flesh and spirit. And now the flesh ...
— The Heritage of the Desert • Zane Grey
... the white flame in us is gone, And we that lost the world's delight Stiffen in darkness, left alone To crumble in our ...
— The Collected Poems of Rupert Brooke • Rupert Brooke
... polished table nervously arranging the flowers. Evidently she had something to say, but for once had not the courage to say it. At last, with one of those determined gestures with which irresolute people strive to stiffen their wavering wills, she pushed the flowers on one side, and came and sat directly ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie
... Mrs. Julian Jones stiffen, although she kept her gaze fixed balefully upon two mud-hens that were prowling along the lagoon shallows below us. "The hussy!" she hissed, once and implacably. Jones had stopped at the sound, but went ...
— The Red One • Jack London
... one is a quilly or finny substance, consisting of several long, slender and variously bended quills or wires, something resembling the veins of leaves; these are, as 'twere, the finns or quills which stiffen the whole Area, and keep the other part distended, which is a very thin transparent skin or membrane variously folded, and platted, but not very regularly, and is besides exceeding thickly bestuck with innumerable small bristles, which are onely perceptible by the bigger magnifying ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... the Pirolo to drop between us and the sun, and at the same time to loop-circuit the prisoners, who were a trifle unsteady. We saw them stiffen to the current where they stood. The woman's voice went on, sweet and deep ...
— A Diversity of Creatures • Rudyard Kipling
... Snip looked round for Jan's supper, after bolting their own, they saw a great hound with stiff legs and erect hackles, alert in every hair of his body—but no supper. The supper, very slightly masticated and swallowed with furious haste, was already beginning its task of helping to stiffen Jan's fibers and give fierceness to the lift of ...
— Jan - A Dog and a Romance • A. J. Dawson
... the sounding axe so falls the vine, Whose tender branches round the poplar twine. 440 She chose her ruin, and resign'd her life, In death undaunted as an Indian wife: A rare example! but some souls we see Grow hard, and stiffen with adversity: Yet these by fortune's favours are undone; Resolved into a baser form they run, And bore the wind, but cannot bear the sun. Let this be nature's frailty, or her fate, Or Isgrim's[106] counsel, her new-chosen mate; Still she's the fairest of the fallen crew, 450 ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... urged brusquely, not waiting for the gasp of pained surprise of the little Clerk to end. He was glad to see the figure beside him presently straighten itself, as though to be braced for a task of difficulty. Indignation and resentment were good things to stiffen ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... the same manner. This time, we distinctly think of marionettes. Invisible threads seem to us to be joining arms to arms, legs to legs, each muscle in one face to its fellow-muscle in the other: by reason of the absolute uniformity which prevails, the very litheness of the bodies seems to stiffen as we gaze, and the actors themselves seem transformed into automata. Such, at least, appears to be the artifice underlying this somewhat obvious form of amusement. I daresay the performers have never read Pascal, but what they ...
— Laughter: An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic • Henri Bergson
... was continuing these operations, she felt the child stiffen on her knee, and looking, saw the little eyes glide and roll as though drawn by a power foreign to the will. A neighbour, who was hastily called, declared it to be convulsions, and for some hours the little life ...
— Lancashire Idylls (1898) • Marshall Mather
... overcoat, and a hat which he drew down over his eyes with a furtive jerk of his yellow fingers. Then he went behind the bar and swallowed something; it was not whisky, but it brought a faint tinge of colour into his cheek, and seemed to stiffen his knees. ...
— Bunch Grass - A Chronicle of Life on a Cattle Ranch • Horace Annesley Vachell
... preserve the advantages of the corset without its evils. This jacket may at first be fitted to the figure with corsets underneath it, just like the waist of a dress. Then, delicate whalebones can be used to stiffen the jacket, so that it will take the proper shape, when the corset may be dispensed with. The buttons below are to hold all articles of dress below the waist by button-holes. By this method, the bust is supported as well as by corsets, ...
— The American Woman's Home • Catherine E. Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe
... lands and the ingredients available in their new land produced tasty dishes that have been handed down from mother to daughter for generations. Their cooking was truly a folk art requiring much intuitive knowledge, for recipes contained measurements such as "flour to stiffen," "butter the size of a walnut," and "large as an apple." Many of the recipes have been made more exact and standardized providing us with a regional cookery we ...
— Pennsylvania Dutch Cooking • Unknown
... time, the Odd Girl had developed such improving powers of catalepsy, that she had become a shining example of that very inconvenient disorder. She would stiffen, like a Guy Fawkes endowed with unreason, on the most irrelevant occasions. I would address the servants in a lucid manner, pointing out to them that I had painted Master B.'s room and balked the paper, and taken Master B.'s bell away and balked the ringing, and if they could suppose that that confounded ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... splinting that right leg on to the left and stiffen the knees with something (you'll probably be able to get a decent stick or two off that small tree), and shove the arm inside his leather legging. We've two pairs of putties you can bandage with, and there are puggries on all three ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren
... agreed that "Europe would yet find it necessary to materially modify the Monroe Doctrine." But the Spaniard, believing discretion to be the better part of valor, had apologized for the acts of his undiapered babes and the excesses of his hungry beggars before his neighbors could stiffen his backbone with ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... Smith. Andrew stood quite still looking at her. He saw her start for a moment as she recognized him, and her eyes swept him over with a half incredulous, half startled expression. She drew a little breath. And then Andrew saw her suddenly and instinctively stiffen. She looked him in the face and bowed very slightly, without the vestige ...
— Jeanne of the Marshes • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... and who would know it were I to leave your corpse to stiffen on the snow? But I bear you no ill will, and have no intention to hurt you. I would not harm a hair of your head. I will not subject you even to the inconvenience of having these fetters on your wrists, though you were unfeeling enough to place them ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... fog of new thoughts that were confusing his daughter's mind and she could feel his body stiffen. A thrill ran through her own body and she forgot McGregor. With all the strength of her spirit she was absorbed in what David was saying. In the challenge that was coming from the lips of her father she began to feel there would be born in her own ...
— Marching Men • Sherwood Anderson
... and that punishment for crimes is a thing unknown. But this is far from being the case. It is quite true that a Boer soldier does not know how to click his heels together, turn his toes to an acute angle, stiffen his back, and salute every time an officer runs against him. He could not properly perform any of the very simplest military evolutions common to all European soldiers if his immortal welfare depended upon it. That is why he is such a failure as an attacking agent. Still, in spite ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... cold, quick precision, that he could not tell that she did not love him. And apparently he could not. He let her go after a minute, and flung himself down by her in just the attitude that the knock on the door, fifteen months ago, had interrupted. And Marjorie tried not to stiffen herself, and not to wonder if anybody was coming in, and not to feel that a perfect stranger was doing something he had ...
— I've Married Marjorie • Margaret Widdemer
... Bates. "Stiffen up!" "Don't be no broken reed, Katie! I don't want you dependin' on ME; I came to see if you would let ME lean on YOU the rest of the way. I wa'n't figuring that there was anything on this earth that could get you down; so's I was calculatin' you'd be the very one to hold me ...
— A Daughter of the Land • Gene Stratton-Porter
... awkward enough when he chooses. You can never tell how far he'll let things go on. But when his back once gets up he'll stiffen pretty hard." ...
— Tom, Dick and Harry • Talbot Baines Reed
... modern sense is a coarse open texture of cotton or hemp, loaded with gum, and used to stiffen certain articles of dress. But this was certainly not the mediaeval sense. Nor is it easy to bring the mediaeval uses of the term under a single explanation. Indeed Mr. Marsh suggests that probably two different words ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... as we seek fellowship with God (and willingness for the light is the prime condition of fellowship with God), God will show us the expressions of this proud, hard self that cause Him pain. Then it is, we can stiffen our necks and refuse to repent or we can bow the head and say, "Yes, Lord." Brokenness in daily experience is simply the response of humility to the conviction of God. And inasmuch as this conviction is continuous, we shall need to be broken continually. And this can be very costly, when ...
— The Calvary Road • Roy Hession |
