"Taut" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... was going on before him, had left the plane. He stood wide-eyed and white-faced at what he saw. Matthews stood there panting. A thin grin, the ghost of his usual grin wrinkled his taut features. ...
— Death Points a Finger • Will Levinrew
... topsail schooner. To the great surprise of those who were watching her, her bow began to swing slowly around, her sails trembled in the air for a minute or two and then moved over to the other side, her yard was braced forward, the sheets hauled taut, and she was off on the other tack with a big bone in her teeth. By this move she hoped to pass so far astern of the suspicious-looking craft in front of her, as to be beyond range of the light guns her captain had reason to believe were concealed under those piles of canvas which looked ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon
... muzzle of his rifle under the front end of the tent and holds the rifle upright, sling to the front, heel of the butt on the ground beside the bayonet. The rear-rank man comes to the front of the tent and pins down the two front corners on the line of bayonets, stretching the sides of the tent taut. He then inserts a pin in the loop of the front guy rope and drives it in the ground at such a distance in front of the rifle as to hold the rope taut. Then both men proceeding to the rear of the tent, each pins down a corner, ...
— The Plattsburg Manual - A Handbook for Military Training • O.O. Ellis and E.B. Garey
... my fingers all at once, pressed her palms together hard, and sat up very straight, settling her eyes upon Mr. Frank's. When she spoke, the metallic ring was that of a taut piano-string. ...
— When Grandmamma Was New - The Story of a Virginia Childhood • Marion Harland
... too for the beginners, it was their cheery old friend McCarthy who gave them their first lesson in trimming off the stock to fit the frames; attaching the toggles, or nippers; and tying the leather so that every part of it could be drawn out taut. ...
— The Story of Leather • Sara Ware Bassett
... men find is resistant, And they anchor on the Rope's taut length; Even grasshoppers combined, Are a force, the farmers find— ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... the trail and the others, holding fast to their staffs, carefully follow, each one cautious to keep the rope stretching out in front of her rather taut; then if one girl stumbles the others brace themselves and keep her ...
— On the Trail - An Outdoor Book for Girls • Lina Beard and Adelia Belle Beard
... Then take two pieces of twine, one 47 feet 5 inches long, and the other 39 feet. Fasten one line to each of the spikes that you have placed 27 feet apart. Where the two lines meet as they are pulled taut are the true corners of the court, as there are only four points where they can meet. The various measurements can then be marked as above by referring to the diagram. It is customary to mark a double court and to indicate the lines for ...
— Outdoor Sports and Games • Claude H. Miller
... his eyes up to the dome where he saw the canvas drawing taut. He knew that he had ...
— The Circus Boys Across The Continent • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... monotonously. Then a man across the street ran out of his store and pointed upward. A rope was thrown from an upper window of the Montgomery Block. Someone picked it up and carried it to The Bulletin Building, pulled it taut. On a strip of linen had been hastily inscribed the following announcement, ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... wheel, cursing, his hands knotted round the spokes, his back taut and muscle-ridged under the thin shirt. The cracked voice of Daddy John came from beyond the canvas hood and David's urgent cries filled the air. The mules, necks outstretched, almost squatting in the agony of their endeavor, held their ...
— The Emigrant Trail • Geraldine Bonner
... clothes-stick Miss Timmins had abandoned and used it for a brace. With a rope tied to the handle of the plank door and drawn taut, it was held half open. Tom then climbed out upon and straddled the door and raised his arms to receive the girl when she lowered herself ...
— Ruth Fielding Down East - Or, The Hermit of Beach Plum Point • Alice B. Emerson
... long. He had taken a turn or two around a limb before making his cast, and he now held the bear taut, with ease. The loose end dangled down ...
— The Young Wireless Operator—As a Fire Patrol - The Story of a Young Wireless Amateur Who Made Good as a Fire Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss
... Jon's voice became taut. "You mean you're helping him? You're trying to get the Empire into a war with the Gehan Federation so that he can become another dictator, like Jerris the First?" He kept his eyes carefully averted from the Emperor ...
— The Unnecessary Man • Gordon Randall Garrett
... situation got more desperate. The distance between the taut-sucked canvas and the sledge on which it should have been resting became greater, and this must have been due to the stretching of the canvas itself and the loss of the snow blocks on the top: it ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard
... them that there would be no one in the house except Orson, his man, and some of the kitchen servants, the others having followed their mistress to the country; nevertheless the rescuers' nerves were painfully taut, and they tried to go as silently as burglars. It was hard, awkward work; they collided with unseen objects; their arms ached with the constant strain; when they finally gained the library they were drenched with perspiration. Merkle switched on the ...
— The Auction Block • Rex Beach
... man stood there with taut drawn bow Tarzan recognized him not so much the NEGRO as the ARCHER of his ...
— Tarzan of the Apes • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... arrest the attention and stimulate the imagination. "His voice sounded hoarse and awkward, like a rusty lock." "I saw her sway, like something stricken by the wind." "His laugh rang false, like a cracked bell." "His voice shook like a taut rope." "My mind flying like a weaver's shuttle." "His blows resounded on the grave as thick as sobs." "The private guilty considerations I would continually observe to peep forth in the man's talk like rabbits from a hill." Nothing could be more effective ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... of action as opposed to nervous cogitation, braced up on the instant like taut wire. What, for heaven's sake, could that be? What a terrible cry! Sohlberg the artist, responding like a chameleon to the various emotional complexions of life, began to breathe stertorously, to blanch, to lose control ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... his gas-mask the lean lines of his jaw went taut. Tense, steely fingers flipped to the knobbed control instruments; the gleaming single-seater scout plane catapulted in a screaming somersault. Lance's ever-wary sixth sense told him the tongues of disintegrating ...
— Astounding Stories, February, 1931 • Various
... o'clock Christmas afternoon the last bolt was drawn taut. The gallery, was done. Bannon had been on the work since midnight—sixteen consecutive hours. He had eaten nothing except two sandwiches that he had stowed in his pockets. His only pause had been about nine o'clock that morning when he had put his head in the office door ...
— Calumet "K" • Samuel Merwin and Henry Kitchell Webster
... around, each eager for the last word, he turned away and busied himself with his tiller-rope, sick at heart. At last the good-bys were all said; Morton had taken his seat at the rudder, and Molly was nestled with baby on a cushion in the bottom of the taut little boat, when, just as Jasper was holding out a hand to help Sara aboard, she turned and gave a last, long, lingering look over the quaint little town in its radiant setting ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry
... I connected the nymph to the leader about sixteen inches from the tip. Within the next few minutes I took several nice trout, within rod's length of where I was standing. What actually happened, the lead was so heavy that it immediately sank straight to the bottom, and my taut line held the nymph suspended about two inches below the surface. The short gut between the nymph and the leader allowed the nymph to quiver much as the natural was doing. All the various common nymphs can be faithfully copied, by learning to tie the various styles of those herein illustrated. ...
— How to Tie Flies • E. C. Gregg
... table, the hanging cover of which had effectually concealed him, Jean Pylotte had managed to adjust the noose upon the floor about Nick's legs. At the signal given him, he had quickly drawn it taut. ...
— With Links of Steel • Nicholas Carter
... moment brought something new, more wonderful than anything her fancy had ever pictured. She liked best the cities through which they passed, their life, the bustle and confusion, the hurrying throngs, the rushing automobiles, the gleaming railroad tracks like taut bands of silver, the smoke-screened factories with their belching stacks, the rows upon rows of houses, snuggling in friendly ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott
... Slone held the taut lasso with his left hand, and with the right he swung the other rope, catching the noose round Wildfire's nose. Then letting go of the first rope he hauled on the other, pulling the head of the stallion far down. Hand ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Campfire Stories • Various
... that, Maria—and so these fellows, who seemed to be in two lots, some at the top and some at the bottom of the plankway, were entirely out of my sight as yet, though I had a good view of their sliding-plane. But presently the ropes began to strain and creak, drawn taut—as our fishermen express it—either from the upper or the lower end, and I saw three barrels come sliding down—sliding, not rolling (you must understand), and not as a brewer delivers beer into a cellar. ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... directly over the boat again was a help to me. Across it, running fore and aft, I stretched a heavy wire rope on which I had placed a big block for a traveller, and carrying the end of the rope forward to the capstan I fell to work with the hand-bars and got it strained so taut that it was like a bar of iron. Then to the traveller block I made fast my hoisting tackle—and so was able to swing up the heavy pieces from where they were stowed, and to run them along the taut rope until they were clear of the boat on either side, and then ...
— In the Sargasso Sea - A Novel • Thomas A. Janvier
... tack, and not expecting anything; so when he'd hail and ask her to cash in, I (the only dog on the inside of her game) could see her canvas flicker a moment,—but only just a moment,—then it would belly out taut and full, and she would say, as calm as a summer's day, "It's synonymous with supererogation," or some godless long reptile of a word like that, and go placidly about and skim away on the next tack, perfectly comfortable, you know, and ...
— The Great English Short-Story Writers, Vol. 1 • Various
... never in his college days, ranked as an athlete, but as he flew over the ground that night, with the long rope that bridged the difference betwixt himself and Sarah Maria quite taut, he had an injured feeling, as of one to whom injustice had been done. Not even the champion runner had ...
— The Gentle Art of Cooking Wives • Elizabeth Strong Worthington
... the machine over the stern, and had the square end of the cap bolted to the stern-post. He had already fixed four spans of nine-inch hawser to the sides of the makeshift, two fastened to tackles, which led into the gunroom ports, and were housed taut—these kept the lower part of the makeshift close to the stern post—and two, to which guys were now fixed and led through the aftermost ports on to the quarter-deck, where luff-tackles were attached to them, by means of which the makeshift was to ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... the rescue of those in the hulk would be but a matter of another day or two; for, having once gotten a line to the hulk, we should haul across a thin rope by its means, and with this a thicker one; after which we should set this up so taut as possible, and then bring the people in the hulk to the island by means of a seat and block which we should haul to and fro along the ...
— The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" • William Hope Hodgson
... when he left him, at last, and come for'ard. There was a sheep in the long-boat, and, as he was cruising about decks, he smelt it, and grabbed it, and was suckin' its blood in a jiffy; so we managed to get a slip-knot over him, and hauled taut on it from aloft. Then a young fellow went down with a line, and wound it round and round him, till he couldn't stir, and at last, with a heap of trouble, we got him stowed in his cage again, sheep and all; for he never ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I, No. V, May, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... silver sky, Piercing and jubilant is the shape of their flying, Their beaks are pointed with delight, Curved sharply with desire, The passionate direction of their flight, Clear and high, Stretches their bodies taut like humming wire. The cold wind blows into angry patterns the jet-bright Feathers of their wings, Their claws curl loosely, safely, about nothingness, They clasp no things. Direction and desire they possess By which in sharp, unswerving ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Marjorie Allen Seiffert
... uneventful morning canter. He stood at the foot of the stairs preparing to mount when Gregoire rode up as if pursued by furies; checking his horse with a quick, violent wrench that set it quivering in its taut limbs. ...
— At Fault • Kate Chopin
... the masthead of the Cunarder, where, through the twilight, she could "spell" the spark, signal by signal and letter by letter, as the current broke from the head of the installation wires to the hollow metal mast, from which ran the taut-strung wires connecting, in turn, with the operating office just ...
— Phantom Wires - A Novel • Arthur Stringer
... with the falling bridge. Carson, sitting up, feet wide apart and braced, was heaving on the rope. This effort swung Smoke in to the side wall, but it jerked Carson out of his niche. Like a cat, he faced about, clawing wildly for a hold on the ice and slipping down. Beneath him, with forty feet of taut rope between them, Smoke was clawing just as wildly; and ere the thunder from below announced the arrival of the bridge, both men had come to rest. Carson had achieved this first, and the several pounds of ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... next made taut above; and the weight of the stone—which was too heavy for Marengo to move—kept all fast below. Francois slipped down the rope first. There was but little difficulty in his doing so; as the pieces of wood formed rests, or steps, that prevented him from ...
— The Boy Hunters • Captain Mayne Reid
... much like business. She was like some young wild creature of the forest cornered and brought to bay, but the very terror in her soul rendered her more dangerous. Of the heart beating like a trip-hammer the gray unwinking eyes that looked into hers read nothing. She had schooled her taut nerves to obedience, and they answered her resolute ...
— A Texas Ranger • William MacLeod Raine
... drew on the line a little harder, and swung an eel weighing half a pound or more to the bank, where he promptly put one foot on the eel and drew the line taut. ...
— The Wolf Patrol - A Tale of Baden-Powell's Boy Scouts • John Finnemore
... to stir, to sob or pant or shiver lest she betray herself. Or, perhaps, a woman who was not hushed by panic, but by deliberation. A woman who slowly levelled a weapon, assuring her aim in the blank darkness by such guides as my breathing and the taut direction of her imprisoned tresses. An ugly woman could not have such hair as this. Or, could she? I had a doubtful recollection of various long-haired demonstrators glimpsed in drugshop windows, who were not beautiful. Yes, but they would never have found themselves ...
— The Thing from the Lake • Eleanor M. Ingram
... not have mourned as she would mourn for her own daughter. I must touch up the horses a bit. I want to get home. I may not be able to go out again to-night. Last night I was up until dawn with Clara." Gordon touched the horses with a slight flicker of the whip. He held the lines taut as they sprang forward. His face was set ahead. James glancing at him had a realization of the awful loneliness of the other man by his side. He seemed to comprehend the vastness of the isolation of a grief which concerns one, and one only, more than ...
— 'Doc.' Gordon • Mary E. Wilkins-Freeman
... horsemen draw together for a parley, then one remained on guard while the others circled on separate ways beyond his range of sight. His fear was that one of them might steal alongside the cave and leap unexpectedly into its very mouth upon him, so with taut nerves ...
— The Palace of Darkened Windows • Mary Hastings Bradley
... depict the bestiality of that day; and if I had I would think it sin to write of it. The helm was lashed on the port tack, the haulyards set taut, and all hands down to the lad who was the cook's scullion proceeded to get drunk. I took the precaution to have a hanger at my side and to slip one of Cockle's pistols within the band of my breeches. I was in an exquisite' agony of indecision as to what manner to ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... released her grasp of her sister's arm and collapsed on a chair. Stone, still supporting Helen, felt her muscles grow taut and an instant later she stepped back from his side and stood by her sister. As the two girls faced the circle of men, the likeness between them was extraordinary. Each had the same slight graceful figure, equal height; and feature for feature, ...
— The Red Seal • Natalie Sumner Lincoln
... in his own person the essence of the Hindu Trimurti; and hence the tri-literal monosyllable Om or Aum is applied to him as being essentially the same as Brahma-Vishnu-Siva. He is the same as Hermes, Thoth, Taut, and Teutates. One of his names is Heri-maya or Her-maya, which are evidently the same name as Hermes and Khirm or Khūrm. Heri, in Sanscrit, ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... a craft, she was; a square-bilt, trim, well-ballasted craft, fore and aft; none of your sky-scraping, taut, Baltimore clipper, fair-weather, no-tonnage jigamarees! Betsy is a woman; her mother was just like her when I fell in with her, and it wasn't long afore I chartered her for a life's voyage. And the man ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley
... The tree had begun to lean, and two of the guides were straining taut. He wondered. He wondered if the men at the guides were used to the work. Now, for the first time, he realized that the crest of the tree had a vast overhang of foliage on one side, and mighty misshapen limbs. He ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... I let the rest of the rope run through my hands till it could hang taut, meaning to slide down it and go to his assistance, for I was sure that all depended upon me now. I was already changing my position, when—my sinking heart, which seemed to suggest that I was about ...
— Charge! - A Story of Briton and Boer • George Manville Fenn
... reading. This may be accomplished by driving a small nail near each end of the beam, the exact location being on the neutral plane and vertically above each knife-edge support. Between these nails a fine wire is stretched free of the beam and kept taut by means of a rubber band or coiled spring on one end. Behind the wire at a point on the beam midway between the supports a steel scale graduated to hundredths of an inch is fastened vertically by means of thumb-tacks or small screws passing through holes in ...
— The Mechanical Properties of Wood • Samuel J. Record
... danced fitfully over the greenish stretches, growing wilder and wilder under the whip of a flouting wind. The two patchwork sails on the lumbering Doraine flapped noisily for awhile, as if shaking off their tor-por, then suddenly grew taut and fat with prosperity. The twisted, half-jammed rudder,—far from worthy despite the efforts of its repairers,—whiningly obeyed the man at the wheel, and once more the ship felt the caress of the deep ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon
... balls; (3) of the vane, G, properly so called; and (4) of the cap, C, provided with bayonet catch, crowning the tube and covering the point of attachment of the wire of transmission. This latter consists of a simple brass or galvanized iron wire, f f, perfectly taut, and made fast in the top of the tube. After traversing as many stories as necessary this wire terminates, in the interior of the room where the observations are made, in a copper rod to which is fastened a horizontal ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 401, September 8, 1883 • Various
... friendly protection. It was much more reassuring than to stand poised in a narrow trail with no possibility of sidestepping a charge. We waited at the crossing for further sounds of the elephants—waited for some time with rifles ready and then gradually relaxed our taut nerves. A line of porters with their burdens were huddled in one of the trails awaiting developments. I took a picture of the situation and had stood my rifle against the tree, and sat down to whisper the situation over. All immediate danger seemed to have passed. It seemed ...
— In Africa - Hunting Adventures in the Big Game Country • John T. McCutcheon
... was cantering toward the fire with a calf in his wake. Another cowpuncher dropped the loop of his lariat on the ground, gave it a little upward twist as the calf passed over it, jerked taut the riata, and caught the animal by the hind leg. In a moment the victim lay stretched on the ground. In the gathering gloom the girl could not quite make out what the men were doing. To her sensitive nostrils drifted an acrid odor of burnt hair and flesh, the wail ...
— The Big-Town Round-Up • William MacLeod Raine
... the tug, and the bight carried across the "towing-horse" and firmly fastened to the tug's fore-deck, while our end on reaching the forecastle of the Silver Queen was similarly secured inboard, Tim satisfying himself that it was taut ...
— Afloat at Last - A Sailor Boy's Log of his Life at Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... sewing-machine. When she brought the pile of hemmed sheets to her mother her heart swelled with joy in her own goodness. There was Mark Olivier's sister, who rejoiced in the movements of her body, the strain of the taut muscles throbbing on their own leash, the bound forwards, the push of the wind on her knees and breast, the hard feel of the ground under her padding feet. And there was Mary Olivier, the little girl of thirteen whom her mother ...
— Mary Olivier: A Life • May Sinclair
... and dropped over the horns of the animal. The pony, with the perfect craft of long practice, swerved to one side with a rush. The dragging rope swung up against the running steer's legs, grew suddenly taut. Down went the steer's head, and next moment its feet were swept from under it as it went heavily to the ground. Man and horse were perfect in their team work. As the supple rider slid from the back of the pony it ran ...
— Wyoming, a Story of the Outdoor West • William MacLeod Raine
... of itself. Take, for example, towns. The fairest and most beautiful towns are those which have built themselves—those in which each man has built to suit his own exclusive circumstances and needs; whereas towns which men have constructed on regular, string-taut lines are no better than collections of barracks. Put beauty aside, and look only to what ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... that free arm back where Lafe could press the weight of one big foot thereon, and also complete the adjustment of the cord. He arranged it by looping twice round the cleat, the length reaching to Fritz's throat being drawn taut. Moreover, as the German's body was resting sidewise upon his other arm, still tightly bound, Blaine felt that he had the man for the ...
— Our Pilots in the Air • Captain William B. Perry
... little probability of its breaking, there are four other ropes of the same material secured to the body of the anchor, to serve in case of accidents. There is no strain whatever in the meantime on these reserved ropes, which hang slack, and would only come taut and into play in case of ...
— Another World - Fragments from the Star City of Montalluyah • Benjamin Lumley (AKA Hermes)
... staysail, or to some providential sea, the vessel did fall off, however, and presently she righted, coming up with great force, with a heavy roll to windward. The staysail helped us, I feel persuaded, as the stay had got taut in the wreck, and the wind had blown out the hanks. The brig's helm being hard up, as soon as she got way, the craft flew round like a top, coming up on the other tack, in spite of us, and throwing her nearly over again. ...
— Ned Myers • James Fenimore Cooper
... way down they halted suddenly under an oak tree and accused their man of knowing where his partner's money was. This he strongly denied, and was very positive in his denial till he felt the surprise of a rope around his neck, with the end over a limb, and beginning to haul pretty taut in a direction that would soon elevate his body from the ground, when he weakened at their earnestness and asked them to hold on a minute. As the rope slackened he owned up he had the dust and would give ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly
... the claws stood out like talons, his tail behind him as stiff and straight as a rod. Neither did the man crouch or flee, nor did the beast attain to him. At the height of his leap the rope tightened taut on his neck, causing him to describe a somersault and fall heavily to the floor ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London
... Malwa artists preferred a more fluid grouping, their straining luxuriant trees blending with swaying creepers to create a soft meandering rhythm and only the human figures, with their sharply cut veils and taut intense faces, expressing the prevailing cult of frenzied passion.[82] Such schools of painting reflected the Rajput need for passionate romance rather than any specially strong adhesion to Krishna, the divine lover. Although one copy of the Rasika Priya and one of the Bhagavata ...
— The Loves of Krishna in Indian Painting and Poetry • W. G. Archer
... corner, or climbs up to a higher level, and for a time is lost to sight, having left his charge behind him; and he, unaccustomed to such an expedition, dares not look down, and fears to stir another step, till feeling the rope taut between himself and the guide, and hearing his cheery voice, he ventures forward, to find that the danger was not so great as he imagined. Thus made bolder by each difficulty surmounted, he begins to feel the exhilaration of ...
— Men of the Bible; Some Lesser-Known Characters • George Milligan, J. G. Greenhough, Alfred Rowland, Walter F.
... the fire with sand, and then turned in. The flap of the tent door was up, and I saw the branches and the stars and the white moonlight. The shaking willows and the heavy buffetings of the wind against our taut little house were the last things I remembered as sleep came down and covered all with ...
— The Willows • Algernon Blackwood
... and friends are certain little toy-boat builders, who bestow upon me from time to time boats fashioned by their knives; vessels which would not, it is true, encounter stormy seas, and therefore are not fitted for use, but which look taut and trim as they lie in the quiet harbour of bracket or slab amongst other choice ornaments. A rowing-boat, a yacht, a schooner, a man-of-war—all these varieties are somewhat commonplace. The construction of them requires skill and dexterity, ...
— Little Folks (Septemeber 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... threatened to draw me again into the water, by his desperate struggles; but at last, with the strength and force of desperation, I managed to reach the painter of the boat, which fortunately being 'taut' from the ring, enabled me to raise myself and the youth out of the water, and we were both got into the boat, though in a most exhausted condition; indeed I had to be conveyed home. The boy soon recovered and left the dock the next tide, and I never ...
— The Hero of the Humber - or the History of the Late Mr. John Ellerthorpe • Henry Woodcock
... shutting his eyes while Miss Amory's rested upon him. The life and beauty which had been such ever-present characteristics of his personality seemed to have left him never to return. Miss Amory's old nerves were strung taut. She had passed through many phases of feeling with regard to him as the years had gone by. During those years she had believed that she knew a hidden thing of him known by no other person. She had felt herself ...
— In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... quarter, and everything packed upon her, from the royal studding-sails down, was storming through it at a pace nearer to sixteen than to fifteen knots in the hour, while the wild weird melody of a hundred harps singing through the taut mazes of her rigging aloft mingled with the roar of the wind out of the great spaces of her straining canvas, and the deep, continuous thunder of the bow wave, raising a concert of such mad, soul-stirring harmony as causes ...
— The Cruise of the "Esmeralda" • Harry Collingwood
... might have led to bloodshed. The favorite amusement was cutting down hammocks. Dark forms might be seen on all fours making their way on the greasy and slippery deck in the direction of selected victims. The sharp blade of a knife would be drawn across the taut cord that supported the hammock. Then an uproar that awakened the entire steerage would take place. If the one who was cut down happened to be an Irishman, he would loudly challenge all the passengers to come up and fight him, not caring whether they came in ones ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... on duty till the next morning, and after the first bustle, which always takes place on board when settling down in harbor—boats to lower, booms to swing out, running rigging to make taut—we had nothing more to do but look on. We said to each other: "Where are we in reality?—In the United States?—In some English colony in Australia, ...
— Madame Chrysantheme Complete • Pierre Loti
... his wife held everything Roman, that before passing the night in the tent to which they had been taken, they examined it carefully. The tent, round of form, was decorated inside with woolen cloth, striped in strongly contrasting colors. It was fixed on taut cords which were fastened to stakes driven into the earth. The cloth of the tent did not come down close to the ground, and Albinik remarked that between the coarsely tanned hides which served as a carpet, and the lower edge of the tent, there remained a space three times the width of his palm. ...
— The Brass Bell - or, The Chariot of Death • Eugene Sue
... wait before we heard her barking, for strange to say, though she was like a pig she did not grunt. She was calling to her solitary young one to get up, I suppose. Presently we felt a pull on one of our lines, and directly afterwards the other was drawn taut. We gave each of them a jerk, and then springing forward with our sticks, we were just in time before the capybara drew back into her hole to give her a couple of stunning blows on the head. We quickly had her out, and a few more blows ...
— The Three Lieutenants • W.H.G. Kingston
... And ringing shrilly, taut and lithe, Within the wind a core of sound, The wire from Romney town to Hythe Alone ...
— Poems of To-Day: an Anthology • Various
... weather leech of the topsail shivers, The bowlines strain and the lee shrouds slacken, The braces are taut, the lithe boom quivers, And the waves with the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... above you by the evil one. That's where you came from!' - a walk up and down the pulpit: 'and where are you going' - stopping abruptly: 'where are you going? Aloft!' - very softly, and pointing upward: 'Aloft!' - louder: 'aloft!' - louder still: 'That's where you are going - with a fair wind, - all taut and trim, steering direct for Heaven in its glory, where there are no storms or foul weather, and where the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are at rest.' - Another walk: 'That's where you're going ...
— American Notes for General Circulation • Charles Dickens
... even turn his head to look. He's gone without a word. Here comes another, A different kind of craft on a taut bow-line,— Deacon Giles Firmin the apothecary, A pious and a ponderous citizen, Looking as rubicund and round and splendid As the great bottle in his own ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... sudden strain of the fish she nearly lost her balance, scrambled hastily down from the parapet, propping the pole desperately against her body, and stood so, unbending, unyielding, her eyes fixed on the water where the taut line ...
— The Dark Star • Robert W. Chambers
... which ornamented its ankles, only served to intensify the impression of indecency. A pink ribbon round its neck completed the outrage. The animal had absolutely the air of a decked trollop. A chain ran taut from the creature's neck into the middle of a small crowd of persons gesticulating over trunks, and Constance traced it to a tall and distinguished woman in a coat and skirt with a rather striking hat. A beautiful and aristocratic ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... with a quivering, taut good-humour: "Prove to me she's dead, and I'll let you die ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... at the apparition in the doorway with the flaming henna head and taut brown body, with long, thin, brown arms stretched down stiff as ramrods to the sides, and "Ow!" he said again, as she suddenly moved and again stood still with the gleaming orange eyes fixed on his host, who looked at her for an instant, and looked away ...
— Desert Love • Joan Conquest
... board; the ropes were carefully coiled, and all the running rigging hauled taut; for, lying near the queen's yacht, Paul desired to have the vessel present her best appearance. The work of the day was ended, and the students were at liberty to observe the strange scenes around them. There was the city of Antwerp, but it was not much different from any other ...
— Dikes and Ditches - Young America in Holland and Belguim • Oliver Optic
... is of bark from the white birch-tree, A butterfly's wing is my sail, And twisted grasses my cordage be, Stretched taut ...
— Cap and Gown - A Treasury of College Verse • Selected by Frederic Knowles
... him down the stair, then dragged him along the lower deck. They passed a line of sleeping deck-hands too stupid to observe them. Dragging astern of the boat, high between the two long diverging lines of the rolling wake, there rode a river skiff at the end of its taut line. ...
— The Law of the Land • Emerson Hough
... their white Indian looking on, had a very good time beating Simon, until they all, including Simon, were tired out. Then they staked him flat on his back, stretched by arms and legs and neck—his ankles drawn taut to two stakes, his elbows and wrists held by a stout pole laid across his chest, and his neck enclosed in a halter. He could not ...
— Boys' Book of Frontier Fighters • Edwin L. Sabin
... changed to a yell. The drum beat quickened, and the great circle of dancing Indians broke and charged the crowd of whites. A number of them drew revolvers and began firing them into the air. Others drew taut the great bows they carried. The ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... after his sparing her at Cedar Crest, would receive him and treat him at least no worse than an enemy with whom there was a half hour's truce. Sure enough, when he rang the bell of her suite, Maggie herself admitted him to her sitting-room. She was taut and pale, her look neither ...
— Children of the Whirlwind • Leroy Scott
... the boat was made taut enough before I brought you here, and you think she wouldn't have broke away before this if she was going to do it? Don't be ...
— A Sailor's Lass • Emma Leslie
... descent to the Subway, she was almost in his shadow; then cautiously after him down the iron stairs, and when he paused to buy his ticket, he might have touched her as she held herself taut against the wall and out of his vision. A passer-by glanced back at her twice. From the last landing of the stairway and leaning across the balustrade, she could follow him now with her eyes, through the iron gateway and on to the ...
— Every Soul Hath Its Song • Fannie Hurst
... a better time turned up; and happening to get a month's wages from a schooner of ninety-five tons at Scarborough, he strolled about the street a bit, and kept looking down the railings for a servant-girl who might have got her wages in her work-box. Clean he was, and taut, and clever, beating up street in Sunday rig, keeping sharp look-out for a consort, and in three or four tacks he hailed one. As nice a young partner as a lad could want, and his meaning was to buckle to ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... throttle, and while the two tugs steadily drew her off into deep water, the Maggie fought valiantly to stick to the beach and even to continue her interrupted journey overland. She merely succeeded in stretching both hawsers taut; slowly she was drawn seaward, stern first, and at the expiration of fifteen minutes' steady pulling, Mr. Gibney could restrain himself no longer. He rang for full speed astern—and got it promptly. Then, calling Neils Halvorsen to aid him, he abandoned the wheel ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... he, and let raise the mast and hoist the mainsail, and the wind filled the sail, and they made taut the ropes all round. But anon strange matters appeared to them: first there flowed through all the swift black ship a sweet and fragrant wine, and the ambrosial fragrance arose, and fear fell upon all the mariners that ...
— The Homeric Hymns - A New Prose Translation; and Essays, Literary and Mythological • Andrew Lang
... as if a cord in his soul had been made taut and were vibrating without making a sound. The steps of the eight people, as they died away in the distance, developed gradually into a rhythmical, musical movement. What had been confused became ordered; ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... end is tightly wound successive layers of fibrous bark, until its size is adjusted to the socket in the haft. Above the swathing of bark a strong line is made fast; the padded end is fitted into the socket, the line is made taut along the whole length of the haft, and secured by three or four half hitches about a foot from the thin end. A neat coil of perhaps 50 yards of line lies in the bottom of the canoe. Probably each of the blacks will ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... chance against his antagonist—Man. Except that the hunters are few and now dress in San Francisco clothes, they go to the hunt in the same old way as when Baranof, head of the Russian Fur Company, led his battalions out in companies of a thousand and two thousand "bidarkies"—walrus-skin skiffs taut as a drumhead, with seams tallowed and an oilskin wound round each of the manholes, so that the boat {68} could turn a somerset in the water, or be pitched off a rock into the surf, and come right side up without taking ...
— Vikings of the Pacific - The Adventures of the Explorers who Came from the West, Eastward • Agnes C. Laut
... steeply downward that my hands can scarce check the mad rush of my galloping horses. And all the while, the heaven is spinning round, and the stars with it. By the horns of the Bull I have to drive, past the Archer whose bow is taut and ready to slay, close to where the Scorpion stretches out its arms and the great Crab's claws ...
— A Book of Myths • Jean Lang
... Jerry's Eyes Fell on the Creature's Head, He Shuddered—for the Face Was Nothing but Bone, with Dull-brown Skin Stretched Taut over It. A Skeleton ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science April 1930 • Various
... Mr. Boulong has painted the ship, and she looks as taut and snug as a man-of-war," said the commander, who was evidently ...
— Across India - Or, Live Boys in the Far East • Oliver Optic
... glistening quarsteel into the sea gloom, into the thick of the smooth, lithe, brown-skinned shapes that now and again poised pressing against the submarine, peering in with their liquid seal's eyes. Dimly he could see the taut seaweed ropes stretching down from the top of the Peary to the sea-bottom. It looked hopeless, and to these men inside it was hopeless. He knew he must speak in confident, assured tones to drive away the uncaring lethargy holding them all, and he framed definite, concise ...
— Under Arctic Ice • H.G. Winter
... was associated with almost every thing in civilization. He introduced the beginnings of civilized life, invented the art of writing, and was to the Central Americans not wholly unlike what Thoth was to the Egyptians, and Tautus, or Taut, to the Phoenicians. If the bas-relief of the cross at Palenque were half as old as his worship in Central America, it would be far more ancient ...
— Ancient America, in Notes on American Archaeology • John D. Baldwin
... she listened. That was apparent in the animation of her face, in the way in which she would suddenly straighten herself as she sat, needle in air, the thread taut over her raised little finger. Then she would quickly resume her work, sometimes after putting in a thoughtful word, which agreed generally with ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... and rolled stiffly out of saddle, his horse only too willingly standing stock-still the instant he found himself no longer urged. "Dismount" either by signal or command would have been an affront to a cavalry force two-thirds of whose array seemed to be dismounted already, some towing along by taut bridle-rein the famished relic of a once spirited charger, others comforting themselves with the reflection that at least they had now only their own carcass to care for, others still wishing they had not even that responsibility, ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... started and his muscles grew taut, for the other voice was that of Conscience and it shook with terrified unevenness and a tremulous faintness like the leaping and weakening of a fevered pulse. He could tell that she was talking guardedly with her lips ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... "Sit down. You will have the canoe upset in a moment. Hold your rod steady and keep the line taut. That's right. Now lead him round toward me. There," and grasping the line he lifted a fine rock bass over the side of ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey
... men under different circumstances, and I have never had an occasion to be ashamed of a shipmate, only excepting when he was drunk, which is human, so to speak. Thanking the captain kindly for his inquiries, I have to advise that all is going well at Malabar Cottage. The cottage keeps taut and staunch; and now that my old shipmate Creary has joined me, we keep to the weather side of the butcher's bill without any difficulty. We pull along on a even keel wonderfully well, Creary being a good-natured man, and as pleasant a shipmate ...
— The Grey Lady • Henry Seton Merriman
... taut string merely, Give a touch, and she must throb to time? Think you how his bow must rouse the echoes, ...
— Behind the Arras - A Book of the Unseen • Bliss Carman
... There was a person there whose presence made a deep impression upon my memory. A fine stocky lad, with a great square jaw, heavy beery jowls, and a blue-black, bearded chin; in a blue striped collar. He put both hands firmly on the bar-rail at a good distance apart; straightened his arms taut and his body at right angles with them, so that he resembled a huge carpenter's square; then curled his back finely in, and said, with a significant look at the man behind the bar, "Gimme one o' them shells." A thin glass ...
— Walking-Stick Papers • Robert Cortes Holliday
... little I opened my eyes and stared about me, scarcely comprehending where I was or what had happened. Ortez called upon his men to raise me. Being placed erect the cord was drawn just taut enough to sustain me standing. Now the ghastly woman I had seen in the hall pushed ...
— The Black Wolf's Breed - A Story of France in the Old World and the New, happening - in the Reign of Louis XIV • Harris Dickson
... a faint noise from the black depths below us. A rope alongside the rough ladder began to move, as though someone was pulling it taut. We gazed down. ...
— The Exploits of Elaine • Arthur B. Reeve
... herself wound up tightly and needing to be run down. She was taut as a spring. After a while she took to plucking out from the darkness words ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst |
