"Block" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... back." There was a curve to his words that hooked into her heart like forceps about a block of ice. But she outstared him, holding her lips in the center of the comedy rim so that he could see ...
— The Vertical City • Fannie Hurst
... you, he should die if he had twenty heads to lay upon the block," said Isabella, for she saw then that he was not the just man he ...
— Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare • E. Nesbit
... day was brightening and the sun rising, and by the gray light the fagot-maker could see about him pretty clearly. Not a sign was to be seen of horses or of treasure or of people—nothing but a square block of marble, and upon it a black casket, and upon that again a gold ring, in which was set a blood-red stone. Beyond these things there was nothing; the walls were bare, the roof was bare, the floor was bare—all was bare and ...
— Twilight Land • Howard Pyle
... I wouldn't try to do a scientific guy—no, sir. Me without no eddycation, only brains? Fat chance I'd have to put one over on a Academy sport what's chuck-a-block with Latin an' Greek an' scientific stuff an' all ...
— Police!!! • Robert W. Chambers
... shallow water, became so small that he bumped his head, and had to press his shoulders together in order to pass, and often he thought that he would stick fast among the rocks, like a hatchet in a block of wood. He always managed to free himself, however, and finally reached the big basin, where a crowd of maidens with green hair and scaly tails were sporting, and they invited him to come and play tag with them. But the fish advised him not ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... block of houses in which you dwell, the wretchedness, the temptation, and the outrage of municipal crime will put its hand on your door-knob, and dash its awful surge against the marble of your door-steps, as the stormy sea ...
— The Abominations of Modern Society • Rev. T. De Witt Talmage
... in the middle of the block. Here met, nearly every evening, the head ones of his flock for a little while to talk over religion and politics. Outsiders called it the "Amen ...
— Tess of the Storm Country • Grace Miller White
... that lozenges were utterly powerless to keep out that biting air, and the Bear-mother seated herself resignedly on an ice-block. ...
— Soap-Bubble Stories - For Children • Fanny Barry
... the minor mode. Kullak calls this "a bravura study for velocity and lightness in both hands. Accentuation fiery!" while Von Bulow believes that "the irresistible interest inspired by the spirited content of this truly classical and model piece of music may become a stumbling block in attempting to conquer the technical difficulties." Hardly. The technics of this composition do not lie beneath the surface. They are very much in the way of clumsy fingers and heavy wrists. Presto 88 to the half is the metronome indication in all five editions. Klindworth does not comment, ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker
... Their misery could not be conveyed to the mind. The woman was like a demon come among them. They felt chiefly degraded, not by her vulgarity, but by their inability to cope with it, and by the consequent sickening sense of animal inefficiency—the block that was put to all imaginative delight in the golden hazy future they figured for themselves, and which was their wine of life. An intellectual adversary they could have combated; this huge brogue-burring engine quite overwhelmed them. Wilfrid's worse than shameful behaviour ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... understanding the Chinese Chou, strikes us immediately, and we sympathise with Pere Bourgeois's perplexity; yet, many words, which are in common use amongst us, may perhaps be as puzzling to children. Block (see Johnson's Dictionary) signifies a heavy piece of timber, a mass of matter. Block means the wood on which hats are formed. Block means the wood on which criminals are beheaded. Block is a sea-term for pulley. Block is an obstruction, a stop; and, finally, Block ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... disposal of the sovereign of England. Even the tragedy of Fotheringay scarcely produced a passing coldness. On the 8th February, 1587, Elizabeth's warrant was carried out, and Mary's head fell on the block. She was accused of plotting for her own escape and against Elizabeth's life. It is probable that she had so plotted, and it would be childish to express surprise or indignation. The English queen, on her part, had injured her kinswoman too deeply to render it possible to ...
— An Outline of the Relations between England and Scotland (500-1707) • Robert S. Rait
... intrinsically, perhaps, more beautiful. No doubt this comes from violent contrast between our city and the hush and peace of trees. Our streets are all treeless, and our great heave of masonry comes up to the very edge of our green oases. Even the smaller parks which fill but a block or two, when twilight enfolds them, blurring the harsher outlines and conjuring out the shadows, can captivate the senses. If you chance to wander in Brooklyn—which no self-respecting inhabitant of Manhattan permits himself to do except under compulsing!—you may come upon ...
— Penguin Persons & Peppermints • Walter Prichard Eaton
... then, for airn or steel; [iron] The brawnie, banie, ploughman chiel, [bony, fellow] Brings hard owre-hip, wi' sturdy wheel, The strong forehammer, Till block an' studdie ring an' reel [anvil] Wi' ...
— Robert Burns - How To Know Him • William Allan Neilson
... fist at him, 'is greatest tief—and you know it you rascal—as never did en-razh me so, that I cannot bear myself!' I suppose chip to mean chap, but it may include the custom-house-officer's father and have some reference to the old block, ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... his office than he found letters and documents there disproving the Whig statement in toto, and later in the day he carried them over to Mr. Webster, who had an office in what was then Niles's Block. Mr. Webster looked carefully through them, congratulated Mr. Wright on his good fortune, and handed him two hundred- dollar bills. Peter Harvey, who was in Webster's office at the time, afterwards stopped Elizur Wright on the sidewalk and said to him: "Mr. Wright, you could have afforded to ...
— Cambridge Sketches • Frank Preston Stearns
... situations so dreadful, men think fast; he worked gradually round the bottom of the raft by his hands, till he got to leeward, still holding on. There he found a solid block of wood at the edge of the raft. He prised himself carefully up; the raft in that part then sank a little: he got his knee upon the timber of the raft, and with a wild cry seized the nearest upright, ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade
... and deeds, to conquer disease, decrepitude and death, and acquire a high status. As seeds that have been scorched by fire do not sprout forth, so the pains that have been burnt by knowledge cannot effect the soul. This inert body that is only like a block of wood when destitute of souls, is, without doubt, short lived like froth in the ocean. He that obtaineth a view of his soul, the soul that resideth in every body, by help of one or half of a rhythmic line (of the Vedas), hath no more need for anything. Some obtaining a knowledge ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... close at his heels, Ralph vaulted over the fence. Before the young Jew could follow, he was inside of the hallway. A minute later he was in the next street, and running through the crowd toward the end of the block. He did not cease his rapid pace until the neighborhood was left a good ...
— The Young Bridge-Tender - or, Ralph Nelson's Upward Struggle • Arthur M. Winfield
... mother cat, for a couple of partly grown kittens stood there in plain sight, with every hair on their short backs erected, and their whole appearance indicating that they were "chips off the old block," as Seth ...
— Boy Scouts on a Long Hike - Or, To the Rescue in the Black Water Swamps • Archibald Lee Fletcher
... passed, then another; he cranked once more, but as the motor was seized with a fit of shuddering the two white-fronted figures turned the upper corner and approached. Their relative positions were unchanged. The block was a short one, yet they seemed winded. Bergman was sobbing now like a woman, and he was ...
— The Auction Block • Rex Beach
... how she made herself a welcome guest; it would doubtless seem that when so young a girl goes visiting without her mother, she might be more of a care than a pleasure. In the first place, Eloise was careful not to go farther than the end of the block when she went outdoors to play; the end of the block was as far as Mrs. Dawson could see from the sitting-room window and, as she said she did not want Eloise out of her sight, Eloise took pains ...
— Dew Drops, Vol. 37, No. 9, March 1, 1914 • Various
... proceeds to remove their chief stumbling-block, the thing of greatest offense to them. He warns them against the course adopted by them of Jerusalem, who had the Word of salvation from Christ himself, who read it in the prophets every day, who should have had ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. II - Epiphany, Easter and Pentecost • Martin Luther
... "'Suddenly the prince seized his dagger between his teeth, fastened his sash to a block of stone, took his axe in one hand, and with the other slid down this substitute for a rope; falling a few steps from the wild beast, he sprang upon her, and, swift as lightning, dealt her two mortal strokes, just as the black, losing his strength, was about to drop the trunk of the tree, sure ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... more and more severe. During the night the temperature fell below zero; ice was already forming on the surface of the Baikal. Although the raft managed to pass easily over the lake, it might not be so easy between the banks of the Angara, should pieces of ice be found to block up ...
— Michael Strogoff - or, The Courier of the Czar • Jules Verne
... own permanently. To the horror and surprise of her friends, she plumped it down immediately in front of Mr. Wickers (after marching past an immense congregation), and, wholly unembarrassed by her conspicuous position, settled herself comfortably, took out her block and pencil, and proceeded to jot down that worthy's features line upon line, as though he had been a newly-imported animal at the "Zoo" on exhibition, paying no attention to the precept upon precept he was trying to ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, August, 1885 • Various
... there was between the legislator who passed laws against witches, and the burgher who defended his guild from some feudal aggression? between the enlightened scholar and the dunce of to-day, than there was between the monkish alchemist and the block head of yesterday? Peasant, voter, and dunce of this century are no doubt wiser than the churl, burgher, and blockhead of the twelfth. But the gentleman, statesman, and scholar of the present age are at least quite as favorable a contrast ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... Government House is a long, low cottage edifice, which looks well from the harbour; and on the east of the town are some extensive stores, belonging to the Falkland Island Company, with their small fleet of vessels in front of it. On the west of the town is the Government Dock-yard, with block-house, workshops, guard-house, and stores, all neatly railed in. The surrounding country consisting of slight elevations, either rocky or covered with tussac grass, is not attractive. I could not help looking ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston
... Clergy Reserves were one seventh of the land in each township. Another seventh was withheld from free settlement as Crown Lands. Now in some townships there were about 50,000 acres. Let the class find out how many acres were thus kept from settlement. Tell them that this land was not all in one block, but distributed through the township. They can now be asked to consider how this would interfere with close settlement and therefore with the establishment of schools, churches, post-offices, mills, and stores. A diagram of a township would be of great help. ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: History • Ontario Ministry of Education
... up to his office high in the Star block after a month's sickness. He had resolutely pulled a pad of paper under his hand to write, but the window was open and that wind coming in, and he could ...
— Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... more cheerful and jolly and ordinary we are on the way the sooner we shall get over the journey. The noblest Englishman that ever lived, and the most deeply serious, was as full of innocent mirth as a child and laid his head down on the block with a jest. Let us keep our course by the stars, by all means, but the immediate tasks are much nearer than ...
— Pebbles on the Shore • Alpha of the Plough (Alfred George Gardiner)
... passing occurrence, all the thoughts, the emotions, the solitary meditations, the reverential communion, the occasional intercourse with the few dwellers of the desert,—like the strokes, slight and almost imperceptible in their effect, which the block receives from the hand of the sculptor,—all were fitting the apparently exiled Hebrew for his high vocation as ...
— Notable Women of Olden Time • Anonymous
... time the sloop's deck was perpendicular, we had unbent the boom- lift from below, made it fast to the wharf, and, with the other end fast nearly to the mast-head, heaved it taut with block and tackle. The lift was of steel wire. We were confident that it could stand the strain, but we doubted the holding-power of the stays that held ...
— The Human Drift • Jack London
... toads and frogs in solid rocks need not be specially given; suffice it to say, that these narratives are repeated year by year with little variation. A large block of stone or face of rock is detached from its site, and a toad or frog is seen hereafter to be hopping about in its usual lively manner. The conclusion to which the bystanders invariably come is that the animal must have been ...
— Young Folks' Library, Volume XI (of 20) - Wonders of Earth, Sea and Sky • Various
... June 7; on board transport S.S. City of Washington, en route with expedition (Fifth Army Corps) to Cuba, from June 9 to 25; at Siboney and Las Guasimas, Cuba, from June 25 to 30; occupied the immediate block-house hill at Fort San Juan, Cuba, July 1 to 10, from which position the regiment changed to a place on the San Juan ridge about one-fourth of a mile to the left of the block-house, where it remained until July 15, when it took station ...
— History of Negro Soldiers in the Spanish-American War, and Other Items of Interest • Edward A. Johnson
... trousers press can be made in the following manner: Get the local monumental mason to supply you with two slabs of granite measuring about six feet by two feet and weighing about seven hundredweight each. Place the trousers on top of one block of granite, place the other block on top of the trousers and secure with a couple of book-straps. Finish off with ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Jan. 15, 1919 • Various
... all shut up, and other offices in block closed at six. Door of Kazmah's is locked. I knocked ...
— Dope • Sax Rohmer
... broke in pieces his musical instruments. ... On the summit he was received by six priests, whose long and matted locks flowed in disorder over their sable robes, covered with hieroglyphic scrolls of mystic import. They led him to the sacrificial stone, a huge block of jasper, with its upper surface somewhat convex. On this the victim was stretched. Five priests secured his head and limbs, while the sixth, clad in a scarlet mantle, emblematic of his bloody office, ...
— The Story of Extinct Civilizations of the West • Robert E. Anderson
... following morning they were up, and by daybreak the schooner was standing out of the harbor for Block Island, one of the famous haunts of the swordfish. Colin, who had good eyesight, and who was always eager to be up and doing, volunteered to go to the crow's-nest and keep a lookout for the dorsal fin of a swordfish, which, he was told, could be seen a couple of miles away. There was ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... handkerchief, and pressed the cool linen to his wet brow, while she could see his broad chest heaving and hear the dull, short sound of his breath between his grinding teeth. Her arms went round him, and tried to draw him to her, but he sat upright like a figure of stone, unbending as a block of granite. ...
— Greifenstein • F. Marion Crawford
... never faltering in any act of kindness on account of hardship or privation; while the rest, as already intimated, felt a sort of awe in his presence from the mystery that surrounded him. Among the spectators was our old friend, Tom Gladding, leisurely engaged in whittling out a chain from a pine block, some twelve inches in length, from which he had succeeded in obtaining three or four links that dangled at its end, and listening with a comical expression, as if he were anticipating ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... during the wet season. One of the nuggets I picked up in the creek I have just mentioned weighed several pounds, and was three or four inches long; it was rather more than an inch in thickness. This nugget I placed on a block of wood and beat out with a stone, until I could twist it easily with my fingers, when I fashioned it into a fillet as an ornament for Yamba's hair. This she continued to wear for many years afterwards, but the rude golden bracelets and anklets I also made for her she gave away ...
— The Adventures of Louis de Rougemont - as told by Himself • Louis de Rougemont
... to one of the members of our party. It was suggested we go to a certain place which was known by the proprietor's name. We turned into one of the cross streets and mounted the stoop of a house in about the middle of a block between Sixth and Seventh Avenues. One of the young men whom we had met rang a bell, and a man on the inside cracked the door a couple of inches; then opened it and let us in. We found ourselves in the hallway ...
— The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man • James Weldon Johnson
... as everybody knows who is interested in philosophical curiosities, is the first and perpetual sophism of the human mind,—the favorite tool of falsehood, the stumbling-block of science, the advocate of crime. The syllogism has produced all the evils which the fabulist so eloquently condemned, and has done nothing good or useful: it is as devoid of truth as of justice. We might apply ...
— What is Property? - An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government • P. J. Proudhon
... castellated. The entrance was now turned from the S. to the N. front—the turnpike road, which passed in front of the house and along the Moat to the Village, having been diverted in 1804—and the present Flower-garden constructed with the old Thorn-tree in the centre. Quite recently has been added the block at the N.W. angle of the house, containing Mr. Gladstone's Study, or, as he calls it, the ...
— The Hawarden Visitors' Hand-Book - Revised Edition, 1890 • William Henry Gladstone
... him then at the place of justice; and waited there with constant prayer, in the presence of Mary and of Catherine, Virgin and martyr. But before I attained, I prostrated me, and stretched my neck upon the block; but my desire did not come there, for I had too full consciousness of myself. Then up! I prayed, I constrained her, I cried "Mary!" for I wished this grace, that at the moment of death she should give him a light and a peace in his heart, and then I should see him ...
— Letters of Catherine Benincasa • Catherine Benincasa
... the arm, and dragged me with him to the narrow entrance of the pass, and as soon as we came in he rolled three large rocks, which had evidently been used for such purpose before, so as completely to block ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat
... on the southern shore of Lake Erie at the site of the present town of Erie. The block-house, an unusually strong and commodious one, was in command of Ensign Christie, with a courageous and skilful garrison of twenty-seven men. Christie, learning of the attack on the other posts, "braced ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... moment, not to an orderly retreat, but to instant flight. At one end of the street were seen the rebel pikes, and bayonets, and fierce faces, already gleaming through the smoke; at the other end, volumes of fire, surging and billowing from the thatched roofs and blazing rafters, beginning to block up the avenues of escape. Then began the agony and uttermost conflict of what is worst and what is best in human nature. Then was to be seen the very delirium of fear, and the very delirium of vindictive malice; private and ignoble ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... represents old and popular folk-stories about Daniel and his friends, that language being retained because in it the stories were familiarly told, while for the more prophetic or apocalyptic message the sacred language was naturally used. Ch. vii., however, presents a stumbling-block on any view of the Aramaic section. The Aramaic of the book is that spoken when the book was written: it was certainly not the language spoken by the Babylonian wise men. It is most improbable that they would have used Aramaic at all; and if they had, it would not have been the dialect ...
— Introduction to the Old Testament • John Edgar McFadyen
... of the fleeing American army. At Mount Hermon I readily found the Nairne tomb. It lies on the slope of the hill towards the river. Through the noble trees gleamed the mighty tide of the St. Lawrence. A great pine tree stands near the block of granite that marks the Nairne graves and a gentle breeze through its countless needles caused that mysterious sighing which is perhaps nature's softest and saddest note. One's thoughts went back ...
— A Canadian Manor and Its Seigneurs - The Story of a Hundred Years, 1761-1861 • George M. Wrong
... It contains the researches themselves. The public, so to speak, has been listening to the pianist playing his morning scales, has been watching the artist mixing his colours, has been examining the unshaped block of marble and the chisels in the sculptor's studio. It must be confessed, of course, that the archaeologist has so enjoyed his researches that often the ultimate result has been overlooked by him. In the case of Egyptian archaeology, for example, there ...
— The Treasury of Ancient Egypt - Miscellaneous Chapters on Ancient Egyptian History and Archaeology • Arthur E. P. B. Weigall
... won the toss, and old Tom Pratt took guard and proceeded to dig himself in by making what he termed his "block-hole." I visualised the choleric blue eye of ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Sept. 5, 1917 • Various
... are cold—you hold me like a block of wood; wait, I'll stir you with the fire of love," she said, and again clung fawningly ...
— Venus in Furs • Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
... shut up at night in a fireproof, drink-proof cubicle. The plan proved a brilliant success. The little store downtown became a big one, and grew bigger and bigger, swallowing all the other stores in its block; and it was now ten years since the great Sixth Avenue department store, which could call itself the largest in New York, was opened under the benediction of ...
— Winnie Childs - The Shop Girl • C. N. Williamson
... sovereign and his colleagues; and that he must not expect to escape the just reward of his crimes, because he had possessed the ingenuity to make others his associates in guilt. Yet I am of opinion that it was religious, and not political rancour, which led him to the block; and that, if the zealots could have forgiven his conduct as archbishop, he might have lingered out the remainder of his life in the Tower. There was, however, but little difference ...
— The History of England from the First Invasion by the Romans - to the Accession of King George the Fifth - Volume 8 • John Lingard and Hilaire Belloc
... withdraw any part of my duty and affection toward her majesty, and because, when so many veins of blood are opened, it is uncertain how they may be stayed, and what wilt be the event thereof.".... The hand ready on the block to be stricken off, he said often to the people: "Pray for me now my calamity is at hand." And so, with these words, it was ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... as implying more than the words said, but he did not ask for an interpretation, and before long she had put a question to him. They were nearing a large house that stood far back from the road on the left hand side. It was a big block of a place, greyish-white in colour, and with more than half of its windows bricked up, indescribably gloomy. A long, straight piece of water lay before it, stretching almost from the walls to the road, from which it ...
— The Good Comrade • Una L. Silberrad
... business. The general himself came down to the stream to hearten and cheer the men, promising each of them a pension of a thousand francs and the Cross of the Legion of Honor. The first who went down into the Beresina had his leg taken off by a block of ice, and the man himself was washed away; but you will better understand the difficulty of the task when you hear the end of the story. Of the forty-two volunteers, Gondrin is the only one alive to-day. Thirty-nine of them lost ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac
... dreamed. And Ivan, in a little paradise of his own, was drawn, in spite of himself, into her spirit of enthusiasm. He promised to go, that very evening, to his uncle. And so, at length, he left her, half a block from the Dravikine house, and went his way towards his apartment, already beginning on the fourth ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter
... country became more thickly studded with lights. They flashed in the foreground in regular constellations as the train whizzed with undiminished speed past tall block ...
— The Promise - A Tale of the Great Northwest • James B. Hendryx
... inlaid shrines and monuments, they sought out one the latest of all, but consisting of one enormous block of stone, with no ornament save ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... beggar's mouldy travertine Which Gandolf from his tomb-top chuckles at! Nay, boys, ye love me—all of jasper, then! 'T is jasper ye stand pledged to, lest I grieve. My bath must needs be left behind, alas! 70 One block, pure green as a pistachio-nut, There's plenty jasper somewhere in the world— And have I not Saint Praxed's ear to pray Horses for ye, and brown Greek manuscripts, And mistresses with great smooth marbly limbs? —That's if ye carve my epitaph aright, ...
— Men and Women • Robert Browning
... been faithless to their agreement, was yet in position, as he and his companions had left it a short time previous, and, although the new day was but half an hour old, the throng in front of Master Lillie's shop was so great as to entirely block the street. ...
— Under the Liberty Tree - A Story of The 'Boston Massacre' • James Otis
... had no intention at that time of entering the harbour itself, his object, when he found that the Spanish squadron was not at San Juan, being to learn for future use exactly how much water there was in the channel, and if any attempt had been made to block the way. ...
— The Boys of '98 • James Otis
... a Saturday morning. That Saturday was some sort of a festal day for the Chinese, and at the hour mentioned, a dragon a block long, consisting of a hundred Celestials covered with papier-mache, was twisting and writhing along ...
— Owen Clancy's Happy Trail - or, The Motor Wizard in California • Burt L. Standish
... you put on any more sweetness and light when you get engaged. I simply couldn't stand it! You're chock-a-block full of ...
— Patty Blossom • Carolyn Wells
... sand, in which at many places water, which most horses refused, but which seemed good enough for a Turk, could be obtained by digging wells. This route bent south-westward from Romani and reached the Canal at Kantara, and it was this route that he determined to block by advancing eastward ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... them.—Well, the sensation to which the Councillor of State was a victim at five in the morning in Crevel's handsome and elegant bed, was immeasurably worse than that of feeling himself bound to the fatal block in the presence of ten thousand spectators looking at you with ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... won't be a professional race horse—at least, not in this country—that we will put in, but jest ole Hatrack, an' if he don't win the race by a city block I'll ...
— Ted Strong's Motor Car • Edward C. Taylor
... woman to dream that she cooks hash, denotes that she will be jealous of her husband, and children will be a stumbling block to her wantonness. ...
— 10,000 Dreams Interpreted • Gustavus Hindman Miller
... commanded a comprehensive view of the crops of Lisconnel, its potatoes and oats, green and gold, meshed in their grey stone fences, and flecked with obstructive boulders and laboured cairns. In the middle of the Ryans' neighbouring field there is a block of quartzite, as big as a small turf-stack, which gleamed exceedingly white from amongst the deep muffling greenery of the potato-plants. Mrs. Joyce had been praising their thriving aspect to old Paddy, who, however, was disposed to express ...
— Strangers at Lisconnel • Barlow Jane
... place without causing us physical discomfort, and this condition is a serious stumbling-block in the way of the acquisition of poise, for, in view of the great stress the man of timidity lays upon the opinion of others, he will be apprehensive of giving them any inkling of his distress, and yet his difficulty in breathing will ...
— Poise: How to Attain It • D. Starke
... the ship safely though with much toil and danger, and there found the master almost crazed with fear and doubt of the issue, and the man with him injured by a falling block. Indeed, this poor captain clung to the rail, watching the cable as it dragged the anchor and fearing every moment lest it ...
— The Virgin of the Sun • H. R. Haggard
... nearly at an end. Soon he paused, crossed the road to a block of flats, ascended to the eighth floor by an automatic lift, and rang the bell at a door which bore simply the number II. A trim parlourmaid opened it ...
— Peter Ruff and the Double Four • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... can be done," said Captain Helfrich coolly. "This house may not stand a long siege, perhaps, though we'll do our best to prepare it. We'll block up the windows and all outlets as fast as we can. See, get all the rice and coffee bags to be found, and fill them with earth; we may soon build up ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston
... a Boche college suggested that the opening lines of Schiller's "Sehnsucht" were peculiarly apposite to the state of mind of the Huns who dwelt by the Somme. Wishing to share my discovery, I wrote the verse in large block capitals, ready to be dropped at a convenient spot. I took the liberty of transposing three pronouns from the first person to the second, so as to apostrophise our Boche brethren. The patrol finished, my pilot spiralled down to within a 300-yard range of the ground and ...
— Cavalry of the Clouds • Alan Bott
... at an end, a Tewkesbury ham commenced, together with the least touch of West Indian—Swithin was so long over this course that he caused a block in the progress of the dinner. To devote himself to it with better heart, he paused ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... relate are several pieces representing the horse and domesticated sheep, of which Plate IX, Figs. 3 and 4, are the best examples. Both are of Navajo importation, by which tribe they are much prized and used. The original of Fig. 3 represents a saddled pony, and has been carefully carved from a small block of compact white limestone veined like Italian marble. This kind of fetich, according to the Zunis, is manufactured at will by privileged members of the Navajo nation, and carried about during hunting and war excursions ...
— Zuni Fetiches • Frank Hamilton Cushing
... introduce into a merely revolutionary document an abstract truth, applicable to all men and all times, and so to embalm it there that to-day and in all coming days it shall be a rebuke and a stumbling-block to the very harbingers ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay
... made a singular study of corruption. Beneath his feet, as he sat in the garden porch, was a block of marble through which there ran a scarlet stain. It began with a faint line, thin as a hair, and grew as it advanced, sending out offshoots to right and left, and broadening to a pool of brilliant red. There were strange lives into which he ...
— The Hill of Dreams • Arthur Machen
... have shot the man then and there, but he knew the thunder of his gun would betray his presence; so, using the weapon as a club he had struck out at his attacker and tried to block the thrust of the knife. For a moment he was successful; but the knife proved the better weapon in the close rough and tumble scuffle that ensued and, with its point at his very throat, Wes ...
— Astounding Stories, July, 1931 • Various
... and society and the stately house at Kensington, which, from the end of last century until the opening years of the Queen's reign, was the chief salon of the Whig party, combined, with an easy procrastinating temperament, to block the way, until death ended, in the autumn of 1840, the career of the gracious master of Holland House. The materials which Lord Holland and his physician, librarian, and friend, Dr. John Allen, had accumulated, and which, by the way, passed under the scrutiny ...
— Lord John Russell • Stuart J. Reid
... consolidating. When she walked her movements were not equally distributed over her whole person, as they are in other women, producing those graceful undulations which are so attractive. She moved, so to speak, in a single block, seeming to advance at each step like the statue of the Commendatore. When she felt in good humour she was apt, like other old maids, to tell of the chances she had had to marry, and of her fortunate discovery in time of the want of means of her lovers,—proving, unconsciously, that her worldly ...
— The Vicar of Tours • Honore de Balzac
... had the vanities rather than the weaknesses of one; she would fain have inspired and responded to the passions natural to one; but policy always had the dominion over her sentiments without extinguishing them, and the proud sovereign sent to the block the overweening and almost rebel subject whom she afterwards grievously regretted. These inconsistent resolutions and emotions caused Elizabeth's life to be one of agitation, though without warmth, and devoid of serenity ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... their intentions, who would never become the destroyers of a limited legitimate monarchy, or the corrupt regicides of a rump Parliament, such as brought the wayward Charles the First, of England, to the fatal block. ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 5 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe
... years the home and headquarters of the noted Chippewa chief, Hole-in-the-day, and has been the scene of many sanguinary struggles between his braves and those of the equally noted Sioux chief, Little Crow. The ruins of a block-house, remains of wigwams, and a few scattered graves are all that is now left to tell the story of its aboriginal conflicts. A family of four persons living in a log-house form the white population of the place. Reuben Gray, the genial patriarch who presides over this solitary household ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens
... his neck on a silver chain; so Malcolm took the key and went home, riding the uncle's horse, and let out Margaret, and they lived happy and died happy, and she was heir to all the tower and the servants. But the first thing she did was to block the walls of the dungeon, so they couldn't move ...
— Half a Dozen Girls • Anna Chapin Ray
... friends set to work and crowded the space before the door with all the furniture in the room, as not only to make the passage impassable, but so to block the door that by no means could ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... threat "to lay him down dead if he tells," and Isidore required promise of safe conduct to his own block ...
— Little Citizens • Myra Kelly
... she is, breathes a prayer, that the Lord may have mercy on that soul, as "clear as diamond, and as hard," as she said of herself. That last scene, too, before the fatal block—it could not be altogether acting. Mrs. Leigh had learned many a priceless lesson in the last seven years; might not Mary Stuart have learned something in seventeen? And Mrs. Leigh had been a courtier, ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... to whom he had confided his intentions of capturing a white squaw. With these villains he intended to attack the house of the Waltons, while the main body of the savages made their onset upon the bulk of the settlement, including the block-house. This measure failed, for the simple reason that he had mistaken the house, and a family by the name of Scraggs suffered in the stead of his ...
— Ellen Walton - The Villain and His Victims • Alvin Addison
... blue sea, or under close-reefed topsails labouring in the wrath of a cyclone with a terrific turmoil. Underneath this work of art was the name of the person to whom the chest belonged, painted in block shaded letters, and the fate of many a crew has been traced by the washing ashore of a relic of this sort. All this was done by the sailor himself, and during the process of elaboration many a castle was built in the air and many a vow made that ...
— The Shellback's Progress - In the Nineteenth Century • Walter Runciman
... up into the eye of the wind, and backed her fore-yard. A boat put off from her, and we awaited it with indefinable alarm. It was soon at the gangway we had hastily lowered, unknowing whether woman or child might not be our visitor. It was a young Russian sailor whose hand had been crushed under a block a fortnight before, and who, without aid for his injury other than the simple remedies that make up the pharmacopoeia of sailing vessels, was like to die from blood-poisoning. Had our ship not been met, he would undoubtedly have perished, for no other steamer ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... precautions. As they heard nothing more, they concluded that Sir Walter was right, and that the danger was over for perhaps another hundred years. The fact, as discovered afterwards, was that the goblins had, in working up a second sloping face of stone, arrived at a huge block which lay under the cellars of the house, within the ...
— The Princess and the Goblin • George MacDonald
... hand observe the beheading axe, which has been here since 1687, also the block on which Lord Lovat, in 1747, lost his head at one stroke for the share he took in the attempt ...
— Authorised Guide to the Tower of London • W. J. Loftie
... Town itself, and needing to be quenched again. [Helden-Geschichte, i. 473-475.] Nay, he was clear for burning down, or blowing up, the Protestant Church, indispensable sacred edifice which stands outside the walls: "Prussians will make a block-house of it!" said Wallis. A chief Protestant, Baron von Something, begged passionately for only twelve hours of respite,—to lay the case before his Prussian Majesty. Respite conceded, he and another chief Protestant had posted off accordingly; and did the next morning ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... put Your fingers 'twixt the cleaver and the block? Jealous—I wonder? Anyhow, it seems, I've got a daughter, too. Alone, you say? However long I stayed, I'd have to go Alone, at last: and I'd as lief be gone, While I can carry myself on my two pins. Being buried with the Barrasfords is a chance I've little mind ...
— Krindlesyke • Wilfrid Wilson Gibson
... name. No response save the echoes. The house dogs, roused to a fresh excitement, were gathering about the door, barking in affected alarm, save one, to whom Kinnicutt was a stranger, that came, silent and ominous, dragging a block and chain from under the house. Kinnicutt heard the sudden drowsy plaints of the old rheumatic grandmother, as she was rudely awakened by the clamors, and presently a heavy footfall smote upon the puncheons that floored the porch. Old Byars himself, with his cracked voice and long gray hair, ...
— A Chilhowee Lily - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... under suddenly tripled demand. No transportation for private supplies was available in the overtaxed condition of the railroads; so the strangers, perforce, had to "grin and bear it," dry soever as the grin might be. Private boarding-houses sprang up like mushrooms on every block; bereaved relicts and ambitious spinsterhood equally clutching the chance to turn an honest penny. And naturally, ordinary trials of boarding-house life were aggravated by circumstance. Discomfort of the hotels was great enough; but, desiccated into the boarding-house can, it ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... Palazzo Trente Papafava, through the kindness of its noble owner, we saw Fasolata's most beautiful piece of sculpture, the Fallen Angels. It is a solid block of white Carrara marble about five feet high, and represents the angels cast out from heaven, a group of sixty-five to seventy figures. "They are in all attitudes that the human form could take in such a headlong descent, ...
— Fair Italy, the Riviera and Monte Carlo • W. Cope Devereux
... lie directly at the foot of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. From a small beginning Messrs. Koehler and Froehling have steadily progressed, till at this time their position is a very enviable one. Their cellars, occupying the basement of Montgomery Block, excite the admiration of all who visit them, and their wines are more favorably known than those of any other vintners. Agencies have been established in New York and other cities, under the supervision ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 79, May, 1864 • Various
... thought in her heart that she was a poor-spirited, despicable little creature, whose luck in life was only too good for her merits. O you poor women! O you poor secret martyrs and victims, whose life is a torture, who are stretched on racks in your bedrooms, and who lay your heads down on the block daily at the drawing-room table; every man who watches your pains, or peers into those dark places where the torture is administered to you, must pity you—and—and thank God that he has a beard. I recollect seeing, years ago, at the prisons for idiots and madmen at Bicetre, ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... set upon the marshes, and baited with rabbits which had been hung in the tilt until they began to smell badly, or with other scraps of flesh. The trap securely fastened by its chain to a block of wood or the base of willow brush, was carefully concealed under a thin ...
— The Gaunt Gray Wolf - A Tale of Adventure With Ungava Bob • Dillon Wallace
... by many pictures cut from illustrated papers and fastened to the canvas walls. The fly of the tent projected some distance in front, and formed a kind of verandah, beneath which a second rustic seat stood, as well as a block of wood that bore a tin dish, and evidently did duty as a washstand. Several blackened billies hung about the camp, with a frying-pan that bore marks of ...
— A Little Bush Maid • Mary Grant Bruce
... crowded beyond their capacity. Extra trains followed one another as close together as the block signals would allow them to run. Humanity packed the cars. It was like a continual series of football days. In three of them it was estimated that two hundred thousand people had left Manhattan. It would have been physically impossible ...
— The Sign at Six • Stewart Edward White
... those yearnings of human sympathy which predominate so much more in the sermons of the Master than in the writings of his successors, and which have made the parable of the Prodigal Son the consolation of mankind, as it has been the stumbling-block of all ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... father retired and let Tracey run the business for Flora, and he's still managing it, but Flora is the real head.... Now, let's see.... Oh, yes, the Drakes!... Johnny is vice president of the Hamilton National Bank, as you know, and owns a big block of the stock. Carolyn has no money of her own, except what Johnny gives her, and I rather think he ...
— Murder at Bridge • Anne Austin
... was mentioned; but the net result was that we got just enough to make our breakfast tea, but not enough to fill the water-bottles, so we started on our next stage in the very worst of tempers to find that we had hardly got out of camp before we were involved in a regular block at the railway crossing which, needless to say, was frightfully dusty. This delay proved, however, to be a blessing in disguise, as it enabled our water camels to catch us up with a small ration of water for lunch. If we had not got this water we ...
— The Fife and Forfar Yeomanry - and 14th (F. & F. Yeo.) Battn. R.H. 1914-1919 • D. D. Ogilvie
... All right!" And, needing no other invitation, he set his strength against the massive block ...
— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England
... responsible? The third question, he says, is the only one seriously considered by Bentham; and Bentham's answer, we have seen, leads to that 'tyranny of the majority' which was Mill's great stumbling-block. Why, then, does Bentham omit the other questions? or rather, how would he answer them? for he certainly assumes an answer. People, in the first place, are 'induced to obey' by the sanctions. They don't rob that they may not go to prison. ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume I. • Leslie Stephen
... like that!" laughed Ned. "That's your application for another block of Liberty Bonds, Tom, and I want you, as a personal favor to me, as a business favor to the bank, and as your plain duty to Uncle Sam, ...
— Tom Swift and his Air Scout - or, Uncle Sam's Mastery of the Sky • Victor Appleton
... a block of traffic near the Mansion House, and rain began to fall. The two occupants of the car watched each other surreptitiously, mutually suspicious, like dogs. Scraps of talk were separated by long intervals. Mr. Prohack wondered ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett
... music; who desire you more Than growing boys their manhood; dying lips, With many thousand matters left to do, The breath of life; O more than poor men wealth, Than sick men health—yours, yours, not mine—but half Without you; with you, whole; and of those halves You worthiest; and howe'er you block and bar Your heart with system out from mine, I hold That it becomes no man to nurse despair, But in the teeth of clenched antagonisms To follow up the worthiest till he die: Yet that I came not all unauthorized Behold your father's ...
— The Princess • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... to meet him again, yet you are ready at a moment's notice to run away with him, disgracing yourself and your family. You make promises about never seeing him: you break them the instant you get the opportunity. You profess that your girlish fancy for a barber's block of a fellow has been got over; and then, as soon as one's back is ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 90, June, 1875 • Various
... hardly have found an illustrator. Botticelli's illustrations are crowded with incident, blending with a naive carelessness of pictorial propriety three phases of the same scene into one plate. The grotesques, so often a stumbling-block to painters who forget that the words of a poet, which only feebly present an image to the mind, must be lowered in key when translated into form, make one regret that he has not rather chosen for illustration the ...
— Great Pictures, As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Esther Singleton
... the last year's brand Light the new block, and, For good success in his spending, On your psalteries play, That sweet luck may Come while the ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow—Book 3 - Christmas Poems from 'round the World • Various
... broad cast-iron staircase to the landing, they walked into the first large room. The walls were stuccoed to look like marble, the huge plate-glass windows were already in, only the parquet floor was not yet finished, and the carpenters, who were planing a block of it, left their work, taking off the bands that fastened their hair, ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... Macaulays were "small miners," working on tribute a mine belonging to a block owned by a company in which Henry Pym had large interests. Complaints had come through to his ears concerning the difficult conditions upon which the two young miners, and many others like them, struggled to make a fortune or a livelihood, and he had a fancy to go and see ...
— The Rhodesian • Gertrude Page
... eyes of one to understand and express so clearly and excellently, the intent of the Gospel in the acceptation of Christ's righteousness,—as he sheweth through all his Considerations,—a thing strangely buried and darkened by the adversaries, and their great stumbling block. Secondly, the great honour and reverence which he every where bears towards our dear Master and Lord; concluding every Consideration almost with his holy name, and setting his merit forth so piously; for which I do so love him, that were there nothing else, I would print it, that with it the honour ...
— Lives of John Donne, Henry Wotton, Rich'd Hooker, George Herbert, - &C, Volume Two • Izaak Walton
... weeks afterwards Jude was engaged with some more men, outside Crozier College in Old-time Street, in getting a block of worked freestone from a waggon across the pavement, before hoisting it to the parapet which they were repairing. Standing in position the head man said, "Spaik when he ...
— Jude the Obscure • Thomas Hardy
... not neglect common precautions. His first action was to send his youngest brother, Tirumala, the "Yeltumraj" or "Eeltumraaje" of Firishtah, to the front with 20,000 horse, 100,000 foot, and 500 elephants, to block the passage of the Krishna at all points. Next he despatched his second brother, Venkatadri, with another large army; and finally marched in person towards the point of attack with the whole power of the Vijayanagar empire. The forces were made up of large drafts from all the provinces — Canarese ...
— A Forgotten Empire: Vijayanagar; A Contribution to the History of India • Robert Sewell
... eye of Schmitz was small and round, and seemed to be filled with pink cobweb, his hair was in a state of tumult, and was full of chips, suggesting that he had recently slept on the wood heap. Schmitz had a fierce, red moustache, that looked as if it had been trimmed on a block with an adze. ...
— The Missing Link • Edward Dyson
... clambering, a ridge was at length gained, on which the second stake was set up, and then the party proceeded onwards to fix the third; but now the difficulties proved to be greater than before. A huge block of ice was fixed upon as that which would suit their purpose, but it stood like a peninsula in the very midst of a crevasse, and connected with the main body of ice by a neck which looked as sharp as a knife on its upper edge, so that none but ...
— Rivers of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... "Those boys are too lucky! If they weren't they never would have gotten away with the stunt they pulled to-night. Imagine riding right into our hands and getting away from us! Every time I think of it I feel like kicking myself around the block." ...
— The Boy Ranchers on Roaring River - or Diamond X and the Chinese Smugglers • Willard F. Baker
... door in at a blow, Ferry and I fired, and our foes sprang in. Certainly they were brave; the doorway let them in only by twos, and the fire-log, falling under foot, became a stumbling-block; yet in an instant the room was ringing and roaring with the fray and benighted with its smoke. Their first ball bit the top of my shoulder and buried itself in the wall—no, not their first, but the first save one; ...
— The Cavalier • George Washington Cable
... could feel that it got colder, and at night there was a sharp frost; so I determined now to set-to at the seals. There were none of the sort that you get fur from, and there was not much warmth to be had from the skins, still they would do to block up the entrance to my den. I killed five or six of them, and found that some of the young ones were furry enough to make coats of. As I was sitting on the ground by them next morning, lamenting I had nothing to boil down their blubber in, an ...
— A Chapter of Adventures • G. A. Henty
... little ticklish for indiscriminate roaming about, owing to the arrangements which he knew to be in progress. The dare-devil Major Lally, of the French revolutionary time, is said to have laid his head upon the block with many doubts as to the grace of his position, and with an apology to the executioner if he should have happened to transgress any of the rules of mortuary good-breeding,—on the ground that "he never had had his head cut off before;" ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford
... making fun of me," Mamma had continued with good-humoured vehemence, "but there were no Welsh hills and valleys to block the view of castaway fellow-creatures not a mile off, and it was daylight, and he must have ...
— Miscellanea • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... was called "l'homme protee," or protean man. He had an exceptional power over his muscles. Even those muscles ordinarily involuntary he could exercise at will. He could produce such rigidity of stature that a blow by a hammer on his body fell as though on a block of stone. By his power over his abdominal muscles he could give himself different shapes, from the portly alderman to the lean and haggard student, and he was even accredited with assuming the shape of a "living skeleton." Quatrefages, the celebrated French scientist, examined him, and said that ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... Central Park, which lies between Fifty-ninth Street on the south, and One Hundred and Tenth Street on the north, is true to its name, occupying about the centre of the island. The distance between two parallel streets is called a block, and twenty blocks make a mile. It will therefore be seen that Dick was exactly right, when he said they were a mile and a half ...
— Ragged Dick - Or, Street Life in New York with the Boot-Blacks • Horatio Alger
... you my word, my head is tired nodding! Be off now and close the door after you and give out that anyone that comes to this side of the house at all in the next half-hour, his neck will be on the block before morning! ...
— Three Wonder Plays • Lady I. A. Gregory
... whether, on the whole, inspiration does not leave unaffected the ordinary human phenomena; and it is hard to suppose that where the rules of judgment in ordinary writings are so distinct, God would have thus purposely cast a stumbling-block in our way, and contrived a snare into which our reason should mislead us. That is hard to credit; yet that and nothing else we must believe if we refuse to apply to the Gospel the same canons of criticism ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude
... her delay by quickly rushing to block the triumphant tide of Germany. And two British army corps saved the war by holding up five of Germany's best armies at Mons; holding them whilst they waited for the French to move up from their first mistakenly-held position; till, finding that aid not forthcoming, ...
— The Sequel - What the Great War will mean to Australia • George A. Taylor
... pathway that leads from Upper Rydal to Grasmere. The ponderous block of stone, which is mentioned in the poem, remains, I believe, to this day, a good way up Nab-Scar. Broom grows under it, and in many places on ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... the implement of fashion with some misgiving. Of course, it was all right for a minister to carry one if he chose. He was too far above the rest of the community to be judged by ordinary standards; but there was no denying that a slim cane savoured of "pride," and might prove a stumbling-block to Donald Neil and wee Andra and such wayward youths as were ...
— Duncan Polite - The Watchman of Glenoro • Marian Keith
... perhaps with a momentary uneasiness; but all emotion passed away on the instant, for one so disciplined in mind rarely permitted any outward exposure of his secret thoughts. The Puritan calmly issued an order to replace the prisoner in the block-house, assigning the upper of the two principal floors for his keeping; and then he prepared himself to receive guests were little wont to disturb the quiet of his secluded valley. He was still in the act of giving forth the ...
— The Wept of Wish-Ton-Wish • James Fenimore Cooper
... him," said Avice with satisfaction. "Now, look here, Wilf—I believe Bob may come. You go and be near the front door, to block Eliza, if ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... ... well, I wonder what I am fit for! I might have been a royal chief forester to-day! And yet, when the governor died, I went straight home and threw over my career. I wasn't born for the higher functions of society. All this even is too civilised for me. A block house, a rifle, bear's ham for supper and a load of lead sent into the breeches of the first comer—that ...
— The Dramatic Works of Gerhart Hauptmann - Volume II • Gerhart Hauptmann
... Lovat boasted to an English nobleman, that though he had not his wealth, he had two thousand men whom he could at any time call into the field, the Honourable Alexander Gordon observed, that those two thousand men brought him to the block. 'True, sir,' said Dr Johnson: 'but you may just as well argue, concerning a man who has fallen over a precipice to which he has walked too near, "His two legs brought him to that"—is he not the better for having ...
— The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D. • James Boswell
... Bible," was the rejoinder, "you are three parts gone on the road to infidelity, and will go the other part before you know where you are. The Bible is not without its value to us the clergy, but for the laity it is a stumbling-block which cannot be taken out of their way too soon or too completely. Of course, I mean on the supposition that they read it, which, happily, they seldom do. If people read the Bible as the ordinary British churchman or churchwoman ...
— The Way of All Flesh • Samuel Butler
... pleasant change when our muscles got hardened to it; and there was always something interesting turning up. Of course the Germans had their tunnels too, and they were trying to reach our lines. Often we could hear each other working and sometimes one party would send in a torpedo to block the other's tunnel. I remember the first one they sent us. That day I was working at the bottom of the shaft hitching sandbags to the rope by which they were pulled to the top. Skinny was coming down the ladder in the shaft, and when he was about ...
— Into the Jaws of Death • Jack O'Brien
... sizzles on his brow, look out f'r hand an' feet an' head an' coupling pins an' rapid-firin' guns. Fitz can be ca'm whin they'se annything to be ca'm about, but he can't wait. If he was a waiter, he'd be wurrukin' at th' thrade. Look at th' jaw iv him! It's like a paving block. ...
— Mr. Dooley in Peace and in War • Finley Peter Dunne
... counteract this by means of weight; and, in order to do this, he next piled five courses of Cornish moor-stone above the timber courses. The stones were huge blocks, which, when laid and fastened in one solid stratum, weighed 120 tons. They were not laid in cement; but each block was fastened to its fellow by joints and similar to the first. The whole of this fabric was built round a strong central mast or pole, which rose from the rock. The two timber courses above described terminated the "solid" ...
— The Story of the Rock • R.M. Ballantyne
... false—but yet it is better as it is. Good my murderer, and the rest of you, stand back a little, and let me speak with this unhappy apostate.—Kneel down by me, Master George—You have heard that I failed in my attempt to take away that Moabitish stumbling-block and her retinue—I gave them that which I thought would have removed the temptation out of thy path—and this, though I had other reasons to show to thy mother and others, I did chiefly purpose for ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... is for some incautious word thou hast spoken, which lay as a stumbling-block in thy neighbor's path, which wounded thy neighbor's heart far more sorely and deeply than these sharp flints now wound ...
— Bible Stories and Religious Classics • Philip P. Wells
... Manuel, what do I care who occupies the throne of Galavia? No other man could so block my path as Karyl." Then as one in the confessional he declared shamefacedly: "I have never said it to any man because it is too much like murder, but—sometimes I wish I had reached Cadiz one day later than I did." He drew his handkerchief ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... compelled the British railways to adopt, in the interest of the public safety, the block system and continuous brake, and great lines like the New York Central and Hudson River companies should be compelled to adopt ...
— The Railroad Question - A historical and practical treatise on railroads, and - remedies for their abuses • William Larrabee
... of Prague. The former residence was much too small, and Libussa directed her workmen to build a town on the spot, where they should find at midday a man making the best use of his teeth. They began their research and one day at that hour discovered a carpenter sawing a block of wood. It struck them that this laborious man was making a better use of his teeth (viz., teeth of his saw) than the mere feeder and they judged that this ought to be the place where the town should be built. They therefore proceeded to trace with ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye
... consequence—McDowell, who lost at Bull Run; McClellan, who failed to take Richmond, when within twelve miles of that city and no opposition, comparatively; and Burnside, who was so badly whipped at Fredericksburg. To the left of the block, where the President is standing with the bloody axe in his hand, are shown the members of the Cabinet—Secretary of State Seward, Secretary of War Stanton, Secretary of the Navy Welles, and others—each awaiting his turn. This part of the "Dream" ...
— Lincoln's Yarns and Stories • Alexander K. McClure
... dingy street was ugly, but the greater part of it appeared to be honest. The two pedestrians came upon a block or two, however, where it offered suggestions of a less upright character, like a steady enough workingman with a naughty book sticking out of his pocket. Three or four dim shops, a single story in height, exhibited foul signboards, yet fair enough ...
— Alice Adams • Booth Tarkington
... not other devil's own powers act more or less in the same set manner. But the furious ingredients of these bombs hurled on Walthamstow contained stuff that released a discharge which swept all things from it horizontally, in a quarter-mile, lightning sweep, like a scythe of flame. A solid block of shabby villas was laid out as flat as your palm by the explosion of this second bomb. Scarcely a brick was left standing upright. What houses escaped demolition around the edge of the convulsion had their doors and windows splintered into rubbish. The concussion of this ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... that all men are created free and equal, and that no human being has a right to make merchandise of others born in humbler stations, and place them on a level with horses, cattle, and sheep, knocking them off the auction- block to the highest bidder, sundering family ties, and outraging the purest and tenderest feelings ...
— A Woman's Life-Work - Labors and Experiences • Laura S. Haviland
... Aliguyen's house, we found him sitting on a block facing the sun, lying against his shield, which was supported by the side of the house. The body was in a terrible state of decomposition. It was swollen to three times its living girth. Great blisters had collected under the epidermis, which broke from ...
— The Head Hunters of Northern Luzon From Ifugao to Kalinga • Cornelis De Witt Willcox
... other while the examination went on. When it was concluded, thirty-eight of us were pronounced sound, and three unsound; certificates were made out and given to the auctioneer to that effect. After dressing ourselves we were all driven into the slave sty directly under the auction block, when the jail warder came and gave to every slave a number, my number was twenty. Here, let me explain, for the better information of the reader, that in the inventory of the slaves to be sold all go by number—one, two, three, and so on; ...
— Narrative of the Life of J.D. Green, a Runaway Slave, from Kentucky • Jacob D. Green
... published during the Yuen time, of which he has met with a reprint, there are figures to illustrate the division of the city into Fang, a word "which appears to indicate a certain space of ground, not an open square ... but a block of buildings crossed by streets, and at the end of each street an open gateway." In one of the figures a first reference indicates "the market place," a second "the official establishment," a third "the office for regulating weights." These indications seem ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... 2 feet in diameter—while near the lower end one equally large was bolted to each of the four sides of the central mass. When Dr. Dresser expressed surprise on the subject he was told that the walls must be strong enough to support the central block; and on his pointing out that the central block was not supported by the sides, he was taken up to the top of the building and the fact demonstrated to him that the huge central mass was suspended like the clapper ...
— The Empire of the East • H. B. Montgomery
... theologians and naturalists, with many attempted reconciliations. Today thinking people see that the battle was due to mistakes on both sides; that there is a scientific and a religious approach to Truth; and that strife ensues only when either attempts to block the other's path. Charles Darwin wisely said, "I do not attack Moses, and I think Moses can take care of himself." Both physicists and theologians were wrong when they thought of "nature" as something fixed, so that it is possible to state what is natural and what supernatural; ...
— Some Christian Convictions - A Practical Restatement in Terms of Present-Day Thinking • Henry Sloane Coffin
... of life is marvellously shown in an estate agent's office. What! There was a block of traffic in Oxford Street; to avoid the block people actually began to travel under the cellars and drains, and the result was a rise of rents in Shepherd's Bush! And you say that isn't picturesque! Suppose you were to study, in this spirit, the property question in London ...
— How to Live on 24 Hours a Day • Arnold Bennett
... correspond and which they obey; evolution of the best and elimination of the worst as the law of being; all this and much more may be found in the poetic utterances of this slender Essay. It fell like an aerolite, unasked for, unaccounted for, unexpected, almost unwelcome,—a stumbling-block to be got out of the well-trodden highway of New England scholastic intelligence. But here and there it found a reader to whom it was, to borrow, with ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... hold hands with his mother until he went to sleep and that when he awoke it was to find that the clasp still held. It was a long time before he realized that what to him were whimsical pranks, were in the nature of tragedies to his parents. If he put a stumbling-block in one of their paths, it upset the whole fabric of their daily life, made them feel, I suppose, that they were losing such faculties as they possessed: memory and the sense of touch—and they would be obliged either to walk with infinite slowness, ...
— The Spread Eagle and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... That difficulty is not that people compete, but that there are too many competitors; not that a man's seat at the table has to be decided by fair trial of his abilities, but that there is not room enough to seat everybody. Malthus brought to the front the great stumbling-block in the way of Utopian optimism. His theory was stated too absolutely, and his view of the remedy was undoubtedly crude. But he hit the real difficulty; and every sensible observer of social evils admits that the great obstacle to social improvement is that social ...
— Social Rights and Duties, Volume I (of 2) - Addresses to Ethical Societies • Sir Leslie Stephen
... comes also the feeling of permanence, of credit for good performance. This desire for permanence shows itself all through the work of men in Traditional Management, for example—in the stone cutter's art where the man who had successfully dressed the stone from the rough block was delighted to put his own individual mark on it, even though he knew that that mark probably would seldom, if ever, be noticed again by anyone after the stone was set in the wall. It is an underlying trait of the human mind to desire this ...
— The Psychology of Management - The Function of the Mind in Determining, Teaching and - Installing Methods of Least Waste • L. M. Gilbreth
... of him. There are various other modes of torture in common use among the natives of Guinea. One is tying the head, feet, and hands, in such a way that by turning the body backwards, they may be drawn together by the cords employed. Another is securing a wrist or ankle to a block of wood by an iron staple. By means of a hammer any degree of pressure may thus be applied, while the suffering so produced is continuous, only being relieved by the wood being split, and the staples removed, but this may not be done until a crime has been confessed by a person ...
— The Ethnology of the British Colonies and Dependencies • Robert Gordon Latham
... after block they walked along, as if neither had anything especial in mind, anything worth the trouble of speech. ...
— The Price She Paid • David Graham Phillips
... with Mattison in the next block, and relieved him of half the load. Then for a long time they ran and doubled, fugitives from half a dozen detectives and a few lumbering policemen. At last Mattison turned up a dark alley in the residence district. Coming to a board fence, he threw the books over, then climbed after. ...
— The Short Line War • Merwin-Webster |
