"Choppy" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... last to a difficult, narrow, canon trail, where the pony hopped skillfully over fallen trees, until, for very weariness of his choppy, determined efforts, she dismounted, tied him securely, and made the rest of her climb on foot. Hidden Creek tumbled near her and its voice swelled. All at once, round the corner of a great wall of rock, she came upon the head. It gushed ...
— Hidden Creek • Katharine Newlin Burt
... by the French "ridens," or in England "ridges," and in some charts, "ripples" or "overfalls," and while there is sure to be a short choppy sea upon them, even in calm weather, the effect of a gale is to make them ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... afterwards, and the extra canvas would not have made ten minutes' difference to us at the outside. We shall have pretty nearly a dead beat down the Solent. Fortunately the tide will be running strong with us, but there will be a nasty kick up there. You will see we shall feel the short choppy seas there more than we shall when we get outside. She is a grand boat in a really heavy sea, but in short waves she puts her nose into it with a will. Now, if you will take my advice, you will do as I am going to do; put on a pair of fisherman's boots and oilskin and sou'wester. There are several ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty
... man was a good weight and not fat, so that he floated deep. The sea was choppy, too, with a nasty little surf on the beach. But the Eel brought the sufferer in ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Life-Savers • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... a handsome female elephant approached, careering at a curious choppy gait. With her trunk well up, she was ...
— Son of Power • Will Levington Comfort and Zamin Ki Dost
... taken me for a Seminole—at least, the probability seemed to be strong in that direction. The darkness again was too intense for her to see my features, and, since I had been fairly successful in speaking the choppy English of the Indian, I determined to continue the deception until morning. For she had become somewhat accustomed to the "trusted friend" by now, whereas re-introductions at this hour would be exceedingly awkward, if not quite disastrous to her peace of mind. So, without a halt, I walked on through ...
— Wings of the Wind • Credo Harris
... a north-east wind suddenly arose which stirred the blue waters of the Mediterranean until the short choppy waves gave to the vessel a new and peculiar roll, differing from any previously experienced by those on board. As a result, many of the passengers, not being able to adjust themselves to this unfamiliar change of motion, became suddenly ...
— A Trip to the Orient - The Story of a Mediterranean Cruise • Robert Urie Jacob
... Running Water, to distinguish it from the waters of the coast. It did not empty into the British Channel, for the simple and sufficient reason that there was no such channel at the time. Where now exists that famous passage which makes islands of Great Britain, where, tossed upon the choppy waves, the travelers of the world are seasick, where Drake and Howard chased the Great Armada to the Northern seas and where, to-day, the ships of the nations are steered toward a social and commercial center, was then good, solid earth crowned with great forests, and the present ...
— The Story of Ab - A Tale of the Time of the Cave Man • Stanley Waterloo
... stood by the rail, peering into the fog, but it seemed to her that no one else was afoot on board the steamer. Already the boat was beginning to show signs of the uneasy trip ahead. Many foghorns, far and near, were barking their lugubrious warnings; the choppy waves were slashing against the vessel with a steady beat; the bobbling of the ship increased as it plunged deeper into the cross-seas. But she had no thought of the ship, the channel or the perils that surrounded her. Her mind was back in London with her heart, and there was nothing ahead ...
— The Hollow of Her Hand • George Barr McCutcheon
... Wayland glanced up. Eleanor MacDonald was looking straight into his eyes. And the sheep rancher's choppy voice was saying to the Missionary, "Some men go up in the mountains to fish for trout; but others stay right down in the Valley and ...
— The Freebooters of the Wilderness • Agnes C. Laut
... clear, cold, beautiful night. The sea was calm except for the white water at our bows and the two long radiating swells running far off into the distance upon either hand astern, forming a great V which our propellers filled with choppy waves. Benson was in the tower, we were bound for San Diego and ...
— The Land That Time Forgot • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... undertake their embarkment below the portage, they now strolled around here and there, intending to wait until their friends caught up with them. Off to the east they could see, from among the short, choppy hills, a country which seemed for the most part covered with continuous growth of poplars, sometimes broken with glades, or ...
— The Young Alaskans on the Trail • Emerson Hough
... know is, it's against nature to suppose that women can fight men." Mrs. Marvell's remarks were rather like the emergence of scattered spars from a choppy sea. ...
— Delia Blanchflower • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Billie," Harris counseled mildly. "He's plum out of the country by now. It'll be dark in three hours—and it's right choppy country over there." ...
— The Settling of the Sage • Hal G. Evarts
... crumple to the deck. Then she saw him make a brave and desperate rally, as, though torn with agony, he lurched forward in an endeavor to clinch with the brute before him. Again the mucker struck his victim—quick choppy hooks that rocked Mallory's head from side to side, and again the brutal blow below the belt; but with the tenacity of a bulldog the man fought for a hold upon his foe, and at last, notwithstanding Byrne's best ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... Abbe,—Your style has not appeared to me soft. You are a frank Secretary of State:—nevertheless I give you warning, it is to be a settled point that I embrace you before going. I shall not be able to kiss you; my lips are too choppy from my devil of a disorder [SCURVY, I hear]. You will easily dispense with my kisses; but don't dispense, I pray you, with my warm ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVI. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Ten Years of Peace.—1746-1756. • Thomas Carlyle
... during which she very ridiculously cried and explained that he must be more careful and not risk his life so much! And then there was a faint, faint sound outside the Platform. It was the yapping sound of a siren, crying out in short and choppy ululations as it warmed up. Finally its note steadied and it wailed ...
— Space Platform • Murray Leinster
... current was tremendous in its sheer liquid mass and momentum. Van slipped off and swam by the broncho's side. Together the two breasted the surge of the tide, and now made more rapid progress. It required tremendous effort to forge ahead and not be swept headlong to a choppy stretch ...
— The Furnace of Gold • Philip Verrill Mighels
... a bridge builder named Elton Reeves. Elton had a pleasant, sun-burnt face and a little choppy moustache beneath which his teeth glistened when ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... it savagely into space. Then he went on, "But It is here, and I'll find It. It is in the hold, perhaps in one of those boxes. I'll unscrew them one by one and see. You work the helm." And with a warning look and his finger on his lip, he went below. There was springing up a choppy wind, and I could not leave the helm. I saw him come out on deck again with a tool chest and lantern, and go down the forward hatchway. He is mad, stark, raving mad, and it's no use my trying to stop him. He can't ...
— Dracula • Bram Stoker
... were in Lake Erie there arose one of the sudden storms so prevalent on the Great Lakes in autumn. Instead of creeping along the shore, the bateaux were in mid-lake, and before a landing could be made the gale was on them in all its fury. There was a wild race for land; but the choppy, turbulent sea beat upon the boats, of which some were swamped and the crews plunged into the chilly waters. They were opposite a forbidding shore, called by Wilkins Long Beach, but there was no time to look for ...
— The War Chief of the Ottawas - A Chronicle of the Pontiac War: Volume 15 (of 32) in the - series Chronicles of Canada • Thomas Guthrie Marquis
... willing to expend itself to the very last ounce, with tremendous courage and good heart; there was always a touch of fear that Gray Peter, plunging unabated over rough and smooth, might be running himself out. But Sally would not maintain one pace. She was apt to shorten her stride for choppy going, and she would lengthen it like a witch on the level. She kept changing the elevation of her head. She ran freely, looking about her and taking note of what she saw, so that she gave an indescribable ...
— Way of the Lawless • Max Brand
... Tatini was adept in canoeing, and with a quartet of hoe we would have ordinarily sent the vaa spinning through the water; but we were nearing the southernmost extremity of the Presqu'ile, and the wind and current from the northeast swept about the broken coast in a confusion of puffs and blasts, choppy waves and roaring breakers, and made our progress slow and hazardous. The breeze caught up the foam and formed sheets of vapor which whipped our faces and blinded us, while an occasional roller broke on our prow, and soon gave Tatini continuous work in bailing ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... while the governor sailed in the open sea. On the twenty-fifth, he came alone to pass the night at the promontory of Azufre [285] ["Sulphur Point"] on the island of Manila, opposite that of Caca, where the current runs strong and the sea is choppy. As it was during the blowing of the brisa, the galley could not advance. It anchored under shelter of the point, but, through the strength of the current, dragged slightly. In order to return to its shelter, the Chinese were kept incessantly at the oar. In fact, they rowed ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVI, 1609 • H.E. Blair
... she replied. "I can manage a sail; I know the argot, I could tell the shrouds from the bulwarks, and I've rowed a boat in a choppy sea." ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... Both boys could now recognize the design characteristic of boats built on the Chesapeake Bay. The boats were known as "bay builts," and distinguished by their straight bows—almost vertical to the water line—square sterns, and flaring sides. The design was ideal for the shallow, choppy waters of the bay, and the boats could take a heavy bay storm with greater comfort and safety than ...
— The Flying Stingaree • Harold Leland Goodwin
... ain't anywheres around, either. You fellers make me sick. Lollin' around here an' not paying no attention, by golly—he's liable to be ten mile from here by this time!" When Slim stopped, his jaw quivered like a dish of disturbed jelly, and I wish I could give you his tone; choppy, every sentence an accusation that should have made those ...
— Flying U Ranch • B. M. Bower
... down the St. Lawrence began. When they reached the ocean they joined a convoy of a dozen ships, screened in a cold mist and rocked by a choppy sea. Then began the ocean voyage of twelve days, through fog and rain and over a rough, gray sea. At night it was early to bed, because ...
— Chit-Chat; Nirvana; The Searchlight • Mathew Joseph Holt
... cold morning, with a grey, cold, choppy sea on, the spray from which dashed over the boat, wetting me thoroughly, and making me feel pinched, blear-eyed, and miserable. I even envied the seals I saw cosily asleep in dry, sandy caves, at the foot of ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... Dan; but they are not so angry. The heads are not breaking over as they did last night, and the boat will go better over these long waves than she did through the choppy sea at the beginning ...
— With Lee in Virginia - A Story of the American Civil War • G. A. Henty
... runners clash with the rocks, and I see Dr. Hingston's lantern (he always would have a lantern), bobbing about like the binnacle light of an oyster sloop, very loose in a choppy sea. Therefore I do not laugh the winds to scorn as much as I did, ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 4 • Charles Farrar Browne
... the early fall of 1699, sturdy young Arvid Horn, a stout, blue-eyed Stockholm boy, stripped to the waist, and with a gleam of fun in his eyes, stood upright in his little boat as it bobbed on the crest of the choppy Maelar waves. He hailed ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... thank the man. He turned into the street. The buildings swam in a garish light, he felt his head rocking, and his feet seemed scarcely to touch the paving stones rising and dipping under him like a choppy sea. He drifted into a bar, and drank brandy, and went forth again with renewed ...
— The Missing Link • Edward Dyson
... The glint of pain in his eyes sent a wave of remorse through Archie's soul. Congdon bore his affliction manfully. There was about him nothing even remotely suggestive of Eliphalet Congdon's grotesque figure or excited, choppy speech. He had suffered and perhaps his wound was not alone responsible for his pallor or the hurt look in his eyes. As Congdon played nervously with his watch chain, he inspected ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson
... He strained his eyes to keep them in sight, and finally fetched the telescope on to the veranda. A squall was making over from the direction of Florida; but then, she and her men laughed at squalls and the white choppy sea at such times. She certainly could swim, he had long since concluded. That came of her training in Hawaii. But sharks were sharks, and he had known of more than one good swimmer drowned ...
— Adventure • Jack London
... finally made of it nothing but a little green, flabby lump which no longer moved or spoke. Then she wrapped it in a cloth, as in a shroud, and she went out in her nightgown, barefoot; she crossed the dock, against which the choppy waves of the sea were beating, and she shook the cloth and let drop this little dead thing, which looked like so much grass. Then she returned, threw herself on her knees before the empty cage, and, overcome by what she had ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... left her and for a moment she stood motionless—only giving to the plunge and jump of the Coquette through the choppy waves. ...
— Wyn's Camping Days - or, The Outing of the Go-Ahead Club • Amy Bell Marlowe
... of seaplane. It was one of those oily seas in which a watcher from the air may follow a submarine for miles, as an olive green shadow under the lighter green. The U-boat doubled twice; but it was half an hour before her sunken shadow was lost to sight under choppy blue waters, and long before that time she was evidently at ease in her mind and pursuing a steady course. For the moment her trail was then lost, and the hawk, having reported her course, dropped out ...
— Aircraft and Submarines - The Story of the Invention, Development, and Present-Day - Uses of War's Newest Weapons • Willis J. Abbot
... except that they had beards, and their withered skins and wild attire made them look not like any earthly creatures. Macbeth first addressed them, when they, seemingly offended, laid each one her choppy finger upon her skinny lips, in token of silence: and the first of them saluted Macbeth with the title of thane of Glamis. The general was not a little startled to find himself known by such creatures; but how much more, when the second of them followed up that salute by giving him the title of ...
— Books for Children - The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 3 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... signs of life on that part of the earth, with the exception of a few horrible, naked, and shattered trees. Nothing green was visible anywhere. In fact the land looked as though it had been a very choppy earth-brown sea suddenly frozen to stillness. Everywhere was shell-holes, shell-holes, shell-holes—large and small. Only by careful searching could one ascertain where enemy trenches had been. Dotted about over this terrain were the Hun "pill-boxes," concrete shelters ...
— The Seventh Manchesters - July 1916 to March 1919 • S. J. Wilson
... around it was quite rough and choppy this streak lay perfectly calm, glistening in the sun with peculiar purple ...
— The Enchanted Island • Fannie Louise Apjohn
... "Choppy," muttered Doctor Ledyard as he sat across the hearth from his hostess and looked now at her fair, tranquil face and then at the cheerful ...
— The Place Beyond the Winds • Harriet T. Comstock
... The sea was somewhat choppy, but notwithstanding this, when the steward appeared on the companion-way, beaming all over, in his best silk gown and jacket, and rang the dinner-bell with all his might, we gaily responded to his call and ...
— Corea or Cho-sen • A (Arnold) Henry Savage-Landor
... a stunt tossin' round in a choppy sea like as if you was a chip on the waves," commented Jan ...
— Flood Tide • Sara Ware Bassett
... breath of wind we had felt since the Titanic stopped her engines. Anticipating a few hours,—as the day drew on to 8 A.M., the time the last boats came up,—this breeze increased to a fresh wind which whipped up the sea, so that the last boat laden with people had an anxious time in the choppy waves before they reached the Carpathia. An officer remarked that one of the boats could not have stayed afloat another hour: the wind had held ...
— The Loss of the SS. Titanic • Lawrence Beesley
... the ship. Clouds hung low, running before the wind, and bringing intermittently little dashes of rain that seemed still further to compress the walls of horizon. The sea was not what could be called rough, but merely choppy and fretful, with short waves that would not have troubled a larger craft. The steamer proved to be a small, undistinguished dingy-looking boat, more like a commercial tramp than a government vessel. An officer, apparently the mate, stood on the bridge, sinewy hands grasping the rail, ...
— A Rock in the Baltic • Robert Barr
... much colder, and the big chunk of ice that served the refugees as a raft was moving quite rapidly over a choppy sea. ...
— Through the Air to the North Pole - or The Wonderful Cruise of the Electric Monarch • Roy Rockwood
... the out-hanging latch-string and the general pot, he had succeeded to his own satisfaction as a knight of the carpet. Quick to take a cue, he circulated with an aplomb which his striking garments and long shambling gait only heightened, and talked choppy and disconnected fragments with whomsoever he ran up against. The Miss Mortimer, who spoke Parisian French, took him aback with her symbolists; but he evened matters up with a goodly measure of the bastard lingo of the Canadian voyageurs, and left her gasping and meditating over a proposition ...
— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London
... into his clothes and was ready as soon as Porky, who considered himself the record dresser. Together they slipped through the dark passage and went up on deck. The Firefly fled like a wild thing, cutting a swift path through a rough and choppy sea. ...
— The Boy Scouts on a Submarine • Captain John Blaine
... turned obediently. Presently they were moving in a wide circle with the houseboat as a center. A slight surface wind had arisen and the water in the cove was a bit choppy, but not enough to obscure bubble tracks ...
— The Electronic Mind Reader • John Blaine
... of the string of climbing objects which grew smaller with incredible swiftness as they shot for the sky. Coburn saw another carrier. There was a huge bow-wave before it. Destroyers ringed it, seeming to bounce in the choppy sea made by so many great ...
— The Invaders • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... Cuthbert's, was more like a very benevolent parent than a tutor. Perhaps he was rather old for his work, but he was so extraordinarily peaceful that you could not help liking him, and I had a vague feeling that he was my grandfather. The change from Mr. Edwardes to him was like going to bed in a choppy sea and waking up in a punt on the Cherwell. I can't explain the feeling I had for him, but he seemed to be surrounded by a homely atmosphere, and he reminded me of hot-water bottles and well-aired beds without making me feel stuffy. You worked for him because ...
— Godfrey Marten, Undergraduate • Charles Turley
... the mouth of that river there is an island, which the French had called Massacre Island from the great quantity of human bones which they found bleaching on its shores. It was evident that there some awful tragedy had been acted; but Tradition, when interrogated, laid her choppy fingers upon her ...
— Great Epochs in American History, Vol. II - The Planting Of The First Colonies: 1562—1733 • Various
... long in Shanghai, but embraced the first opportunity to reach Foo Chow. It was a coast voyage of several days and was attended with much discomfort, as the choppy seas through which we sailed made all of us very ill—a remarkable experience, considering the fact that during the whole of our protracted voyage we had not suffered an uncomfortable moment. We reached Foo Chow, however, in due time, and Mr. Gouverneur at once assumed his official ...
— As I Remember - Recollections of American Society during the Nineteenth Century • Marian Gouverneur
... the west, and a gleam of daylight was streaking the sky at the east, before the churning, choppy waters began leaping less high, and once again I was tossed crest-high, where I was glad to catch sight of a sailing-vessel that was steadying herself in the distance, and a white yacht was skipping like a frightened ...
— Lord Dolphin • Harriet A. Cheever
... that dashed their heavy-laden boats against the floe-ice, ultimately drove them ashore, and nearly cost the little party their lives. On that last day of the long struggle up the stream, a stiff north-easter was cutting the middle reach of the mighty river, two miles wide here, into a choppy and dangerous sea. ...
— The Magnetic North • Elizabeth Robins (C. E. Raimond)
... point and blew dead against us, and we began to think that the boat was very small for such a sea. The women and a child had to disembark here, and were almost in tears, and the length of time that the boatmen took to make up their minds to come out from the harbour and face the choppy sea did not reassure them. Nero marched bravely up and down the deck, giving vent every now and then to a rather cracked crow, and we wondered how he escaped being blown overboard! Fortunately he carried very little sail, only two feathers remaining in his dilapidated tail; but his ...
— The Shores of the Adriatic - The Austrian Side, The Kuestenlande, Istria, and Dalmatia • F. Hamilton Jackson
... had changed into angry, choppy waves from the tops of which the spindrift streamed in long ...
— The Moon Pool • A. Merritt
... was a good promise of rain. February has a reputation for nasty weather in the north Atlantic. The wind was cold and seemed to be rising. Our boat bobbed about like a cork on the swells, which fortunately were not choppy. ...
— "And they thought we wouldn't fight" • Floyd Gibbons
... creek, and thrust me down into the stern sheets. Then he shoved her off with a stretcher (the oars had been carried to the fisher's house, there were none in the boat), and as soon as we were clear of the rocks, in the rather choppy sea, he stepped the stretcher in the mast-crutch as a mast, and hoisted his coat as a sail. He made rough sheets by tying a few yards of spun-yarn to the coat-skirts, and then, shipping the rudder, he bore away before the wind towards the cave ...
— Jim Davis • John Masefield
... precious burden, still trying to lift her over the edge, but unable to do so. It was all she could do to keep her grasp on the wet clothing and keep the child's head above water as the eddies tossed her boat around on the rough surface of the lake. The waves were choppy and every time she would nearly succeed in lifting the baby in, a sudden lurch would almost ...
— Two Little Women • Carolyn Wells
... cockleshell row boats and scull a few miles down the coast would lead him where? Only along the coast, rock-strewn beyond the sands and faced with cliffs. Of boat craft he had no knowledge, the sea was choppy, and the sailing boats now out seemed going ...
— The Man Who Lost Himself • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... dash down on the rushing waters, in which he was for the moment lost. Emerging from the boiling foam at the foot of the fall, he scrambled on a rock and stood up to look for the channel. From that point he had a wearisome pull in dead, choppy water, until he reached New Hampton. At many places along the route, well disposed persons were liberal with their advice to give up such an "outlandish" mode of traveling and to "git on land like a human critter." Though the advice sounded ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... sensations visuelles. Disconnected by his constant abuse of the dash—he must have studied Poe not too wisely—infinitesimal strokes of colour supplying the place of a large-moulded syntax, this prose has not unity, precision, speed, euphony. Its rhythms are choppy, the dabs of paint, the shadings within shadings, the return upon itself of the theme, the reticent, inverted sentences, the absence of architectonic and the fatal lack of variety, surprise, or grandeur in the harmonic sense, these ...
— Ivory Apes and Peacocks • James Huneker
... lawn space is always beautiful. It is restful. It adds a feeling of space to even small grounds. So we might generalize and say that it is well to keep open lawn spaces. If one covers his lawn space with many trees, with little flower beds here and there, the general effect is choppy and fussy. It is a bit like an over-dressed person. One's grounds lose all individuality thus treated. A single tree or a small group is not a bad arrangement on the lawn. Do not centre the tree or trees. Let them drop ...
— The Library of Work and Play: Gardening and Farming. • Ellen Eddy Shaw
... [Footnote: Admiralty Records 1. 2733—Orders of Vice-Admiral Buckle to Capt. Yates, 29 April 1778.] In such work as this man-o'-war boats were of little use. Just as they could not negotiate Deal beach without danger of being reduced to matchwood, so they could not live in the choppy sea kicked up in the Downs by a westerly gale. Folkstone market boats and Deal cutters had to be requisitioned for pressing in those waters. Their seaworthiness and speed made the Downs the crux of inward-bound ships, whose only means of escaping ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... lop is a short choppy sea raised by the immediate action of a breeze. A swell consists of the long heaving waves which follow, and sometimes precede, a storm. The diverse action of different sorts of waves on a shingle beach is interesting. Short seas (i.e. short ...
— A Poor Man's House • Stephen Sydney Reynolds
... time," he said. "Never halloo for the prairie until you are clear of the forest. If the wind remains in its present quarter, we are fortunate. Should it happen to veer round to the eastward, and you see the rocks of Tierra del Fuego lashed by the choppy sea that can run even through a land-locked channel, you will be ready to open two bottles as a thanks-offering. Is this your first trip round by ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... cactus which she had seen through her glasses one day. Indeed, the dismal honking of the machine called Bill back to the trail, where Sudden came jouncing along like a little, leaky boat laboring through a choppy sea. Bill rode off without ...
— Skyrider • B. M. Bower
... to see so much flesh on my bones; did you?" said Mercy, noting their surprise, and being just as sharp and choppy in her observations as ever. "But I'm getting wickedly and scandalously fat. And I don't often have to repeat Aunt Alviry's song of 'Oh, my back ...
— Ruth Fielding at Briarwood Hall - or Solving the Campus Mystery • Alice B. Emerson
... "That's not all." The dancers clapped and the orchestra resumed. He started again. Couples surged around him, and sometimes he avoided them and sometimes he did not. Then he saw a head bobbing not far away, as if it were one cork and he another on a choppy sea. It resembled Eve's head. It was Eve's head. She was dancing with Oswald Morfey. He had never supposed that Eve could dance ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett
... first time in his life an extraordinary, choppy air, a rapid beat that rose and fell abruptly, sending a powerful thrill through his heart as he lay there in the bushes. The words were nothing, almost without meaning, but the tune itself was full of compelling power. It set the feet ...
— The Guns of Bull Run - A Story of the Civil War's Eve • Joseph A. Altsheler
... Pablo the country gets somewhat "choppy," and the road a succession of short-hills, at the bottom of which modest-looking mud-holes patiently await an opportunity to make one's acquaintance, or scraggy-looking, latitudinous washouts are awaiting their chance to commit a murder, or to make the unwary cycler ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... all but dark; a short, choppy sea had risen, the wind came in sharp, angry puffs every now and then, and we made scarcely any headway against it. The barque seemed to be almost standing still, though she was really coming along at a ripping pace. Presently ...
— Ridan The Devil And Other Stories - 1899 • Louis Becke
... six away we steered for home, but with a head wind and rather choppy sea, so there was no help for it but to tack, which made a long trip of it; but to make it short to the reader we reached home about nine p.m., tired, wet, and hungry, for it began to drizzle at sundown. ...
— Jethou - or Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles • E. R. Suffling
... clubs, weights, patent exercisers and gymnasium stunts are all right for those who enjoy them. One thing to bear in mind is that short, choppy movements are not as good as the larger movements that bring the ...
— Maintaining Health • R. L. Alsaker
... the morning. So, wooing sleep, we huddled into the chairs of the saloon, and wished for the day. We slept through troubled dreams, and woke to a gathering calm on the sea. As our eager eyes swept the view by daylight, we found that we were in a semicircular and unsheltered bay, whose choppy water harboured two warships that were desultorily firing. Near us a derelict trawler ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... which Tommy Lark and Sandy Rowl stood lay near the edge of the floe, the sea was running up the lane in almost undiminished swells—the long, slow waves of a great ground swell, not a choppy wind-lop, but agitated by the wind and occasionally breaking. It was a thirty-foot sea in the open. In the lane it was somewhat less—not much, however; and the ice in the lane and all round about was heaving in it—tumbled about, ...
— Harbor Tales Down North - With an Appreciation by Wilfred T. Grenfell, M.D. • Norman Duncan
... me the wind is freshening every moment, and we'll have a decidedly choppy sea before night. I'm thinking ...
— That Mainwaring Affair • Maynard Barbour
... The sea was choppy and fretful. The little bride boat danced and careened about recklessly. Between the Sabah and Piang lay Bongao, and straight for Bongao he headed, skilfully keeping the vinta steady. A white mist rose, as if to hide the vinta from the pursuers, but when the fleet reached the river's mouth ...
— The Adventures of Piang the Moro Jungle Boy - A Book for Young and Old • Florence Partello Stuart
... and inversions make his style seem choppy, like a wave-tossed sea; but his sentences are so full of vigor that they almost call aloud from the printed page. His style was not an imitation of the German, but a characteristic form of expression, natural to him ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... morning, he and Jonas took their places on board the ship, and sailed for Rome. It was now far in November, and the passage was a boisterous one; and the size of the waves astonished John, accustomed, as he was, only to the short choppy seas of the Lake of Galilee. Jonas made up his mind that they were lost and, indeed, for some days the vessel was in imminent danger. Instead of passing through the straits between Sicily and the mainland of Italy, ...
— For the Temple - A Tale of the Fall of Jerusalem • G. A. Henty
... with its heavy stretches of sand, its incredibly steep clay hills, its ruts and bumpers over which the buckboard rocked like a boat in a choppy sea, and its succession of shadeless habitant houses and discouraged farms, had never seemed to him so monotonous. At eight o'clock, when it was growing dusk, and the moon rising, he reached the landing-place on the Branch, and found his canoe, with his two old canoe-men, ...
— Days Off - And Other Digressions • Henry Van Dyke
... until we arrived off the head of Whidby Island. Here a choppy sea from a light wind began slopping over the scow and evidently would sink us despite our utmost efforts at bailing. When the captain would slow down the speed of his steamer, all was well; but the moment greater power was applied, over the ...
— Ox-Team Days on the Oregon Trail • Ezra Meeker
... intuition of it ran down the line in that mysterious fashion by which information passes down a line of waiting men. The line rose, advanced, and dropped again. Companies deployed to the left and behind—fighting their way through the chaparral as a swimmer buffets his way through choppy waves. Every man saw now that the brigade was trying to form in line of battle for a charge on that curving, smokeless flame of fire that ran to and fro around the top of the hill—blazing fiercely and steadily here and there. For half an hour the officers struggled to form the ...
— Crittenden - A Kentucky Story of Love and War • John Fox, Jr.
... columns of printed matter. But as she was putting it down their own name caught her eye. All at once her benumbed faculties regained their power, her heart began to beat wildly, for there, in clearest print, in short, choppy, unequivocal sentences, was the hideous fear which she had contrived ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... and saw the fellow under the lamp, just lifting the silver cap to his lips. A disagreeable smile moulded the long face, wrinkled the nostrils and slid away under the choppy blond mustache. The strong light from the overhead lamp brought ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling
... Ireland expects that every man and so on and sometimes had a terrible time of it in the wintertime not forgetting the Irish lights, Kish and others, liable to capsize at any moment, rounding which he once with his daughter had experienced some remarkably choppy, ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... skiff through the choppy waves with vigorous strokes and shot her around at the last moment for a perfect landing. The mainsail and jib went up with rapid jerks while the rings rattled their protest. The strenuous physical exercise brought ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... said encouragingly. "I saw that you felt a bit nervous, for your cheeks were white; but that is the way: bravely meet a terror and it shrinks to half its size. I can remember feeling as timid as could be on entering an open boat and pulling off in a choppy sea; but now I know the danger, and how to meet it, I feel as calm and comfortable as you will after a trip or two. Now then, lay hold of that rope and give a pull when I cry 'haul', and we'll soon have a little sail ...
— Nat the Naturalist - A Boy's Adventures in the Eastern Seas • G. Manville Fenn
... at the bow quartz port-hole. Down the long shaft through which they had risen they saw the glaring flame of the Gorm. As they looked, its regular pulsations turned irregular: it leaped and splashed as though it was a stormy, choppy sea. Then it gave one final mighty heave, and the universe seemed to shatter beneath them. The "walls" of the shaft collapsed about them and they were enswathed in a ...
— Pirates of the Gorm • Nat Schachner
... in a Valley. So marked is the time element, with the compensatory lengthenings and pauses, that the poem almost demands to be chanted rather than read; but when well chanted it is peculiarly musical, and when ill read it is horribly ragged and choppy. The whole poem will repay study for the metrical subtleties, but the first stanza is sufficient to illustrate the rhythm (there are normally ...
— The Principles of English Versification • Paull Franklin Baum
... and all the dancers began to dance with a last desperate fury. Bodies buffeted one from behind, and while one was yet looking round in apology or anger more bodies buffeted one from the flank. It was like swimming in a choppy sea, where there is no time to get the last wave out of your mouth before the next one ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, July 7th, 1920 • Various
... pulled many miles through a choppy sea with the wind against him, and he was thinking that it would be really pleasant to sit writing for an hour or two somewhere out of the roaring of the wind. Entering his office, he took off his jacket and sat down on the rough stool before the equally rough desk where his ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant
... twelve thousand feet and that gave him a chance to drift a long way, but not far enough if his gas ran out. Steadily he drove toward the friendly shore. Below him the channel looked cold and choppy. ...
— A Yankee Flier Over Berlin • Al Avery
... time the girls appeared we had yanked up all the sails that was handy, and the Pyxie was slanted over, just scootin' through the choppy water gay and careless, like she was glad ...
— Torchy, Private Sec. • Sewell Ford
... this is that the vast body of water which forms the North Sea, in forcing its way between the narrow straits of Dover, is driven into short cross-waves and currents, which make the sea always choppy ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1, No. 41, August 19, 1897 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... much as the short, choppy waves of the ocean and the slow, long swell of the ocean, but not more so. The sailor handles his boat in one way in a choppy sea and in a different way in a rolling sea, for he knows that these two kinds of waves act dissimilarly. The long, slow swell of the ocean would correspond ...
— General Science • Bertha M. Clark
... p.m., having, in logic swum the distance of two-and-a-quarter miles in twenty-three minutes. The aid the swimmer derived from choosing the flood tide he admitted was considerable, and served him for nearly half the distance; when out of the influence of this, the water suddenly became very choppy, the waves being too small for the swimmer to time, yet with annoying frequency throwing their crests above the surface of the water. Subsequently a great stillness was encountered, until Starcross was neared and ...
— Original Letters and Biographic Epitomes • J. Atwood.Slater
... Ruth Bellenden no longer, but the wife of a gentleman with a name none but a foreigner can spell," added Mister Jacob; and then he went on: "Well, you surprise me very much, captain—very much indeed. Matrimony is a choppy sea and queer things swim in it. But this—this I had not looked ...
— The House Under the Sea - A Romance • Sir Max Pemberton
... presence all men trembled. He was a sturdy little man, about fifty, short and stout, with a big round head, gray hair brushed up, a red face, a masterful way of speaking, a thick, affected accent, and every now and then he would break out into a choppy sort of volubility. He had forced himself on Paris by his enormous self-confidence. A business man, with a knowledge of men, naive and deep, passionate, full of himself, he identified his business with the business of France, ...
— Jean-Christophe Journey's End • Romain Rolland
... from the north-east and east continued the entire day, and broke into occasional severe gusts that were most troublesome to us. Heavy rain-clouds hung over our heads. My men felt cold and shivery and quite miserable in the choppy waters, which made them extremely ill. Their faces were green and yellow, their eyes had a pitiful expression in them. They looked as if they were all being led to execution. The temperature of the atmosphere was ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... with a number of different subjects: Why does it not seem "choppy"? How does the author manage to link the different parts together? How would you describe this piece to some one who had not read it? Mr. Smith is an artist who paints in water-colors: do you see how ...
— Modern Prose And Poetry; For Secondary Schools - Edited With Notes, Study Helps, And Reading Lists • Various
... in line formation with the U.S.S. Susquehanna, the U.S.S. Antigone, and the U.S.S. Ryndam, the latter being on the left flank of the formation and about 800 yards from the President Lincoln. The weather was pleasant, the sun shining brightly, with a choppy sea. The ships were about 500 miles from the coast of France and had passed through what was considered to be the most dangerous part of the war zone. At about 9 a.m. a terrific explosion occurred on the port side of the ship about 120 feet from the bow and immediately afterwards ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various
... side and he would look after Jane very carefully. So he and Jane and Jennifer got on one end, and Jessica, Joyce and Joan sat on the other, and screaming and laughing they tossed like a boat on a choppy sea: until Jessica without any warning jumped off her perch in mid-air and destroyed the balance, and down they all came helter-skelter, laughing and screaming more than ever. But Jane reproved Jessica for her trick and said nobody would believe her another time, and that it was a bad ...
— Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard • Eleanor Farjeon
... their stout ashen blades bend, and the cutter went forward in jerks through the rather choppy sea. ...
— Fitz the Filibuster • George Manville Fenn
... gentlemen,—say, are they aught? They seem to understand me, by each at once his choppy finger laying on his skinny lips! Princes of the Powers of the Air, Shall we define them? It is certain the solid Earth or her facts, except being held in perpetual terror by such workings of the Shadow-world, reaped no effect from those Twenty Years of Congressing; ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. VI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... boat seemed changed. By the motion the men were rowing across a choppy current, probably toward shore. Joe found this to be so, a little later, for the boat's side grated against what was probably a ...
— Baseball Joe in the Big League - or, A Young Pitcher's Hardest Struggles • Lester Chadwick
... things the British Channel was the most disappointing thing we encountered in our travels. All my reading on this subject had led me to expect that the Channel would be very choppy and that we should all be very seasick. Nothing of the sort befell. The channel may have been suetty but it was not choppy. The steamer that ferried us over ran as steadily as a clock and everybody felt as ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... filled the sails, and the Eleanor shot for the opening in the bar. Quick as she had been, however, she was no quicker than Gladys, and the Defiance and the Eleanor passed through the bar and out into the open sea together. Here there was more motion, since the short, choppy waves outside the bar were never wholly still, no matter how calm the sea might seem to be. But Bessie, who had been rather nervous as to the effect of this motion, which she had been warned to dread, found ...
— A Campfire Girl's Happiness • Jane L. Stewart
... from the madly rippling ivy leaves. The sky was high and pale, and crossed by hurrying and scattered clouds; a clean, roaring gale tore over the hills, and ruffled the rain pools in the road, and bowed the trees like whips. The bay was iron colour; choppy waves chased each other against the piers. Now and then a pale flicker of sunlight brightened the whole scene with blues and greens and shadows spectacularly clear; then the clouds met again, and the wind sang like a ...
— The Story Of Julia Page - Works of Kathleen Norris, Volume V. • Kathleen Norris
... far too worried to pay heed to his questioner's florid turn of speech. He sighed deeply. He felt like a timid swimmer in a choppy sea, knowing he was out of his depth ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy |
