"Deft" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... without the least appearance of discomposure, had dismounted, and with his long deft Hindu fingers soon released the animal, patched up his gear, replaced him between the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. XVII, No. 99, March, 1876 • Various
... pleasant meal. Mary Nellen, who amicably divided themselves between the task of cooking and serving, forwarded their desires, making faces all the time at unfamiliar sauce-pans, and quite plainly agreed with them that men were to be comforted by such recognised device. Anne and Lydia were deft little housewives. They had a sober recognition of the pains that go to a well-ordered life, and were patient in service. Their father had no habit of complaint if the machinery creaked and even caused the walls to shudder with faulty action. Yet they knew ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... with drops of water like a lump of chipped red granite in a shower. It was all very well for that old sea-dog to cry. He had to read on to the end; but after the splash he did not remember much of what happened for the next few days. An elderly sailor of the crew, deft at needlework, put together a mourning frock for the child out of one of her ...
— End of the Tether • Joseph Conrad
... others, but one practice will not train us all alike. Skill of all kinds is hard to attain unto: but when thou bringest forth this prize, proclaim aloud with a good courage that by fate divine this man at least was born deft-handed, nimble-limbed, with the light of valour in his eyes, and that now being victorious he hath crowned at the feast ...
— The Extant Odes of Pindar • Pindar
... doctor bared the leg and laid a deft finger on the exact spot of the break. "Simple fracture," was his verdict. "Bone badly splintered, though—would have come through the skin in short order if you hadn't got the splints on when you did. ...
— Sure Pop and the Safety Scouts • Roy Rutherford Bailey
... quietly, apart from us. I watched him drink, curiously. He took the cup; then, with a long piece of carved wood, he dipped into the sake, shaking a few drops on the floor to the four quarters. Finally, with a deft sweep, he lifted his heavy mustache with the piece of wood and drank off the ...
— The War Terror • Arthur B. Reeve
... an entertaining half-hour with them, but they will be glad we are gone. Here comes Krishna, the deft handed, to pack sketches and all; I must supervise him, and see that he does not pack my cousin's soap, matches, and pieces of string along with his increasing collection of these articles in a ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... (if we have time to study them) upon just proportion and the value of subtle curves. Moreover, the different household vessels, the stone and bronze lamps, the various table dishes, even the common pottery put to the humblest uses, all have a beauty, a chaste elegance, a saving touch of deft ornamentation, which transforms them out of "kitchen ware" into works of art. Those black water pots covered with red-clay figures which the serving maids are bearing so carelessly into the scullery at the screaming summons of the cook will ...
— A Day In Old Athens • William Stearns Davis
... a deft movement she draws SIR WILLIAM toward the billiard-room, and glances back at BILL before going out, but he has turned to the writing-table. When the door is closed, BILL looks into the drawing-room, them opens the door under the stairs; and backing away towards the writing-table, sits down there, ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... ventured one, "the assault was both deft and certain. Are you accustomed to Mr. Hasbrouck's house, that you found your way with so little ...
— The Golden Slipper • Anna Katharine Green
... was silent, and, except for the deft action of brushes, motionless. Only that from below was heard the musical splash of the Barberini Tritons, and that from the windows could be seen the sombre pines of the Ludovisi gardens swaying in solemn rhythmic measure must have been sometimes unbending from the dole and drear of ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various
... so free as you are with bad language," replied Pan, smiling down on her. Then with deft movement he hitched his belt round farther forward on his hip. It was careless, it might have been accidental, but it was neither. And the girl grasped its meaning. She turned white under her paint, and the eyes that searched Pan were just ...
— Valley of Wild Horses • Zane Grey
... alone, smiled at his own reflection in the mirror; rearranged his ruffles with a deft and shapely hand; consulted his watch; made sure that the padding which enhanced the calves of his most notable legs was all as it should be; seated himself and hummed a merry air, in meditative wise; and was in such ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell
... deft woman with her hands, and was soon apparelled. She took in her hands the change—the precious centimes they kept ever at their side; for this coin is little used, and they had made provision at ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 17 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... lightning glance the thought of the other, the pair flung themselves upon the fellow. And while Dick, exerting all his giant strength, pinned the man's arms to his sides, and at the same time, by a deft movement of his left foot, tripped the fellow up so that he crashed violently forward upon his face on the stone pavement of the passage, Phil clasped the man's throat with his two hands, compressing his windpipe in such a vice-like grip that it was ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... door of the lad's room. There he crouched listening until assured by the regular breathing of those within that both slept. Quietly he inserted a slim, skeleton key in the lock of the door. With deft fingers, long accustomed to the silent manipulation of the bars and bolts that guarded other men's property, Condon turned the key and the knob simultaneously. Gentle pressure upon the door swung it slowly inward upon ...
— The Son of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... distributed themselves as best suited them. It was most homelike and resting. Bennington had never before experienced the delight of seeing a young girl about a house, and he enjoyed to the utmost the deft little touches by which is imparted that airily feminine appearance to a room; or, more subtly, the mere spirit of daintiness which breathes always from a woman of the right sort. He felt there was added a newer and calmer element of joy ...
— The Claim Jumpers • Stewart Edward White
... deft hand she re-arranged the disordered folds of her dress. There was a faint flush under her eyes and her ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio
... a moment the officer, if he too is an old hand, quietly removes the candle from the lantern and with a deft turn of his wrist tips the boiling-hot contents of the tallow cup surrounding the flaming wick out upon the bare arm or exposed chest of the "case." When the fit was genuine, as of course it sometimes was, the test had no particular reviving effect; but if the man ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... instant she was almost palsied with recurrent terror: the footfall, stealthy, shuffling, weighty, sounded again. It was never the echo of her own deft, light step! A distinct, sibilant whisper suddenly hissed with warning throughout the place, and as she turned with the instinct of flight she caught a glimpse in the darkling mirror across the dining-room of a fugitive speeding ...
— The Ordeal - A Mountain Romance of Tennessee • Charles Egbert Craddock
... Buddir ad Deen Houssun, all fixed their eyes upon him, and admiring his shape, his behaviour, and the beauty of his face, they could not forbear looking upon him. When he was seated every one deft their seats, came near him to have a full view of his face, and all found themselves moved ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 1 • Anon.
... she grew tenderly deft over his wounds. She washed them clean, bound them up with strips torn from her skirt. She pushed back his hair from eyes and brows, and washed him clean of blood and sweat and rage. Her petticoat was her towel; she would have used her hair, but that she dared not lose command ...
— The Forest Lovers • Maurice Hewlett
... part and adjunct to the machines, the workers! Strong, sturdy, bared forearms flashed regularly like moving, rhythmic shafts ... deft hands clasped and reached, ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... sheep industry, had been extremely solicitous of obtaining for a favour. 'Twas a satisfaction to me that my rustic friend departed without it. He was no sooner gone than I came near and perched myself on the arm of a chair beside the girl. For a minute I sat watching in silence the deft movements of the firm brown hands in which were both delicacy ...
— A Daughter of Raasay - A Tale of the '45 • William MacLeod Raine
... could only be worthily served in singing robes and laurel crowned. And yet many of Jonson's lyrics will live as long as the language. Who does not know "Queen and huntress, chaste and fair." "Drink to me only with thine eyes," or "Still to be neat, still to be dressed"? Beautiful in form, deft and graceful in expression, with not a word too much or one that bears not its part in the total effect, there is yet about the lyrics of Jonson a certain stiffness and formality, a suspicion that ...
— Volpone; Or, The Fox • Ben Jonson
... What swift deft fingers she had to be sure. He could not help stopping for a moment in his bewilderment to watch her; then he went, and meekly and swiftly did her bidding. There was much done during that afternoon. ...
— The Chautauqua Girls At Home • Pansy, AKA Isabella M. Alden
... his work and upon how to save time, pointing out to Martin where he did in five motions what could be done in three, or in three motions what could be done in two. "Elimination of waste motion," Martin phrased it as he watched and patterned after. He was a good workman himself, quick and deft, and it had always been a point of pride with him that no man should do any of his work for him or outwork him. As a result, he concentrated with a similar singleness of purpose, greedily snapping up the hints and suggestions thrown out by his working mate. He "rubbed ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... last night," began Madam Villenauve, shaking her finger at him archly as she swept some skirts off a chair for him to sit down, and then took her place before her dressing-table, where she added the last deft touch to her coiffure. "I have been seeing you smiling at ze reedeec'lous Carmen. Oh, la, la! Carmen!" she shrilled. "It is I, monsieur, I zat am ze Carmen. It was zis Matteo, the scoundrel who run away wiz ...
— The Making of Bobby Burnit - Being a Record of the Adventures of a Live American Young Man • George Randolph Chester
... cocos we made our camp, and old Sru and the women and children at once set to work to build a "house" to protect us in case it rained during the nights. Very quickly was the house built. The "devil" was sent up the cocos to lop off branches, which, as they fell, were woven into thatch by the deft, eager hands of the women, who were supervised by Sivi, Nalik's handsome wife, amid much chatter and laughter, each one trying to outvie the other in speed, and all anxious to follow Nalik and myself ...
— "Martin Of Nitendi"; and The River Of Dreams - 1901 • Louis Becke
... Migwan, and Hinpoha sped after her paint box. Hinpoha could not have written that little sketch if her life depended upon it, but her talent with the brush was unmistakable. With a few deft strokes she pictured Migwan sitting in the woods and beside her the little red berry with its comical face. Now it was Migwan's turn to admire. Hinpoha went on ...
— The Camp Fire Girls in the Maine Woods - Or, The Winnebagos Go Camping • Hildegard G. Frey
... go with me and Ellen," said Alexia, quietly, beginning with her deft fingers to remove grubby pinafores and brush tumbled hair. "Will you get ready, Ellen? And do not waste time, please, or we shall lose the best ...
— A Bachelor's Dream • Mrs. Hungerford
... was Sadie. Could she admit Sadie even for the sake of having Elizabeth? Olga pondered long over that while she was teaching the girl to work with the beads and the raffia. Sadie was an apt pupil. Those bony little fingers of hers were deft and quick. Within a month she had made her Camp Fire dress and her headband, and was eagerly at work over the requirements for a Fire Maker. But, as Mary Hastings said to Rose ...
— The Torch Bearer - A Camp Fire Girls' Story • I. T. Thurston
... life he led, what with his studies indoors and out and his duties about the hut,—for the Hermit taught him to be deft in all tasks, however simple and homely. John could cut up firewood or cook a porridge with as happy a face as he wore when he played with Brutus or sang the morning hymn of praise at ...
— John of the Woods • Abbie Farwell Brown
... pressing it hard. She was determined that she would have an answer. No conviction of duty or feeling of filial regard was strong enough to overwhelm love in this woman's heart. As she spoke she flashed upon him her most brilliant glance and by a deft movement of her bridle hand swerved the jennet in closer to his barb. She laid her hand upon his strong arm and bent her head close toward him. They were far from the others now and the turns of the winding road ...
— Sir Henry Morgan, Buccaneer - A Romance of the Spanish Main • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... lined the shore, where peasants in bright-coloured shirts and vests lounged. After much haggling and good-humoured banter, Sanine hired one of the little boats. Ivanoff was a deft and powerful oarsman, and the boat shot forward across the water like a living thing. Sometimes the oars touched reeds or low-hanging branches which for a long while after such contact trembled above the deep, dark stream. Sanine steered with so much erratic energy that the ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... the student's rapt expression) and 776 J 017 ("A double-breasted, snappy, yet semi-conservative effect in dark-green worsted, a special social value"), leaning to the latter because of a purely literary response to that subtle and deft appeal of the attributive "social." The devotee of Messrs. Sears-Roebuck was an innately social person, though as yet his gregarious proclivities lay undeveloped and unsuspected by himself. Also he was of a literary ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... beautiful literary phraseology ... and each letter invariably held a sonnet ... and that, too, of an amazingly high standard of poetic excellence, considering the number Mallows was dashing off every day ... many of them were quite lovely with memorable phrase, deft turn ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... by clockwork by the appearance; Th' exalted driver, usually so deft, Resented, in his doze, the interference Of any one poor fellow-suff'rer left; Of all his strength and energy bereft, The weary horse dragged listlessly along, And there appeared to be no effort left In the sleepy trilling of the songster's song, Which ...
— The Minstrel - A Collection of Poems • Lennox Amott
... society" far more frequently and with greater alacrity if they felt assured that the way had been smoothly paved with their own visiting-cards, well laid in place by the deft fingers of their skillful women folk, who have left no flaw in the ...
— Etiquette • Agnes H. Morton
... out and joined Uncle Peter and Mary Louise in watching the boy attach the tires, which were on demountable rims and soon put in place. All were surprised at Bub's sudden exhibition of energy and his deft movements, for he worked with the assurance of ...
— Mary Louise • Edith van Dyne (one of L. Frank Baum's pen names)
... humming, and, turning his head, saw a boy of fourteen or perhaps a little more, busily cleaning a rifle in a way that betokened the most expert knowledge of the weapon. Pierre himself knew rifles as a preacher knows his Bible, and as he lay half awake and half asleep he smiled with enjoyment to see the deft fingers move here and there, wiping away the oil. A green hand will spend half a day cleaning a gun, and then do the work imperfectly; an expert does the job efficiently in ten minutes. This ...
— Riders of the Silences • John Frederick
... grace. But he is no mere virtuoso. There is something in him beyond the executant. Of Malibran, Alfred de Musset says, most beautifully, that she had that "voice of the heart which alone has power to reach the heart." Here, also, behind the skilful player on language, the deft manipulator of rhyme and rhythm, the graceful and earnest writer, one feels the beating of a human heart. One feels that he is giving us personal impressions of life and its joys and sorrows; that his imagination is powerful because it is genuinely his own; that the flowers ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... being called upon, instantly contrived some impromptu verses amid general approbation—for his intelligence was as lithe and graceful as his body was agile. And our foppish Ensign, who was no dolt by a long shot either, made a most deft rondeau in flattery of the ladies, turning it so neatly and unexpectedly that we all drew our side-arms and, thrusting them aloft, cheered both him and the fair ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... into the range of a pier glass. "Now close your eyes and keep them closed." Around Allie's hips he flung the scarf, drew it snug and smooth, then knotted it. Next he snatched the length of chiffon and bound it about her head. His touch was deft and certain; a moment and it had been fashioned to suit him. Then he stood back and eyed ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... deft fingers disrobed the moody lady, loosened the elaborate structure of hair, brushed it out, and all the while she sat frowning angrily ...
— The Baronet's Bride • May Agnes Fleming
... intelligent administration and we demand for our own sake and for the sake of those that shall come after us that the wisdom of woman shall be included; not only that her delicate, intuitional sense of justice shall leaven the lump of public opinion but that her deft hand shall help to knead it into the bread of righteous law. We ask as one of the rights that government is bound to secure that in the administration of its power it shall make use of the fullest wisdom of the whole people; that the entire popular brain and social conscience ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume V • Ida Husted Harper
... by deft stages Peter led the conversation to a lighter vein. It was nearly ten when they left, the dining-room was all but deserted and they departed in high spirits, her arm within his, her ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... league. So too, in the lowest school, as far as possible from the university, the kindergarten has won its place and the blocks, and straws, and bands, the chalk, the clay, the scissors, are in use to make young fingers deft. Between the highest and the lowest schools there is a like call for hand-craft. Seeing this need, the authorities in our public schools have begun to project special schools for such training, and are looking for guidance far and near. At this intermediate ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 497, July 11, 1885 • Various
... Deft and noiseless fingers toiled, and wrought the great Creator's plan, Through countless ages moulding earth for the abode ...
— Poems • Marietta Holley
... Jubilee described on previously. I have given two extreme examples, but there are also gradations of these characters, who had better find employment from those requiring "hands" only. Successful work on a fruit farm, or in a garden, requires a quick brain, a keen eye, a brisk step and a deft hand. Many of its labors are light, and no profit can follow unless they are performed with despatch, at the right time and in the ...
— Success With Small Fruits • E. P. Roe
... into this business," suggested Billie. "With one deft movement of the arm, I'll help each plate to creamed potatoes, passing them along in order to Nancy, who can dish out the baked omelette. While we are doing that Mary can serve the butter and Elinor can pass around the biscuits. There is no labor wasted and the food ...
— The Motor Maids at Sunrise Camp • Katherine Stokes
... he sat in the queen's presence, playing upon a little harp that Allogia had given to him. And as his deft fingers touched the trembling strings he chanted a little song, telling of how the giant Loki, in punishment for all the ills he had done to gods and men, was bound by strong cords against the walls of a cave, with a serpent suspended over him dropping venom into his face drop by drop; and of how ...
— Olaf the Glorious - A Story of the Viking Age • Robert Leighton
... purple berries, and in autumn they take on their winter dress of scarlet. When ripe the berries taste like mealy crab-apples. I have often seen chipmunks eating the berries, or apples, sitting up with the fruit in both their deft little hands, and eating it with such evident relish that I frequently found myself thinking of these berries as ...
— Wild Life on the Rockies • Enos A. Mills
... who knew the joiner's art, Or distant ground in every part; Each busied in his several trade, To work machines or ply the spade; Deft workmen skilled to frame the wheel, Or with the ponderous engine deal; Guides of the way, and craftsmen skilled, To sink the well, make bricks, and build; And those whose hands the tree could hew, And work with slips of cut bamboo, Went forward, and to guide them, they ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... truthful woman, and the proof of it is that when I do start out to tell a lie, it is a good honest one, not a deft little evasion such as runs trippingly from the tongue ...
— Flint - His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes • Maud Wilder Goodwin
... the next question that comes before them is, how the disguise is to be got up. About this there seems a difficulty to Ludwig, and also to Cypriano; though recalling the transformation of the latter into a soldier-crane, so quickly done by the deft hands of the gaucho, they doubt not that he will also find the ways and means for ...
— Gaspar the Gaucho - A Story of the Gran Chaco • Mayne Reid
... well driven. More than once the watcher nodded in quick approval of a skilful turn or deft manoeuvre. Once he rose and changed his position to see more distinctly, and it was then that he ...
— From the Car Behind • Eleanor M. Ingram
... wide," which we so easily purchase to-day, meant to the colonial dame or daughter the work of many weeks and months, from the time when the fleeces were first given to her deft hands. Fleeces had to be opened with care, and have all pitched or tarred locks, dag-locks, brands, and feltings cut out. These cuttings were not wasted, but were spun into coarse yarn. The white locks were carefully tossed and separated and tied into net bags with tallies ...
— Home Life in Colonial Days • Alice Morse Earle
... can undress yourself," said the housekeeper. Jewel's deft fingers flew over the buttons in her eagerness to prove her independence. When at last she stood in her little white nightgown, so neat and fine in its small decorations, Mrs. Forbes said, "Do you want me to hear you ...
— Jewel - A Chapter In Her Life • Clara Louise Burnham
... too deeply engaged to notice more than that somebody had entered the cabin. They stood at his shoulder and looked on. He imparted to the pan a deft circular motion, pausing once or twice to rake out the larger particles of gravel with his fingers. The water was muddy, and, with the pan buried in it, they could see nothing of its contents. Suddenly he lifted the pan clear and sent the water ...
— The Faith of Men • Jack London
... from the skins of lions that had reached such an advanced age that they died naturally, and on one side was tawny hair while the other side was cured to the softness of velvet by the deft Knooks. When Claus received these strips of leather he sewed them neatly into a harness for the ten reindeer, and it proved strong and serviceable and lasted ...
— The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus • L. Frank Baum
... cunningly hidden by its owner under a heap of brush and sedge-grass, that only the explicit directions they had received enabled them to find it. It was in good condition, about eighteen feet in length and two paddles lay in the bottom. Tom got in, pushed off from the shore, and with deft strokes brought the slender craft down to ...
— Bert Wilson in the Rockies • J. W. Duffield
... as they row To and fro, Up and down the Lower River for an afternoon or so— (For the deft manipulation Of the never-resting oar, Though it lead to approbation, Will induce excoriation)— They are infinitely sore, Keeping time, time, time In a sort of Runic rhyme Up and down the way to Iffley in an afternoon or so; (Which is slow). Do they blow? 'Tis the ...
— Green Bays. Verses and Parodies • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... Nellie Dawson herself, it is unlikely that for a time she suspected the truth in all its fulness. She knew that hers was a peculiarly sweet enjoyment, while her deft fingers were busy with some needlework, to listen to the reminiscences of the two. Sometimes she started with a shock of alarm, when the father pictured in his graphic way a situation from which it seemed no escape was open to ...
— A Waif of the Mountains • Edward S. Ellis
... and leaned back accordingly, blowing an endless chain of smoke-rings, and watching her face, her supple slenderness, the deft movements of her hand, with a contentment whose vital ingredients he either could not or ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver
... element in Felicia's childhood. Frivolous, shallow, having all her life kept her mind enveloped in pink swaddling-clothes, she had at all events a dainty knack at housekeeping, and agile fingers clever at sewing, embroidering, arranging furniture, and leaving the trace of their deft, painstaking touch in every corner of a room. She alone undertook to train that wild young plant, and to awaken with care the womanly instincts in that strange creature, on whose figure cloaks and furs, all the elegant inventions ...
— The Nabob, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... Dick the sponge, with instructions to hold it with a gentle pressure against the panther's mouth and nostrils. This done, the American seized a lancet, and, lifting the swollen paw, made a quick, long incision in it, upon which an amazing quantity of exceedingly offensive matter spurted out. With deft manipulations of the member, the American quickly pressed all the matter out of it, after which he carefully washed out the cavity with warm water, treated it with an antiseptic, stitched up the wound, dressed it, and finally bound it up tightly with ...
— In Search of El Dorado • Harry Collingwood
... in a sleeping-car. It delighted her to watch the deft porter make up the berths; she decided that the peculiar etiquette of sleeping-cars required that all travelers, male and female, should be driven to bed by lordly colored men in white jackets, and there left in cramped misery with nothing but ...
— The Purple Heights • Marie Conway Oemler
... wears, According to his place; According as was his affairs Here, in the time of grace. 55. Some on the right hand of the Lamb, Likewise some on the left, With robes and golden chains do stand Most grave, most sage, and deft.[9] 56. The martyr here is known from him Who peaceably did die, Both by the place he sitteth in, And by his dignity. 57. Each father, saint, and prophet shall, According to his worth, Enjoy the honour of his call, And plainly hold it forth. 58. Those bodies which sometimes ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... of the Berlin sidewalks, who enrolled for hospital work when her lover went to the front. She Was a tall, dark, handsome girl, who looked to be more Spaniard than German, and she was graceful and lithe even in the exceedingly shapeless costume of blue print that she wore. She was less deft than either of her associates but very willing and eager. As between the three—the noblewoman, the working woman and the woman of the street—the medical officials in charge made no distinction whatsoever. Why should they? In this sisterhood ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... Poor Sadie! What a time she would have! "She will learn a little about life while I am away," thought Ester complacently, as she stood before the mirror, and pinned the dainty frill on her new pink cambric wrapper, which Sadie's deft ...
— Ester Ried • Pansy (aka. Isabella M. Alden)
... later he had it near the surface, and had drawn it into the stream which ran out of the deep hole, into the shallowest part of which the convict had waded, and as soon as line and current had brought it near enough, he gave one deft scoop with his joined hands and threw it out on ...
— First in the Field - A Story of New South Wales • George Manville Fenn
... there was general laughter and applause. The whimsical idea of building a tale around the persons of the letter was one which his playful mind was competent to develop, and he had written a deft and amusing introduction. Taking "Joe" as his subject he had sketched that gentleman's character with a touch of irony. He had made him a Rhodes Scholar from Indiana (evoking good-natured protest from Minters) and had carried him on a vacation to Guilford House, a small hotel in London much ...
— Kathleen • Christopher Morley
... yet-watching men: Mary of Seven Evils, Mary Magdalen. And he was frighted at her. She sighed: 'I dreamed him dead. We sell the body for silver....' Then Judas cried out and fled Forth into the night!... The moon had begun to set: A drear, deft wind went sifting, setting the dust afret; Into the heart of the city Judas ran on and prayed To stern Jehovah lest his ...
— Georgian Poetry 1916-17 - Edited by Sir Edward Howard Marsh • Various
... it was laden, to the kitchen, while she carried the eatables. Coming back, together they folded the tablecloth. A pleasant enough occupation to be shared with a pretty girl; but it was evident, although his trade had made his blunt fingers deft at the handling of material, and he was carefully observant of the practice which must be followed in the art, that he was thinking of other things than maintaining ...
— Mrs. Day's Daughters • Mary E. Mann
... masterpieces of Van Dyck and Rubens frowned and leered down upon him; descended the final stretch of broad oak stairs, crossed the hail, and entered his master's rooms. Mr. Fentolin was sitting before the open window, an easel in front of him, a palette in his left hand, painting with deft, swift touches. ...
— The Vanished Messenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... She swept the glowing lengths of her hair over it with a deft movement. "Why, what makes you so happy?" she ...
— By the Light of the Soul - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... Eppie came running up the path. She was barefooted, as Eppie always was except on Sundays, and wore a coarse, gray wincey dress and a big apron. Poor Eppie's clothes were all much too large for her, for the little girl had no woman's deft hand to dress her. She shyly slipped past the boys and took hold of Elizabeth's hand. Her big, pathetic eyes shone with joy. "Oh, Lizzie, I'll be that glad to see you," she whispered in her old-fashioned way. Perhaps it was her long dress, but somehow Elizabeth ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith
... for an entirely new outfit did not appeal to his imagination with the force that might have been expected. But, however lukewarm his adhesion to the project might be, Francesca and her brother were clearly determined that no lack of deft persistence on their part should endanger its success. It was for the purpose of reminding Sir Julian of his promise to meet Comus at lunch on the following day, and definitely settle the matter of the secretaryship that Francesca was now enduring ...
— The Unbearable Bassington • Saki
... and found that he could not raise his hand to his fur cap. "All right, Miss Allison," he smiled to her reassuringly. "Drive on." And then some one helped him in to Wells's parlor, and Mrs. Wells came fluttering down, all sympathy and welcome. Her deft, womanly hands stripped off the cheap hood and coat of the little sufferer; other friendly, sympathetic souls came in to help; and then, feeling oddly faint and queer, Forrest quietly stole away. Closing the glazed hall door behind him, ...
— A Tame Surrender, A Story of The Chicago Strike • Charles King
... the other did both strike and wound, His arms were surer, and his strength was more; From Tisipheme the blood streamed down around; His shield was deft, his helm was rent and tore. The dame, that saw his blood besmear the ground, His armor broke, limbs weak, wounds deep and sore, And all her guard dead, fled, and overthrown, Thought, now her field lay waste, her hedge ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... she had refused Hess' offer of a private car, and she now rather regretted it. She had a headache, and the great coils of red-gold hair seemed to weigh tons. It would have been a relief to have it taken down and brushed by a deft-fingered maid. But the maid also had been left behind. And that, she decided, was ...
— Desert Conquest - or, Precious Waters • A. M. Chisholm
... means of escape. Nimble, deft, sharp-sighted, he found a weak place in his prison, worked it open, and leaped forth upon the highway a free anthropoid ape. None of the sleepy, weary drivers noticed his escape, and a proper sense of caution caused him to seek security under a way-side ...
— The Ape, the Idiot & Other People • W. C. Morrow
... petulant little shiver, and then, though paler and evidently agitated, composed her tattered and dusty outer garments in a deft, ladylike way, and leaned back against the mountain side, He saw her also glance at his loosened shirt front and hanging neckerchief, and with a heightened color he quickly re-knotted it around his throat. They moved from the ledge toward the trail. ...
— From Sand Hill to Pine • Bret Harte
... her trunk, had whipped out her key, unlocked it, and was swiftly selecting the numbers wanted from the trays, her breath coming quickly, her deft fingers choosing unerringly, when an indignant voice said, in Portuguese, ...
— Emma McChesney & Co. • Edna Ferber
... His hands were large and shapely, and very skilful. Never a finished draughtsman, he was none the less expert in representing, with swift, sure strokes, the essential structure of the object he wished to recall or explain. He was deft, too, with the dissecting-knife and the microscope, and with the geologist's hammer. His neck (the weak part, as his fatal illness showed) was rather short; his head was fine and large. In later years his hair, of a chestnut ...
— Louis Agassiz as a Teacher • Lane Cooper
... stopping her work as she spoke, she made her wheel go faster than before; and I gazed with admiration at her deft fingering of the wool, from which the thread flowed in a continuous line, as if it had been something ...
— Ranald Bannerman's Boyhood • George MacDonald
... picked a little ivory ball out of one of the pockets before setting the wheel in motion. Then, as it began to revolve, with a deft turn of the wrist he launched the ball in a whizzing rush along a narrow shelf inside the rosewood rim, and in a direction contrary to the whirl ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... descriptions, so that any apparatus, however delicate or heavy, could be made and built as might be required by Edison in experimenting. Mr. John Kruesi had charge of this shop, and was assisted by a number of skilled mechanics, notably John Ott, whose deft fingers and quick intuitive grasp of the master's ideas are still in demand under the more recent conditions at the Llewellyn ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... servant going in and out rapidly, bullied a good deal by her master, deft but nervous. I noticed how everything was solid and good: the chairs, table, clock, clothes—and especially the cooking. I saw his local newspaper neatly folded on the mantelpiece. I saw the pet dog of his retirement crouching at his side, ...
— On Something • H. Belloc
... American boys are adapted, through a life of competitive sport, quickly to grasp the sailorman's trade, the truth remains that in a very short space the boy who has never seen a ship develops swiftly into a bluejacket, rolling, swaggering, but none the less deft, ...
— Our Navy in the War • Lawrence Perry
... into his new duties of second mate. Both Jeb and Neb were well past seventy, and, while still hale and hearty, were not so nimble as they had been forty years ago; so a second mate, with light feet and deft hands, proved most helpful, now that the "Lady Jane" had ...
— Killykinick • Mary T. Waggaman
... day that O-Tar would take the Princess Tara of Helium to wife. For hours slaves prepared the unwilling bride. Seven perfumed baths occupied three long and weary hours, then her whole body was anointed with the oil of pimalia blossoms and massaged by the deft fingers of a slave from distant Dusar. Her harness, all new and wrought for the occasion was of the white hide of the great white apes of Barsoom, hung heavily with platinum and diamonds—fairly encrusted with them. The glossy mass of her jet hair had been built into a coiffure ...
— The Chessmen of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... berry-picking never was so dreary to her. The very sound of the berries falling into her tin pail smote her with a sense of pain; she thought of the day's work before her with revulsion. However, it was before her, and her fingers flew among the bushes, from berry to berry, gathering them with a deft skilfulness her companions could not emulate. Diana knew how they were getting on, without using her eyes to find out; for all their experience was proclaimed aloud. How the ground was rough and the bushes thorny, how the berries ...
— Diana • Susan Warner
... deft and handy with his table appointments as Patty herself, and quite free from ...
— Patty and Azalea • Carolyn Wells
... works, 'Cherries' and 'A Rose,' Mrs. Rhoda Holmes Nicholls shows us a true water-color executed by a master hand. The subject of each is slight; each stroke of her brush is made once and for all, with a precision and dash that are inspiriting; and you have in each painting the sparkle, the deft lightness of touch, the instantaneous impression of form and coloring that a water-color ...
— Women in the fine arts, from the Seventh Century B.C. to the Twentieth Century A.D. • Clara Erskine Clement
... of herself that she perceive accurately paves the way for accurate, deft service in her profession. There are constant means at hand for training in the art. Suppose you try to get so definite a picture of each ward or room you enter, in a swift but attentive examination of its furnishings and their locations, and of the patients, ...
— Applied Psychology for Nurses • Mary F. Porter
... for Winter," "On a Certain Condescension in Foreigners" as perfect types of the English familiar essay. But all of Lowell's essays are discursive and familiar. They are to be measured, not by the standards of modern French criticism—which is admittedly more deft, more delicate, more logical than ours—but by the unchartered freedom which the English-speaking races have desired in their conversations about old authors for three hundred ...
— Modern American Prose Selections • Various
... he took his book, and left An awkward silence to my care, That soon I filled with questions deft And debonair; ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Jean Ingelow
... before, and it seemed to her like a place in fairyland. The semi-darkness of the retired rooms faintly colored by tiny electric lights, the beautifully clean tables and the strange foods, the neatly dressed waitresses with quick, deft movements and gravely attentive faces—these things thrilled her. She noticed that the girls in the restaurant, in spite of their gravity and industry, observed both herself and the big man with the minutest inspection, and she felt that they all envied her the attentions ...
— Mary, Mary • James Stephens
... sixth year, his father brought for him a Divine perfect in knowledge of all the sciences, spiritual and temporal, and the craft of penmanship and what not. Accordingly, the boy began to read and study under his learner until he had excelled him in every line of lore, and he became a writer deft, doughty in all the arts and sciences: withal his sire knew not that was doomed to him of dule and dolours.—And Shahrazad was surprised by the dawn of day and fell silent and ceased to say her permitted say. Then quoth her sister Dunyazad, "How sweet is thy story, O sister mine, and how enjoyable ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... succession of uncouth shapes dropped its rocky outline into the shadowy purple sea, there was visible, hastily clambering across pathless boulders, another man, of a young and lithe figure, and with something in the eager, forward thrust of the head, crouching gait, and swift, deft footing that resembled an animal of the cat species when about to leap on its prey. He was evidently making for the cove, but would have to take the rope path in order to reach it, as there was no way of approaching it on that side except over the sheer face of rock. ...
— A Loose End and Other Stories • S. Elizabeth Hall
... repertoire of comic songs;' the Spring Board Family, who have been 'pronounced by the general consensus of the medical faculty in London to be unique,' as having neither joints nor backbone; and Herr von Deft, 'who will repeat the same astounding performances which have electrified the reigning families of Europe.' The serious people (for whom 'the glee-singers of Mesopotamia' are also suspected of dropping a line) are angled for by white-cravatted lecturers, who enhance their statistics ...
— Some Private Views • James Payn
... hands a primrose wreath enwove, With fingers deft, and eyes with tears bedimmed: No lovelier face the painter's art e'er limned, No poet's thought ...
— The Death of Saul and other Eisteddfod Prize Poems and Miscellaneous Verses • J. C. Manning
... the new beds; but the general practice is to grow new plants. Always beware of buying old, dry roots, as they will sometimes refuse to grow, even if they look green and fresh. With many, in cutting, the practice is to cut clear through at the bottom, string and all, then by a deft movement of the hands the smilax is slipped from the string which, with the addition of a foot or two to tie again, is at once ready for the next, while others bring to market string and all, these being simply matters ...
— Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 3, January 19, 1884. - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside • Various
... merely intimated his displeasure, in his pride believing that to intimate was to command. But to his surprise the rope tightened around his neck, shutting off his breath. In quick rage he sprang at the man, who met him halfway, grappled him close by the throat, and with a deft twist threw him over on his back. Then the rope tightened mercilessly, while Buck struggled in a fury, his tongue lolling out of his mouth and his great chest panting futilely. Never in all his life had he been so vilely treated, and never in all ...
— The Call of the Wild • Jack London
... grimly, enjoying the spar. They carried it on a little while, Meadows, now fairly on his mettle, administering a little deft though veiled castigation here and there, in requital for various acts of rudeness of which she had been guilty towards him and others during the preceding days. She grew restive occasionally, but on the whole she bore it well. Her arrogance was not of ...
— A Great Success • Mrs Humphry Ward
... safe to say that they have intercourse with the Tartars, and that they buy iron to sell it to the latter. The Spaniards who passed these islands called them the islands of Ladrones ["Thieves"]; for in sober truth all these people are thieves, and very bold ones, very deft in stealing; and in this science they might instruct the Gitanos [gypsies], who wander through Europe. In verification of this, I will recount an occurrence witnessed by many Spaniards, one which caused much wonder. While ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume VI, 1583-1588 • Emma Helen Blair
... At this deft disentanglement of a complicated idea, Rankin, who, like the professional juryman, wagged his head in agreement with each speaker and was convinced by the most violent, gazed ...
— Murder in Any Degree • Owen Johnson
... sleeve was the more pathetic when I saw him mixing his flour for a damper, and in the cunning twists and wriggling by which the fingers freed each other of the sticky dough and other dextrous manipulations, I soon came to recognise that with his left hand he was as deft as many men with their right and left. He had sailed the boat ladened with wire netting and heavy goods from Bowen, 200 miles south, and was on his way to his selection, 100 miles further north. ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... saw a gardener moving about at his work. He went in that direction, and he saw that the man, who was old and had a very wise and tender face, was setting out some young trees in a piece of ground. He planted them carefully with deft hands, and he smiled to himself as he worked, as though he was full of joyful thoughts. David wished in his heart to go and speak with him, but something held him back. Presently the gardener went ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson
... interval when Barton's attention was turned in another direction, Morton Agnew crumpled a piece of paper, and, with a deft toss, which he made sure was not seen by any one, he threw it beneath Badger's desk. Badger did not know it was there, but the keen eyes of Barton saw it as soon as they were again ...
— Frank Merriwell's Reward • Burt L. Standish
... the readiness with which he accepted a situation, no matter how unwelcome. The hand that held the weapon of Jack Dudley whipped round to the front with a deft movement, which, however, was not quicker than the return of the grin to ...
— Two Boys in Wyoming - A Tale of Adventure (Northwest Series, No. 3) • Edward S. Ellis
... the other night, in Holborne, about midnight, being at cards, a link-boy come by and run into the house, and told the people the house was a-falling. Upon this the whole family was frighted, concluding that the boy had said that the house was a-fire: so they deft their cards above, and one would have got out of the balcone, but it was not open; the other went up to fetch down his children, that were in bed; so all got clear out of the house. And no sooner so, but the house fell down indeed, from ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... sat beside Dr. Mundson, watching his deft fingers control the simple-looking buttons and levers. So fast was their flight now that, through the portholes, sky and earth looked the same: dark gray films of emptiness. The continuous weird whistle from the hidden mechanism ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science February 1930 • Various
... acquaintance with a curling-iron; but luckily for me I always did Cousin Catherine's when she wanted to look as beautiful as she felt; and though my hands trembled with nervousness, I not only "ondulated" Lady Turnour's transformation without burning it up, but I added it to her own locks in a manner so deft as to make ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... appointed. The trail led steeply upward. It soon shook free of the thorn tangle and debouched on grassy rolling shoulders from which a wide, maplike view could be seen of the country through which they had passed. Shortly they skirted a deep deft canon in which sang a brook; and at its head came to a forest. The trees were tall, their cover dense; long, ropelike vines hung in festoons. It was very still. A colobus barked somewhere in the tops; the small ...
— The Leopard Woman • Stewart Edward White et al
... smalnesse you may finde, That she is of the Fayry kinde, And therefore apt to chuse her make Whence she did her begining take: Besides he 's deft and wondrous Ayrye, And of the noblest of the Fayry, 10 Chiefe of the Crickets of much fame, In Fayry a most ancient name. But to be briefe, 'tis cleerely done, The pretty ...
— Minor Poems of Michael Drayton • Michael Drayton
... like a merry army of marsh-dwellers, each over the back of the other, on their way to the deeply impressive services of their respective college chapels. Inside, the organs were pealing majestically, in response to the deft fingers of many highly respectable musicians, and all the proud traditions, the legendary struggles, the well-loved examinations, the affectionate memories of generations of proctorial officers, the innocent rustications, the warning ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., October 25, 1890 • Various
... mother was not idle. With the deft fingers of a woman she was lifting and laying out the handsome ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Lieutenants - or, Serving Old Glory as Line Officers • H. Irving Hancock
... of us can tell," replied the Colonel; "nominally he is at the head of a department in the Treasury, but he has acquired a great influence in the Cabinet—he is so deft at the despatch of business—and he is at the White House as much as he is anywhere. He is not a man whom ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... does at this day. But the old workman did his work much more skillfully and tastefully than the modern—threw on expanses of mellow color, delicately paneled off the places for the scenes, and penciled in the figures and draperies (there are usually more of the one than the other) with a deft hand. Of course, the houses of the rich were adorned by men of talent; but it is surprising to see the community of thought and feeling in all this work, whether it be from cunninger or clumsier hands. The subjects are nearly always ...
— Italian Journeys • William Dean Howells
... happened when Eelan first came home; but a year or two after, the family conferences took a more serious tone. She had learnt to keep her father's books in the shop, and had become deft at housework; but there was no prospect of her settling in a house of her own; many of the best young men in the place had offered themselves as lovers and ...
— A Dozen Ways Of Love • Lily Dougall
... deft strokes of his heavy-backed sheath-knife, Grief clipped a triangular piece of shell from the end of a husked drinking-cocoa-nut. The thin, cool liquid, slightly milky and effervescent, bubbled to the brim. With ...
— A Son Of The Sun • Jack London
... fourth stroke Terence obediently shipped his oars; with a deft twist of one oar, Murphy straightened the boat and shot neatly in alongside the submarine, the deck of which was less than three feet above the water. As Cappy Ricks had anticipated, the men on that deck promptly snagged the boat at bow ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... over and over, that my name isn't Barber," went on Cis, touching her hair with deft fingers. ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... were in a trance, and could only find existence, expression, in the ecstasy of tone, that would catch our souls with his into the very seventh heaven of harmony. Or, in merry mood, I have seen him take a banjo, for he could play on any instrument, and as with deft fingers he would strike some strange new note or chord, you would see his eyes brighten, he would begin to smile and laugh as if his very soul were tickled, while his hearers would catch the inspiration, and an old-fashioned 'walk-round' and 'negro ...
— Sidney Lanier • Edwin Mims
... and so, by academic right, a gentleman. Nay, Mademoiselle, never laugh; do not mock me yet. In what do you find me less a man than any of the vapid caperers that fill your father's salon? Is not my shape as good? Are not my arms as strong, my hands as deft, my wits as keen, and my soul as true? Aye," he pursued with another wild wave of his long arms, "my attributes have all these virtues, and yet you scorn me—you scorn me because of ...
— The Trampling of the Lilies • Rafael Sabatini
... threw the bedding down on Hal's cot. With the deft hands of the trained soldier Shrimp made the bed up with neatness ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys in the Ranks - or, Two Recruits in the United States Army • H. Irving Hancock
... his left hand, and with his right grasped the shank of the hook on the first ganging; he forced the sharp point into the fish until the barb had gone clean through and the herring was impaled firmly. Then he dropped the hook into the empty tub, giving the ganging a deft swing, so that it fell in a smooth coil. He repeated the process swiftly, while the others watched him ...
— Jim Spurling, Fisherman - or Making Good • Albert Walter Tolman
... be a splendid boatwoman, and although her delicate and shapely arms were as mere pipe-stems to the great brawny limbs of her companion, yet she had a deft, mysterious way of handling the sculls that sent the cockleshell faster over ...
— Blown to Bits - or, The Lonely Man of Rakata • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... Her fingers deft have guessed the knack Of making each advantage tell: Her hat, her hair still down her back, Her frocks and muff of ...
— Too Old for Dolls - A Novel • Anthony Mario Ludovici
... her daughter was at the same age," he answered. "But come, this, too, will interest you." And lifting the lid of a dainty work-basket, he pointed to a bit of embroidery, in which the needle was still sticking, as though it had been laid down by the deft fingers but a few ...
— Elsie's Womanhood • Martha Finley
... down on the floor. Unconcernedly she pulled her jackstones out of her pocket, and soon their regular click-clock and the deft thump of her small, fat fist was all that was heard ...
— The Madigans • Miriam Michelson
... I'll not let 'em do anything to you," said the Prince staunchly. "I like Americans better than anybody else," he went on with deft persuasiveness. "They ain't—aren't afraid ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... crept into her rugged face. "Pretty creatur!" she said aloud; then, with deft and careful fingers she tucked the bed-clothes close around the sleeping girl, smiled broadly, ...
— Miss Ashton's New Pupil - A School Girl's Story • Mrs. S. S. Robbins
... who maketh moan so sweet Over his brood belike or nest-mate dear, So deft and tender are his notes to hear, That fields and skies are with delight replete; And all night long he seems with me to treat, And my hard lot recall ...
— The Development of the Feeling for Nature in the Middle Ages and - Modern Times • Alfred Biese
... one hand and found a small flat jewelled case in the folds of his turban, and opening it, with the long, deft fingers took out ...
— Leonie of the Jungle • Joan Conquest
... exclaimed Polly. "Well, I saw a carved bear I think Davie would like, and—" the rest was lost in the confusing array of tempting things spread out for their choice by deft shopkeepers. ...
— Five Little Peppers Abroad • Margaret Sidney
... the waking constellations, Where the waves peal their everlasting strains, And their dull subterrene reverberations Shake him when storms make mountains of their plains - Him once their peer in sad improvisations, And deft as wind to cleave their frothy manes - I leave him, while the daylight gleam declines Upon the capes ...
— Satires of Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries, with - Miscellaneous Pieces • Thomas Hardy
... The deft boy swung the glasses of water on his tripartite dipper with ceaseless splash and clink. There was a pleasant murmur of talk in which an Eastern listener would have heard the "r" sound well-defined. There were many couples seated about the ...
— The Spirit of Sweetwater • Hamlin Garland
... with a curious tip, an ink eraser made of finely spun glass threads which scraped away the surface of the paper more delicately than any other tool that had been devised. There were the materials for his, their rehabilitation if they were placed in his wife's deft artist fingers. Here was all the chemistry and ...
— Constance Dunlap • Arthur B. Reeve
... with what seems temperamental abruptness: "Sit down. One can always think better sitting down." She catches a chair under her with a deft movement of her heel, and Miss Garnett sinks provisionally into her seat. "And I think ...
— The Daughter of the Storage - And Other Things in Prose and Verse • William Dean Howells
... pasture you trace, By the river, their milk, for miles, Spotted once with the English tent, In days of the tocsin's alarms, To tower of the tallest of piles, The country's surveyor breast-high. Home of her birth and her love! Home of a diligent race; Thrifty, deft-handed to ply Shuttle or needle, and woo Sun to the roots of the pear Frogging each mud-walled cot. The elders had known her in arms. There plucked we the bluet, her hue Of the deeper forget-me-not; Well wedding ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... rose again a deft cast from Armstrong had sent the rope across the bows within Roger's reach, while the doctor, with the other end lashed round his body, was running at full speed towards the calmer water ...
— Roger Ingleton, Minor • Talbot Baines Reed
... unheeded to the floor and his left hand seized the descending tumbler. Simultaneously there was a disgruntled yelp from Jim Morton and a howl of laughter from the rest of the audience. For the juggler, while he had miraculously caught the tumbler in mid-air, had not been deft enough to keep the contents intact and about half of it had gone into the football manager's face. However, everyone there except Morton applauded enthusiastically and hilariously, and Larry Jones, sweeping his offending locks ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour
... came a change, and it grew as she saw and appreciated the man in him. Her caprices fell from her, and she was the shrewd woman of the world, a deft creature of courts, a cunning weaver of the delicate skeins of intrigue and politics. A glint of craft and purpose struck from the gray eyes, as in preparation for battle. Her mischievous bantering had really been fraught with design, and by it she had revealed to herself this man. ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... he began it. But under his deft hands it grew, and blossomed, and spread—oh, beyond imagination. At the end of half an hour he finished; finished with the remark, uttered in an adorably ...
— Chapters from My Autobiography • Mark Twain
... garments for her sinful husband, and the appointed executioners dug his grave. They went for him at midnight. By the side of the grave they had let him kneel and pray. His throat had then been cut by a deft hand, and he was held so that his blood ran into the grave, thus consummating the sacrifice to the God of Israel. The widow, obeying priestly instructions, announced that her ...
— The Lions of the Lord - A Tale of the Old West • Harry Leon Wilson
... of craftsmen deft at large to seek the skilfullest, the most curious and cunning to work structures of stone;— upon that chosen site God's temple to grace as the Guarder of souls gave her rede from on high. She the Rood hight with gold to inlay and the ...
— Anglo-Saxon Literature • John Earle
... the doctor calmly, when Shock and he had been left alone, "I hope there will be no more interruption. We must proceed with the trephining. Ah, beautiful, beautiful!" his quick moving, deft fingers keeping pace ...
— The Prospector - A Tale of the Crow's Nest Pass • Ralph Connor
... winces a little, and her eyes overflow with tears, but beyond an occasional convulsive sob she does not give way. The arm is bandaged with some cooling lotion, and Denise brings her mistress a little cream to anoint the scratched hands. Floyd Grandon has been watching the deft motions of the soft, swift fingers, that make a sort of dazzle of dimples. It ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... for much remained to be done. And there would needs be deft manipulation of the gallant little monoplane by its clever pilot, if two separate flights out of the enclosed valley were ...
— The Aeroplane Boys on the Wing - Aeroplane Chums in the Tropics • John Luther Langworthy
... slender—a bit too graceful; and he was, if anything, a bit too well groomed. He had light hair, and moustache. He had cold eyes that smiled; cold lips that smiled. He stood in the doorway, trying to accustom his eyes to the gloom within, the while playing a deft tattoo upon his booted calf with light crop that he ...
— A Fool There Was • Porter Emerson Browne
... and as I was an expert with the needle, I was able to support myself and lay aside a little sum each week. I trimmed hats at a small price, and added to my income in various manners, owing to my French taste and my deft fingers. ...
— An Ambitious Man • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... man with a bald head and a smirched face, looking like a working blacksmith—placed on the floor a leather bag of tools, from which, having looked at the coffin, and picked with his nail at the screw-heads, he selected a turnscrew and, with a few deft twirls at each of the screws, they stood up like little rows of mushrooms, and the lid was raised. I saw the light, of which I thought I had seen my last, once more; but the axis of vision remained fixed. As I was reduced to the cataleptic state in a ...
— The Room in the Dragon Volant • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... back to the smithy, and there, the very day of his arrival, more to Simon's delight than he cared to show, the soft-handed bookbinder began to wield a hammer, and compel the stubborn iron. So deft and persevering was he, that, ere they went from the forge that same night, he could not only bend the iron to a proper curve round the beak of the anvil, but had punched the holes in half a dozen shoes. At last he confessed himself weary; and when his grandfather saw the ...
— There & Back • George MacDonald
... unable to stop the tears racing over her cheeks, turned, and fled with long steps back to the crowd of girls surrounding poor Miss Anstice, Miss Salisbury herself wiping the linen gown with an old napkin in her deft fingers. ...
— Five Little Peppers at School • Margaret Sidney
... her young friend to milk the two fine cows that came up to the bars expectantly, after which the evening meal was prepared, and Pearl was amazed at the deft manner in which the boy set about his work. He told her more about calories and food values and balanced meals than the Domestic Science Department at the Normal School had ...
— Purple Springs • Nellie L. McClung
... expressed besides weakness that Mary wondered what illness could thus have cut the man off from the world. She was used to the waste products of life; one "resident patient" succeeded another at her father's house, and to each she was a deft nurse and a supple companion. They had in common, she found, a certain paltriness; most of them had been overtaxed by easy burdens; but this man's aspect conveyed suggestions of a long struggle with a burden beyond all strength. The meanness of him, all his appearance of having begun in the ...
— The Second Class Passenger • Perceval Gibbon
... "George." They all love it, perhaps because of George Washington; and most of them are really named George. I never met with such perfect service as they can give. Some of them are delightful. The beautiful, full voice of the "darkey" is so attractive—so soothing, and they are so deft and gentle. Some of the women are beautiful, and all the young appeared to me to be well-formed. As for the babies! I washed two or three little piccaninnies when I was in the South, and the way they rolled their gorgeous eyes at me ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol 31, No 2, June 1908 • Various
... paper in the sleeves of Gheta's ball dress, and Lavinia, finding an unexpected reluctance to proceed with what she had come to say, watched the servant's deft care. ...
— The Happy End • Joseph Hergesheimer
... the picture drawn by his cousin and then stooping again, with a few deft turns of a heavy cord, helped Andy secure the broken plane so it would not get into trouble during the ...
— The Aeroplane Boys Flight - A Hydroplane Roundup • John Luther Langworthy
... few weeks, a good position in this big Eastern city. She had made good and been promoted until her wages not only kept herself with strict economy, but justified her in looking forward to the time when she might send for her next younger sister. Her deft fingers kept her meagre wardrobe in neatness—and a tolerable deference to fashion, so that she had been able to annex the "gentleman friend" and take a little outing with him now and then at a moving ...
— Exit Betty • Grace Livingston Hill
... tail was winged With chipped and sparkled sunshine. And the shade Broke up and splintered into shafts of light Wheeling about the fish, who churned the air And made the fish-line hum, and bent the rod Almost to snapping. Care The young man took against the twigs, with slight, Deft movements he kept fish and line in tight Obedience to his will ...
— Men, Women and Ghosts • Amy Lowell
... the deft brown fingers, and marveled at the girl's collected manner, her quiet, even voice. For Ezra Jackson's wife was shaken by alternate gusts of anger and hurt pride, of shame and fear, as, with a judicial fairness ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine
... restraining with difficulty an impatient, uncourtly gesture, placed the watch in her hand, her delicate deft fingers opened the case, disregarding both the face and the place for inserting the key; but dealing with a spring, which revealed that the case was double, and that between the two thin plates of silver which formed it, was inserted a tiny piece of ...
— Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge
... to go round fallen trunks and swampy places, so that we really walk three or four times the distance to Hog Harbour. Our guide uses his bush-knife steadily and to good purpose: he sees where the creepers interlace and which branch is the chief hindrance, and in a few deft cuts the ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser
... on the surface of the sea, and, naturally, the shark makes for him. As the creature rolls over to bite, the wily Malay glides out of his way with a few deft strokes of the left hand, whilst with the right he deliberately plants the pointed skewer in an upright position between the open jaws of the expectant monster. The result is simple, but surprising. The shark is, of course, unable to close its mouth, and ...
— The Adventures of Louis de Rougemont - as told by Himself • Louis de Rougemont |
