"Flop" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... crude lab that spawned a dud. Their necks to Truman's ax uncurled Lo, the embattled savants stood, and fired the flop heard ...
— Trinity [Atomic Test] Site - The 50th Anniversary of the Atomic Bomb • The National Atomic Museum
... gown, bringing up the rear: like a pack of cards arranged to be tumbled down at a touch, with a disproportionately large Knave of clubs at the end. When they have had a minute or so at the chief altar, they scramble up, and filing off to the chapel of the Madonna, or the sacrament, flop down again in the same order; so that if anybody did stumble against the master, a general and sudden overthrow of the ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens
... feller'd ort 'o jes' to-day Git down and roll and waller, don't you know, In that-air stubble, and flop up and crow, Seein' sich craps! I'll undertake to say There're no wheat's ever turned out thataway Afore this season!—Folks is keerless tho', And too fergitful—'caze we'd ort 'o show More thankfulness!—Jes' looky hyonder, hey?— And watch that ...
— Green Fields and Running Brooks, and Other Poems • James Whitcomb Riley
... white petals beginning to unclose. But what slippery stalks they had. Aunt Emma held Milly, and father held Olly, while they dived their hands under the water and pulled hard. And some of the lilies came out with such short bits of stalk you could scarcely hold them, and sometimes, flop! out came a long green stalk, like a long green snake curling and twisting about in the boat. The children dabbled, and splashed, and pulled, to their hearts' content, till at last Mr. Norton told them they had got ...
— Milly and Olly • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... of his head—no rollin' of his shoulders—no wabblin' of his hind parts, but steady as a pump bolt, and the motion all underneath. When he fairly lays himself to it, he trots like all vengeance. Then look at his ear—jist like rabbit's; none o' your flop-ears like them Amherst beasts, half horses, half pigs, but strait up and p'inted, and not too near at the tips; for that 'ere, I consait, always shows a horse ain't true to draw. There are only two things, Squire, worth lookin' at in a horse, ...
— The Clockmaker • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... in and get me out. He told me not to go to a certain part of the lake. He had been all over it and tried it before I got my skates on, but I forgot and went. A boy was with me, a skunky little rat, who, when he saw the ice was cracking, tried to pull me back, and then he let go my hand and flop I went in and flop came Billy behind me while the little Fur Coat stood off and bawled for help and said afterward he didn't know how to swim. Having on heavy clothes, I went down quick and was hard to get up, and I would ...
— Kitty Canary • Kate Langley Bosher
... a June night can be, and the loo, the red-hot wind from the westward, was booming among the tinder-dry trees and pretending that the rain was on its heels. Now and again a spot of almost boiling water would fall on the dust with the flop of a frog, but all our weary world knew that was only pretence. It was a shade cooler in the press-room than the office, so I sat there, while the type ticked and clicked, and the night-jars hooted ...
— The Man Who Would Be King • Rudyard Kipling
... to bear. His hair was always brushed straight up, his eyes were always very wide open,—and he usually carried a big letter-book with him, keeping in it a certain place with his finger. This book was almost too much for his strength, and he would flop it down, now on this man's desk and now on that man's, and in along career of such floppings had made himself to be very much hated. On the score of some old grudge he and Mr Love did not speak to each other; and for this reason, on all occasions ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... instrument with a desperate grasp, that will not relax until he lands at Calais. Is there any analogy, in certain constitutions, between keeping an umbrella up, and keeping the spirits up? A hawser thrown on board with a flop replies 'Stand by!' 'Stand by, below!' 'Half a turn a head!' 'Half a turn a head!' 'Half speed!' 'Half speed!' 'Port!' 'Port!' 'Steady!' ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... look for him and leaned back so far that he almost fell flop off the elephant's back. Tody caught him just in time or there would ...
— Seven O'Clock Stories • Robert Gordon Anderson
... him to her, and patted his back. That was the price he had always to pay for bread or butter or jam. Finally, she gave him the bread and let him go. Down the back steps he came, running eagerly and calling Frank. Once more in the kitchen began the flop of the churn, once more rose ...
— Frank of Freedom Hill • Samuel A. Derieux
... said. "I reckon ez how that settles it. Old Eph Yeates'll share fair, powder and lead, parched corn and pan-meat with the man that can flop him that-away. Whilst ye're a-needing a friend in the big woods—a raw-meat-eating Injun-skinner that can jest or'narily whop his weight in wildcats—why, old Eph's your man; from now on, if not sooner." And in this wise began an alliance the like of which, for true-blue loyalty on ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... eyes, and hampered the free action of the arms, began to wear on me. Try as I may, I cannot master the little sidewise shift of the pack which the captain showed us, and which Godwin says makes shooting prone "just as easy!" Looking at the other men, I often saw them flop on their faces to rest; they were working as hard as on the range. The pretense of firing, when our cartridges were gone, took away some of the excitement. Then at about the fifth dash, which the others took with some briskness but which I had to finish at a slow jog, I began to get ...
— At Plattsburg • Allen French
... more than that," repeated Mr. Cruncher. "They ain't worth much, then. Whether or no, I won't be prayed agin, I tell you. I can't afford it. I'm not a going to be made unlucky by your sneaking. If you must go flopping yourself down, flop in favour of your husband and child, and not in opposition to 'em. If I had had any but a unnat'ral wife, and this poor boy had had any but a unnat'ral mother, I might have made some money last week instead of being counter-prayed and countermined and religiously circumwented into the worst of luck. ...
— A Tale of Two Cities - A Story of the French Revolution • Charles Dickens
... sullen trout yields. In all gentleness you float him within reach of your net. Quietly, breathlessly you walk ashore, and over the beach, and yet an unnecessary hundred feet from the water lest he retain still a flop. Then you lay him upon the stones and lift up ...
— The Forest • Stewart Edward White
... the passage with particular attention to variations of tread and so on. But as it is, I'm like an insect that's flown into a room of its own accord. I dash against the walls, dash against the windows, flop against the ceiling, do everything on God's earth, in fact, except fly out again. And all the while I'm thinking, like that moth, or that butterfly, or whatever it is, 'The shortness of life! The shortness of life!' I've only one night or one day, and there's this vast dangerous garden, waiting ...
— The Garden Party • Katherine Mansfield
... near you, and he is tired out, and you think you never saw such a nice bass, and that it weighs at least six pounds, and just as you are reaching out with the landing net, to take him in, he gives one kick, chews off the line, you fall over backwards, and the bass disappears with a parting flop of the tail, and a man who is fishing a little ways off asks you what you had on your hook, and you say that it was nothing but a confounded dogfish, anyway, and you wind up your reel and go home, and you are so mad and hot that the leaves on the trees curl up and turn yellow like late in ...
— Peck's Uncle Ike and The Red Headed Boy - 1899 • George W. Peck
... I wouldn't have hurt you. None of these flop-over Janes for me!... An' I'll give you a hunch, Pretty Eyes. You might have run acrost a ...
— The Call of the Canyon • Zane Grey
... I pulled my umbrella into shape, opened it with a flop, and stepped from the shelter of the doorway into the pelt ...
— The Underdog • F. Hopkinson Smith
... squirrels during the winter. The dearest one of all had been injured and lived only a few days. The flying squirrel is the least interesting and seems stupid. It will lie around and sleep during the entire day, but at dark will manage to get on some high perch and flop down on your shoulder or head when you least expect it and least desire it, too. The little uncanny thing cannot fly, really, but the webs enable it to take tremendous leaps. I expect that it looks absurd for us to be taking ...
— Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 • Frances M.A. Roe
... poke down the swallows' nests under the chapel eaves. The Book inside, of which they almost make an idol, seemed to think the life of a sparrow—and possibly of a swallow—was of value; still it is good fun to see the callow young come down flop on the ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies
... flop in the water, and when Bumper turned he saw a queer looking fish swimming toward the shore, using his hind legs instead of fins to propel him along. He had big, staring eyes, and a green head, with white under ...
— Bumper, The White Rabbit • George Ethelbert Walsh
... Janet had ever known. Even the dipping paddles made no noise, though sometimes there was a gurgle, as though a fish had broken the water behind them; sometimes, in the shining pools ahead, she saw the trout leap out. At every startling flop Delphin would exclaim: "Un gros!" From an upper branch of a spruce a kingfisher darted like an arrow into the water, making a splash like a falling stone. Once, after they had passed through the breach of a beaver dam, Herve nodded ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... the business of a minute fraction of a second. The effect of the New Accelerator passed like the drawing of a curtain, vanished in the movement of a hand. I heard Gibberne's voice in infinite alarm. "Sit down," he said, and flop, down upon the turf at the edge of the Leas I sat—scorching as I sat. There is a patch of burnt grass there still where I sat down. The whole stagnation seemed to wake up as I did so, the disarticulated vibration of the band rushed ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... did not say a word. He just jumped against Pinkie Whiskers with such force that the rod flew out of his hand and the little tadpole went flop ...
— Hazel Squirrel and Other Stories • Howard B. Famous
... gaze on her from afar: yet she never had difficulty with any of them—till August, alas. That was my fault, for bringing in a wild man from the woods, who could not be counted on or ruled like the rest, but would flop around in his uncircumcised way and break things. I should never forgive myself for that, if I did not hope to get matters right—and more so than they ...
— A Pessimist - In Theory and Practice • Robert Timsol
... don't know what he's doing with the curling iron, but I think—wait a minute till I can speak—oh, oh, oh—I think he tripped over the apron while he was trying to flop an omelet and the omelet came down on his ...
— Roy Blakeley's Camp on Wheels • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... up, Ginger!" Peter called lustily, but Ginger only seemed to flop in deeper, through ...
— The Bobbsey Twins in the Country • Laura Lee Hope
... old doorman with his look of sea dog recognized her, admitting her with a nod. The titter of music came back through the wings and quick, loud thumps of a tumbling act in progress. The smell of grease paint, like the flop of a cold, wet hand to her face, smote her with a familiarity out of all proportion to her ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst
... go in at first. He may have smiled at them, and coaxed, and hung back. It was a leg and an arm gripped then; a swing for Fionn, and out and away with him; plop and flop for him; down into chill deep death for him, and up with a splutter; with a sob; with a grasp at everything that caught nothing; with a wild flurry; with a raging despair; with a bubble and snort as he was hauled again down, and down, and down, and found as suddenly ...
— Irish Fairy Tales • James Stephens
... blazed up. The lights in the house, and down the whole street, flickered and went out. In the blackness which followed, each stage of the Phoenix's descent could be heard as clearly as cannon shots: the twanging and snapping as it tumbled through the wires, a drawn-out squawk and the flop of wings in the air below, the crash into the hedge, the jarring thud against the ground. Broken wires began to sputter ominously and fire out sparks. A smell of singed feathers and ...
— David and the Phoenix • Edward Ormondroyd
... Kit slowly, with the glass to his eye. "Any quantity of seals on the ice there; and—there's something larger scooting along. That's a narwhal: no, 'tain't, either. By jolly! see the seals flop off into the water as it shoots along! afraid of it. There! something flashed then in the sun! Raed, I believe that's a kayak,—an Esquimau canoe! ...
— Left on Labrador - or, The cruise of the Schooner-yacht 'Curlew.' as Recorded by 'Wash.' • Charles Asbury Stephens
... the skyline, "There's a word uh praise I've been aiming to give yuh. I've seen riding, and I've done a trifle in that line myself, and learned some uh the tricks. But I want to say I never did see a man flop his horse any neater than you done that morning. I'll bet there ain't another man in the outfit got next your play. I couldn't uh done it better myself. Where did you learn that? ...
— The Happy Family • Bertha Muzzy Bower
... presently began also to knock our heads against the wall, keeping time with him and with each other, till the priest said, 'Peter! it's dragon-time now,' whereat the roof flew off, and a great yellow dragon came down on the chapel-floor with a flop, and danced about clumsily, wriggling his fat tail, and saying to a sort of tune, 'O the Devil, the Devil, the Devil, O the Devil,' so I went up to him, and put my hand on his breast, meaning to slay ...
— The World of Romance - being Contributions to The Oxford and Cambridge Magazine, 1856 • William Morris
... through another hole as his friend fired and saw the Indian flop down and crawl aimlessly about on hands and knees. "What's ...
— Bar-20 Days • Clarence E. Mulford
... darling,' said Lady Wetherby, melting completely, 'when you get that yearning note in your voice I just flop and take the ...
— Uneasy Money • P.G. Wodehouse
... over and gosh, how he did flop around! It was a fit all right. I bet he died, too, because he went limp all at once. He acted like he'd seen a ghost. He yelled, 'What did you give him?' to the other fellow. What did he call him?" he asked Beany. "I heard him ...
— The Boy Scouts on a Submarine • Captain John Blaine
... men. I haven't the least doubt in the world that Mrs. Huntington, for all her baby face, is back of all Huntington's violence—thinks she's a wonderful inspiration to him, with a special genius for the cattle business! And when she gets him killed—with your assistance—she'll flop down, and weep—and you too, both of you—and wail that you didn't ...
— The Heart of Thunder Mountain • Edfrid A. Bingham
... withdrawal, retirement, remigration^; recession &c (motion from) 287; recess; crab-like motion. refluence^, reflux; backwater, regurgitation, ebb, return; resilience reflection, reflexion [Brit.] (recoil) 277; flip-flop, volte-face [Fr.]. counter motion, retrograde motion, backward movement, motion in reverse, counter movement, counter march; veering, tergiversation, recidivation^, backsliding, fall; deterioration &c 659; recidivism, recidivity^. reversal, relapse, turning ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... through it once before? Of course. I remember now; you started as an ultra-Calvinist, and came over with a flop. Whittenden of Saint Luke's told me. He always claimed he was the ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... heavy flop of the side Cloister door as it closed behind them, and then silence once more and the thin angry voice of Canon Foster, ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... had him by the big toe. 'Hands up, Hans'! I said, and he didn't argue, all that he did was to swear like one of ourselves and flop down. 'Why don't ye bury yer sausages, Hans?' I asked (p. 079) him. 'I smelt yer, me bucko, by what ye couldn't eat. Why didn't ye have something better than water in yer bottle?' I says to him. Dang a Christian word would he answer, only swear, an swear with ...
— The Red Horizon • Patrick MacGill
... himself with elation at the thought of what a Christmas there was going to be in the lonely wilderness cabin. He had bought two or three things for his wife; and when he shouldered his pack, slinging it high and strapping it close that it might not flop with his rapid stride, he found the burden no light one. But the lightness of ...
— The Backwoodsmen • Charles G. D. Roberts
... opinion that trouble is to char-ac-ter what a peg'll be to a creepin' vine—something to which the vine'll 'ook on and pull itself up by. Where there's nothink to ketch on to the vine'll grow; but it'll grow in a 'eap of flop." There was a tremor in his tone as he summed up. "That's ...
— The Dust Flower • Basil King
... to the hearth, planted his shoulders against the mantel at Tottie's favorite vantage point, and surveyed Clare. "We thought you were gone," he remarked good-naturedly. He bobbed at her, with a flop of the big hat against ...
— Apron-Strings • Eleanor Gates
... his forelock again, kicked out his left leg, and as he bobbed his head, his pigtail went up and came down again flop between his shoulders as if it were ...
— In the King's Name - The Cruise of the "Kestrel" • George Manville Fenn
... she exclaimed, "I have been so naughty," for she had decided to take up this line. "We ran over a cat. Charles told me not to jump out, but I would, and look!" She held out her bandaged hand. "Your poor Meg went such a flop." ...
— Howards End • E. M. Forster
... the play of the rain drops, she would toss up her face to defy them as she ran; then flop her arms up and down in a flying motion, not really unlike ...
— The Girl Scouts at Bellaire - Or Maid Mary's Awakening • Lilian C. McNamara Garis
... blade or teeth of the tool. All weeds and trash should be covered during the operation. A common fault of beginners is to put the spade in the soil on a slant and only about half the length of the blade, and then flop the soil over in the hole from which it came, often covering the edge of the unspaded soil. The good spader works from side to side across his piece of ground, keeping a narrow trench or furrow between the spaded and unspaded soil, ...
— The First Book of Farming • Charles L. Goodrich
... sad! oh, dire to tell!" (Said BAINES). "Be good enough to stop." And senseless on the floor he fell, With unpremeditated flop! ...
— The Bab Ballads • W. S. Gilbert
... ruther go somewhar else an' he did—poor, ignorant devil! I went to t' other feller that was rasslin' with a log tryin' to git it under him. He'd flop the log an' then it would flop him. He'd throwed his rifle 'crost the timber. I goes over an' picks it ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller
... was named in Dutch, Stoom. It grew fast and soon showed that it was as powerful as its parents had been; yet it was much worse, when shut up, than when allowed to go free in the air. Stoom loved to do all sorts of tricks. In the kitchen, it would make the iron kettle lid flop up and down with a lively noise. If it were confined in a vessel, whether of iron or earthenware, when set over the fire, it would blow the pot or kettle all to pieces, in order to get out. Thinking ...
— Dutch Fairy Tales for Young Folks • William Elliot Griffis
... things," he denied meekly. "It's you that keeps on mentioning. I wish yuh wouldn't. I like to hear you talk, all right, and flop all those big words easy as roping a calf; but I wish you'd let me choose your subject for yuh. I could easy name one where you could use words just as high and wide and handsome, and a heap more pleasant than ...
— The Lonesome Trail and Other Stories • B. M. Bower
... and the harness in the other, you single out the cur you are after, make proper advances, and when he comes sniffling and snuffling and all the time keeping at a safe distance, you drop the sheet-iron on the snow, the brute makes a dive, and you make a flop, you grab the nearest thing grabable—ear, leg, or bunch of hair—and do your best to catch his throat, after which, everything is easy. Slip the harness over the head, push the fore-paws through, and there you are, one dog ...
— A Negro Explorer at the North Pole • Matthew A. Henson
... capable of keeping his own counsel, and capable of making up his own mind. In these three respects he differs materially from our present President whose last flop on the arbitration of the Panama Canal proposition ...
— The Letters of Franklin K. Lane • Franklin K. Lane
... way they lose their heads. Big, burly drummers and farmers and ex-soldiers and high-collared dudes and sports that, a few moments before, were filling the car with noise and bragging, get so scared that their ears flop. ...
— Sixes and Sevens • O. Henry
... They say, chuckling to themselves, 'that villain's got his dose at last, and serve him right too.' They want to enjoy his struggles, while the heroine stands grimly at the door taking care that he doesn't get away. Then when my fist comes down flop on the stage and they realise that I am indeed done for, the yell of triumph that goes up is something ...
— Revenge! • by Robert Barr
... nothing to do but flop down on the shabby little couch and howl. So Della did it. Which instigates the moral reflection that life is made up of sobs, sniffles, and smiles, ...
— The Four Million • O. Henry
... him, the boy flung himself on the ground and lay. The girl had felt certain he would do so, and fancied she heard him flop among the heather, but could not be sure, for, although not even yet at her speed, her blood was making tunes in her head, and the wind was blowing in and out of her ears with a pleasant but deafening accompaniment. When she knew he could see her no longer, ...
— Heather and Snow • George MacDonald
... and as he worked mechanically, shredding the flesh into long strips, he watched the lower trail. Ten days had gone by since he had fled across the Valley, but the danger of pursuit had not passed and, as he saw a great owl that was nesting down below rise up blindly and flop away he paused and reached for ...
— Shadow Mountain • Dane Coolidge
... I saw three tiny old females stumble forward, three very formerly and even once bonnets perched upon three wizened skulls, and flop clumsily before the priest, and take the wafer hungrily into their ...
— The Enormous Room • Edward Estlin Cummings
... contrarily everything happened! Grisha will keep up his character, too. Although he is a blockhead, he has some sense. Now he'll flop down on the hay and he'll lie there on ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... bird when yo' come down ker-flop!" murmured Aleck, soberly. "Yo' will be all busted up, dat's wot ...
— The Rover Boys in the Air - From College Campus to the Clouds • Edward Stratemeyer
... the same moment a loud flop was heard on the quarter-deck. It was the forgotten mermaid, who, emerging from her stateroom, and ascending the companion-way at that moment, had fainted at the spectacle. The Pirate Prodigy rushed to her side with a bottle ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... believe him. Why, I've seen him set Dan'l Webster down here on this floor—Dan'l Webster was the name of the frog—and sing out, 'Flies, Dan'l, flies!' and quicker'n you could wink he'd spring straight up and snake a fly off'n the counter there, and flop down on the floor ag'in as solid as a gob of mud, and fall to scratching the side of his head with his hind foot as indifferent as if he hadn't no idea he'd been doin' any more'n any frog might ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... seem to get time to write a real letter. All hands, including your husband, are so dead tired when off watch that there is nothing to do but flop down on your bunk—or on the deck sometimes—and sleep. The captain and I take watch on the bridge day and night, and outside of this I do my own navigating and other duties, so time does not go a-begging with me. However, we are still ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various
... heels, as they did before a shower came on; but somehow he never could manage it. He liked most, though, to see them rising at the flies, as they sailed round and round under the shadow of the great oak, where the beetles fell flop into the water, and the green caterpillars let themselves down from the boughs by silk ropes for no reason at all; and then changed their foolish minds for no reason at all, either; and hauled themselves up again into the tree, rolling up the rope in a ball ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V2 • Charles H. Sylvester
... FLOP. A correspondent from the University of Vermont writes: "Any 'cute' performance by which a man is sold [deceived] is a good flop, and, by a phrase borrowed from the ball ground, is 'rightly played.' The discomfited individual declares that they 'are all ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... really want to have a great crowd of friends, do you? It is only weak-minded people like myself who flop on any stranger's neck with protestations of undying affection. It is the easiest thing in the world for any Douglas that ever was to make friends: I think because we are always willing to laugh at the feeblest jest. Nothing endears one so quickly ...
— Olivia in India • O. Douglas
... companions take up the parable in turn, "and the echoes, huddling in affright, like Odin's hounds," go baying down the valleys and clamouring amongst the pines, like a legion of invisible fiends after a strange cat. Then again all is hush, and tramp, and sanctity, and flop, and holy meditation! And so the ...
— The Fiend's Delight • Dod Grile
... in which it had been engulphed, showed by the way it hung down its pendant head, that aunt had at all events allayed its stiffness. He desired aunt to rise also, but I felt by her throbbing cunt, and the pressure she put on my prick, as she rose from it, so that it came out with a loud flop, that she would fain once more have done me the service of allaying any stiffness that might re-arise. However, it was much limper than before, although still of a goodly thickness. When she got on her legs, she stooped forward, kissed it, took it in her mouth, and ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... was nevertheless a cunning one. Several jurors expressed their appreciation of his sympathy and one answered: "Tired o' talkin'! Wall, I reckon so. I'm jes' tireder an' dryer 'n if I'd been tailin' down beef steers all day. My ol' tongue's been a-floppin' till thar ain't nary 'nother flop left in her 'nless I could git to ile her up with a swaller o' red-eye, an—" regretfully—"I reckon thar ain't no sort ...
— The Red-Blooded Heroes of the Frontier • Edgar Beecher Bronson
... a Sell-Out, because all the Members of the Research Club wanted to see that new Dido called the Chicken Flop. ...
— Ade's Fables • George Ade
... of which the fine Kashmir shawls are made. This pashm is a provision which Nature makes against the intense cold of these altitudes, and grows on yaks, sheep, and dogs, as well as on most of the wild animals. The sheep is the big, hornless, flop-eared huniya. The yaks and sheep are the load carriers of Rupchu. Small or easily divided merchandise is carried by sheep, and bulkier goods by yaks, and the Chang-pas make a great deal of money by carrying for the Lahul, Central Ladak, and Rudok merchants, their sheep ...
— Among the Tibetans • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs Bishop)
... dipped his beak in the pond; he thought it was his beak, but, of course, it was only his nose, and therefore, very little water came up, and that not so refreshing as usual, so next he tried a puddle and he fell flop into it. When a real bird falls in flop, he spreads out his feathers and pecks them dry, but Peter could not remember what was the thing to do, and he decided rather sulkily to go to sleep on the weeping-beech in the ...
— Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens • J. M. Barrie
... Maggie. Out of the way, Flop!" shouted Jack, charging down ruthlessly on to the little girls, sending Maggie to the right-about and Flop to the left. "You are not to try to lift Towzer, Maggie; mother has said so, ever so many times. You'll be dropping her and smashing ...
— A Christmas Posy • Mary Louisa Stewart Molesworth
... get done there," said Quinlan, letting himself flop down into a chair across the desk from Drayton. "Go ahead and get through. I've got nowhere to come but in, and nowhere to go ...
— The Thunders of Silence • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... way from Hall he had run flop into the arms of Mrs Stratton, who was carrying in her hands a ...
— The Cock-House at Fellsgarth • Talbot Baines Reed
... another, against Jeremy's coat; then he would lie dead for a moment, suddenly springing, with his head up, in the hope that the surprise would free him; then he would turn into a snake, twisting his body under Jeremy's arm, and dropping with a flop on to the floor. All these manoeuvres to-day availed him nothing; Jeremy held his neck in a vice, and dug his fingers well into the skin. Hamlet whined, then lay still, and, in the midst of indignant reflections against the imbecile tyrannies of man, fell, ...
— Jeremy • Hugh Walpole
... Walter without resentment. "My mind does flop about like a kite. I think of everything but what I ought to. It's a ...
— Walter and the Wireless • Sara Ware Bassett
... a 'sooty' (cornicoides). We put him down on the deck, where he strutted about in the proudest way, his feet going flop—flop—flop as he walked. He was a most beautiful bird, sooty black body, a great black head with a line of white over each eye and a gorgeous violet line running along his black beak. He treated us with the greatest contempt, which, from such a beautiful creature, we had every appearance of ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard
... they did," said Sue sleepily to Bunny when they were talking about this, as they lay close to the big dog in their blankets, "even if any fish did flop up, Bunny, Splash would ...
— Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue at Camp Rest-A-While • Laura Lee Hope
... clearer alto as he sang. His mother tried to quiet him, but he smiled his dead smile at her through his cindery eyes, shook his head and went on. When he had lain quiet for a moment, he turned to one of us and said: "Dock, I'm goin' up and dive off that stump—a back flip-flop—you dassent!" Pretty soon he seemed to come up snuffing and blowing and grinning and said, "Last man dressed got to chaw beef." Then he cried: "Dock's it—Dock's it; catch 'im, hold him—there he goes—duck him, strip him. O well, ...
— In Our Town • William Allen White
... take in the situation. They say, chuckling to themselves, 'That villain's got his dose at last, and serves him right, too.' They want to enjoy his struggles, while she stands grimly at the door taking care that he doesn't get away. Then when my fist comes down flop on the stage, and they realize that I am indeed done for, the yell of triumph that goes up is ...
— McClure's Magazine, March, 1896, Vol. VI., No. 4. • Various
... bad-tempered man, And yet I never swear When flop into my porridge Comes a woolly ...
— The Bay and Padie Book - Kiddie Songs • Furnley Maurice
... different from the Major as anything could be: a tall, pale, rangey woman, kind-hearted and good-natured as they make 'em, but with a pair of nose-grabber specks, and a way of letting her hands flop at the wrist, whilest she talked in a high gobbley-gobble style, like singin' a tuneless tune. They made a pair to draw to. The Lord only knows what you'd got if you filled. My! And the general effect of that lady! She wore her hair in an omelet, and looked as if she'd been ...
— Mr. Scraggs • Henry Wallace Phillips
... of her haythen messes; and the lad was lyin, square where the boulder struck, on the Indian blanket, atin' a pace of cactus candy. And jist one pebble came rattlin' down, but Miss Linda happened to be lookin', and she scramed to the b'y to be rollin' under where ye found him; so he gave a flop or two, and it's well that he took his orders without waitin' to ask the raison for them, for if he had, at the prisint minute he would be about as thick as a shate of writing paper. The thing dropped clear and straight and drove itself into ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter
... braced himself for the combat, and at the proper moment chopped viciously at the bear's forearm and felt the blade sink into the bone. This time he got in three good hard lunges under the arm, and when the bear fell "ker-flop" he had no doubt that the ...
— Bears I Have Met—and Others • Allen Kelly
... and the slender rod bent. Clay gave a quick pull, and something shiny whizzed through the air, landing with a dull flop some ...
— Canoe Boys and Campfires - Adventures on Winding Waters • William Murray Graydon
... Is not he a dear? I'll let you hold him,' and she attempted to deposit the fat, curly, satiny creature in Dolores's arms, which instantly hung down stiff, as she answered, half in fright, 'I hate dogs!' The puppy fell down with a flop, and began to squeak, while the girls, crying, 'Oh! Dolly, how could you!' and 'Poor little pup!' all crowded round in pity and indignation, and Wilfred observed, ...
— The Two Sides of the Shield • Charlotte M. Yonge
... sailed close to the surface of the ocean, undulating over the waves and into the hollows exactly paralleling, at a height of only a few feet, the restless contour of the sea. Occasionally they would all flop their wings two ...
— The Gray Dawn • Stewart Edward White
... reply—"Faith, kind uncle, when men abandon jealousy, forsake taking of tobacco, and cease to wear their beards so rudely long. Oh, to have a husband with a mouth continually smoking, with a bush of furs on the ridge of his chin, readie still to flop into his foaming chops, 'tis more than most intolerable;" and similar indications of dislike to smoking could be quoted ...
— The Social History of Smoking • G. L. Apperson
... it's quite enough," returned Kaliko earnestly. "On the other hand, no one can hurt a dragon, because he's the toughest creature alive. One flop of his huge tail could smash a hundred nomes to pancakes, and with teeth and claws he could tear even you or me into small bits, so that it would be almost impossible to put us together again. Once, a few hundred years ago, while wandering ...
— Tik-Tok of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... rapidly, one after another. In spite of the volley the man still crawled upwards, but as he reached the top of the low house and passed his legs over he gave a feeble moan and then.... flopper-ti flop, flopper-ti flop, he crashed down the other side and ended with a dull thud on the ground. On the other side there he was dead as a door-nail and all covered with blood. It was our first proper work. But he was not a ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale
... well recoil. A plank, by way of flying drawbridge, joined it to the shore. And it was a dreary moment for Jimson when he pulled this after him and found himself alone on this unwholesome fortress. He could hear the rats scuttle and flop in the abhorred interior; the key cried among the wards like a thing in pain; the sitting-room was deep in dust, and smelt strong of bilge-water. It could not be called a cheerful spot, even for a composer absorbed in beloved toil; how much less for a young gentleman haunted by alarms and awaiting ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... have been overcome by the heat (it was a land breeze and it drew like the breath of a furnace over the hay-cocks and the clover), or it may have mistimed the wheel, which passed over its head and left it to flop a moment in the dust and then fall still. The poor little tragedy was sufficiently distressful to me, but I bore it well, compared with my driver. He could hardly stop lamenting it; and when presently we met a young farmer, ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... the deceased and they are ready. For a moment they stand and squirm like angle-worms on a hook, and froth at the mouth, and look, as they stand there, like a pile driver that has been run into by an engine. They teeter up and down a little, and then fly off on a tangent, and they flop around in unexpected places among the other dancers, jump like a box car, bump against other couples, and at every bump they are driven closer together, until they are so near that it does seem as though they will have to be pried apart ...
— Peck's Compendium of Fun • George W. Peck
... rose at the dancing gnats and flies. She could see them rush upward through the brown water. Sometimes they leapt clear of it, exposing their silver bellies, pink-spotted sides, and the olive-green of their backs. They dropped again with a flop, and rings circled outward from ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... flapjacks for breakfast and El Sawyer (he's a Raven) hung one of them around his neck for a souvenir. He's a fresh kid. Maybe you think it's easy to flop flapjacks—I ...
— Roy Blakeley's Adventures in Camp • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... moment there was a loud flop by the window in the rear, and the Tennessee Shad rose slowly from the floor. At the same moment Doc Macnooder, ambling innocently by on the farther sidewalk, turned, dashed across the street, bounded into the shop and, returning to the door, ...
— The Varmint • Owen Johnson
... Men representing everything from flop tents to locating agents boarded trains en route, trying to persuade the seekers to register at their respective towns. And all of them were bitter against the railroads, which were furnishing return accommodations every few hours, giving the tradesmen little chance to make their fortunes, ...
— Land of the Burnt Thigh • Edith Eudora Kohl
... burned softly on the far woodland trail that led south and south across the silent ranges! Pete snatched a rope from the pack and walked out toward the pony. That good animal, a bit afraid of the queer figure in the flapping overalls and flop-brimmed sombrero, snorted and swung around facing him. Dragging his rope, Pete walked slowly forward. The pony stopped and flung up its head. Pete flipped the loop and set back on his heels. The rope ran taut. Pete was prepared for the ...
— The Ridin' Kid from Powder River • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... is BUCHANAN, slops over tremenjous, he do; Kinder poet, dear boy, I believe, and they always do flop round a few, Make a rare lot o' splash and no progress, like ducks in a tub, dontcher know, But cackle and splutter ain't swimming; so ROBERT, my ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, February 22nd, 1890 • Various
... from her robe a glittering knife about a foot long. The young man, seeing her do this, ran out in a fright and she after him, only to find that he had vanished. She then threw her dagger up into the air, and whish! a streak of light like a rainbow, and something came tumbling down with a flop. Ku got a light, and ran to see what it was; and lo! there lay a white fox, head in one place and body in another. "There is your friend," cried the girl; "I knew he would cause me to destroy him sooner or later." Ku dragged it into the ...
— Myths and Legends of China • E. T. C. Werner
... bosoming itself in deep rock-strewn cuts. Mary's little pony cantered recklessly through it all, scampering along like a playful dog after a stone, leading Bennington's larger animal by several feet. He had full leisure to notice the regular flop of the Tam o'Shanter over the lighter dance of the hair, the increasing rosiness of the cheeks dimpled into almost continual laughter, to catch stray snatches of gay little remarks thrown out at random as they tore along. After a time they drew out from the shadow of the pines into the ...
— The Claim Jumpers • Stewart Edward White
... a drop of any kind in him. If I wanted him to go on one side of the road he was sure to be possessed of an equal desire to go on the other side. Finally I and my mule fell out. I got a big hickory and would frail him over the head, and he would only shake his head and flop his ears, and seem to say, "Well, now, you think you are smart, don't you?" He was a resolute mule, slow to anger, and would have made an excellent merchant to refuse bad pay, or I will pay your credit, for his whole composition seemed ...
— "Co. Aytch" - Maury Grays, First Tennessee Regiment - or, A Side Show of the Big Show • Sam R. Watkins
... all eyes and ears; he watched by daylight, he listened by dark, and the sounds that he heard in his dreams were sounds of water searching the banks, swirling and sinking into holes, or of mud subsiding with a wretched flop into the ...
— In Exile and Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... to sixteen feet away (the distance depends on the size of the players and the space to play in, the larger each are the greater the distance may be) watching the parade for a short time, then begins to flop his wings (moves arms in imitation of flying) and calls out, "How many chicks have you?" The "hen" replies, "four and twenty, shoo! shoo!" The "hawk" shouts, "That's too many. I'll take a few," and then runs after the children trying to touch ...
— Games For All Occasions • Mary E. Blain
... is very fine, indeed!" cried Buddy Pigg. "I think I will take a nap here," and lopsy-flop! if that little guinea pig didn't curl up inside the cabbage and go fast, fast asleep; and not even his tail stuck out, because, you see, he didn't have any tail—guinea pigs never do have any, which is a ...
— Buddy And Brighteyes Pigg - Bed Time Stories • Howard R. Garis
... much encumbered for a curtsey, she pretended not to see him and his friend at all, and so passed, flip-flop, within three yards of them, onward down towards the village. The Vicar watched her slow transit in silence, and ...
— The Food of the Gods and How It Came to Earth • H.G. Wells
... swirling, passing. Better get this job over quick. Listen: a fourworded wavespeech: seesoo, hrss, rsseeiss, ooos. Vehement breath of waters amid seasnakes, rearing horses, rocks. In cups of rocks it slops: flop, slop, slap: bounded in barrels. And, spent, its speech ceases. It flows purling, widely flowing, floating foampool, ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... we're tied up at the dock and we hear Mac's been talkin' we'll just spread the word that he was so soused he jumped overboard an' swum ashore without waitin' to see if we could back off. Lordy, Gib, don't work me to death. I'm that weary I could flop on this wet deck an' be off to sleep ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... savage strength that he gripped the rifle; and it was with a cold and deadly intent that he aimed and fired. The first Greaser huddled low, let his carbine go clattering down, and then crawled behind the rim. The second and third jerked back. The fourth seemed to flop up over the crest of lava. A dark arm reached for him, clutched his leg, tried to drag him up. It was in vain. Wildly grasping at the air the bandit fell, slid down a steep shelf, rolled over the rim, to go ...
— Desert Gold • Zane Grey |
