"Tear off" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... with rage at sight of St. Genis, whose face is just then thrown into vivid light by the glare of the torches, cries wildly: "Soldiers of the Emperor, who are being forced to resist him, turn on those treacherous officers of yours, tear off their epaulettes, ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy
... ran, the sunflowers grew; some of them were as big as little trees, with great rough leaves and many branches which bore dozens of blossoms. They made a gold ribbon across the prairie. Occasionally one of the horses would tear off with his teeth a plant full of blossoms, and walk along munching it, the flowers nodding in time to his bites as he ...
— My Antonia • Willa Cather
... pall-bearers! going to be all DAY getting that hatful of freight out?' and supplement this explosion with a firmament-obliterating irruption or profanity which nothing could stay or stop till his crater was empty. And now and then while these frenzies possessed him, he would tear off handfuls of the cotton and expose his cooked flesh to view. It was horrible. It was bad for the others, of course—this noise and these exhibitions; so the doctors tried to give him morphine to quiet him. But, in his mind or out of it, he would not take it. He said his wife had been killed ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... yere Road Runners turns in mighty diligent; an' not makin' no more noise than shadows, they goes pokin' out on the plains ontil they finds a flat cactus which is dead; so they can tear off the leaves with their bills. Doc Peets an' me sets in our saddles surveyin' their play; an' the way them Road Runners goes about the labors of their snake killin' impresses us it ain't the first bootchery of the kind they appears in. They ...
— Wolfville • Alfred Henry Lewis
... done in my absence, for that the poor priest has died no natural death, is evident; therefore his Grace, I trust, will probe the business to the uttermost, and find out who is the evil Satan amongst us—ay, and tear off the deceitful mask, that my good name thereby may be justified before the Prince ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... thou shalt come out To front the sun; and Zeus's winged hound, The strong, carnivorous eagle, shall wheel down To meet thee—self-called to a daily feast— And set his fierce beak in thee, and tear off The long rags of thy flesh, and batten deep Upon ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... All the birds of heaven will descend, with them will come the eagle, Heedless and hurrying on the flesh he will swoop, Thinking of that which is hidden inside. So soon as he enters the ox, seize his wing, Tear off his wing-feathers and claws, Pull him to pieces and cast him away, Let him die of hunger and thirst. So as the mighty Samas commanded, Rose the snake, went to the mountain, There he found a wild ox, Opened his body, tore out his inward parts, Entered and dwelt within him. ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... from loud laughter and strong, plebeian action became more appalling to him. He would leave the camp, set off at a run as soon as he got safely out of sight; and, when he was sure of seclusion in distance, he would "cut loose"— yell and laugh and caper like a true madman; tear off his superfluous clothes, splash and thresh in some lonely lake like a baby whale that has not yet had the primary lessons in how to behave. When he returned to camp, subdued in manner, like a bad boy after recess, he was, in fact, not one bit subdued beneath the surface, but the more fractious for ...
— The Fashionable Adventures of Joshua Craig • David Graham Phillips
... dust, For he made it his brag he was allus there fust. —Allus there fust, with a whoop and a shout, And he never shut up till the fire was out. And he'd knock out the winders and save all the doors, And tear off the clapboards, and rip up the floors, For he allus allowed 'twas a tarnation sin To 'low 'em to burn, for you'd want 'em agin. He gen'rally stirred up the most of his touse In hustling to save the outside of the house. ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... one of the miscreants, emboldened by his fall, wanted to fire his gun at him, or strike him with blows of the sledge-hammer, or stab him with a knife or swords, every one wanted to draw a drop of blood from the fallen hero, and tear off a shred from ...
— The Black Tulip • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... piece of wall-paper I had seen him tear off in the den, scraped off some powder from it, dissolved it, and ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve
... the church. Order was only established by the intervention of the soldiers. During the confirmation the diseased redoubled their howls and infernal vociferations, and tried to spit in the face of the bishop and to tear off his pastoral raiment. At the moment when the prelate gave his benediction a still more outrageous scene took place. The violence of the diseased was carried to fury, and from all parts of the church arose yells and fearful howling; so frightful was the din that tears fell from the eyes ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... the sharks made it highly doubtful whether they would not in a few hours more have devoured it piecemeal. Already they had scooped out some deep furrows in the solid blubber, making it easier to get hold and tear off more, and their numbers were increasing so fast that the surrounding sea was fairly alive with them. Lower and lower sank the sun, deeper and darker grew the gloom upon our faces, till suddenly Samuela leaped to his feet in our midst, ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... cried Elizabeth, advancing to the table, which was strewn with a profusion of flowers. 'What delightful heliotrope and geranium! Oh, Anne! how could you tear off such a branch of Cape jessamine? that must have been your handiwork, ...
— Abbeychurch - or, Self-Control and Self-Conceit • Charlotte M. Yonge
... must be something of the kind. "Though," she said, "dogs always seem to have some end in view, or perhaps a dozen ends, for though they tear off after an imaginary interest as if there was nothing else in the world, they get tired of it, or else start another, and forget all ...
— The Good Comrade • Una L. Silberrad
... by him, they were despised by others. Many men, great and small, attacked and insulted them, sometimes going so far as to tear off their clothing; but though despoiled of their only tunic, they would not ask for its restitution. If, moved to pity, men gave back to them what they had taken away, they ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier
... his life, he had wrecked himself, with his accursed weakness; and now he was done with it—he would tear it out of him, root and branch! There should be no more tears and no more tenderness; he had had enough of them—they had sold him into slavery! Now he was going to be free, to tear off his shackles, to rise up and fight. He was glad that the end had come—it had to come some time, and it was just as well now. This was no world for women and children, and the sooner they got out of it the better for them. Whatever Antanas might suffer where he was, he could suffer ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... twentieth century young woman you love her. You'll be all to the mustard. Do something brave. Go hire a kid that is a good swimmer, to fall into the lake as you and your sweetheart are walking past, then throw back your shoulders and tear off your coat and leap in, the kid will get you to shore, but you'll be a hero in her eyes. Impersonate the hero, and ...
— Supreme Personality • Delmer Eugene Croft
... herself along with her hands, hoist after hoist sidewise, of course the thin stuff dragged on the rocks and began to go to pieces. By the time she came to where she could stand, she was a rebus of the Coliseum,—"a noble wreck in ruinous perfection." She just had to tear off the long tatters, and roll them up in a bunch, and fling them over into a hollow, and throw the two or three breadths that were left over her arm, and walk home in her silk petticoat, itself much the sufferer ...
— We Girls: A Home Story • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... sumac—whatever you have a mind to call it. But a bad case of it, I assure you. I'll leave more of the cooling draught; and I'll send up a salve to put on her face and hands. Don't let it get into the poor child's eyes—and don't let her tear off the mask which she will have ...
— Ruth Fielding in Moving Pictures - Or Helping The Dormitory Fund • Alice Emerson
... be quiet; "But," she added, practically, "would you mind giving me the fifty cents now, Maurice? You always tear off to Eleanor the minute you get home, and ...
— The Vehement Flame • Margaret Wade Campbell Deland
... learn that Bill Howard, who had wound the rope twice round the post to give himself a little leeway, was drawn right up to the post when she set back; that they had been afraid the headstall would tear off; that they had been rather nervous about the post, and other such little points, which I had not been clever enough to elicit by ...
— More Jonathan Papers • Elisabeth Woodbridge
... and, as he hoped, mortally; but that did not suffice for his revenge, and he had either suddenly attacked the settlement, in the hope of securing either Rudolph himself or some of his comrades, that he might shed the white man's blood on the grave of his son, and tear off their scalps ...
— The Pilgrims of New England - A Tale Of The Early American Settlers • Mrs. J. B. Webb
... such— Solomon was regarded with favour. His person was as sacred as that of a detective or a city missionary. Men who scowled on the world at large gave a familiar nod to him, and women who sometimes desired to tear off people's scalps never displayed the slightest wish to damage a hair of the postman's head. He moved about, in fact, like a benign influence, distributing favours and doing good wherever he went. May it not be said truly that in the spiritual world we have ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne
... to wear at it. She was afraid he was falling in love with Iole, and steeped the garment in the preparation she had made from Nessus's blood. No sooner did Hercules put it on, than his veins were filled with agony, which nothing could assuage. He tried to tear off the robe, but the skin and flesh came with it, and his blood was poisoned beyond relief. Unable to bear the pain any longer, and knowing that by his twelve tasks he had earned the prize of endless life, he went to Mount Oeta, crying aloud with the pain, so that the rocks rang again with the ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 5 of 8 • Various
... power and fellowship, we have a right to ask what are a man's leading pursuits. And we must be prepared to tear off a mask before we understand the most of our fellows, for society and all of life is permeated with disguise. Now and then one seeks to appear worse than he is, hates fuss and praise, but this rare bird (to use slang and Latin in one phrase) is the exception that proves the rule that men on ...
— The Foundations of Personality • Abraham Myerson
... implement for Reaping, by horse, or ox power, as some ancient writers assert, we certainly have no correct and reliable account of a machine that would be considered efficient or useful at the present day; a machine to save or tear off the heads only—as described by Pliny and Palladius—would more properly be termed a gathering machine, and not at all suited to the wants and habits ...
— Obed Hussey - Who, of All Inventors, Made Bread Cheap • Various
... the family, who were to spend three gay months in Bath. She dressed and danced as did the rest, but in the very ball-room found herself thinking, "If I only knew where to find the Methodists, or any who would show me how to please God, I would tear off all my fine things and run through the fire to them. If ever I am my own mistress I will spend half the day in working for the poor, and ...
— Fletcher of Madeley • Brigadier Margaret Allen
... By the purple shadows I can tell you that in a few minutes 'twill be sunrise, and all gaudier than a campmeeter's picture of heaven. So I'll just roll over and tear off ...
— The Plunderer • Henry Oyen
... Hurley's friend—from glancing towards Fred, to see how he fared. He appeared to be in the same condition as myself, and was lying upon his side, almost motionless; but his eyes were riveted upon the horrible contortions of the snake, as the ruffian, a powerfully built man, strove to tear off the coils which bound him with ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... "that's all well and good but if I win you must promise to tear off the bristles where I want to ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten
... "Tear off yon insolent placard. Nay, hold! fix over it our proclamation of ten thousand florins for the heretic's head! Ten thousand? methinks that is too much now—we will alter the cipher. Meanwhile Rinaldo Orsini, Lord Senator, march ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... kept from Mother," he said. "Get hold of to-morrow's paper, and if the paragraph is there, cut it out or tear off the page." ...
— Round the World in Seven Days • Herbert Strang
... marvellous mummies—all once living members of some of the oldest families in Finland; there they lie in wondrous caverns in the crypt, but as formerly tourists were wicked enough to tear off fingers and so forth in remembrance of these folks, they are now no longer shown. However, that delightful gentleman, the Head of the Police, who escorted us about bo, had the mysterious iron trapdoor in the ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... the wounded that fly away to die, and those whose plumage is so torn that it is not fit to put in a fine lady's bonnet. In some cases where birds have gay wings, and the hunters do not wish the rest of the body, they tear off the wings from the living bird, and throw it ...
— Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders
... Tartarin knew who these pirates were—"they," of course, the celebrated "they" who had too often been hunted after by him in the by-ways of Tarascon. At last they had decided to meet him face to face. At the outset surprise nailed him to the spot. But when he saw the outlaws fall upon the luggage, tear off the tarpaulin covering, and actually commence the pillage of the ship, then the hero awoke. Whipping out his hunting-sword, "To arms! to arms!" he roared to the passengers; and away he flew, the foremost of all, upon ...
— Tartarin of Tarascon • Alphonse Daudet
... Grandfather's away, I consider I've a right to take his place and use the car if I want. I'm master here in his absence! I'll make it all right with him; don't you girls alarm yourselves! Tear off and put on your coats, and tell Atkins to pack us a basket of lunch, and to put some coffee in ...
— The Princess of the School • Angela Brazil
... poor woman. "Then it was you who did the deed! I tear off the mask, and with dread and loathing see you as you are—you, whom the poor fugitive beholds in nightmares, and awakes raving—you, the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 5 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... in France during a period of "Rest." Runners arrive breathlessly from all directions bearing illegible chits, and tear off in the same directions with illegible answers or no answer at all. Motor-bicycles snort up to the door and arrogant despatch-riders enter with enormous envelopes containing leagues of correspondence, orders, minutes, circulars, maps, signals, lists, schedules, summaries ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, June 13, 1917 • Various
... the woman down there in the water deterred him and caused him to hasten at once to her assistance. Anxiously he peered over the edge, and at length saw a hand thrust above the surface. It took him but an instant to tear off his coat and hurl himself into the water below. A few powerful strokes brought him close to the woman, and he was enabled to reach out and clutch her with a firm grip ere she again disappeared. Fortunate it was for him that he was a strong swimmer, and he was ...
— The Unknown Wrestler • H. A. (Hiram Alfred) Cody
... munch, his face wrinkled between desire and disapproval, then suddenly succumbed to appetite and began to tear off huge mouthfuls. For a time we ...
— The First Men In The Moon • H. G. Wells
... king and shepherd, throned Law, Strike down the monsters of Monopoly. Lift up thy club, O mighty Hercules! Behold thy "Labors" yet unfinished are: Tear off thy Nessus shirt and bare thine arms. The Numean lion fattens on our flocks; The Lernean Hydra coils around our farms, Our towns, our mills, our mines, our factories; The triple monster Geryon lives again, Grown quadruple, ...
— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon
... the giant was going to tear off his leather apron furiously and stride out of the place; but just then Uncle Jack stretched out his great strong hand and lifted up Pannell's kitten, which had sprung upon the forge and was about to set its little paws on the ...
— Patience Wins - War in the Works • George Manville Fenn
... speaks prose. Almost all Lear's speeches, after he has become definitely insane, are in prose: where he wakes from sleep recovered, the verse returns. The prose enters with that speech which closes with his trying to tear off his clothes; but he speaks in verse—some of it very irregular—in the Timon-like speeches where his intellect suddenly in his madness seems to regain the force of his best days (IV. vi.). Othello, in IV. i., speaks in verse till ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... passageway, "that is the best we can do—with wood. We must stop these cracks with something else. What did you wear?" He glanced at the chair where Alice had thrown her things. "A white cloak and a straw hat with a white veil and a black velvet ribbon. Tear off the ribbon and—we can't stand on ceremony. Here are my coat and vest. Rip them into strips and—Great God! ...
— Through the Wall • Cleveland Moffett
... sorry for it? The Volga gave it to me, and the Volga has taken it back. It did not tear off ...
— Foma Gordyeff - (The Man Who Was Afraid) • Maxim Gorky
... freedom when themselves are free, Each wanton judge new penal statutes draw, 385 Laws grind the poor, and rich men rule the law,[45] The wealth of climes where savage nations roam[46] Pillaged from slaves to purchase slaves at home, Fear, pity, justice, indignation start, Tear off reserve, and bare my swelling heart; 390 Till half a patriot, half a coward grown, I fly from petty tyrants to ...
— Selections from Five English Poets • Various
... coat, rolled up his sleeves, and directed an orderly to tear off strips of red flannel, fill a bucket with brandy and carry them to the hospital. On arriving at the bedside of a patient he directed him to be stripped, and then with flannel soaked in brandy he rubbed ...
— Autobiography of Ma-ka-tai-me-she-kia-kiak, or Black Hawk • Black Hawk
... long box which Santy handed to Hepzebiah. Santy himself helped her to tear off the wrappings; and lo and behold! it was a great big doll with blue eyes and ...
— Half-Past Seven Stories • Robert Gordon Anderson
... did see a blue crab deliberately cut my line. We had to move the boat, pick up the lost piece of line, and knot it to the other. Then I watched a blue crab tear off my bait. But I failed to feel or see that faint vibration of my line. We moved the boat again, and again my line was cut. These blue crabs were a nuisance. Sam moved the boat again. We worked up the flat ...
— Tales of Fishes • Zane Grey
... cheap trick," exclaimed Craig when the attendant had gone. "That's how he tells the gullible their names before they tell him. I've a good notion to tear off two sheets. The second is chemically prepared, with paraffin, I think. By dusting it over with powdered charcoal you can bring out what was written on the first sheet over it. Oh, well, let's let him get something across, anyway. Here goes, our names and addresses, ...
— The Poisoned Pen • Arthur B. Reeve
... green hills of my native land with a mighty splendor. A new life and a great joy came to me as I filled my lungs with the sweet air. D'ri pulled into a cove, and neither could speak for a little. He turned, looking out upon the river, and brushed a tear off his ...
— D'Ri and I • Irving Bacheller
... he said to himself, as the brown hand swept a tear off the page she was supposed to be studying. "This is no place for a child like that. She has the making of a fine woman in her, and I haven't done right by her. She is bright, and Maria ...
— Tabitha at Ivy Hall • Ruth Alberta Brown
... pressed Bruhier with so much impetuosity that he drove him to a distance from his horse, to whose saddle-bow the precious balm was suspended; and very soon Charlemagne saw Ogier, now completely in the advantage, bring his enemy to his knees, tear off his helmet, and, with a sweep of his sword, strike ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... child," said the mother; and she implored and wept. All at once she grasped two pretty flowers with her two hands, and called to Death, "I'll tear off all your flowers, for I am ...
— Bible Stories and Religious Classics • Philip P. Wells
... let us ask what that means. To English hearts it is not necessary to expound elaborately the infinite meanings which cluster round that blessed expression "home." Home is the one place in all this world where hearts are sure of each other. It is the place of confidence. It is the place where we tear off that mask of guarded and suspicious coldness which the world forces us to wear in self-defence, and where we pour out the unreserved communications of full and confiding hearts. It is the spot where expressions ...
— Sermons Preached at Brighton - Third Series • Frederick W. Robertson
... arm, while the poor girl stood afraid and trembling in the midst of that elfish crew—"ha, ha! here is my fine lady, with her smooth face and clean gown, who disdains to keep company with us, and do as we do! Let us tear off her clothes, and ...
— Venus in Boston; - A Romance of City Life • George Thompson
... and cheerful semi-pension restaurants where whole families, including, in these days, minor politicians with axes to grind and occasional young women from the boulevards, all dine together in a warm bustle of talk, smoke, the gurgle of claret, and tear off chunks of hard French bread, while madame the proprietress, a handsome, dark-eyed, rather Spanish-looking Bordelaise, sails round, subduing the impatient, smiling at those who wish to be smiled at, and ordering her faithful waiters about like ...
— Antwerp to Gallipoli - A Year of the War on Many Fronts—and Behind Them • Arthur Ruhl
... rancher's wife givin' you flowers and weepin' over your youth and kissin' you good-bye. In the mornin', when we're ready to go and I'm about to fix up the vouchers for our host, you break away and ride like the devil. We'll all tear off a few shots and foller in a hurry, leavin' the farmer hopin' that the villain is recaptured and the girls tearfully prayin' that the gallunt and ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach
... go forth, the Dutchmen were obliged to hollow out a long corridor beneath the snow. Each night they first heard the bears, and then the foxes, which walked upon the top of the dwelling, and tried to tear off some planks from the roof, that they might get into the house. So the sailors were accustomed to climb into the chimney, whence, as from a watch-tower they could shoot the animals and drive them off. They had manufactured a great ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part I. The Exploration of the World • Jules Verne
... to dress and came down radiant. At dinner she spoke exultingly of her approaching freedom. She would tear off her widow's weeds and deck herself in the flower of youth. She would plunge into the great swelling sea of Life. She would drink sunshine and fill her soul with laughter. She would do a million hyperbolic things, the mention of which ...
— Septimus • William J. Locke
... consequences of her own confounded curiosity and folly. In moving, she had unconsciously brought the poor manuscript close to the candle; the leaves caught the flame; her own cap and hand burning first made her aware of the mischief done. She threw down the book; her sleeve was in flames; she had first to tear off the sleeve, which was, luckily for her, not sewn to her dress. By the time she recovered presence of mind to attend to the book, half its leaves were reduced to tinder. She did not dare then to replace what was left of the manuscript ...
— A Strange Story, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Pfannenschmidt had recovered from his surprise and alarm. He, who did not believe in the devil, although he daily addressed him, knew that the monster before him was an unseemly jest or a malicious interruption. He must, therefore, tear off his mask and ...
— Berlin and Sans-Souci • Louise Muhlbach
... how the misfortune occurred: Seeing herself all withered, the woman took the fan with which her companion had been winnowing maize for the manufacture of beer and shut herself into her hut, carefully closing the door. There she began to tear off her old skin, throwing it on the fan. The skin came off easily, a new one appearing in its place. The operation was nearing completion. There remained the head and neck only when her companion came to the hut to fetch her fan and before the old ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson
... with himself and opened a tin of salmon. But he could not eat. He believed that he would never eat again. He slept for an hour, then woke from terrifying dreams. His mind wandered and he longed to be gone and tear off his clothes and dip ...
— The Spinners • Eden Phillpotts
... the wise men of this tribe that the earth was originally peopled by giants, who were fully three times the size of modern men. They were so swift and powerful that they could run alongside a buffalo, take the animal under one arm, and tear off a leg, and eat it as they ran. So vainglorious were they because of their own size and strength that they denied the existence of a Creator. When it lightened, they proclaimed their superiority to the lightning; when ...
— Last of the Great Scouts - The Life Story of William F. Cody ["Buffalo Bill"] • Helen Cody Wetmore
... above a thousand wonderful creatures that are otherwise never discerned in the water. But there they are, and it is no delusion. It almost looks like a great plateful of spiders jumping about in a crowd. And how fierce they are! They tear off each other's legs and arms and bodies, before and behind; and yet they are merry ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... parts underneath from injury and helps to keep out germs. Therefore when blisters are formed don't tear off the skin. Insert a needle under the skin a little distance back from the blister and push it through to the opposite side. Press out the liquid through the holes thus formed. Heat the needle red hot first, with a match or candle, to kill ...
— Manual for Noncommissioned Officers and Privates of Infantry • War Department
... groans of ghosts may strike thy ears, They would not wound thee, as this story will. Hark, hark! a hollow voice calls out aloud, Jocasta! Yes, I'll to the royal bed, Where first the mysteries of our loves were acted, And double-dye it with imperial crimson; Tear off this curling hair, Be gorged with fire, stab every vital part, And, when at last I'm slain, to crown the horror, My poor tormented ghost shall cleave the ground, To try if hell can ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden
... "Sniffer" Orne, "what a messed up state all politics is in since this prim'ry business has put the blinko onto caucuses and conventions. Caucuses was sensible, Mr. Britt. Needn't tell me! Voters liked to have the wear and tear off 'em. Now a voter gets into that booth and has to caucus by himself, and he's either so puffed up by importance that he thinks he's the whole party ...
— When Egypt Went Broke • Holman Day
... suspended by the strip of leaf. Not in the least daunted the baya makes a fresh effort and flies off, still gripping the strand firmly. At the third, if not at the second attempt, the thin strip is completely severed. Having secured its prize the weaver-bird proceeds to tear off one or two more strands and then flies with these in its bill to the nesting site, uttering cries of delight. The fibres obtained in this manner are bound round the branch from which the nest will hang. More strands ...
— A Bird Calendar for Northern India • Douglas Dewar
... horrid sight, and Cherry was terribly frightened lest they should all come to life suddenly, and set on her and tear off her limbs too. She told Aunt Prudence, "she was mortal fear't of 'em, for she'd heard tell on 'em up to Zennor, and everybody said there was never no knowing what they wouldn't be up to. She'd thought all along that she'd got in with the Little People, only her master was such a fine upstanding man, ...
— Cornwall's Wonderland • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... a button of his coat had been torn away. He asked a by-stander for a pin, and carefully adjusted the garment. The thought in his mind was, "I don't mind being killed; but I thought he might tear off my coat, and show them my money." From this moment he kept his hand in such position that he might feel the packages in ...
— The Bread-winners - A Social Study • John Hay
... with the broken blade and rusty handle, and smiled as he hacked away at the twine. After several vigorous efforts the string parted and several hands hurried to tear off the heavy paper. ...
— The Blue Birds' Winter Nest • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... one, O thou that didst tear off the eyes of Bhaga and the teeth of Pushan, O destroyer of the sacrifice of Daksha, O three-eyed deity, I have a great doubt. In days of yore, the Self-born One created the four orders. Through the evil consequence of what acts cloth a Vaisya become a Sudra? Through what acts ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... blind the builder to the fact that it is far more important to have the outside smooth. If smooth, there are no projecting surfaces for water to collect in, no edges for the frozen earth to cling to and by expansion tear off from the wall. If smooth, the joints in the masonry can be pointed or filled with mortar, and thus a suitable surface for the tar or ...
— Rural Hygiene • Henry N. Ogden
... I here? Whither should I fly? Methinks my presence is still a link to decency. Should I tear off the ephod, I scarcely fancy 'twould blaze upon another's breast. He goes not to the sacrifice; they say he keeps no fast, observes no ritual, and that their festive fantasies will not be balked, even ...
— Alroy - The Prince Of The Captivity • Benjamin Disraeli
... to Mary to allow him to tear off a small piece of her robe, so that he may keep himself warm with it ...
— The Evolution of Love • Emil Lucka
... to be forgotten. It turned into a tornado. Failing of its effort to tear off the roof of the dugout, it stormed tempestuously, fretfully; it raved, ...
— The Way of the Wind • Zoe Anderson Norris
... "it's all fair and right, no doubt, but all I say is, if I win, you shall be bound to tear off the bristles where ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various
... mine, and take with thee Ukhat When the cattle comes to the trough, Let her tear off her dress and disclose her nakedness. He[871] will see her and approach her. His cattle, which grew up on his field, ...
— The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria • Morris Jastrow
... five begin by devouring the edge of his mantle, specked with chalky atoms. This is the favourite morsel. With their mandibles, those stout pincers, they lay hold of it through the froth; they tug at it, tear off a shred and retire to a distance to swallow it ...
— The Glow-Worm and Other Beetles • Jean Henri Fabre
... need to tear off our buttons hurryin'," said the former, as he flung down a dead spruce by the fireside and began chopping it into sticks. "They won't be lookin' for more fodder till they've picked the bones o' that 'ere moose. Don't ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller
... food was not a pleasant spectacle. I bought several hundred live carp—a cheap, bony fish—and put them in a ditch where I could take them with a net as I wanted them. The eagle would spring upon a fish, take one of her long hops into a corner, and tear off its head with one stroke of her beak. While I was curing her broken wing the creature tolerated me after a fashion, but when she was well she grew more and more savage and dangerous. Once a Dutchman, ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... and economical, though liberal in her charities, that one of her regular evening occupations was to tear off the seals from the letters she had received during the day, in order that the wax might be melted down and sold; the produce made one poor family "passing rich with forty pounds a year."—See "Filia ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... to be with such good people! There, now, Charlotte, don't look like that," rushing up to the tall girl and standing on tiptoe to drop a kiss on the sallow cheek—"we won't go; we'll stay at home and be martyrs," and she began to tear off her hat with ...
— Five Little Peppers Grown Up • Margaret Sidney
... Come down, Typhoeus. If mine be most, lo! thus I make it more; Kick up thy heels in air, tear off thy robe, Play with thy beard and nostrils. Thus 'tis fit (And no man take compassion of thy state) To use th' ingrateful viper, tread his brains Into ...
— Sejanus: His Fall • Ben Jonson
... old man to be stretched on the ground, and thirty men, fifteen on each side, to pull and haul him by cords tied to his arms, legs, and other limbs, so as to dislocate and almost tear them asunder; and two hangmen in the mean time to scourge his body with so much cruelty, as to mangle and tear off the flesh in many parts: under which torment the martyr expired. His body was watched by guards appointed for that purpose, till after three days it was stolen away by the Christians, and buried by the care of ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... and frightened passers-by, lest these spirits might take offence at not being noticed. Women and men when compelled to travel on the hills go well provided with these rags, and when—for the sacred trees are very numerous—supplies run short, many a woman has been known to tear off a bit of her silk gown, and attach it to a branch of the ...
— Corea or Cho-sen • A (Arnold) Henry Savage-Landor
... of Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg, however, the British Cabinet henceforth came to occupy itself, before all things, with the fate allotted to our country by the Imperial Government in the war that it was preparing. In order to tear off the mask from German statesmanship, the surest method was to ask it a straightforward question. On July 31, Sir Edward Grey, following the example of the Gladstone Ministry of 1870, inquired both of Germany and France whether they would respect the neutrality of Belgium. At the ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... however, making no offer of surrender. An occasional firing into the breastwork was kept up during the day. Now and then, one of the Indian allies, in bravado, would rush up to the fort, fire over the ramparts, tear off a buffalo robe or a scarlet blanket, and return with it in triumph to his comrades. Most of the savage garrison that fell, however, were killed in the first ...
— The Adventures of Captain Bonneville - Digested From His Journal • Washington Irving
... only surpassed in loudness by the table-music of Satan. Yet Contention soon insinuated herself among the unsuspicious dancers; and, animated by Zeal and Fury, they hastily snatched up weapons. When Theology perceived that all embraced delightful Poetry, and that Morality wished to tear off her own veil, in order to cover her with it, she gave the latter a thrust with a poniard from behind, and singed the nude and tender Poetry with her flaming torch. Both raised a dreadful shriek: Policy commanded silence, and Quackery hastened to bind up the wound of Morality, whilst Medicine ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger
... Clogher's bill? Why, he paid it to me; do you think I was such a fool to go without it? As for the four shillings, I will give you a bill on Parvisol for it on t'other side of this paper; and pray tear off the two letters I shall write to him and Joe, or let Dingley transcribe and send them; though that to Parvisol, I believe, he must have my hand for. No, no, I'll eat no grapes; I ate about six the other day at Sir John Holland's; but would ...
— The Journal to Stella • Jonathan Swift
... runs, widely diffused over the limbs of Hercules. So long as he is able, he suppresses his groans with his wonted fortitude. After his endurance is overcome by his anguish, he pushes down the altars, and fills the woody Oeta with his cries. There is no {further} delay; he attempts to tear off the deadly garment; {but} where it is torn off, it tears away the skin, and, shocking to relate, it either sticks to his limbs, being tried in vain to be pulled off, or it lays bare his mangled limbs, and his huge bones. The blood itself hisses, just as ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Copious Notes - and Explanations • Publius Ovidius Naso
... saw Dicky Maloney suddenly raise his hat, tear off his shock of red hair, leap up the steps and stand at the side of General Pilar. The Minister of War laid his arm across the young man's shoulders. All who had known President Olivarra saw again ...
— Cabbages and Kings • O. Henry
... tries to check them? By St. Ives! it is the good priest who spake for them in the hall. He kneels, he prays, he implores! What! villains, would ye raise hands against those who have befriended you? Ah, the butcher has struck him! He is down! They stamp him under their feet! They tear off his gown and wave it in the air! See now, how the flames lick up the walls! Are there none left to rally round us? With a hundred men we might hold ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle
... temporising, for deception, for any species of polite shilly-shallying. We must, on the morrow, tear off our masks and appear before these misguided and feminine victims of our duplicity in our own characters as scientists. We must boldly avow our identities and flatly refuse to stir from this spot until the mystery of this astounding lake had ...
— Police!!! • Robert W. Chambers
... is looking. And so tear-smeared and mud-bespattered up the long rise of darkening Crouch End Lane, where to-night the electric light blazes from a hundred shops, and dead beat into the Seven Sisters Road station, there to tear off its soaked jersey; and then home to Poplar, with shameless account of the jolly afternoon that it has spent, of the admiration and the ...
— Paul Kelver • Jerome Klapka, AKA Jerome K. Jerome
... company. He makes himself agreeable all around, and as John has had no proof of the Briton's miserable work in the harbor of Malta, he is wise enough to restrain his feelings and hold his tongue, trusting to some future event to tear off the mask and reveal him ...
— Miss Caprice • St. George Rathborne
... white lead, and gumstone. But probably the list of "Chastisements'' is one of the funniest things in this Guide to Conversation. The list contains a fine, honourable fine, to break upon, to tear off the flesh, ...
— Literary Blunders • Henry B. Wheatley
... is good for children and serves morality, keeping the poor in good humor or in awe by promising rewards in heaven or threatening torments in hell, they encourage the religious people up to a certain point: for instance, if Savonarola only tells the ladies of Florence that they ought to tear off their jewels and finery and sacrifice them to God, they offer him a cardinal's hat, and praise him as a saint; but if he induces them to actually do it, they burn ...
— Preface to Androcles and the Lion - On the Prospects of Christianity • George Bernard Shaw
... the children were hungry, Chew-chew let them tear off strips of partly boiled meat. Sometimes she let them drink the broth from bone ...
— The Later Cave-Men • Katharine Elizabeth Dopp
... daring brute, quite indifferent as to whether he carried off the station-master, the signalman, or the pointsman; and one night, in his efforts to obtain a meal, he actually climbed up on to the roof of the station buildings and tried to tear off the corrugated-iron sheets. At this the terrified baboo in charge of the telegraph instrument below sent the following laconic message to the Traffic Manager: "Lion fighting with station. Send urgent succour." Fortunately ...
— The Man-eaters of Tsavo and Other East African Adventures • J. H. Patterson
... way to the Augustins to read and recite to the Sisters, he was waylaid by a troop of his old playfellows. They wished him to accompany them to the old rendezvous in the square; but he refused, because he had a previous engagement. The boys then began to hustle him, and proceeded to tear off his tattered clothes. He could only bend his head before his assailants, but never said ...
— Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist • Samuel Smiles
... "What odds"—he pointed the frying-pan at the Southerner—"d' yu' figure Trampas's being under any foreman's wing will make to a man like him? He's going to remember Mr. Trampas and his spite-work if he's got to tear him out from under the wing, and maybe tear off the wing in the operation. And I am goin' to advise your folks," ended the complete Scipio, "not to leave you travel so much alone—not ...
— The Virginian - A Horseman Of The Plains • Owen Wister |
