"Tortoise" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... method many investigations have been made of muscular contractions in isolated muscles. Landois has noted that the muscles of a man may be made to contract two hours and a half after removal, those of the frog and the tortoise 10 days after. Recently Burrows (1911) has noted a slight increase in the myotomes of the embryo chick after they have been kept for 2 to ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor
... hum of busy life which comes up to us from the town with its population of a hundred thousand souls. As to the products of this locality, they are mostly figured porcelain, embroidered silks, japanned goods, ebony and tortoise-shell finely carved and manufactured into toy ornaments. Every small, low house has a shop in front quite open to the street; but small as these houses are, room is nearly always found in the rear or at the side for a little flower-garden, ...
— Foot-prints of Travel - or, Journeyings in Many Lands • Maturin M. Ballou
... hall very soon had the matter decided. Evelyn slid a pace or two this way and that, and pronounced that the floor was excellent. Signor Rodriguez informed them of an old Spaniard who fiddled at weddings—fiddled so as to make a tortoise waltz; and his daughter, although endowed with eyes as black as coal-scuttles, had the same power over the piano. If there were any so sick or so surly as to prefer sedentary occupations on the night in question to spinning and watching others spin, the drawing-room and billiard-room ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... puffing, panting boy, guarding his door, hands on knees, ever ready for a dart wherever the attempt was made. The whole party in the home nearly went into fits at the fun, and at the droll remarks Uncle John made at this hare and tortoise spectacle; till at last either the Captain gave in, or Davie made a cleverer attack than ever, for with a great shout he flew upon Papa, and held him fast by the legs. Everyone shrieked with delight; Papa hid in such clever places, and ...
— The Stokesley Secret • Charlotte M. Yonge
... it. But this by the way. The hawksbill-turtle on this coast of Brazil is most sought after of any, for its shell; which by report of those I have conversed with at Bahia, is the clearest and best clouded tortoise-shell in the world. I had some of it shown me which was indeed as good as ever I saw. They get a pretty deal of it in some parts on this coast; but it ...
— A Voyage to New Holland • William Dampier
... shame, Puffing little clouds of smoke, and picking at a daisy, Dreaming of your dinner, p'raps, or wishful for the same: Suddenly, around that ferny bank there slowly waddled— Slowly as the finger of a clock her shadow came— Slowly as a tortoise down that winding path she toddled, Leaning on a crooked staff, a poor old crooked dame, Limping, but not lame, Tick, tack, tick, tack, a poor old ...
— Collected Poems - Volume Two (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... of interest in Henry IV.'s room, in which he is said to have been born 13th December, 1553, including the magnificently carved bedstead; but the chief attraction is the tortoise-shell cradle, which as a rule Frenchmen come only to see. Why they should come is quite a different matter, seeing that although a tortoise's shell might make a very comfortable cradle for even such an illustrious infant as was ...
— Twixt France and Spain • E. Ernest Bilbrough
... whence a Capuchin issues on wet days; you look to find the execrable engravings which spoil your appetite, framed every one in a black varnished frame, with a gilt beading round it; you know the sort of tortoise-shell clock-case, inlaid with brass; the green stove, the Argand lamps, covered with oil and dust, have met your eyes before. The oilcloth which covers the long table is so greasy that a waggish externe will write his name on the surface, using his thumb-nail ...
— Father Goriot • Honore de Balzac
... which is either white or untidy, well-gloved or otherwise, he twirls his moustache, or his whiskers, or picks his teeth with a little tortoise-shell toothpick. ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... believe she made some, but nobody listened much, so she came away disappointed and fiercely determined to do good somewhere or know the reason why! She's a stout, wildly untidy woman whose mouse-coloured hair is always coming down, though it's freely dotted with irrelevant tortoise-shell combs; and whose elaborate clothes look somehow insecure, the way scree does on the side of a mountain. Her ideas leap out of her brain like rabbits out of holes, and then go scuttling away again, to be followed ineffectively by others: and her latest is ...
— The Lightning Conductor Discovers America • C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson and A. M. (Alice Muriel)
... Tharonhij-Jagon, that is, God, once went out walking with his brother, and a dispute arose between them, and God killed his brother." I suppose this fable took its rise from Cain and Abel. They have a droll theory of the Creation, for they think that a pregnant woman fell down from heaven, and that a tortoise, (tortoises are plenty and large here, in this country, two, three and four feet long, some with two heads, very mischievous and addicted to biting) took this pregnant woman on its back, because every place was covered with water; and that the woman sat upon the tortoise, groped ...
— Narratives of New Netherland, 1609-1664 • Various
... a moderate drinker; ah, sir, do you bear in mind How the plodding tortoise in the race left the leaping hare behind? 'Twas because he held right on and on, steady and true, if slow, And that's the way, I'm thinking, that the moderate drinkers go! Step over step—day after day—with sleepless, tireless pace, While the toper sometimes looks behind ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various
... entreat you to spare me this time! I've indeed said what I shouldn't; but if I had any intention to insult you, I'll throw myself to-morrow into the pond, and let the scabby-headed turtle eat me up, so that I become transformed into a large tortoise. And when you shall have by and by become the consort of an officer of the first degree, and you shall have fallen ill from old age and returned to the west, I'll come to your tomb and bear your stone tablet ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... she had sung Una voce poco fa at the age of seven with the same embellishments which she used later when she appeared in the opera in which the air occurs. No, these singers are freaks of nature like tortoise-shell cats and like those rare felines they are usually females of late, although such singers as Battistini and Bonci remind us that men once sang with as much agility as women. But when this type of singer finally becomes extinct naturally the operas which depend on it will disappear too for ...
— The Merry-Go-Round • Carl Van Vechten
... i.e. the lyre. The first lyre was supposed to have been formed by drawing strings over a tortoise shell. ...
— Selections from Five English Poets • Various
... "March!" quoth he. "These bonds stick so plaguey close that I cannot so much as bend my knees!" "For shame!" they answered. "It is fear and not armour that stiffens your legs." Thus rebuked, Sancho endeavoured to move, but fell flat on the earth like a great tortoise; while in the darkness the others made a clash with their swords and shields, and trampled upon the prone governor, who quite gave himself up for dead. But at break of day they raised a cry of "Victory!" and, lifting Sancho up, told him that ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books - Vol. II: Fiction • Arthur Mee, J. A. Hammerton, Eds.
... are probably the descendants of illicit connections among Banjaras. The word Pachbhaiya means 'five brothers,' and this name possibly commemorates a polyandrous connection of some Audhelia woman. Limuan means a tortoise, which is a section of many castes. Several of the section-names are thus totemistic, and, as in other castes, some reverence is paid to the animal from whom the name is derived. At present the Audhelias forbid marriage within ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell
... having very fair sandy Beeches, pav'd with innumerable Sorts of curious pretty Shells, very pleasant to the Eye. Amongst the rest, we found the Spanish Oyster-Shell, whence come the Pearls. They are very large, and of a different Form from other Oysters; their Colour much resembles the Tortoise-Shell, when it is dress'd. There was left by the Tide several strange Species of a muciligmous slimy Substance, though living, and very aptly mov'd at their first Appearance; yet, being left on the dry Sand, (by the Beams of the Sun) soon exhale ...
— A New Voyage to Carolina • John Lawson
... 'Bije always did, and I didn't want to fall too fur behind. But," with a chuckle, "you needn't mention the price to anybody. If Abbie—my second cousin keepin' house for me, she is—if Abbie heard of it she'd be for puttin' me in an asylum. Abbie's got a hair breastpin and a tortoise shell comb, but she only wears 'em to the Congregationalist meetin'-house, where she's reasonably sure there ain't likely to be any sneak-thieves. She went to a Unitarian sociable once, but she carried 'em in a ...
— Cap'n Warren's Wards • Joseph C. Lincoln
... it happens with those of a phlegmatic temperament, of a dull habit, does not permit him to move, except with feebleness, in a sluggish manner, his experience is slow, frequently unprofitable. The tortoise and the butterfly are alike incapable of preventing their destruction. The stupid man, equally with him who is intoxicated, are in that state which renders it impossible for them to arrive at or attain the end they ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 1 • Baron D'Holbach
... by their ready made clothes of a material that would be warm in Alaska and by them wearing Spanish dollars for watch guards and by the walk which is rolling easily when sober and pitching heavily toward the night. The oldest resident always sits in front of the hotel and in the same seat, with a tortoise shell cane and remembers when Vasquez or Mendoza or Barrios, or Bonilla occupied the Cathedral and fired hot shot into the Palace and everybody took refuge in the English Consulate and he helped guard the bank all night with ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... one of the knives—a folding knife with a broad single-edged blade, locked open with a spring; the handle was of tortoise shell, bolstered ...
— Time Crime • H. Beam Piper
... there was published an instruction book in this art, called Chelys Minuritionum, i.e., the 'Tortoise-shell of Diminutions,' hence (Chelys meaning a lyre, made of a tortoise-shell) 'The Division Viol.' The book is by Christopher Sympson, a Royalist soldier, who was a well-known viol-da-gamba player. The work is in three parts, the third of which is ...
— Shakespeare and Music - With Illustrations from the Music of the 16th and 17th centuries • Edward W. Naylor
... scrubbed by the daughter of his former tenant. Fish nets were draped upon the walls like tapestry; beyond hung the gun and a bag of cartridges. Long, slender sea-shells with the brown translucency of the tortoise were arranged in the form of fans. They were the gift of Tio Ventolera, as were two enormous periwinkles on the table, white, with erect points, and the interior of a moist rose-color, like feminine flesh. Near the window his mattress ...
— The Dead Command - From the Spanish Los Muertos Mandan • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... sticks sharpened to a point we have performed all the digging of a pretty long canal. The earth was lifted out in 'gowpens' and carried to the huge dam we have built in karosses (skin cloaks), tortoise-shells, or wooden bowls. We intended nothing of the ornamental in it, but when we came to a huge stone, we were forced to search for a way round it. The consequence is, it has assumed a beautifully ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... forces of nature and of nature's jungle. Why, even the tiny balu of the tribe of Go-lat, the great ape, was better fitted to survive than these, for a balu could at least escape the numerous creatures that menaced its existence, while with the possible exception of Kota, the tortoise, none moved so slowly as did helpless ...
— Tarzan the Untamed • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... now passes along the streets of the metropolis will come upon a vendor of toys, who will drop upon the pavement an artificial miniature tortoise, rabbit, rat, or what not, well wound up; and the creature will begin to crawl, or dance, or jump, or run, according to its nature. The busy, conservative man smiles a superior smile, and passes on. It ...
— Notable Events of the Nineteenth Century - Great Deeds of Men and Nations and the Progress of the World • Various
... special correspondents to the scene of the pageant. Mr. Reuter will soon have completed his Overland Telegraph to China. At Liverpool they call New York "over the way." The Prince of Wales's travels in his nonage have made Telemachus a tortoise, and the young Anacharsis a stay-at-home. Married couples spend their honeymoon hippopotamus hunting in Abyssinia, or exploring the sources of the Nile. And the Traveller's Club are obliged to blackball nine-tenths of the candidates ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 1 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... of Raffael. It would be easy to explain a thought from the image on the retina, and that from the geometry of light, if this very light did not present the very same difficulty. We might as rationally chant the Brahim creed of the tortoise that supported the bear, that supported the elephant, that supported the world, to the tune of "This is the house that Jack built." The sic Deo placitum est we all admit as the sufficient cause, and the divine goodness as the sufficient reason; but an answer to the Whence and Why is ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... Yours is, too, the time of life to acquire this inestimable habit. Men fail much oftener from want of perseverance than from want of talent and of good disposition: as the race was not to the hare but to the tortoise, so the meed of success in study is to him who is not in haste, but to him who proceeds with a steady and even step. It is not to a want of taste or of desire or of disposition to learn that we have to ascribe the rareness of ...
— Advice to Young Men • William Cobbett
... mahogany, walnut, English oak, bird's-eye maple, and the manufactured effects such as ormolu, marquetry, and Boule, or buhl. He explained the latter—how difficult it was to produce, how unsuitable it was in some respects for this climate, the brass and tortoise-shell inlay coming to swell with the heat or damp, and so bulging or breaking. He told of the difficulties and disadvantages of certain finishes, but finally recommended ormolu furniture for the reception room, medallion tapestry for the ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... elasticity. A further discovery was made by Mr Goodyear, who, by adding about twenty per cent of sulphur, converted it into so hard a substance that all sorts of articles can be manufactured from it for which tortoise-shell had hitherto been chiefly used—indeed, it is difficult to say what cannot be made ...
— In the Wilds of Africa • W.H.G. Kingston
... eleven cats at the farm here now. Papa's favorite is a little tortoise-shell kitten he has named "Sour Mash," and a little spotted one "Fannie." It is very pretty to see what papa calls the cat procession; it was formed in this way. Old Minniecat headed, (the mother of all the cats) next to her came aunt Susie, then Clara ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... species which were extinct before man was created, and hence "indicate a faint and shadowy knowledge of a previous state of organic existence." The Hindoos dreamed that the earth rested on an elephant, and the elephant on a tortoise, and the tortoise on a serpent; and though it may be an unimportant coincidence, it will not be out of place here to state, that a fossil tortoise has lately been discovered in Asia large enough to support an elephant. I confess that I ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 56, June, 1862 • Various
... red ribbon, which is the same as offering her his hand.[16] As soon as the betrothal has taken place, the fiance must think at once about a present for his fiancee. This varies, of course, according to the ability and taste of the giver. Formerly it was a tortoise-shell comb, a silver needlecase, a silk handkerchief, ear-rings, finger-rings, gloves, etc. Now-a-days nothing is left but rings and a certain silver arrangement to support the hair, and called, like the ribbon above mentioned, 'ntrizzaturi. In Milazzo and its territory the fiance ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... are very kind," Donald replied. Miss Bascom had adjusted her tortoise-shell lorgnette, and was surveying ...
— Hepsey Burke • Frank Noyes Westcott
... gone, and Nassau is given up to a sleepy trade in sponges and tortoise-shell, and peace is no name for the drowsy tenor of the days under the palm trees and the scarlet poincianas. A little group of Government buildings surrounding a miniature statue of Queen Victoria, flanked by some old Spanish cannon and murmured ...
— Pieces of Eight • Richard le Gallienne
... of the Hare and the Tortoise?' she queried. 'If not you'll find it in the Third Reading Book. Perhaps you're not as far ...
— The Adventure League • Hilda T. Skae
... of escape from the harsh realities and dull routine of ordinary existence. From his childhood the world of ideas seems to have been at least as real and familiar to him as the material world. The fabulous beings of whom he talked to his young sisters—the Great Tortoise in Warnham Pond, the snake three hundred years old in the garden at Field Place, the grey-bearded alchemist in his garret[90]—had probably for him as much meaning and interest as the living people around him. Urged by a restless desire ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... Viking period (A.D. 800-1050) were oval and convex, somewhat in the form of a tortoise. In their earliest form they occur in the form of a frog-like animal, itself developed from the previous Teutonic T-shaped type. With the introduction of the intricate system of ornament described above, the frog-like animal is gradually superseded ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various
... that materials might be given to him for making the pots. So Vishnu gave his Sudarsana (discus) to be used as a wheel, and the mountain of Mandara was fixed as a pivot beneath it to hold it up. The scraper was Adi Kurma the tortoise, and a rain-cloud was used for the water-tub. So Kulalaka made the pots and gave them to Maheshwar for his marriage, and ever since his descendants have been known as Kumbhakar ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell
... of these periods is the free use of small solid figures of animals as decoration—the phoenix, the elephant, the frog, the ox, the tortoise, and occasionally men; shapes grow less austere and less significant, as a comparison between figures 11 and 13 will indicate; then towards the end of the 2nd century A.D. the influence of Buddhism is felt in the general tendency towards suavity of form (fig. 14). This ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... a small fish, tied by the tail, the flat head of which was furnished with numerous suckers, by which it attached itself so firmly to any object as to be torn to pieces rather than abandon its hold. In this way the Spaniards witnessed the taking of a tortoise of enormous size. The same mode of fishing is said to be employed on the eastern coast of Africa. The natives led the Admiral to suppose that the sea was full of islands south and west, and that Cuba ran to the west without ...
— Notable Voyagers - From Columbus to Nordenskiold • W.H.G. Kingston and Henry Frith
... extreme heat, and the evenings, nights, and mornings are usually cool. Gold is found in all parts, although not in large quantities, but it must exist where there are traces of it. Throughout the whole island there is a great deal of wax and much tortoise-shell. Rice is sowed in all parts, and in some places in great quantities. They raise fowl, goats, and swine in all the villages, and wax they do not save. There is a great quantity of wild game, which is excellent, growing ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume X, 1597-1599 • E. H. Blair
... driven about by a cyclone, as they rushed from one sight to another, filling up all the chinks between with shopping, which was irresistible where everything was so pretty and so wonderfully cheap. She herself purchased a tortoise-shell fan and chain for Rose Red, and had her monogram carved upon it; a coral locket for Elsie; some studs for Dorry; and for her father a small, beautiful vase of bronze, copied from one ...
— What Katy Did Next • Susan Coolidge
... turtle soup is made of a small native tortoise, called a terrapin, and the article terrapin ...
— The Cook's Oracle; and Housekeeper's Manual • William Kitchiner
... thee! the first crowd was made of a horse-head. 'Tis true, the finding of a dead horse-head Was the first invention of string instruments, Whence rose the gittern, viol, and the lute: Though others think the lute was first devis'd In imitation of a tortoise-back, Whose sinews, parched by Apollo's beams, Echo'd about the concave of the shell: And seeing the shortest and smallest gave shrill'st sound, They found out frets, whose sweet diversity (Well-touched by the skilful learned fingers) Raiseth so strange a multitude of chords. ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various
... in danger of being wrecked. Several of these fish they caught, using large hooks fastened to chains, and sometimes baited merely with a piece of colored cloth. From the maw of one they took out a living tortoise; from that of another the head of a shark, recently thrown from one of the ships; such is the indiscriminate voracity of these terrors of the ocean. Notwithstanding their superstitious fancies, the seamen were glad to use a part of these sharks for food, being very short ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving
... parasol was a big paper box. Mell lifted the lid. A muff and tippet lay inside, made of yellow and brown fur like the back of a tortoise-shell cat. These were beautiful, too. Then came rolls of calico and woollen pieces, some of which were very pretty, and would make nice doll's dresses, ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... reality. What men call motion is only a name given to a series of conditions, each of which, considered separately, is rest. "Rest is force resistant; motion is force triumphant."[457] The famous puzzle of "Achilles and the Tortoise," by which he endeavored to prove the unreality of motion, has been rendered ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker
... wards of Edo, his little trays fitting neatly into each other, and wrapped in a furoshiki or bundle-handkerchief. His wares formed a marvellous collection of the precious and common place, ranging from true coral and tortoise shell, antique jewelry and curious netsuke of great value, to their counterfeits in painted wood, horn, and coloured glass. "Mobei San, long has been the wait for you. Is there a bent comb in stock?"—"Truly this Mobei is vexing. ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... that certain malconformations very frequently, and that others rarely coexist, without our being able to assign any reason. What can be more singular than the relation between blue eyes and deafness in cats, and the tortoise-shell colour with the female sex; the feathered feet and skin between the outer toes in pigeons, and the presence of more or less down on the young birds when first hatched, with the future colour of their plumage; or, again, ...
— On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection • Charles Darwin
... she saw a grave Chinaman standing on a stage-like platform. He wore a long coat, beautifully flowered, and a hat with a turned up brim. Balanced on his nose were enormous tortoise-shell spectacles. A ragged gray moustache drooped from the corners of his mouth and a ragged wisp of whisker hung from his chin. She was informed by Ah Cum that the Chinaman was one of the literati and that he was expounding the ...
— The Ragged Edge • Harold MacGrath
... tack to get away from this dangerous neighbourhood; but he sees on the other hand enemies not less terrible; a tortoise forty feet long, and a serpent of thirty, lifting its fearful head and gleaming eyes ...
— A Journey to the Interior of the Earth • Jules Verne
... slept still more idly below; while a few, not altogether unmindful of our old shipmate's instructions, were bending over their books or using their pencils. Some also were carving with their knives strange devices on bones, or cutting out rings from the shell of the tortoise. ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston
... the show, I guess, except Monolith, the moth-eaten old elephant, and the big tortoise in the sideshow. They say the elephant's over a hundred, and some think the tortoise is two hundred years old. So they go Scalawag ...
— The Corner House Girls Growing Up - What Happened First, What Came Next. And How It Ended • Grace Brooks Hill
... that of the Philippines, and resembles that of the Marianas Islands. Their manner of pronouncing words is something like that of the Arabs. The woman who appears to be of highest station has many rings and necklaces of tortoise-shell, that are called here carey; and others of a material that is unknown to us. This material, which somewhat ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 41 of 55, 1691-1700 • Various
... the course I 'd wish you; pray observe me. We see that undermining more prevails Than doth the cannon. Bear your wrongs conceal'd, And, patient as the tortoise, let this camel Stalk o'er your back unbruis'd: sleep with the lion, And let this brood of secure foolish mice Play with your nostrils, till the time be ripe For th' bloody audit, and the fatal gripe: Aim like a cunning fowler, close one eye, ...
— The White Devil • John Webster
... way, hurrying on—and I will allow that this attempt of his seemed to me very grotesque, so that I could scarcely help laughing; the other lookers-on in the street laughed too, though some put on an aspect of disgust. 'Look, the tortoise!' some one said; 'does he think he can go quicker than the orderlies?' My companions came up to the man while this commentary was going on, and seized him by each arm. 'Where were you going? Where have you come from? How dare you make an exhibition of yourself?' they cried. ...
— The Little Pilgrim: Further Experiences. - Stories of the Seen and the Unseen. • Margaret O. (Wilson) Oliphant
... they could see that the rock was very large—as large as a big field. No trees grew on it, no grass—nothing. The great rock was as smooth and as bare as the back of a tortoise. ...
— The Story of Doctor Dolittle • Hugh Lofting
... with a dip of about 33 degrees to the westward, and separating with great cleanness and smoothness, present impressions of such liveliness, that there is no possibility of doubt as to their being animal foot-tracks, and those of the tortoise family. A thin layer of unctuous clay between the beds has proved favourable to their separation; and it is upon this intervening substance that the marks are best preserved. Slab after slab is raised from the quarry—sometimes a foot ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 459 - Volume 18, New Series, October 16, 1852 • Various
... opposite to him, but never looked up. A low table was placed in front, on which there was a two- spouted kettle full of sake, some sake bottles, and some cups, and on another there were some small figures representing a fir-tree, a plum-tree in blossom, and a stork standing on a tortoise, the last representing length of days, and the former the beauty of women and the strength of men. Shortly a zen, loaded with eatables, was placed before each person, and the feast began, accompanied by the ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird
... reached their new homes, in numbers comparatively small, but still sufficient to occasion much danger and alarm to the early settlers, and to cause their destroyers to be regarded as among the greatest heroes of the time and the greatest benefactors of mankind. The Hindoo tradition of the tortoise on whose back stands the elephant which upholds the world, and the account of Leviathan in the Book of Job, seem to point in the same direction. [Footnote: For additional instances see Tylor's Early History ...
— The Story of Creation as told by Theology and by Science • T. S. Ackland
... in his stiff cope, creep up to the group with the motion of a tortoise. And, for a moment, his quavering voice pronouncing the absolution was the only ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... necklaces, and bracelets of bones, shells, and beads of mother-of-pearl, tortoise-shell, &c. which are worn by both sexes. The women also wear on their fingers neat rings made of tortoise-shell, and pieces in their ears about the size of a small quill; but ear ornaments are not commonly worn, though all have ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World, Volume 1 • James Cook
... nor the battle to the strong. Lying here in this quiet backwater it is hard to believe that the world without is turbulent with storm and stress and the ebb and flow of uncertain tides. The little yellow cat rolling on its back among the daisies, the staid tortoise making a stately meal off the buttercups near me, these are great events in this haven of peace. And yet, looking back to the working days, I know how much goodness and loving kindness there is under the ...
— The Roadmender • Michael Fairless
... Lord, as he termed him, which I should be very happy to translate, were my pen capable of rendering into English the robust thundering sentences of his powerful Castilian. I had till then considered him a plain uninformed old man, almost simple, and as incapable of much emotion as a tortoise within its shell; but he had become at once inspired: his eyes were replete with a bright fire, and every muscle of his face was quivering. The little silk skull-cap which he wore, according to the custom of the Catholic clergy, moved up and down with his agitation, ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... her joy declar'd: The fair round face, the snowy beard, The velvet of her paws, Her coat, that with the tortoise vies, 10 Her ears of jet, and emerald eyes, She ...
— Select Poems of Thomas Gray • Thomas Gray
... to five large eggs of a shagreen-green colour, upon a bed of leaves. The male and female sit alternately for about a month upon them. The articles we saw exposed for sale in the fair were chiefly pearl shell and the tripang, known also as the beche-de-mer; as also tortoise-shell, edible birds' nests, pearls, and birds of paradise, or rather their stuffed skins. The Malay traders had brought for sale, or to exchange with these articles, guns, swords, knives, choppers, tobacco, plates and basins, handkerchiefs, sarongs, calicoes, ...
— In the Eastern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... table and the ground as if they were a crooked dial-plate, and himself the only figure on it. With hair and whiskers deficient in colour at all times, but feebler than common in the rich sunshine, and more like the coat of a sandy tortoise-shell cat; with long nails, nicely pared and sharpened; with a natural antipathy to any speck of dirt, which made him pause sometimes and watch the falling motes of dust, and rub them off his smooth white hand or glossy linen: Mr Carker the Manager, sly of manner, sharp ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... know what it is to be born alone, Baby tortoise! The first day to heave your feet little by little from the shell, Not yet awake, And remain lapsed on earth, ...
— Tortoises • D. H. Lawrence
... suddenly shouts for "Ten! Reach out to it, longer, longer!" While the wind and the tide raced hand in hand The swing of the crew and the pace were grand; But now that the two meet face to face It's buffet and slam and a tortoise-pace. ...
— The Vagabond and Other Poems from Punch • R. C. Lehmann
... Amongst them is a drawing in sepia for Tintoretto's masterpiece, the Miracle of St. Mark at Venice. In a room kept locked, but which the custode will open on application, are some interesting cabinets (one designed, it is said, by B.Cellini, another of amber, athird of tortoise-shell); also bronzes, carving in wood and ivory, majolica, enamels, etc. Amongst other curiosities is a "Presepio," with numerous figures in coral, the metal ...
— The South of France—East Half • Charles Bertram Black
... your first exertions favored my intentions. I admit that your imagination was more actively employed upon the work than was your penetration. The loss of your fondest convictions was more than atoned for by your presentiments, which gathered results much more rapidly than the tortoise pace of cold scientific inquiry, passing from the known to the unknown. Your kind of inspired system gave you your first enjoyment in this new field of activity, and I was very careful not to destroy a welcome ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... or material composition, what hidden bond can connect the flower which a girl wears in her hair and the blood which courses through her youthful veins; or, what is there in common between the dense and resisting mass of the oak, or the strong fabric of the tortoise, and those broad disks of glassy jelly which may be seen pulsating through the waters of a calm sea, but which drain away to mere films in the hand which raises them out of ...
— Autobiography and Selected Essays • Thomas Henry Huxley
... Topics! [Whirling from one to the other.] Everyone is here, everyone of the slightest mark or consequence! The Pheasant-hen is here, in a frock from fairyland. The Duck is here, who is so good as to say he will recite for us by and by. The Tortoise is here—[Noticing that the TORTOISE is not there] I was mistaken, the Tortoise is not here. She ...
— Chantecler - Play in Four Acts • Edmond Rostand
... deposit their eggs. Some of these marine turtles grow to an enormous size, sometimes reaching a weight of over eight hundred pounds. One of them is much sought for on account of the delicacy of its flesh; another because of the thickness and beauty of its horny plates which furnish the so-called tortoise-shell, an important article of commerce. Turtles appear to reach a very old age, specimens having been known to have lived several hundred years. The box tortoise of our woods, the musk turtles, the snapping turtles are familiar examples of this order, while the terrapin, ...
— Boy Scouts Handbook - The First Edition, 1911 • Boy Scouts of America
... repeat here the well-known fable of the 'Hare and the Tortoise,' but something of the character of those animals may be found in the cousins. At their first dame's school, as well as at the more advanced grammar school of their little town. Howel was always able to beat Rowland in swiftness, whilst ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... parlor in social gatherings, or walking in the street. I once pointed out to a friend a ludicrous resemblance between his countenance and expression and that of one of the tortoises in the illustrations of one of Agassiz's works on natural history. To which my friend replied: "It is the tortoise on which the elephant stands that bears up the foundations of the world," ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar
... England, was at that time divided into counties? What other country possessed similar establishments? But Mary has done more; in her French translation she has preserved many expressions in the English original; such as welke, in the fable of the Eagle, the Crow, and the Tortoise; witecocs, in that of the Three Wishes; grave, in that of the Sick Lion; werbes and wibets, in that of the Battle of the Flies with other Animals; worsel, in that of the ...
— The Lay of Marie • Matilda Betham
... cargo would have put all the machinery of a royal dockyard to shame. As for the activity of the custom-house, it would have been the movement of a tortoise, to the rapidity of whatever is most rapid in unpacking or pilfering. But pilfering here we had none; we were all "men of honour;" and, undoubtedly, if any propensity to mistake the tuum for the meum had been exhibited, there were among us sufficient of the stamp of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843 • Various
... thousands, in the past centuries whose work was superb, but the twenty-eight are deemed to be the immortals of this particular art. One of these great men, Ogawa Ritsuo, is famous for the number and variety of the materials—mother-of-pearl, coral, tortoise-shell, &c. &c., he used in his work. A profuse richness is its chief characteristic. One of his pupils imitated in his work various materials—pottery and wood-carving, and bronzes. The last famous artist in lacquer, Watanobe Tosu, died about thirty years ago. Whether ...
— The Empire of the East • H. B. Montgomery
... this describes a tramp and vagrant world, adrift in space, with neither elephant nor tortoise to plant the sole of its foot upon. It is a set of stars hurled into heaven without even a centre of gravity to pull against. In other spheres of life it is true that we have got used to living in a state of relative insecurity. The ...
— Pragmatism - A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking • William James
... the Vulture, Captain Nabob; the Tortoise snow, from Lapland; the Pet-en-l'air, from Versailles; the Dreadnought, from Mount Etna, Sir W. Hamilton, commander; the Tympany, Montgolfier; and the Mine-A-in-a-bandbox, from the Cape of Good Hope. Foundered in a hurricane, the ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume II • Horace Walpole
... The Master of the Border Hunt lent a couple of foxhounds, who effected nothing; and there were a hundred other attempts and as many failures. Jim Mason set a cunning trap or two and caught his own bob-tailed tortoise-shell and a terrible wigging from his missus; Ned Hoppin sat up with a gun two nights over a new slain victim and Londesley of the Home Farm poisoned a carcase. But the Killer never returned to the kill, and went about in the midst of the all, carrying on his ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant
... he was obliged to stoop as he entered the doorway. Within was an ordinary peasant's kitchen, but cleaner than the average. In spite of the weather the floor boards were freshly scrubbed. The hearth was swept, and by the stove lay a sleek tortoise-shell cat. There was a wooden dresser, a chimney shelf with rows of plates standing on it, and in a doorway just beyond an elderly peasant woman ...
— Kings, Queens And Pawns - An American Woman at the Front • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... his younger rival Sophocles; shortly afterwards he retired to the court of king Hiero, at Syracuse, He died at Gela, in Sicily, in 456, in the 69th year of his age. It is unanimously related that an eagle, mistaking the poet's bald head for a stone, let a tortoise fall upon it in order to break the shell, thus fulfilling an oracle predicting that he was to die by a blow from heaven. The improvements introduced into tragedy by AEschylus concerned both its form and composition, and its manner of representation. In ...
— A Smaller History of Greece • William Smith
... filled with old red velvet furniture. I sat down on a sofa, and before long became conscious that I was being gazed upon by a haughty young woman, with an aristocratic nose, large dark eyes, hair caught back by tortoise-shell combs under a peculiar head-dress, having a gleam of gold directly on the top. Her gown was of dark green, with white puffs let into the sleeves below the elbows; around her tapering waist was a narrow belt of jewels; the front of her corsage was also ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... has gone, as the tortoise goes, Heavy and slow; And the same rose blooms, and the same sun glows, And the same brook ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... made one fearful to set foot upon it. It was a jolly, chummy sort of carpet that seemed to say, "Walk on me all you want to, and don't be afraid to spill your crumbs; I like crumbs." A very large tortoise-shell cat lay stretched along the arm of the couch, half asleep, and purred as Eve dipped her fingers in the long fur. The windows on the side of the room were open and the draperies swayed gently with the little breeze. Wade, seated at the other end of the couch from his hostess, was feeling ...
— The Lilac Girl • Ralph Henry Barbour
... imperceptible fissure? It is well known that reptiles and amphibians are particularly tenacious of life, and that some turtles in particular will live for months, or even for years, without tasting food. The common Greek tortoise, hawked on barrows about the streets of London and bought by a confiding British public under the mistaken impression that its chief fare consists of slugs and cockroaches (it is really far more likely to feed upon its purchaser's choicest seakale and asparagus), buries itself in the ground ...
— Falling in Love - With Other Essays on More Exact Branches of Science • Grant Allen
... the question indifferently while she stooped to pet a tortoise-shell cat that was curled asleep ...
— Jerry • Jean Webster
... seemed to strike our host. He shot his head out of the mist with a queer tortoise-like motion he sometimes had, and blinked approvingly ...
— Tales Of Men And Ghosts • Edith Wharton
... but stand there is no doubt as to the result. The thing that would puzzle us would be for him and his troops to march away into Upper Egypt and lead us a long dance there. In this tremendous heat our fellows would not be able to march far, and it would be like a tortoise trying to catch a hare, hunting them all over the country. The more men Arabi gets together the more likely he is to make a stand and ...
— A Chapter of Adventures • G. A. Henty
... enter in my ledger instead of "two dozen eggs" and "three pounds of butter," "two dozen pearls at so much a dozen" (or would they be entered by ounces?) and "fifty pounds of sandalwood," or should I reckon that by cords? I could find out later. I would wear my large tortoise-shell spectacles (possibly blinders in addition), and I should attend strictly to business for a while, but when a full moon rose over a South Sea lagoon, and the palm trees rustled and the phosphorescence broke in silver on the bow of the pearl schooner, where she rode at anchor in ...
— The Smiling Hill-Top - And Other California Sketches • Julia M. Sloane
... here, and then I suddenly found I could. Princess Ruby declares I make it all up—but I don't. I can even understand what some of the animals have to say, and its rather fun sometimes. The other morning in the Gardens I heard a tortoise telling a squirrel——" ...
— In Brief Authority • F. Anstey
... perfect,' to the frank disapproval of our own George Innes, when he says that it is 'the most infernal piece of clap-trap ever painted. There is nothing in it. It is not even a fine bouquet of colors.' Some one said it looks like a 'tortoise-shell cat having a fit in a platter of tomatoes.' The lurid light that streams through the mist of the angry sea intensifies a scene already ...
— See America First • Orville O. Hiestand
... at the moment when the wise men of his day were saying that the earth was supported on the shoulders of a giant, that the giant stood on a platform made of the backs of elephants; that the elephants stood on the back of a mighty tortoise, but where the tortoise stood none of them said; how did he dare at that time to write that God hangeth the ...
— Christ, Christianity and the Bible • I. M. Haldeman
... consent to appear at Court like a poor and humble frog from the marshes. A little sedan-chair was made for her, large enough to hold a couple of eggs comfortably, and this was covered outside with tortoise-shell and lined with lizard-skin. From the little green frogs that hop about the meadows she selected fifty to act as maids of honour, and each of these was mounted on a snail. They had dainty saddles, and rode in dashing style with the ...
— Old-Time Stories • Charles Perrault
... first rank of the Romans rested their shields upon the wall, and so did those that were behind them, and the like did those that were still more backward, and guarded themselves with what they call Testudo, [the back of] a tortoise, upon which the darts that were thrown fell, and slided off without doing them any harm; so the soldiers undermined the wall, without being themselves hurt, and got all things ready for setting fire to the gate ...
— The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem • Flavius Josephus
... looked at him through her tortoise-shell lorgnette, hanging from a gold chain, the gray amber of her eyes took on an insolent stare through the glasses, a strange expression, half caressing, ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... pleatings! Felicia couldn't get one of those bodies half around her healthy young waist. But she liked the bonnets and the shawls. They were adorable. The shawls were so soft, so quaintly shaped, the bonnets were fairly ravishing. Felicia tried them on, peering into a carved tortoise shell hand mirror, and giggled whimsically at the little flowered ones with lacy ties and the stuffy winter ...
— Little Miss By-The-Day • Lucille Van Slyke
... order to salute a magpie—for he was very superstitious—pointed with his cane to a tank that lay buried on its back in the sand like a defeated tortoise, ...
— General Bramble • Andre Maurois
... of Vishnu are most commonly given as ten[356] but are not all of the same character. The first five, namely, the Fish, Tortoise, Boar, Man-Lion and Dwarf, are mythical, and due to his identification with supernatural creatures playing a benevolent role in legends with which he had originally no connection. The sixth, however, Parasu-rama or Rama with the axe, may contain historical elements. He is represented as a ...
— Hinduism And Buddhism, Volume II. (of 3) - An Historical Sketch • Charles Eliot
... mistress was completely gained over, and easily carried her point with Louis, who had, indeed, wrongs of his own to resent. His feelings were not quick; but contempt, says the Eastern proverb, pierces even through the shell of the tortoise; and neither prudence nor decorum had ever restrained Frederic from expressing his measureless contempt for the sloth, the imbecility, and the baseness of Louis. France was thus induced to join the coalition; and the example of France determined the conduct ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... back to his ledger; the Doctor plunged into the Star, the Captain folded up his newspaper and began studying the trinkets in the holiday stock in the show case under the new books. A comb and brush with tortoise shell backs seemed to arrest his eyes. "Doc," he mused, "Christmas never comes that I don't think of—her—mother! I guess I'd just about be getting that comb and brush for her." The Doctor casually looked through the show case and saw what had attracted ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... Union so afflicted—or blessed, according to how you look at it; the number of volumes in each of the world's ten largest libraries; the salary of every officer of the United-States Government; the average duration of life in a man, elephant, lion, horse, anaconda, tortoise, camel, rabbit, ass, etcetera-etcetera; the age of every crowned head in Europe; each State's legal and commercial rate of interest; and how long it takes a healthy boy to digest apples, baked beans, cabbage, dates, eggs, fish, green corn, h, i, j, k, l-m-n-o-p, quinces, rice, shrimps, tripe, ...
— Bonaventure - A Prose Pastoral of Acadian Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... had finished speaking, Rea was downstairs and out on the east veranda. At the kitchen door stood a Chinaman, throwing bits of meat to the scrambling seventeen cats,—black, white, tortoise-shell, gray, maltese, yellow, every color, size, shape of cat that was ever seen. And they were plunging and leaping and racing about so, that it looked like twice as many cats as there really were, and as if every ...
— The Hunter Cats of Connorloa • Helen Jackson
... and fall of man is the following:—In the beginning, a few men rose out of the ground, but there was no woman among them. One of them found out a road to heaven, where he met a woman; they offended the Great Spirit, upon which they were both thrust out. They fell on the back of the tortoise; the woman was delivered of male twins; in process of time, one of these twins slew ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 338, Saturday, November 1, 1828. • Various
... hurried off a boy to the Mendez house with word that I was coming, sent out for flowers and made a lovely little fuss about me. I tried to make myself look as pretty as possible in a pale tulle, with little rosy wreaths upon it, and the high old tortoise-shell comb, that had been mother's, in my hair. The excitement gave me more color than I had had for weeks. I thought, "Even if I am not happy, at least I can ...
— The Other Side of the Door • Lucia Chamberlain
... bottom—when, in consequence of prolonged droughts, the current had so moderated that they were in no danger of being swept away—each on its large white foot, with its valves elevated over its back, like the carpace of some tall tortoise. I found occasion at this time to conclude, that the Unio of our river-fords secretes pearls so much more frequently than the Unionidae and Anadonta of our still pools and lakes, not from any specific peculiarity in the constitution ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller
... I declare that then he snubbed me not one little bit. These things are very far away. But to me, though far away, they are very vivid and very lovely. I see them as you, when you were small, so often pleaded to see a fairy landscape by looking through the large end of the gold and tortoise-shell spy-glass upon my writing-table. All of which may seem to you somewhat childish and trivial, but I grow an old woman and have a fancy for toys and tender make-believes—such as fairy landscapes seen through the big end of a spy-glass. The actual landscape, ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... cold. "You know I ain't built on the same lines as you; and in a case of this kind, the one that c'n go faster just has to accommodate himself to the pace of the slow one. You're the hare, and I'm like the poor old tortoise; but please remember that the turtle came in winner after all in the race. Not always to the swift, you know, does the race go. I may beat you out in the long run, with the endurance test. If I've got anything at all, ...
— The Boy Scouts in the Maine Woods - The New Test for the Silver Fox Patrol • Herbert Carter
... a testudinate which we remember is that downward one of the unfortunate tortoise that cracked the bald crown of Aeschylus. But turtle, as embracing all chelonians, or, as liberal shepherds call it, "turkle," is unquestionably Cisatlantic. The distinguished naturalist has made himself an American citizen by adopting our own expression, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... after this he was comically alarmed by an inoffensive animal; as he was walking along a deer-track, he chanced to spy a very fine tortoise-shell box, as he imagined, though he could not conceive how it could be dropped there; and, thinking he might make good advantage of it among the Indians, claps it into his pocket; he had not gone far before he heard a hissing noise, which seemed ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Bampfylde Moore Carew • Unknown
... the forehead of every child an account of all that shall happen to him in the world. It is reported of Vixnu that he metamorphosed himself at pleasure. He first took the form and nature of a fish, and the second form assumed was that of a tortoise. The Indians believed there were seven seas in the world,—one of milk, of so delicious a nature that the gods ate butter made of it. One day, when the gods wanted to feast on the butter according to custom, they brought to the shore of the milk ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... Fontange, the Tire-woman, her Account of my Lady Blithe's Wash. Broke a Tooth in my little Tortoise-shell Comb. Sent Frank to know how my Lady Hectick rested after her Monky's leaping out at Window. Looked pale. Fontange tells me my Glass is not true. Dressed ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele
... in her chair. A sham tortoise-shell hairpin dropped from her untidy hair on to the floor with a little clatter. Her veil parted at the top from her hat. Little Alfred, terrified by an angry frown from the cornet player, was hastily returning fragments of partially ...
— The Double Life Of Mr. Alfred Burton • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... shatter'd beech sublime He stood, Still'd with his waving arm the babbling flood; "To Man's dull ear," He cry'd, "I call in vain, "Hear me, ye scaly tenants of the main!"— 250 Misshapen Seals approach in circling flocks, In dusky mail the Tortoise climbs the rocks, Torpedoes, Sharks, Rays, Porpus, Dolphins, pour Their twinkling squadrons round the glittering shore; 255 With tangled fins, behind, huge Phocae glide, And Whales and Grampi swell the distant tide. Then kneel'd the hoary Seer, to heaven address'd His fiery eyes, and smote his ...
— The Botanic Garden. Part II. - Containing The Loves of the Plants. A Poem. - With Philosophical Notes. • Erasmus Darwin
... find a man can live without his money as merrily as a tortoise without its head, or a wasp ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte
... that ever I met," thought he, "I have gone farthest in folly, and have thereby led things into a state of confusion which I myself could not make straight again, even if I were a sage—which I certainly never shall be any more than a tortoise or a phoenix. I once heard tell of a hermit who, because it is written that we ought to bury the dead, and because he had no corpse, slew a traveller that he might fulfil the commandment: I have acted in exactly the same way, for, in order to spare another man suffering and to bear the sins ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... the offending list, and told Cotton the house-master's opinions. Jim Cotton had not very quick feelings, but contempt can pierce the shell of a tortoise, and as Philips innocently retailed the message, the secretary of the Penfold Tablet Fund knew there was one man who held ...
— Acton's Feud - A Public School Story • Frederick Swainson
... age of the moon," said her ladyship, putting the little tortoise-shell-bound calendar into her reticule; and having done so, she proceeded to assist Lady Penelope in the arrangements for ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... fifty kinds of Turtle and Tortoises in North America, some of which live on the land and feed largely upon plants, e. g., the Common Box Turtle, found from the New England States to South Carolina and westward to Kansas, and the Gopher Tortoise of the Southern States. Others are aquatic, like the Painted Turtles, which are found in one form or another practically ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... Drawing, as applicable to Cabinet Work; Veneering, Inlaying, and Buhl-Work; the Art of Dyeing and Staining Wood, Ivory, Bone, Tortoise-Shell, etc. Directions for Lackering, Japanning, and Varnishing; to make French Polish, Glues, Cements, and Compositions; with numerous Receipts, useful to workmen generally. By J. STOKES. Illustrated. A New Edition, with an Appendix upon French Polishing, Staining, Imitating, ...
— Mechanical Drawing Self-Taught • Joshua Rose
... wandering through the globe as the descendants of Noah, without a written language. The Hindoo therefore in his belief that the earth was actually drawn up at the flood, by the tusks of a boar, and that it rests at this hour on the back of a tortoise: and the North American Indian in his wild supposition that Waesackoochack, whose reputed father was a snake, formed the present beautiful order of creation after the deluge, by the help of a musk-rat, afford no inconsiderable proof that the Bible is of far greater antiquity ...
— The Substance of a Journal During a Residence at the Red River Colony, British North America • John West
... Hence some animals have acquired wings instead of legs, as the smaller birds, for purposes of escape. Others, great length of fin or of membrane, as the flying-fish and the bat. Others have acquired hard or armed shells, as the tortoise and the ...
— Lamarck, the Founder of Evolution - His Life and Work • Alpheus Spring Packard
... once more, he was met by a strong up-current and had to fight his way through. Tiny particles stung him as they rushed by, and it seemed to him that millions of fish were darting here and there, snapping at something. It was rice. Gradually it dawned on Piang that he had reached his goal; the tortoise had reached it first, and the secret lay hidden in that dark thing at ...
— The Adventures of Piang the Moro Jungle Boy - A Book for Young and Old • Florence Partello Stuart
... "Behold the Tortoise: He maketh no progress unless he sticketh out his neck." But he maketh very little progress unless he pick the right time and place to "sticketh out his neck"—which can be quite a sticky problem for a man ...
— Wizard • Laurence Mark Janifer (AKA Larry M. Harris)
... clock in the ticket office, but could not see its face; wondered how late it was, and how long she had been absent. Feeling very lonely and restless she closed the door, and sat down in the deserted waiting-room, glad of the companionship of a tortoise-shell cat which was curled up on a chair next ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... saying, 'O Ocean; we have come to churn thy waters for obtaining nectar.' And the Ocean replied, 'Be it so, as I shall not go without a share of it. I am able to bear the prodigious agitation of my waters set up by the mountain.' The gods then went to the king of tortoises and said to him, 'O Tortoise-king, thou wilt have to hold the mountain on thy back!' The Tortoise-king agreed, and Indra contrived to place the ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)
... stormed, prancing from one side of the table to the other, shaking the flimsy sheets in an angry hand, and scattering pins and needles broadcast on the carpet, while Eunice, like the tortoise, toiled slowly away, until bit by bit the puzzle became clear to her mind. She discovered that one piece of the pattern stood for half only of a particular seam, while others, such as collar and cuffs, represented a whole; mastered the mystery of holes and ...
— More About Peggy • Mrs G. de Horne Vaizey
... manuscript, under the four symbols of the cardinal points, we see four figures, one a sitting figure similar to the middle one with black head, on the left side of the Cortesian plate; one a spotted dog sitting on what is apparently part of the carapace of a tortoise; one a monkey, and the other a bird with a hooked bill. Is it not possible that we have here an indication of the four days—Dragon, Death, Monkey, Vulture, with which the Mexican ...
— Notes on Certain Maya and Mexican Manuscripts • Cyrus Thomas
... collection. There is a species of cistus which grows on S. Vincent's rock, which is not, I am told, to be found in any other part of England. Helpless as I am and scoffed at in these matters, I will contrive to get some of it for you. A shoemaker showed us a tortoise shell which he had for sale. I wished to have bought it for La Sophie, but upon inquiry I found it could not be had for less than a guinea; now I thought at the utmost it would not give Sophy above half a crown's worth of pleasure, so I left the shoemaker in quiet possession of his ...
— The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... on the matted floor and divan there were two or three fine Sine carpets; a couple of trophies of splendidly ornamented weapons adorned the wall; by his side, upon a small eight-sided table inlaid with tortoise-shell and mother-of-pearl, stood a silver salver with an empty coffee-cup of beautiful workmanship,—the stand of beaten gold, and the delicate shell of the most exquisite transparent china. He had evidently been on duty at the palace, for he was in uniform, and had removed ...
— Paul Patoff • F. Marion Crawford
... roof, had been made into a sort of Chinese temple. All round the walls were hung curtains of black and yellow, decorated with dragons in gold, and above, suspended by cords at the four corners, was a rug or banner of white ornamented with a great tortoise—the sacred animal of Chinese religion—with gold eyes and claws. All round the side of the room were set coloured lights, shaded and dim. Coming from the bright outer sunlight, the place in its shadowed ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker |
