"Unwind" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "Make him unwind, and then, if he wants to return to active life and take a hand in politics, he may find some honest way of doing so. He'll never make a Saint Vincent de Paul,—though the saint was at the galleys ...
— The Deputy of Arcis • Honore de Balzac
... could throw out the clutch and turn the shaft backwards enough to unwind the line!" ...
— Boy Scouts in the North Sea - The Mystery of a Sub • G. Harvey Ralphson
... curved combs, she let the whole wealth of her tresses unwind and fall. Her hair dropped below her knees in a glorious mass of colour like that of a brown autumn leaf with the sun just glistening on it. She caught it up in one hand and knotted it all again at the back of her head in ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... feet every now and again out of a little copper bowl, and mutters something. He is so much absorbed in what he is doing that he never looks up or turns his head. Another, close by, has hung his gaily-coloured turban on a post and proceeds to unwind his garment and cast it from him before he steps into the water with hardly a rag upon him. This lady in an orange scarf, dripping wet, seats herself on the end of the board, and winds a dry scarf round herself so adroitly that ...
— Round the Wonderful World • G. E. Mitton
... be prepared so they can be used in making tidies, or anything that must be washed. The best crewels are not twisted, and will wash; still, as you are never sure of getting the best, it is well to unwind your skeins, pour scalding water on the wools, and rinse them well in it, squeeze out the water, shake the wools thoroughly, and hang them up. When dry, cut the skein across where it is tied double, and with a bodkin and string, or ...
— Harper's Young People, October 26, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... but one touch to unwind the string, and up, up it mounted like the Parzival airship, bearing the little boy with it, who held tight to the end of the cord. He felt rather giddy and frightened at first, but soon found out that ...
— Fairy Tales from the German Forests • Margaret Arndt
... paper. It is an old scrap of print, the picture of an American patent door-spring, with directions: 'Fasten the spring either end up. Wind it up. Never unwind.' ...
— Twilight in Italy • D.H. Lawrence
... his sides in his vexation at being thus baffled, he touched the soft substance of his silken sash, and instantly an idea kindled at the touch. "Perhaps this will do," he thought, and hurriedly proceeded to unwind it. It was a long sash, for it went from his shoulder to his waist and then three times round his middle, where it was tied in a large bow with long ends. It was at least fifteen feet long, and as tough as any hemp that was ever twisted. He fastened one end of it quickly round ...
— The Duke's Motto - A Melodrama • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... rifles, we want guns, we want shells, fuses, chemicals, and explosives. There is one thing we want less of than usual, and that is red tape. It takes such a long time to unwind—[laughter]—and we can't spare the time. Therefore, the first thing I am going to ask you to do is to organize for yourselves in this locality, and in every other locality, the engineering resources, for the purpose of assisting the ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... pause of motionless silence followed, and then the King slowly arose, and began deliberately to unwind the belt from around the scabbard of the sword he held. As soon as he stood, the Earl and the Count advanced, and taking Myles by either hand, led him forward and up the steps of the dais to the platform above. As they drew a little to one side, the King stooped and buckled ...
— Men of Iron • Ernie Howard Pyle
... The doctor began, with a physician's carefulness, to unwind the coil she had flung down to him. "Are the Savors going, and ...
— Annie Kilburn - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... Persian form of this story, in the "1001 Days" (Prenzlau ed.), 11 : 247, is added the death-penalty in case the hero fails to perform the second cure, which consists in persuading the spirit, in the form of a snake, to unwind itself from the body of the vezir's daughter. The hero had already cured the sultan's daughter ...
— Filipino Popular Tales • Dean S. Fansler
... of its length it went through dense brush, so dense in parts that it defied anyone but a bear to get through it. But when I did reach a secluded pool and manage to thrust my rod out over the water and slowly unwind my bait, I was almost always rewarded by a lively mountain trout as long as my hand, for they never ran over six inches. The grasshopper was absolutely deadly; no fish seemed able to resist it, and sometimes in ten minutes I took six, or even ten, out of a pool as big as an ordinary ...
— A Tramp's Notebook • Morley Roberts
... in a panic. Suppose he accept my tale (thinks I), suppose he invite my sister to his house, and that I bring her. I shall have a fine ravelled pirn to unwind, and may end by disgracing both the lassie and myself. Thereupon I began hastily to expound to him my sister's character. She was of a bashful disposition, it appeared, and so extremely fearful of meeting strangers that I had left her at that moment sitting in a public place alone. And ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... there, I leaned above the vessel's whispering prow, With an unusual joy, and drink, from out The heaven of those true repeated depths, Infinite calm, as though I did commune With the still spirit of the universe. So leaning, from my hair did I unwind This chain of flowers, and dropped it in the sea; Blessing that twilight hour, the port, the bay, The deep dim isle of interlunar woods, My love, and all the world, and naming them Waters of rest—now lies my garland here. What words are these thus furrowed on the shore? These are the very turns ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... wass still speaking I felt my soul carried out into the light of God's face, and my grave clothes were taken off one by one as Janet would unwind my plaid, and I stood a ...
— Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush • Ian Maclaren
... with pleasure through her delicately applied rouge, and stretching out her hands for her gift began eagerly to unwind the various tissue-papers which concealed it. The last of these discarded, she placed the basket in the middle of the table and spent herself in ecstatic phrases, melting from pose ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... thoughts the day Rose with delight to us, and with them set, Must learn the hateful art, how to forget! —Fold back our arms, take home our fruitless loves, That must new fortunes try, like turtle doves Dislodged from their haunts. We must in tears Unwind a love knit up in many years. In this one kiss I here surrender thee Back to thyself: so thou ...
— A Selection From The Lyrical Poems Of Robert Herrick • Robert Herrick
... unwind the hairs and cast them upon the floor. With her woman's instinct she had divined their meaning and gasped in her anger, ready ...
— Bel Ami • Henri Rene Guy de Maupassant
... fish were caught there every season. George turned the boat's head toward this place, and, thrusting his hand into his pocket, drew out a "trolling-line," and, dropping the hook into the water behind the boat, began to unwind the line. The trolling-hook (such as is generally used in fishing for black-bass) can be used only in a strong current, or when the boat is in rapid motion through the water. The hook is concealed by feathers or a strip of red flannel, and a piece of ...
— Frank, the Young Naturalist • Harry Castlemon
... big ball of white cotton and unwind it as you go," said Chris, grinning. "You're bound to find your ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... to unwind this rope from my body. It is lucky I am so lean that it did not make me look bulky. It is not very thick, but it is new and strong, and there are knots every two feet. Roger is waiting for us below, in ...
— Saint Bartholomew's Eve - A Tale of the Huguenot WarS • G. A. Henty
... used in the process of excavation remained, and round it was a portion of the chain so old and rusty as to be worthless for any purpose whatever. Lengths had from time to time been broken off by boys, who would unwind a portion, and then, three or four pull together until the rust-eaten links gave way; and the boys came to the ground with a crash. It was a dirty game, however, dirty even for pit boys, for the yellow rust would stick to hands and clothes and ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty
... intervals, is tied. As the fisherman walks along the bank, the otter runs away from him, and carries his line and hooks far out into the stream. It is very convenient to have a large hand-reel to wind and unwind the line upon; but a forked ...
— The Art of Travel - Shifts and Contrivances Available in Wild Countries • Francis Galton
... quietly round and round the tree to unwind herself; and first Lloyd, and then Palema, and then Lloyd again, scampered round the big circle, and fell, and got up again, and bounded like a deer, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... is a ball of silken thread," she said. "As soon as you go into the Labyrinth where the monster is kept, fasten one end of the thread to the stone doorpost, and then unwind it as you go along. When you have slain the Minotaur, you have only to follow the thread and it will lead you back to the door. In the meanwhile I will see that your ship, is ready to sail, and then I will wait for you at the door of ...
— Old Greek Stories • James Baldwin
... from the spit. Let him be roasted very leisurely; and often basted with claret wine, and anchovies, and butter, mixt together; and also with what moisture falls from him into the pan. When you have roasted him sufficiently, you are to hold under him, when you unwind or cut the tape that ties him, such a dish as you purpose to eat him out of; and let him fall into it with the sauce that is roasted in his belly; and by this means the Pike will be kept unbroken and complete. Then, to the sauce which was within, and also that ...
— The Complete Angler • Izaak Walton
... and butterflies scattered; the paper dried rapidly in the hot sun, as the kite lay on the grass while the string was fastened, Tizzy having the delightful task of rolling the ball along the grass to unwind enough for the first flight; and then, after Ned had thrown a stray goose-feather to make sure which way the wind blew, this being towards the tall poplars, Tizzy was set to hold up the kite as high ...
— Brave and True - Short stories for children by G. M. Fenn and Others • George Manville Fenn
... the eager boy. He had often tried it in Old England; why not try it in Newfoundland? A very brief period sufficed to unwind a thread from the cord, and therewith to attach the feather to the hook. He had no rod, and neither time nor patience to make one. Gathering the cord into a coil, such as wharfmen form when casting ropes to steamers; he swung it round his head, and hove his hook half-way across ...
— The Crew of the Water Wagtail • R.M. Ballantyne
... called after him just as far as they could see him, and when they were sure he was gone they thought they would come down and celebrate. But they didn't do it—not just yet. There wasn't one of them that could unwind himself from his limb, except old Mr. Waters, who had got only a teaspoonful of the medicine, which very likely was just about the right amount. Mr. Waters swung quite loose and free from his limb, and got down without much trouble, and it took him all the afternoon to go around from tree to ...
— Hollow Tree Nights and Days • Albert Bigelow Paine
... despises the asphalt that a Dago treads on, wakes up in the morning with her feet in the bosom of Antonio Spizzinelli. And Mike O'Dowd, that always threw peddlers downstairs as fast as he came upon 'em, has to unwind old Isaacstein's whiskers from around his neck, and wake up the whole gang at daylight. But here and there some few got acquainted and overlooked the discomforts of the elements. There was five engagements to be married announced at the flats the ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry
... in the fountain, health flows in the rills, As their ribbons of silver unwind from the hills; They breathe not the mist of the bacchanal's dream, But the lilies of innocence ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... fire he becomes, almost without effort, a wonderworking cause, a manipulator of nature, a miracle worker. Hence the vacant lots are often lighted up; barrels, boxes, and fences disappear; and one almost believes that part of the charm of smoking is in the very making of the smoke and seeing it unwind into greater mystery as did incense from thousands of altars in ...
— The Minister and the Boy • Allan Hoben
... label at the bookstall and wrote it for him. He went round and round my leg looking for me. "Funny thing," he said as he began to unwind, "he was here a moment ago. I'll just go round once more. I rather think ... Ow! Oh, there you are!" I stepped off him, unravelled the lead and dragged ...
— Once a Week • Alan Alexander Milne
... leader runs slowly round and round into the center, and can either wind the children up tightly or can turn them on nearing the center and run out again. For another change the long line can start running and so unwind the spiral. ...
— My Book of Indoor Games • Clarence Squareman
... one edge under your legs from right to left, then the second edge under from left to right, and over the first edge. Lower your legs, wrap up your shoulders and go to sleep. If you roll over, one edge will unwind but the other ...
— Camping For Boys • H.W. Gibson
... put out, smothering the innocent occupants of the dugouts in their sleep and burning their grain. Not to gaze wild-eyed through the shining windows of these splendid cars as they passed on and on to some more promising unwind-blown country, to build there their beautiful cities ...
— The Way of the Wind • Zoe Anderson Norris
... Quite right. It's the only way to play. But may I once more ask that there should be no talking? We shall never be able to unwind if ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, December 22, 1920 • Various
... it please you, sir! We'll unwind this coil before we snarl another. Fear not that my base mechanical blood shall ever sully your noble strain; but mean though I be, my habit is a tolerably truthful one, and I tell you once and for all ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin
... queer," he said. "Give me a drink of water." He drank part of the water, and poured the rest over his head. Hester turned toward the door to leave him. He instantly stopped her. "I can't unwind the strings. I can't lift ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... red tape showed signs at first of declining to unwind, but further investigation proved the frauds so great, that even the red tape was thrilled into action, and the Government began a suit in the United States District Court at New York for $1,000,000 for penalties for fraudulent custom-house under-valuations. It sued William E. Dodge, ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers
... wasn't to know. Who did know? Madame Beattie, certainly. The old witch was at the bottom of it. She had, for purposes of her own, wound the foreign population round her finger, and she was going to unwind them when the time came to spin a web. A web of many colours, he knew it would be, doubtless strong in some spots and snarled in others. Madame Beattie was not the person to spin a web of ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... subjects of these sketches are well known and well beloved—women whose deeds have been recorded in high places in denominational history; and we deem it no impropriety to take them down, unwind the peculiarity of sect, and weave these honored names in one sacred wreath, that we may dedicate it to all who love ...
— Daughters of the Cross: or Woman's Mission • Daniel C. Eddy
... nearer the point which, if reached, would place The King's Basin forever beyond the reclaiming power of men. Frantic appeals for help were made to the government, but before the ponderous machinery of state, with its intricate and complicated wheels within wheels, could unwind a sufficient quantity of red tape the work of the pioneer citizens would ...
— The Winning of Barbara Worth • Harold B Wright
... which it finds to the nature of things, and never suspects that the Devil goes around in the night, thrusting the square men into the round places, and the round men into the square places. It never notices that the reason why the rope does not unwind easily is because one strand is a world too large and another a world too small, and so it sticks where it ought to roll, and rolls where it ought to stick. It makes sweet, faint efforts with tender fingers and palpitating heart to oil the wheels and polish up ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., April, 1863, No. LXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics. • Various
... absolute, or God, you must be the absolute; or, in other words, God only can find God. This is the simple doctrine, when you unwind the veil he has cleverly hung over it. True, he denounces pantheism; but here is pantheism of the eclectic patent, differing from that of other systems only in subtlety of expression, wherein Cousin certainly ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans
... turned over. He righted it for action, and crossed the room to the ladies Eleanor and Isabel. His ears tingled. He and his whole story discussed in public! Himself unroofed! And the marvel that he of all men should be in such a tangle, naked and blown on, condemned to use his cunningest arts to unwind and cover himself, struck him as though the lord of his kind were running the gauntlet of a legion of imps. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... upon the peak, so near at hand just above me. I hope my readers are none of them too old to sympathize with the boyish feeling. At all events, I quickened my pace. The distance could not be more than half a mile, I thought. But it was wonderful how that perverse trail among the boulders did unwind itself, as if it never would come to an end; and I was not surprised, on consulting a guide-book afterwards, to find that my half mile had really been a mile and a half. One's sensations in such a case I have ...
— The Foot-path Way • Bradford Torrey
... his feet under his cassock, a sign of perturbation; Courtlandt continued to unwind; the Barone glanced fiercely at Nora, who ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath
... various attitudes, for the purposes of an uniform plan, and general occurrence, to which every individual figure is subservient. But this plan cannot be executed with propriety, probability, or success, without a principal personage to attract the attention, unite the incidents, unwind the clue of the labyrinth, and at last close the scene, by virtue ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... not I who am tired, my father,' he said. 'It is only that my legs cannot take such good long steps as thine; and walk as we will the road ever seems to unwind itself further and further in front, like the magic white thread which has ...
— Knights of Art - Stories of the Italian Painters • Amy Steedman
... said to the count. 'I told you last night, and I tell you again to-day, that Barto Rizzo is guilty of gross misconduct, and that you must plead the same to a sort of excuseable treason. Count Medole, you cannot wind and unwind a conspiracy like a watch. Who is the head of this one? It is the man Barto Rizzo. He took proceedings before he got you to sanction them. You may be the vessel, but he commands, or at ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... were humored, they would unwind from her like the cloud which she felt them to be. The family had long fallen into the habit of treating her as a child, playing some imaginary character. She seemed less demented than walking in a dream, her faculties asleep. It was somnambulism rather than ...
— Lazarre • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... contrived before he could be hauled close up to the tree, to walk once or twice round it, carrying the rope with him; the decoy, perceiving the advantage he had thus gained over the nooser, walked up of her own accord, and pushed him backwards with her head, till she made him unwind himself again; upon which the rope was hauled tight and made fast. More than once, when a wild one was extending his trunk, and would have intercepted the rope about to be placed over his leg, Siribeddi, by a sudden motion of her own trunk, pushed his aside, and prevented him; and on one occasion, ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent
... yielded at last to the necessity of self-preservation, and permitted his wife to remove his frogged overcoat, and to unwind him from a system of silk wraps to which the Gordian knot was a slip-noose. This done, he sat down before the dressing-case, and Mme. Remy, after tying a bib around his neck, proceeded to dress his hair and put brilliantine on his moustache. Her husband enlivened the operation by reading ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various
... little stone his hoofs struck, would blaze up, just for a second, making stars all along the road. As they flew on, his long black hair got twisted all around her, and every time the wind blew, it grew tighter and tighter, till she could scarcely breathe, and she prayed him to stop, and unwind his long black hair, before it reached her throat, for as sure as she was alive ...
— Helen and Arthur - or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel • Caroline Lee Hentz
... to get if one was very careful. You could not cast for them; the brook was too small and brushy for that. You had to use a very short line, and wind it around the end of the rod, and work it through the branches, and then carefully, very carefully, unwind and let the hook drop lightly on the water. Then as likely as not there would be a swift, tingling tug, and, if you were lucky, an instant later you would have a beautiful red-speckled fellow landed among the grass and field flowers, his gay ...
— Dwellers in Arcady - The Story of an Abandoned Farm • Albert Bigelow Paine
... the real estate man. "At any minute the strong wind may unwind it and send it whirling off over the town. Or the gale may tear it to pieces, scattering the diamonds over a whole block, and not one in ten of the stones would ever ...
— The High School Captain of the Team - Dick & Co. Leading the Athletic Vanguard • H. Irving Hancock
... effect of thinking of something else, the Sixth Nocturne, and Theron at first thought she was not playing anything in particular, so deliberately, haltingly, did the chain of charm unwind itself into sequence. Then it came closer to him than the others had done. The dreamy, wistful, meditative beauty of it all at once oppressed and inspired him. He saw Celia's shoulders sway under the impulse of the RUBATO license—the ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... sizzled into life and swung slowly about. Then the platform jarred, and the spool of cable began slowly to unwind. Beside him Colonel Culver was returning the salute of an officer outside on the ashy ground. Smithy raised his hand, but the brink of that pit had moved swiftly up—there was nothing before him but a ...
— Two Thousand Miles Below • Charles Willard Diffin
... preacher: he comes in "stomping" as we say, he must clear his throat, he must strike his hands together; he even seems noisy when he unwinds the thick red tippet which he wears wound many times around his neck. It takes him a long time to unwind it, and he accomplishes the task with many slow gyrations of his enormous rough head. When he sits down he takes merely the edge of the chair, spreads his stout legs apart, sits as straight as a post, and blows his nose with a noise like ...
— Adventures In Contentment • David Grayson
... was a very satisfactory thing for a Roman poet, when the wind was quiet, to get an audience about him, under a portico, and unwind his well-written scroll for an hour or two; but there must have been a vast deal of secret machinery, and influence, and agitation, to keep up his name with the people. The followers of Pythagoras, ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... a doubled string, with the turkey hanging from it, looped over this end; the turkey turned round and round until the string was twisted to its utmost, and finally string and turkey were left to themselves, to wind and unwind slowly, an occasional winding-up being all that ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn
... a cheery voice, beginning at once to unwind the cloud, "here I be! Didn't think I'd rain down, did ye? I thought myself, one spell, I ...
— Meadow Grass - Tales of New England Life • Alice Brown
... know about this," said Charley with a wry face. "It isn't as simple as it looks. I'll have to unwind the rope from this limb and hold it with one hand while I throw the loose end with the other. I don't know whether I can do it or not. And how am I to get ...
— The Young Wireless Operator—As a Fire Patrol - The Story of a Young Wireless Amateur Who Made Good as a Fire Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss
... of the leafy paths that the witches take, Who come with their crowns of pearl and their spindles of wool, And their secret smile, out of the depths of the lake; And of apple islands where the Danaan kind Wind and unwind their dances when the light grows cool On the island lawns, their feet where the pale foam gleams; No boughs have withered because of the wintry wind, The boughs have withered because I ...
— In The Seven Woods - Being Poems Chiefly of the Irish Heroic Age • William Butler (W.B.) Yeats
... the pin will turn into the block as far as it did originally. Run one end of the string barely through the hole in the tuning pin and turn it about twice around, taking pains that the coils lie closely; then unwind enough wire (of the same size of course) from your supply to reach down to the hitch pin and back. Place the string on the bridge pins properly, draw it as tight as you can by hand and cut it off about three fingers' width beyond the pin upon which it is to be wound. This will make about ...
— Piano Tuning - A Simple and Accurate Method for Amateurs • J. Cree Fischer
... "froze-'n'-thaw" winter-apple, as a Professor to the bough of which his chair is made. You can't shake him off, and it is as much as you can do to pull him off. Hence, by a chain of induction I need not unwind, ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... glutinous trap of infernal ingenuity, or hidden at a distance in its cabin of green leaves, the Epera fasciata waits and watches for its prey. Let the terrible hornet, or the Libellula auripennis, flying from stem to stem, fall into the limed snare; the insect struggles, endeavours to unwind itself; the net trembles violently as though it would be torn from its cables. Immediately the spider darts forward, running boldly to the intruder. With rapid gestures the two hinder limbs weave a winding- sheet of silk as they ...
— Fabre, Poet of Science • Dr. G.V. (C.V.) Legros
... his boots dropped off. Then he began to spin round—to wind up and unwind and wind up again. Joe came near and eyed the twirling form ...
— On Our Selection • Steele Rudd
... any adjacent body, as I have several times observed, both in Silk-worms and Spiders. Next, because that I find that water does easily dissolve and mollifie the substance again, which is evident from their manner of ordering those bottoms or pods of the Silk-worm before they are able to unwind them. It is no great wonder therefore, if those Dyes or ting'd liquors do very quickly mollifie and tinge the surfaces of so small and so glutinous a body. And we need not wonder that the colours appear so lovely in the one, and so ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... done. He says his first wife was so different, 'n' he says it's just been shock after shock, 'n' two shocks when the twins come. Little Jane caught her dress in a wheel while we was talkin', 'n' we had to turn her 'n' the express-wagon both upside down 't once afore we could unwind it, 'n' while we was doin' that, one o' the twins fell out o' the carriage. The minister says he don't thank no man to talk race-suicide when he's aroun'; he says his blood runs cold to think what ...
— Susan Clegg and Her Friend Mrs. Lathrop • Anne Warner
... begin to consider the reform of the law, we come at once to such a tangle of questions that I have the greatest difficulty in finding the right end to unwind the skein. For the trouble with this matter of our divorce laws, as with most other reforms, is to decide just what ought to be done, how far are we prepared to go? where must the marriage bond be held tight? where may it be loosened? These are but examples ...
— Women's Wild Oats - Essays on the Re-fixing of Moral Standards • C. Gasquoine Hartley
... Delphic motto is cut anew, throws out its secret lures,—its gay, many-coloured, deceiving lures,—its secret labyrinthine clues,—for all lines in this building meet in that centre. All clues here unwind to that. For these—for the minds on whom the continuation of this enterprise was by will devolved, the key to that cabinet—the historical key to its inmost compartment of philosophic mysteries, was carefully laboured ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... [Therefore as you unwind her love from him, Lest it should ravel, and be good to none, You must provide to bottom it ...
— Johnson's Notes to Shakespeare Vol. I Comedies • Samuel Johnson
... coming, when the disciple himself, all tutored in the art of their tradition, bringing with him the key of its delivery, shall be there to unlock those locked-up meanings, to spell out those anagrams, to read those hieroglyphics, to unwind with patient loving research to its minutest point, that text, that with such tools as the most watchful tyranny would give them, they will yet contrive to leave there. They know that their buried words are seeds, and though they ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... the good man's smart, All creatures swerving from their ends, impart Doubts that the Ruler is nor good nor wise. Can it then be that boundless Power, Love, Mind, Lets others reign, the while He takes repose? Hath He grown old, or hath He ceased to heed? Nay, one God made and rules: He shall unwind The tangled skein; the hidden law disclose, Whereby so many sinned in thought ...
— Sonnets • Michael Angelo Buonarroti & Tommaso Campanella
... and succeeded in giving me another in exchange for it. Here it is. To-night, when the guards are asleep, we will unwind it and see what it contains. But here are other important things which we must examine. Here, this half-burned light and this cigarette! Let us be on the watch that no ...
— Marie Antoinette And Her Son • Louise Muhlbach
... or unheard, the words may fell, And yet the heaven-taught mind May learn the sacred air, and all The harmony unwind. ...
— Holidays at the Grange or A Week's Delight - Games and Stories for Parlor and Fireside • Emily Mayer Higgins
... been reached: the tide of frenzy was turning, had turned, was already ebbing. She felt it, was conscious that he also had become aware of it. Then his grasp slackened, grew lax, loosened, and almost spent. She ventured to unwind her limbs from his, to relax her ...
— In Secret • Robert W. Chambers
... Unwind thyself, my precious one, A thread of gold within the woof. All my happiness rests upon thee, Thou art my greatest delight. Thine eyes are lovely and bright, As the rays of my father the Sun. When thy lips ...
— Apu Ollantay - A Drama of the Time of the Incas • Sir Clements R. Markham
... when the glass reached the table it was empty. He then began gradually to unwind his huge woollen comforter, and when he thought himself unobserved, he stole the encumbrance into his ample coat-pocket. He next proceeded to toss about, with a careless abstraction, the large masses ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... Sacred Rubbers, when the grass was damp. He shielded her from over-rough incursions on the part of Susan. He chanted the responses in her Litany of Saint Adrian. He sacrificed his golf so that he could sit near her and hold figurative wool for her to unwind. It was very pretty to watch them. The contrast between them made its unceasing appeal. Besides, Doria did not kick all the time; there were long spells during which, touched by the giant's devotion, she repaid it in tokens of tender regard. At such times she was as fascinating an elf as one could ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke
... searcher safely through the dark recesses of the great labyrinth. He tied it, the dauntless youth in the tale, to the ancient thorn-tree that grew by the cavern's mouth; and then he stepped boldly in, and let it unwind ...
— Escape and Other Essays • Arthur Christopher Benson
... he did was to unwind his long turban from his neck, and cut it in two. Two-thirds he twisted round his waist, the other he made fast to one of the little red stone pillars of the balcony. It hung straight and black down into the shadows of the ...
— The Story of Sonny Sahib • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... and Rube, old Squire Middleton, and the school-master, all except Tall Tom, who stood by the tree to unwind the cable. ...
— The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come • John Fox
... sixteen feet below me, that the eye could trace for a few yards only, beyond which it was lost in the deep gloom surrounding us. Our conductor had already made up his mind what to do: he proceeded to unwind his long narrow turban composed of cotton cloth, and called to his comrades to do the same; by joining these together they formed a kind of rope by means of which we gradually lowered each other, till at last a party ten in number were safely landed ...
— A Peep into Toorkisthhan • Rollo Burslem
... were another lady," she said, "I should swear some gallant had robbed her of it; but, forsooth, she does not allow them to come near enough for such sport, and with five feet of hair wound up in coronals, how could a man unwind a lock, even if 'twas permitted him to stand ...
— A Lady of Quality • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... life before death's hours begin, My eyes are staring, yet their sight is blind. My ears are hollow, yet they hear no sound. My knees are buried and my body sinks. The stars weave fates that they themselves unwind, Traversing the same cycles round and round; While I sit ...
— The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915 • Various
... lingered in the supper chamber, and the gentle Queen, full of sympathy for her favourite, sat in the little ante-room and talked to her of Denmark, and the happy days they had spent there. At last she departed, just as the clock on the tower of St Giles struck twelve, and Margaret was at liberty to unwind the coil of rope, and hide it among the bedclothes, and then, wrapping the warm cloak round her, she lay down and tried to wait quietly until it was safe to do what she ...
— Tales From Scottish Ballads • Elizabeth W. Grierson
... run down the string a distance of eight inches. During the process you will see the wisdom of having rolled the excess string up into little skeins to keep them from being tangled. Thus the upper eye is formed. At this stage unwind your skeins and stretch the string down the bow, untwisting and ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... 1), modified by palms being downward and hand horizontal. From the chest center the hand is then passed spirally forward toward the one addressed; the hand's palm begins the spiral motion with a downward and ends in an upward aspect. (Oto I.) "To unwind or open." ...
— Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples And Deaf-Mutes • Garrick Mallery
... stonily set. They are past the commiseration, the curiosity, or the jeers of their fellow-beings. Years of matrimony, of continuous compulsory canine constitutionals, have made them callous. They unwind their beasts from lamp posts, or the ensnared legs of profane pedestrians, with the stolidity of mandarins manipulating ...
— Sixes and Sevens • O. Henry
... days, and that new order in them—marking the endless train of exercise, development, unwind, in nation as in man, which life is for—we see, fore-indicated, amid these prospects and hopes, new law-forces of spoken and written language—not merely the pedagogue-forms, correct, regular, familiar with precedents, made for matters ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... Amelia, beginning to unwind the visitor's wraps, "what makes you keep houndin' Amos that way? If he hasn't spoke for thirty-five years, it ain't likely ...
— Tiverton Tales • Alice Brown
... shock over, the truth gradually dawned upon him that inasmuch as he had wound himself up, he must possess the ability to unwind himself. All he had to do was to begin at the upper instead of the lower part ...
— The Phantom of the River • Edward S. Ellis
... to us," he replied. "Unwind it, and tie one end to the arrow just above the feathers, and see if you can't shoot ...
— The Island House - A Tale for the Young Folks • F. M. Holmes
... accidentally placed one after another. The generative idea of a poem is developed in thousands of imaginations which are materialized in phrases that spread themselves out in words. And the more we descend from the motionless idea, wound on itself, to the words that unwind it, the more room is left for contingency and choice. Other metaphors, expressed by other words, might have arisen; an image is called up by an image, a word by a word. All these words run now one after ...
— Creative Evolution • Henri Bergson
... their Majesties, the King and Queen, and all the Royal Court." And the pageant began to unwind its sinuous length along the campus lawn, and all the rustic players who formed the rabble fell in behind the royal ...
— Molly Brown's Senior Days • Nell Speed
... life with religion, gathered caste into their garners, and endeavoured to increase and extend it, still there is fair evidence for asserting that these two institutions have no necessary connection, and that, as it was perfectly possible to wind them up together, so it is perfectly possible to unwind them and produce again an entire separation. In a word, it is perfectly possible for a man to retain caste, not as believing it to be part of his native idolatrous religion, but as believing it to be (what it really was till the Brahmins seized hold of it ...
— Gold, Sport, And Coffee Planting In Mysore • Robert H. Elliot
... reach up, slowly unwind the coronal of her tresses, shake them loose, and let them fall like a veil over her ...
— The Moon Pool • A. Merritt
... (query, ammunition?) and professing to be quite ignorant of where they come from; marches of bodies of men across the island; concealment of ditto in the bush; the coming on and off of different chiefs; and such a mass of ravelment and rag-tag as the devil himself could not unwind. ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... begun to unwind herself the instant her attention had been called to Grace Thompson's perilous position at the head of the chute. Hazel Holland also had rolled over to free herself of the blankets. But before either of them had succeeded in getting to her feet, Tommy had taken the long dive, ...
— The Meadow-Brook Girls in the Hills - The Missing Pilot of the White Mountains • Janet Aldridge
... he'll be cuttin' meridians as fast as a hay-chopper? Won't he see the sun gettin' left behind an' whirlin' the other way from what it does in nature? An' ef the sun goes the other way round, ain't it sure to unwind all the time ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye |
