"Deft" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of the hands that had laboured that the soft cheeks and the untroubled eyes of this one woman might be. Into his mind came the face and figure of a little Canadian nurse who had once cared for him through an illness—her quick, deft fingers and her muscular little arms. "Another such as she," he muttered, "has been at work upon the face and body of this gentlewoman; a hunter has gone into the white silence of the north to bring out the warm furs that adorn her; for her there ...
— Windy McPherson's Son • Sherwood Anderson
... you a copy to take away with you,' said Dolly, generously, as she cut out another black head with her deft little hands. 'There, that's for you, Vincent—you won't give ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey
... disease. Thereupon the king summoned the learned men of the House of Life, i.e., the members of the great College of Magic at Thebes, and the qenbetu officials, and when they had entered his presence, he commanded them to select a man of "wise heart and deft fingers" to go to Bekhten. The choice fell upon one Tehuti-em-heb, and His Majesty sent him to Bekhten with the envoy. When they arrived in Bekhten, Tehuti-em-heb found that the Princess Bent-enth-resh was possessed by an evil spirit which ...
— Legends Of The Gods - The Egyptian Texts, edited with Translations • E. A. Wallis Budge
... the rope, and increased the length by a second bandana from his pocket. The rope, manufactured from sled-lashings and short lengths of plaited rawhide knotted together, was both light and strong. The first cast was lucky as well as deft, and Smoke's fingers clutched it. He evidenced a hand-over-hand intention of crawling out of the crack. But Carson, who had refastened the rope around his own waist, ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... rather than plain statement, for a deft waiter was constantly coming in and out, he supplied Hermione with glimpses of his own career, and ascertained from her that she had secured Marcelle's services through the good offices of a lady who was a fellow-passenger ...
— One Wonderful Night - A Romance of New York • Louis Tracy
... me I always did Cousin Catherine's when she wanted to look as beautiful as she felt; and though my hands trembled with nervousness, I not only "ondulated" Lady Turnour's transformation without burning it up, but I added it to her own locks in a manner so deft as to make me want to ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... streets. Bibulous dignitaries sit in council around Governor Alvarado's table. Mexican cigars, wine in old silver flagons (fashioned by the deft workers of Chihuahua and Durango), and carafes of aguadiente, ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage
... "and glad I am to see her again." And with a deft push here and a gentle pull there, she succeeded in getting the ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... before he was thirty—he would have a bachelor apartment with a Jap, Saki. Saki was the perfect servant, noiseless, unobtrusive, expert. He saw little dinners just for four—or, at the most, six. And Saki, white-coated, deft, sliding hot plates when plates should be hot; cold plates when plates should be cold. Then, other evenings, alone, when he wanted to see no one—when, in a silken lounging robe (over faultless dinner ...
— Half Portions • Edna Ferber
... quietly, apart from us. I watched him drink, curiously. He took the cup; then, with a long piece of carved wood, he dipped into the sake, shaking a few drops on the floor to the four quarters. Finally, with a deft sweep, he lifted his heavy mustache with the piece of wood and drank off the ...
— The War Terror • Arthur B. Reeve
... remember for how long she had thought the woman who attended on her a servant. And yet she did think her so until the morning when it suddenly occurred to her that it was not possible any ordinary servant should be so deft and self-contained at once: servants were not so calm—that was it, so calm. Even the best of them were hurried and anxious, and if they were old and valued, they got on one's nerves the more: one had to consider them. Of ...
— The Strange Cases of Dr. Stanchon • Josephine Daskam Bacon
... deft hand at the job. No sound had escaped the Missourian, from the moment the stranglingly tight left arm had been thrown around his throat from behind until, a second later, he ...
— Bruce • Albert Payson Terhune
... with emphatic assurance. "That's my man's. I saw him making it—he's as deft with his fingers, at that sort of thing, as he is at cooking. And since this cap is his, and as he's not amongst the lot there on deck, he's the man that you, Middlebrook, saw escaping in the boat. And since he is that man, I ...
— Ravensdene Court • J. S. (Joseph Smith) Fletcher
... who maketh moan so sweet Over his brood belike or nest-mate dear, So deft and tender are his notes to hear, That fields and skies are with delight replete; And all night long he seems with me to treat, And my hard lot recall unto my ear. ...
— The Development of the Feeling for Nature in the Middle Ages and - Modern Times • Alfred Biese
... The word 'waiter' suggests a soft-voiced, deft-handed being, moving swiftly and without noise in an atmosphere of luxury and shaded lamps. At Bredin's Parisian Cafe and Restaurant in Soho, where Paul worked, there were none of these things; and Paul himself, though he certainly moved swiftly, was by ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... who read 'A Maker of History' will revel in the plot, and will enjoy all those numerous deft touches of actuality that have gone to make the story genuinely interesting ...
— The White Lie • William Le Queux
... bred to virtue by eighteen years of political penury. It entered upon its tasks with vigor, ability and enthusiasm. It had its policies well defined and it set briskly about carrying them out. A deft, shrewd modification of the tariff helped to loosen the stream of commerce which after years of constriction began again to flow freely. There was a courageous and considered increase in expenditures for productive ...
— Laurier: A Study in Canadian Politics • J. W. Dafoe
... as valet did not apparently include giving him his bath by sheer physical force. He was deft, calm, amenable. He led Tembarom down the corridor to the bath-room, revealed to him stores of sumptuous bath-robes and towels, hot- and cold-water faucets, sprays, and tonic essences. He forgot nothing and, having prepared all, mutely vanished, and returned to the bedroom to wait—and gaze in troubled ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... mother was not idle. With the deft fingers of a woman she was lifting and laying out the handsome uniforms one ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Lieutenants - or, Serving Old Glory as Line Officers • H. Irving Hancock
... little, Regnar gave a deft whirl, which cast off the bight from the rock, and the party, dragging behind them their prize, retraced their path amid what soon became a blinding snow-squall. Luckily their track had been through deep snow, and therefore not easily covered up; for when they reached their own island of refuge, ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall
... them as much as possible she used, as soon as she left school, to lend a hand at haymaking or harvesting on neighbouring farms; or, by preference, at milking or butter-making processes, which she had learnt when her father had owned cows; and being deft-fingered it was a kind of work ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... his peril, happily outlived! How her heart trembled and her strong young limbs shook as she lived over in breathless agony the crisis of that night! He had carried her glove in his bonnet—she remembered the deft little movement of stowing it there just the moment before he bent and flashed away among the shadows. Excuse enough for ...
— The Rustler of Wind River • G. W. Ogden
... was afterwards so characteristic of her conversation. For those who remember their own youthful feelings, even the stiff occasional scraps of poetry she wrote at this time glow with a life not always discernible in the deft writing ...
— Lady John Russell • Desmond MacCarthy and Agatha Russell
... special features and claims. The word means skilful, deft. The movement was organised in Sweden a quarter of a century ago as an effort to prevent the extinction by machinery of peasant home industry during the long winter night. Home sloyd was installed in an institution of its own for training teachers at Naeaes. It works in wood only, with little ...
— Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall
... office-holders, priests, saloon-keepers—in short, the whole range and gamut of active, subtle, political life. From McKenty they could obtain that counsel, wisdom, surety, solution which all of them on occasion were anxious to have, and which in one deft way and another—often by no more than gratitude and an acknowledgment of his leadership—they were willing to pay for. To police captains and officers whose places he occasionally saved, when they should justly have been discharged; to mothers whose erring boys or girls he took out of prison and ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... beach of the little secret cove and made their final preparations for the march. These merely consisted in loading the indispensable baggage of the party upon the mules; and as this work was performed by the deft hands of the Cimarrones, twenty minutes sufficed for the accomplishment of the task, when the expedition at once started, taking the way, in the first instance, ...
— The Cruise of the Nonsuch Buccaneer • Harry Collingwood
... while he made close examination. At the base of Mr. Kenny's neck, well above the shoulder-blade, dark blood was welling slowly from an ugly puncture. And in front there was a corresponding puncture, but smaller. And presently his deft and gentle fingers, exploring the folds of the boy's undershirt, closed ...
— The Day of Days - An Extravaganza • Louis Joseph Vance
... Lincoln, by deft touches which reveal a literary taste beyond that of any statesman of his time, indeed beyond that which he himself had yet exhibited, transformed this passage into his peroration. His emendations were largely ...
— The Poets' Lincoln - Tributes in Verse to the Martyred President • Various
... that I sat often and conned my book by the window, long after I knew my portion by heart, in order to watch her deft fingers upon the dulcimer sticks and the play of her dimples. But on my part also this was in all innocence and ...
— Red Axe • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... Persian rugs, which had only arrived from London the night before, on the dark polished boards. For Diana, there were two joys connected with the old house: the joy of entering in, a stranger and conqueror, on its guarded and matured beauty, and the joy of adding to that beauty by a deft modernness. Very deft, and tender, and skilful it must be. But no one could say that time-worn Persian rugs, with their iridescent blue and greens and rose reds—or old Italian damask and cut-velvet from Genoa, or Florence, or Venice—were ...
— The Testing of Diana Mallory • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Mr. Insull wears his Chicago as a shirt front. But most of us have parted company with the town. It is a background designed and marvelously executed for our conveniences. The great metronomes of the loop with their million windows, the deft crisscross of streets, the utilitarian miracles of plumbing, doorways, heating systems and passenger carriers—these are monuments ...
— A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago • Ben Hecht
... resembled lithe Malay children of whom he had seen photographs. At all events, they were natural tree climbers. They made the most daring leaps from frail branches. They sprung from twigs that broke in their deft grasp, but not until they had secured the purchase they aimed at in the act to send them flying through the air to some other perilous point in view. Their feats were fairly bewildering, and as one landed on the ground like a rubber ball and the other chased him out of sight ...
— Ralph on the Overland Express - The Trials and Triumphs of a Young Engineer • Allen Chapman
... for all its gaiety, a certain external quality of pathos (now that the German is to us so sinister a figure) in much of The Pastor's Wife (SMITH, ELDER) with its types of an East Prussian village drawn in with those deft, half kindly, half malicious touches to which the creatrix of Elizabeth of the Garden has accustomed us. Ingeborg is the daughter of an English bishop—a bishop, by the way, so needlessly odious that even those who would cheerfully believe the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, October 28, 1914 • Various
... always spotlessly clean—he was the cleanest-looking man I ever saw—were really rather extraordinary. They looked at first sight clumsy, and even limp; but he was unusually deft and adroit with his fingers, and his touch on plants, in gardening, his tying of strings—he liked doing up parcels—was very quick and delicate. He was fond of all sorts of little puzzles, toys of wood and metal, which had to be fitted together; ...
— Father Payne • Arthur Christopher Benson
... scream, the reel shrilled out, and the fish took nearly a hundred feet of line, but the angler held the brake so hard that the strain rapidly exhausted the fish, and when it turned toward the boat, the professor's deft fingers reeled at such a speed that the line wound in almost as rapidly as the rush of the fish. As soon as the salmon saw the boat it tried to break away, but its captor had caught a glimpse of the fish, and seeing that it was not too ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... in residence, the collection of Baron Steengracht in one of the ample white mansions on the Vyverberg. Most interesting of the pictures to me are Jan Steen's family group, which, however, for all its wonderful drawing, is not in his most interesting manner; a very deft Metsu, "The Sick Child"; a horse by Albert Cuyp; a characteristic group of convivial artists by Adrian Brouwer, including Hals, Ostade, Jan Steen and the painter himself; and—best of all—Terburg's wholly charming "Toilette," an old woman combing ...
— A Wanderer in Holland • E. V. Lucas
... came a frugal matron, neat and deft, With cheerful morning thoughts and quick device To ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... and children at once set to work to build a "house" to protect us in case it rained during the nights. Very quickly was the house built. The "devil" was sent up the cocos to lop off branches, which, as they fell, were woven into thatch by the deft, eager hands of the women, who were supervised by Sivi, Nalik's handsome wife, amid much chatter and laughter, each one trying to outvie the other in speed, and all anxious to follow Nalik ...
— "Martin Of Nitendi"; and The River Of Dreams - 1901 • Louis Becke
... charge of the abalone dishes, Herbert, formerly chef for one of the yacht clubs of the coast, who claims to have the only proper recipe for making abalone's tender. Under ordinary circumstances the abalone is tough and unpalatable, but after the deft manipulation of Herbert they are tender and make a fine dish, either fried, as chowder or a la Newberg. In addition to abalone's the Hof Brau makes a specialty of little Oregon crawfish. While there is a distinctive German atmosphere at the Rathskeller of the German House, the place is too far ...
— Bohemian San Francisco - Its restaurants and their most famous recipes—The elegant art of dining. • Clarence E. Edwords
... Salvador was a capitalist, and the abstract thought soon took the concrete form of a great square plastered building wherein a couple of hundred of his swarthy countrymen worked with deft nimble fingers at a rate of pay which no English artisan could have accepted. Within a few months the result of this new competition was an abrupt fall of prices in the trade, which was serious for the largest firms ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... our Abel took his father's place. At office first he showed his face; Then to the work-yard: thus his father he beguiled. Spite of his slender mien, he worked and always smiled. He was as deft as workmen twain; he dressed The stones, and in the mortar then he pressed The heavy blocks; the workmen found him cheerful. Mounting the ladder like a bird: He skipped across the rafters fearful. He smiled as he ascended, smiled as he descended— The very masons trembled at his ...
— Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist • Samuel Smiles
... fernlike seclusion which enveloped the women of the Hawthorne household when this note was opened and read. Squirrels aroused, owls awakened, foxes startled, would have sympathized. Louisa, the only really active member of the trio, wonderfully deft in finest sewing and embroidery, generously willing to labor for all the relatives when illness required, may not have felt faint or fierce. But Mrs. Hawthorne, even in the covert of her chamber, where she chiefly resided, no doubt drew back; and Elizabeth's beautiful eyes must have shone superbly. ...
— Memories of Hawthorne • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop
... Occidental points of view, and has developed a personal art out of a deliberately narrowed vision. "On the Heights," "Prisoners," "Under a Wineglass," and "Cosmic Justice" are the best of these stories. So definite a propagandist aim is usually fatal to fiction, but Miss La Motte succeeds by deft suggestion rather ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... might be said to have dedicated his being to the pursuit of leisure, that selfsame was Red Hoss Shackleford, of color, and highly so. He was one who specialized in the deft and fine high art of doing nothing at all. With him leisure was at once a calling to be followed regularly and an ideal to be fostered. But also he loved to eat, and he had a fancy for wearing gladsome gearings, and these cravings ...
— Sundry Accounts • Irvin S. Cobb
... cold, crisp air. Martin found it rather pleasant to watch her brisk movements as she prepared the delayed meal. He observed, with something of a mental start, that today, at least, she still had more than a little of the old sumptuous, full-blown quality. It reminded him, together with the deft way in which she hurried, without haste, without flurry, of their first evening in the shack, nearly seven years ago. How tense they both had been, how afraid of each other, how she had irritated him! Well, he had grown accustomed to her at last, thanks be. Was he, perhaps, ...
— Dust • Mr. and Mrs. Haldeman-Julius
... deft hand she re-arranged the disordered folds of her dress. There was a faint flush under her eyes ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio
... By great good fortune I have found a housekeeper no less to my mind, a low-voiced, light-footed woman of discreet age, strong and deft enough to render me all the service I require, and not afraid of solitude. She rises very early. By my breakfast-time there remains little to be done under the roof save dressing of meals. Very rarely do I hear even a clink of crockery; ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing
... earth he made, An image of the teacher wise, So deft he laid, the light and shade, On figure, forehead, face and eyes, That any one who chanced to view That image tall might soothly swear, If he great Dronacharjya knew, The teacher in his flesh ...
— Ancient Ballads and Legends of Hindustan • Toru Dutt
... Paris,—the people, men as well as women, who came in for their cakes or syrop, the eagle-eyed Madame perched high at the comptoir, holding the entire business in her competent hand, and all the deft girls in their black dresses, nimbly serving, "Oui, Madame! Voici, Monsieur! Que desirez-vous?" etc. She admired the neat glass trays of tempting sweets, the round jars of bonbons, the colored liqueurs, the neat little marble-topped tables. Apparently ...
— One Woman's Life • Robert Herrick
... various chords, whose concert was necessary to its harmonious action. Although it was true, as Nelson said, that Paul was the trunk of the many-limbed tree, it was yet more true that Bonaparte's deft cajoling of the Czar, and the inducements astutely suggested by him to Prussia, were the vitalizing forces which animated the two principal parties in the coalition, in whose wake the weaker states were dragged. Through the former he hoped to effect a combination of the Baltic navies against the ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. II. (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... habit of dropping in at the house next door on baking day, for the woman of that house had a deft way in the making of cookies, and Ted had no hesitation in enjoying her hospitality, even to the extent of asking for cookies if ...
— Jokes For All Occasions - Selected and Edited by One of America's Foremost Public Speakers • Anonymous
... a clever man—keen, genial, subtle, two-edged, a gentlemanly and not thorough disciple of Machiavel; able to lead parliamentary forlorn hopes and plant flags on breaches, or to cover retreats with brilliant skirmishing; deft, but never deep; much moved too by the opinions of his permanent staff. These on the night in question had plied him well with hackneyed objections; but to see him get up and relieve himself of them—the air of originality, the really original ...
— Ginx's Baby • Edward Jenkins
... obtaining for a favour. 'Twas a satisfaction to me that my rustic friend departed without it. He was no sooner gone than I came near and perched myself on the arm of a chair beside the girl. For a minute I sat watching in silence the deft movements of the firm brown hands in which were both delicacy ...
— A Daughter of Raasay - A Tale of the '45 • William MacLeod Raine
... her ungrateful and ungracious patient, to repeat her ministrations to the Frenchman. The mucker read in her expression something of the wound his words had inflicted, and he lay thinking upon the matter for some time, watching her deft, white fingers as they worked over the ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... speaking rapidly. It was one of those occasions in which Kennedy's soul delighted. Quickly he drew a deft contrast between the infinitely large hulk of the Usona as compared to the infinitely small bacteria which he had been studying the day before. Suddenly he drew forth from his pocket the bullet that had been fired at Marlowe, ...
— The Treasure-Train • Arthur B. Reeve
... Nor human humours only; who so tender Of touch when sunny Nature out-of-door Wooed his deft pencil? Who like him could render Meadow or ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann
... foreseeing things to come. They were much given to spells, and songs of wizardry, and were very mindful of the old story-lays, wherein they were far more wordy than in their daily speech. Much skill had they in runes, and were exceeding deft in scoring them on treen bowls, and on staves, and door-posts and roof- beams and standing-beds and such like things. Many a day when the snow was drifting over their roofs, and hanging heavy on the tree- boughs, and the wind was roaring through the trees aloft and rattling ...
— The Roots of the Mountains • William Morris
... he heard anything sweeter than her laughter as she turned suddenly from him, so that the glow of the fallen sun was at her back, and with deft, swift fingers began loosening the coils of her hair until its radiant masses tumbled about her, streaming down her back in a silken glory that awed him with its beauty and drew from his lips a cry ...
— The Alaskan • James Oliver Curwood
... over those shoulders, murmuring words of comfort, earnestly promising to never sin again in like manner, provided he could find forgiveness now. And then, with deft touch, that same hand held his garment far enough for its mate to let slip a wriggling trout adown his ...
— The Lost City • Joseph E. Badger, Jr.
... the best, and was as pious as she was deft, never omitting to throw the Sabbath dough in the fire. Not that her prowess as a cook had much opportunity, for our principal fare was corn-bread, mixed with bran and sour cabbage and red beets, which lay stored on the floor in tubs. Here we all lived together—my ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... a second time, and Penrose's foil is flung across the room to left. Marsh is about to crash the candelabrum on Richard's sword, when Richard, with a deft movement, seizes it and hurls it to the floor, where it falls with a dull clatter. Marsh, discomfited, turns to Penrose, who has picked up his fallen sword, and is ...
— Patriotic Plays and Pageants for Young People • Constance D'Arcy Mackay
... "Besides he's deft and wondrous airy, And of the noblest of the fairy! Chiefe of the Crickets of much fame In fairy ...
— Old English Plays, Vol. I - A Collection of Old English Plays • Various
... he watches another expert digger which has a sharp-edged shovel affixed to the end of each of its eight legs, and is so deft in their use that it disappears in the sand on the instant of detection, without visible effort, and almost as quickly as ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield
... family all the days in the year that can be spared from the school. Aside from the ploughing, the labor is light. Pruning, grafting, budding, the picking of the grapes, the gathering of the fruit from the trees, the sorting, packing, and canning, are labor for light and deft hands, and labor distributed through the year. The harvest, of one sort and another, is almost continuous, so that young girls and boys can have, in well-settled districts, pretty steady employment—a long season in establishments packing ...
— Our Italy • Charles Dudley Warner
... hand and found a small flat jewelled case in the folds of his turban, and opening it, with the long, deft fingers took out ...
— Leonie of the Jungle • Joan Conquest
... or design to be made in mosaic is first carefully drawn on paper, and then colored, and the worker in mosaic is supposed simply to follow copy. When you visit the glass-factories of Venice today, you see the painted picture tacked up on the wall before the workmen, who with deft fingers stick the bits of glass into their beds of putty. This scheme of painting a pattern is in order that cheap help can be employed; when it began we do not know, but we do know there was a time when the great ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 4 (of 14) - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Painters • Elbert Hubbard
... obediently shipped his oars; with a deft twist of one oar, Murphy straightened the boat and shot neatly in alongside the submarine, the deck of which was less than three feet above the water. As Cappy Ricks had anticipated, the men on that deck promptly snagged the boat at bow and stern ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... as the throstle's note; Quick in dance as thought can be; Deft his tabor, cudgel stout, Oh, he ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... had the coach been so suave, so kindly, so magnetic. He called Homans and Raymond and Weir and others who were in the house at the moment and stated Ken's case. His speech flowed smooth and rapid. The matter under his deft argument lost serious proportions. But it seemed to Ken that Worry did not tell the boys the whole truth, or they would not have laughed at the thing and made him out over-sensitive. And Ken was ...
— The Young Pitcher • Zane Grey
... greatly Froude and Emerson would be enhanced gifted with graciousness. Goldsmith, even in his own day, was acknowledged the best of the essay writers. This is the realm in which he was, and is to this day, king. From his love of poetry and happiness in his art, and that shining in the power of deft and delightful expression, there is another sphere in which it would be expected that his power would prevail, but in which he had either no actual talent or very little. However we may admire The Haunch of Venison and other stray ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • E. S. Lang Buckland
... certain crispness of dialogue, and deft arrangement of the events of a good plot, Mr. Carlton Dawe has ...
— Berry And Co. • Dornford Yates
... vigorous outdoor life. He was an ardent sportsman, and he spent much of his time in the woods and fields, fishing, riding, walking, hunting. He had a special relish for gardening and for photography, and he liked to undertake laborious jobs in carpentry, at which he was quite deft. That his feeling for the things of the natural world was acutely sensitive and coloured by imagination and emotion is abundantly evidenced in his music. He was fond of taking long, leisurely drives and rides through the rich and varied ...
— Edward MacDowell • Lawrence Gilman
... deft disentanglement of a complicated idea, Rankin, who, like the professional juryman, wagged his head in agreement with each speaker and was convinced by the most violent, gazed ...
— Murder in Any Degree • Owen Johnson
... supper together in a renewal of the pleasant intimacy so delightful to both. He lay on the lounge, propped up with sofa cushions, the while he watched her deft fingers butter the toast and prepare his egg. It was surely worth while to be a convalescent, given so sweet a comrade for a nurse; and after he had moved over to the table he enjoyed immensely the gay firmness with which she denied him what ...
— Wyoming, a Story of the Outdoor West • William MacLeod Raine
... entered upon the warm welcome that waited at Saint John's-in-the-Wilderness, and was still wondering at the homelike cosiness which the mission house had assumed under the deft hands of the two ladies who occupied it, when there came an Indian with word of a white man he had found starving in the wilderness fifteen miles away. Another native with a dog team and a supply of immediate food was hastily despatched to bring the man in, and that night the poor ...
— Ten Thousand Miles with a Dog Sled - A Narrative of Winter Travel in Interior Alaska • Hudson Stuck
... hopes and ambitions they have remained true to their caste and handed down from generation to generation the secret of that gracious urbanity and tact which distinguished the Gallic noblewoman in the last century from the rest of her kind and made her so deft in the difficult art ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory
... with many fair ladies, there were none who were entitled to know my secrets. Also it became known that I had some skill in my art of healing, and it was said among the ladies of Seville that there lived no man in that city so deft at clearing the skin of blemishes or changing the colour of the hair as old Fonseca's nephew, and as any one may know this reputation alone was worth a fortune. Thus it came about that I was more and more consulted ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard
... of the United States, has received word of his nomination; has left Princeton, and is now on his way to the Convention." Excellent stage work. The voice of the secretary making this dramatic statement was the voice of Jacob, but the deft hand behind this clever move was that of Colonel Harvey. This announcement literally sets the Convention on fire. Bedlam breaks loose. The only sullen and indifferent ones in the hall are those of us who met defeat a few hours before. ...
— Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him • Joseph P. Tumulty
... the appeal, for the mother with deft fingers quickly secured the shutter as before; and but for the lamp, all would ...
— Brave Tom - The Battle That Won • Edward S. Ellis
... Something visible or something invisible? Something which gave warning of attack, or something which struck in silence. He found himself gazing long and earnestly at this man's hand, and wondering if death lay under it. It was a strong hand, a deft, clean-cut member, formed to respond to the slightest hint from the powerful brain controlling it. But was this its whole story. Had he said all when he had ...
— Initials Only • Anna Katharine Green
... With a deft touch and no apparent violence the Indian succeeded in getting the locked jaws apart, and Escombe promptly availed himself of the opportunity to pour about a tablespoonful of spirits into the partially open mouth. ...
— Harry Escombe - A Tale of Adventure in Peru • Harry Collingwood
... turning back to go round fallen trunks and swampy places, so that we really walk three or four times the distance to Hog Harbour. Our guide uses his bush-knife steadily and to good purpose: he sees where the creepers interlace and which branch is the chief hindrance, and in a few deft cuts the tangle falls. ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser
... already had happened? If so, the Stannard dinner stood ready to replace it, even though she and her captain had to fall back on what could be borrowed from the troop kitchen. No, the oven door was open, the precious chickens, brown, basted and done to a turn, were waiting Suey's deft hands to shift them to the platter. (No need to heat it even on a December day.) Mrs. Stannard's quick and comprehensive glance took in every detail. The "stick" was obviously figurative—mere vernacular—yet something ...
— Tonio, Son of the Sierras - A Story of the Apache War • Charles King
... pathetic when I saw him mixing his flour for a damper, and in the cunning twists and wriggling by which the fingers freed each other of the sticky dough and other dextrous manipulations, I soon came to recognise that with his left hand he was as deft as many men with their right and left. He had sailed the boat ladened with wire netting and heavy goods from Bowen, 200 miles south, and was on his way to his selection, 100 miles further north. A wiry, slight man though a real "shellback," one who ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... could not, would not kill her; she was too valuable to them. There was the chance of escape and new strength in the belief that she could in some way outwit them; there was a vast difference between the woman who suffered herself to be put to bed by the deft, kindly maid, and the one who dragged herself hopelessly into the room such a short time before. With the growth of hope and determination there came the courage to inspect ...
— Castle Craneycrow • George Barr McCutcheon
... lashes and drooping lids. Dr. Anstruther attached no significance to this trait, doubtless a habit of modest reserve acquired in her profession. He had himself recommended the woman to Mrs. Jones, having frequently employed her on other cases and found her deft, skillful and thoroughly reliable. Janet Orme's signature to the will he regarded as satisfactory, since Judge Bernsted had ...
— Mary Louise Solves a Mystery • L. Frank Baum
... and with a few deft manipulations that proved the truth of his assertion that he could run a car, managed to head the machine once more toward Columbia. Neither of the men seemed to notice just what he was doing. The one who had appeared to Frank first was bending down over ...
— The Boys of Columbia High on the Gridiron • Graham B. Forbes
... women of Troy, being deft with the oar one and all, took the places of the men left behind in the woods, and, singing yet, brought both the long-boats and these other boats safely to Lerryn on the full flood of the tide, and disembarking upon the meadow there, gathered around the tables under the apple-trees to eat bread ...
— The Mayor of Troy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... the product of the women's deft fingers, stood near the gates. At one side was a long shed devoted to the display of farm produce, and the homely place was beautiful with scarlet apples, golden pumpkins, cabbages opening like great, pale-green roses, and heaps of purple grapes and plums. Opposite ...
— Treasure Valley • Marian Keith
... the queen bade of craftsmen deft at large to seek the skilfullest, the most curious and cunning to work structures of stone;— upon that chosen site God's temple to grace as the Guarder of souls gave her rede from on high. She the Rood hight with gold to inlay and the glory of ...
— Anglo-Saxon Literature • John Earle
... almost beyond my power of self-control. Once I felt for the miniature, took it out, and put it back without looking at it. At last I was startled to my feet by the opening of the door, and Madame de Montmery came in. She closed the door softly behind her, with the deft quickness and decision of movement which a sixth sense had told me she possessed, crossed the room swiftly, and stood ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... girl's restless mind, cleared of its anger, its doubts and its doles, came back to rest upon the handsome, humorous, refined face of young Dr. Serviss. She felt again the touch of his deft, strong hands, and heard again the tender cadence of his voice as he said: "I hope you are not in pain? We will release you very soon." She dwelt long upon the final scene at the table, when, with a jesting ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland
... hear how these deft and cunning masters of the wood and the water circumvented the well laid plans of evil men and cooeperated with their brother scouts in a good scout stunt, which brought fame to the quiet camp community in ...
— Tom Slade on Mystery Trail • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... Then gave the King commands to call the prince. He came with smiling face and graceful bows. "Sit here beside us," said the King, and all The three dined there together, royal ones, Surrounded by deft servants and dyangs. They chatted gayly, and, with laughter, ate. When all was finished, from the betel-box The King of siri took, perfumed himself, ...
— Malayan Literature • Various Authors
... joined Uncle Peter and Mary Louise in watching the boy attach the tires, which were on demountable rims and soon put in place. All were surprised at Bub's sudden exhibition of energy and his deft movements, for he worked with the assurance ...
— Mary Louise • Edith van Dyne (one of L. Frank Baum's pen names)
... new plants. Always beware of buying old, dry roots, as they will sometimes refuse to grow, even if they look green and fresh. With many, in cutting, the practice is to cut clear through at the bottom, string and all, then by a deft movement of the hands the smilax is slipped from the string which, with the addition of a foot or two to tie again, is at once ready for the next, while others bring to market string and all, these being simply matters of ...
— Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 3, January 19, 1884. - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside • Various
... couplet, in which the fabliaux were without exception or with hardly an exception composed, can, in a long story, become very tiresome because of its want of weight and grasp, and the temptations it offers to a weak rhymester to stuff it with endless tags. But for a short tale in deft hands it can apply its lightness in the best fashion, and put its points with no lack of sting. The fabliau-writer or reciter was not required—one imagines that he would have found scant audiences if he had tried it—to spin a long yarn; he ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... piled high with steaming white dishes. They swung corners in grand free sweeps, the trays tilted far sideways to balance centrifugal force; they charged the swinging doors at full speed, and when Bobby held his breath in anticipation of the crash, something deft and mysterious happened at the hem of their black skirts and the doors flew open as though commanded by a magic shibboleth. They were tall and short, slender and stout, dark and light, but they had these things in common—they all dressed ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White
... about, taking up such few Romans as had been able to keep afloat; but Drusus was too exhausted to give them further heed. He realized that the vessel he was aboard was no member of the Roman squadron, that its crew were neither Caesarians nor Alexandrians. Deft hands aided him off with his water-soaked clothing, and placed bandages on his bruises and cuts. A beaker of spiced wine, the like of which he had never drunk before, sent a thrill of reinvigorated life through his ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... always a joy to Meg and Jan that whatever poor Fay might have left undone in the matter of disciplining her children, she had at least taught them to eat nicely. Little Fay's management of a spoon was a joy to watch. The dimpled baby hand was so deft, the turn of the plump wrist so sure and purposeful. She never spilled or slopped her food about. Its journey from bowl to little red mouth was calculated and assured. Both children had a horror of anything sticky, and would refuse jam unless it was ...
— Jan and Her Job • L. Allen Harker
... of the dance Johnnie adjusted her costume with the nice skill and care which seem native to so many of the daughters of America. Mandy, dressing at the same bureau, scraggled the parting of her own hair, furtively watching the deft arranging of Johnnie's. ...
— The Power and the Glory • Grace MacGowan Cooke
... march was followed by a halt, when we were ordered to draw well into the left of the road to let the company guns go by. Dark-nosed and cold, they wheeled past, the horses sweating as they strained at the carriage shafts; the drivers, by deft handling, pulling the steeds clear of the ruts; out in front they swung, and the battalion closed up and resumed ...
— The Amateur Army • Patrick MacGill
... in the costumes pertaining to their orders, but in many cases would wear jewels of almost inestimable value, my presence was desired in the belief that I might perhaps be able to ward off any attempt on the part of the deft-handed gentry who might possibly make an effort to gain these treasures, and I may add, with perhaps some little self-gratification, ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr
... tills temper, sirs, Mood it and brood it in your breast— Or if ye ween, for worldly stirs. That man does right to mar his rest, Let me be deft and debonair, I am content, I do ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 348, December 27, 1828 • Various
... some fixing just the same," declared Barbara as the Indian woman entered the room carrying warm water, towels and bandages. While the young woman bent over the engineer and with firm, deft fingers removed the wrappings from his shoulder, carefully cleansed the wound and applied fresh dressing and clean bandages, he watched her face, so near his own, and wondered that he had ever ...
— The Winning of Barbara Worth • Harold B Wright
... an entertaining half-hour with them, but they will be glad we are gone. Here comes Krishna, the deft handed, to pack sketches and all; I must supervise him, and see that he does not pack my cousin's soap, matches, and pieces of string along with his increasing collection of these articles in a ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... correct yachting costume was an adept in boat handling, as she seemed to be in everything else; and when the sandy bottom was fairly yellowing under the Clytie's counter, there was a quick juggling of the tiller, a deft haul at the sheet, and the big main-sail filled slowly to the rippling song of the little seas splitting themselves upon ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... the Indian camp, and Tirzah bought some baskets which they see the Indians make right before their eyes out of the long bright strips of willow. And I spoze, seein' the brown deft fingers weavin' their gay patterns, Tirzah Ann wuz carried back some distance into the land of romance and Cooper's novels, and "Lo the Poor Indian" Stories. She's ...
— Samantha at Coney Island - and a Thousand Other Islands • Marietta Holley
... only for those born To skins of whiter tint, and hence with grasp Of firmer structure, built by kindly Time, Who fashioned us in more ennobled mold; While power divine to cap the climax grand, With hand so deft, gave it its final touch. These men with vision faint who planned so vain Knew not the knightly thought bred in the south. The north winds chill and stunt the subtle power Which flourishes alone 'neath ...
— 'A Comedy of Errors' in Seven Acts • Spokeshave (AKA Old Fogy)
... the cushions, with the rocks at their backs. Edna took her work, a linen cover for her bureau, which she was embroidering exquisitely. Her deft little fingers accomplished really beautiful work, and she loved to ...
— Cricket at the Seashore • Elizabeth Westyn Timlow
... talking yesterday with the detective that ferreted him out. The plunder they found in my little room was perfectly primitive. He had practically no tools to make the cleverest counterfeits in years. A deft hand and a wonderful thumb ...
— Jewel Weed • Alice Ames Winter
... cup of tea, while I smoked, admiring much the deft neatness of the minister's housekeeping, and the gentle, almost motherly, ...
— Black Rock • Ralph Connor
... you. How can he know what is inside of your head if you always shut up like a clam whenever he comes near you? This is the way that you ought to be." She shot one of the great white grains towards him with a deft flip of her thumb and finger. "Be ...
— The Gate of the Giant Scissors • Annie Fellows Johnston
... among these willows sat Silent and his companions. A fifth member had just arrived at this rendezvous, answered the quiet greeting with a wave of his hand, and was now busy caring for his horse. Bill Kilduff, who had a natural inclination and talent for cookery, raked up the deft dying coals of the fire over which he had cooked the supper, and set about preparing bacon and coffee for the newcomer. The latter came forward, and squatted close to the cook, watching the process with a careful eye. He made ...
— The Untamed • Max Brand
... and shining things to pass, With delicate, deft fingers that are learned In ways of silverware and cup and glass, Arrayed in ordered patterns, trimly turned;— And never guesses how this subtle ease Is older than the oldest tale we tell, This gift that ...
— Ships in Harbour • David Morton
... the freshers as they row To and fro, Up and down the Lower River for an afternoon or so— (For the deft manipulation Of the never-resting oar, Though it lead to approbation, Will induce excoriation)— They are infinitely sore, Keeping time, time, time In a sort of Runic rhyme Up and down the way to Iffley in an afternoon or so; ...
— Green Bays. Verses and Parodies • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... a while between the two brothers, so serious a climax did we seem to have reached. But the Master had resumed his occupation, his eyes lowered, his hand seemingly as deft as ever; and I decided ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. XII (of 25) - The Master of Ballantrae • Robert Louis Stevenson
... hope while he is working; and also by giving it work to do in which there is absolute immediate pleasure. Perhaps it is difficult to explain to the non-artistic capacity that this definite sensuous pleasure is always present in the handiwork of the deft workman when he is working successfully, and that it increases in proportion to the freedom and individuality of the work. Also you must understand that this production of art, and consequent pleasure in work, is not confined to the production of matters which are works of ...
— Signs of Change • William Morris
... figure, also the letters and star. The edges must be secure or else the wind would soon play havoc with the flag, so stitch after stitch was taken and everything was thoroughly hemmed and carefully fastened. I was no stranger to the needle, and my deft fingers flew over these letters and hemmed in the corners, so that when it was finished and pressed they looked as though they were woven upon the cloth. I was a whole month stitching and hemming the different ...
— Sixty Years of California Song • Margaret Blake-Alverson
... needs repairing, but sailors must be able to keep every part of their house in perfect order; and there is always something to be done. But we are lazy; we toil not, neither do we tar ropes, and our main business is to get up a thoroughly good appetite while we watch the deft sailor-men going about their business. It is my belief that a landsman might spend a month without a tedious hour, if he would only take the trouble to watch everything that the men do and find out why it is done. Ages on ages ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman
... split his foot open with an ax, they lived so far in the country they couldn't get a physician every time it needed attention, and her kind, brave mamma undertook to dress the wound herself every morning. She would let the deft little fingers squeeze a sponge full of tepid water over the cut as many times as it was necessary, then hold the scissors and bandages, and help in other ways. And old Squire said the tender, compassionate little face "ho'ped 'im as much as ...
— That Old-Time Child, Roberta • Sophie Fox Sea
... roundel hung on a pole which the old thrall had dight. Men were peaceful and happy, for the time was fair and calm, and, as aforesaid, they dreaded not the Roman Host any more than if they were Gods dwelling in God-home. The shooters were deft men, and they of the Burg were curious to note their deftness, and many were breathed with the games wherein they had striven, and thought it good to rest, and look on the new sport: so they sat and stood on the grass about the shooters on three sides, and the mead-horn went briskly from ...
— The House of the Wolfings - A Tale of the House of the Wolfings and All the Kindreds of the Mark Written in Prose and in Verse • William Morris |
