"Feat" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... light in the eye of the Irishman. I observed him narrowly—expectantly. Often I had read of this phenomenal art of improvised ballad-singing, but had always remained a little skeptical in regard to the possibility of such a feat. Even in the notable instances of this gift as displayed by the very clever Theodore Hook, I had always half suspected some prior preparation—some adroit forecasting of the sequence that seemed the instant inspiration of ...
— Pipes O'Pan at Zekesbury • James Whitcomb Riley
... monstrous lady whose adventures in the wildernes Phelps was fond of relating. She was built some thing on the plan of the mountains, and her ambition to explore was equal to her size. Phelps and the other guides once succeeded in raising her to the top of Marcy; but the feat of getting a hogshead of molasses up there would have been easier. In attempting to give us an idea of her magnitude that night, as we sat in the forest camp, Phelps hesitated a moment, while he cast his eye around the woods: "Waal, ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... much abstractionism. Abstractionism of the worst sort dogs Mr. Russell in his own trials to tell positively what the word 'truth' means. In the third of his articles on Meinong, in Mind, vol. xiii, p. 509 (1904), he attempts this feat by limiting the discussion to three terms only, a proposition, its content, and an object, abstracting from the whole context of associated realities in which such terms are found in every case of actual knowing. He puts the terms, thus taken in a vacuum, and ...
— The Meaning of Truth • William James
... had done the trick, he came up to Ciabhan, that was beyond all the Men of Dea or the Sons of the Gael that were in the house, in shape and in walk and in name, and he put the nine rods in his hand. And Ciabhan stood up and he did the feat before them all, the same as if he had never learned to ...
— Gods and Fighting Men • Lady I. A. Gregory
... the storm, the wind that took voices and whirled them high and away, the thunder above and the volleying musketry below, to hear an order was about the most difficult feat imaginable. Stafford gathered, however, that Lawton, commanding since Ewell's wound, was sending him to Jackson with a statement as to affairs on this wing. He went, riding hard against the slanting rain, and found Jackson standing in the middle of the road, a piece of bronze played round by ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... nevertheless more than held his own against the Swedes. His crowning achievement was the great victory of Kirkholm (Aug. 27th, 1605), when with barely 5000 men he annihilated a threefold larger Swedish army; for which feat he received letters of congratulation from the pope, all the Catholic potentates, of Europe, and even from the sultan of Turkey and the shah of Persia. Yet this great victory was absolutely fruitless, owing to the domestic dissensions which prevailed in Poland during the following ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... moment when Willett, seated at the right of "the lady of the house," with Lilian at his dexter side, had caught the eye of his hostess, and, after the manner of the day, had raised his brimming sherry glass and, bowing low, was drinking to her health, a feat the general had thrice performed already. "If I'd only known of this, gentlemen," said their host, but a moment earlier, with resultant access of cordiality, "and could have found a drop of Angostura about the post, we'd have had ...
— Tonio, Son of the Sierras - A Story of the Apache War • Charles King
... in this daring and brilliant feat had been thirty-seven killed and one hundred and ...
— The Bay State Monthly - Volume 1, Issue 4 - April, 1884 • Various
... of the man. Our prince signalized his entrance into the world by a feat worthy of his future life. He invented a new shoebuckle. It was an inch long and five inches broad. "It covered almost the whole instep, reaching down to the ground on either side of the foot." A sweet invention! lovely and useful as the prince ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... in the boat which cost less than a hundred dollars outside of our own labour of building. Journals the world over have spoken not unkindly of the feat; encomiums in seven languages reached us through the newspapers while we lay moored in Washington. Should the same good fortune that followed the Liberdade attend this little literary craft, when finished, it would go safe into many lands. Without looking, however, to ...
— Voyage of the Liberdade • Captain Joshua Slocum
... are not engaged in dancing, are seated in a large semicircle as spectators, occasionally giving a rapturous exclamation of delight, as any part of the performance is well gone through or any remarkable feat of activity exhibited. Where natives have not much acquaintance with Europeans, so as to give up, in some measure, their original habits, if there is any degree of jealousy between the respective tribes, they are sometimes partitioned off from each other by boughs of trees, ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... verge of the forest, and in the garden the spirits whom Merlin the enchanter had raised up in the semblance of knights and ladies held carnival. Vivien, delighted, asked of Merlin in what manner he had achieved this feat of faery, and he told her that he would in time instruct her as to the manner of accomplishing it. He then dismissed the spirit attendants and dissipated the castle into thin air, but retained the garden at the request of Vivien, ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... "round basket," the ball being about six inches in diameter. The players stand in a circle a few feet apart. The ball is thrown by one, and the player nearest to whom it falls kicks it in the air, and attempts to repeat this feat several times in order to keep the ball up, but failing to do so, the next player gains possession and throws it, ...
— Travels in the Far East • Ellen Mary Hayes Peck
... crossing without risk of life. The Indians, in their desperation, made the attempt; and midway their canoes were ground to atoms among the tossing masses. Agile as wild-cats, they all leaped upon a huge raft of ice, the squaws carrying their children on their shoulders, a feat at which Champlain marveled when he saw their starved and emaciated condition. Here they began a wail of despair; when happily the pressure of other masses thrust the sheet of ice against the northern shore. They landed ...
— Pioneers Of France In The New World • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... Blanchard, and an Englishman, Dr. Jefferies; the latter lost his flag. Blanchard had set the French flag floating over the shores of England; public enthusiasm welcomed him on his return. The queen was playing cards at Versailles. "What I win this game shall go to Blanchard," she said. The same feat, attempted a few days later by a professor of physics, M. Pilatre de Rozier, was destined ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume VI. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... nineteenth century that the natural unit of electricity was manifested by itself and without a carrier. At a famous address to the British Association at York in 1881 Sir William Crookes described the first marvellous experiments in which this feat had been accomplished, though there was still to come a long controversy before the interpretation was clearly accepted. It is now definitely established that there is a fundamental atom of electricity which we now call the electron. As ...
— Recent Developments in European Thought • Various
... feat subsided, the maid received another signal, and then seated herself in an armchair, which presently sank down underground, and up in its room came a barber's block, with a vast quantity of black wool on it, and ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... in line to St. Helen's—being performed with the very perfection of nautical accuracy. The review ended with the order, "Furl sails, put the life-lines on, and man yards," which was done as only English sailors can accomplish the feat, while the royal yacht on its return passed through the squadron ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen, (Victoria) Vol II • Sarah Tytler
... himself on the watch, and surprised a mouse that had stolen out of its hole to eat some flour. He dropped upon the imprudent mouse, in describing what is called in geometry a parabola, and seized it by the nose, to prevent it from crying out. This feat, although performed with address and in silence, attracted the attention of the baker's boy. "Hi! a cat!" cried the apprentice, ...
— The Story of a Cat • mile Gigault de La Bdollire
... had already made its appearance in Pishpek, but the natives did not seem to realize what it was. "Why," they said, "we have often heard better music than that." Dr. Tanner was not without his share of fame in this far-away country. During his fast in America, a similar, though not voluntary, feat was being performed here. A Kirghiz messenger who had been despatched into the mountains during the winter was lost in the snow, and remained for twenty-eight days without food. He was found at last, crazed by hunger. When asked what ...
— Across Asia on a Bicycle • Thomas Gaskell Allen and William Lewis Sachtleben
... is taken from the Relation of 1647, and the letter of Marie de l'Incarnation to her son, before cited. The woman must have descended the great rapids of Lachine in her canoe: a feat demanding no ordinary ...
— The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century • Francis Parkman
... and sitting upon an ass, and a colt the foal of an ass" (xxi. 5. 7), shows that Matthew did not understand the Hebrew idiom, which should be rendered "sitting upon an ass, even upon a colt, the foal of an ass," and related an impossible riding feat to fulfil the misunderstood prophecy. The whole trial scene shows ignorance of Roman customs: the judge running in and out between accused and people, offering to scourge him and let him go—a course not consistent with Roman justice; then presenting him to the people with a crown ...
— The Freethinker's Text Book, Part II. - Christianity: Its Evidences, Its Origin, Its Morality, Its History • Annie Besant
... brute by the throat and held it away from him at arm's length, seeming hardly to be aware of its eighty-odd pounds of struggling weight. Into Jim's eyes crept a glint of admiration. It was a feat of strength as well as of animal management; and, himself proficient in both, Jim could accord tribute where it ...
— The Raid on the Termites • Paul Ernst
... far less, as thou well knowest, in the way of accommodating a young gentleman anxious to essay a feat of arms. Thou hast said the word, and we fight—but let me ask to what particular achievement of mine thou hast attached so ugly an epithet. I would fain know to what I am indebted for your ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine—Vol. 54, No. 333, July 1843 • Various
... road, voices were raised. It was plain that their wires had been followed, and that others were in pursuit. And, after all, Frank felt they could afford to grin at being made prisoners now. They had accomplished a great feat. Even if they were caught, that was ...
— The Boy Scouts on the Trail • George Durston
... and soon afterwards a third, of still greater importance, over the principal Spanish army posted in the vicinity of Collioure. On the western side, moreover, the towns of Fontarabia and Saint Sebastian fell into the hands of the republicans: the latter, partly by feat of arms, and partly by the treachery of some of the notabilities of that place. By these successes the French had obtained a good basis of operations; but they still had to fight desperately for every foot of ground. ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... deliberate, regulated, ponderously impressive (GRAVITATISCH) Feat of Arms, as the reader sees; done all by Regulation methods, with orthodox exactitude; in a slow, weighty, almost pedantic, but highly irrefragable manner. It is the triumph of Prussian Discipline; of military orthodoxy well put in practice: the honest outcome of good natural stuff ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... The gates opened inward, and three heavy bars were held in place by means of stout staples riveted to the sheets of steel. The boy had been told that the power of the Blue Pearl would enable him to accomplish any feat of strength, and he believed that ...
— Rinkitink in Oz • L. Frank Baum
... deep. The drinking in cider counties seems always to have been worse as far as quantity goes than elsewhere, and the drink bills on farms were enormous. Marshall says that in Gloucestershire drinking a gallon 'bottle', generally a little wooden barrel, at a draught was no uncommon feat; and in the Vale of Evesham a labourer who wanted to be even with his master for short payment emptied a two-gallon bottle without taking it from his lips. Even this feat was excelled by 'four well-seasoned yeomen, who resolved to have a fresh hogshead tapped, and setting ...
— A Short History of English Agriculture • W. H. R. Curtler
... of love. What feat of Mars, or Hercules, Or bright Apollo, lies above Wit, wing'd ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine
... were tearing down the steep path. They traveled like goats—as surefooted and as light upon their feet. Professor Henderson watched their career in evident interest. Then, gingerly, trying the feat curiously, the old gentleman sprang for a small boulder beside the cabin. He leaped ...
— On a Torn-Away World • Roy Rockwood
... was so expansive and passionate on all other subjects, so that to keep a secret was an impossible feat to them, wore another character when danger to their religion or its ministers required of them to set a seal on their lips. For years frequently, large numbers of priests and religious could not only exist, but move and work among them, ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud
... do to keep from crying out, "I love you! I love you!" Truly Humphrey Van Weyden was at last in love, I thought, as her fingers clung to mine while I lowered her down to the boat. I held on to the rail with one hand and supported her weight with the other, and I was proud at the moment of the feat. It was a strength I had not possessed a few months before, on the day I said good-bye to Charley Furuseth and started for San Francisco ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... shoot the stag without harming the man should receive the office of Chief Forester, to be hereditary in the family, and the tenancy of a hunting lodge near by. Cuno, moved more by pity than hope of reward, attempted the feat and succeeded. The Prince kept his promise, but on a suggestion that the old hunter may have used a charmed bullet, he made the hereditary succession contingent upon the success of a trial shot. Before telling the tale, Cuno had warned Max to have a care, for should he fail in the trial shot on ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... came in sight, it was high time to waken the sleeper. That feat accomplished, Peter's prophecy came to pass. Master Jacob was quite ...
— Hans Brinker - or The Silver Skates • Mary Mapes Dodge
... remind him he could make it better. Mr. SIDNEY PAXTON'S triumph with Poulder was his admirable restraint—rarest of accomplishments among comic stage butlers. The effect of everything was heightened by this excellent economy. It was a lesson in artistic reticence. An even more notable feat in the same kind was The Press of Mr. LAWRENCE HANRAY. Obviously he could have collected a good deal more of the laughter of the house if he had played less subtly. I should put it as quite the best piece of playing in a well-played piece. ...
— Punch, 1917.07.04, Vol. 153, Issue No. 1 • Various
... just performed the feat, with great shyness, when Mark appeared, having been sent in quest of his cousin, when her father perceived that ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... difficulty draw a breath, while he waited till, by finding the rope slacken, he should know that Bill had safely reached the bottom. At last he ascertained that Bill was no longer hanging to the rope, while, from not hearing a sound, he was sure that his companion had performed the feat in safety. ...
— From Powder Monkey to Admiral - A Story of Naval Adventure • W.H.G. Kingston
... I performed this feat yesterday—only wrote the first slip—but there it is, and it is a plunge straight over head and ears into the story. . . . Besides all this, I have really gone with great vigour at the French, where I find ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... deed alike are lost: Not a pillar nor a post In his Croisic keeps alive the feat as it befell; Not a head in white and black On a single fishing smack, 130 In memory of the man but for whom had gone to wrack All that France saved from the fight whence England bore the bell. Go to Paris: rank on rank. Search, the heroes flung pell-mell On the Louvre, deg. face ...
— Browning's Shorter Poems • Robert Browning
... two feet from the ground, I, with my left hand—being a left-handed person, do you see—flung or chucked up a stone, which lighting on the top of the steeple, which was at least a hundred and fifty feet high, did there remain. After repeating this feat two or three times, I "hulled" up a stone, which went clean over the tower, and then one, my right foot still on the ledge, which rising at least five yards above the steeple, did fall down just at my feet. Without knowing ...
— The Pocket George Borrow • George Borrow
... best circuits this act had brought Miss Rosalie Ray, for each of two years. She did other things during her twelve minutes—a song and dance, imitations of two or three actors who are but imitations of themselves, and a balancing feat with a step-ladder and feather-duster; but when the blossom-decked swing was let down from the flies, and Miss Rosalie sprang smiling into the seat, with the golden circlet conspicuous in the place whence it was soon to ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry
... which the strange men exhibit their horsemanship, rushing past each other, in and out, after the manner of a reel, the tall man occasionally balancing himself upon the saddle, and standing erect on one foot. He had just regained his seat after the latter feat, and was about to push his horse to a gallop, when a figure started forward close from beside me, and laying his hand on his neck, and pulling him gently downward, appeared to whisper something into his ear; presently the ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... Certain drivers refused, however, to allow these liberties, but scowled blackly when addressed by the usual cheerful "Give us a ride, Mister?" To catch surreptitious rides with them was considered a desirable feat. Certain daring youngsters stole up behind and crouched low against the runners. Occasionally they escaped detection, but generally tasted the sting of the whip-lash as it curled viciously backward. Then arose from the whole hill the derisive cry ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White
... to her eyes. From beyond the waters there is a hand held out; beyond the waters too live brothers. I would only the Book were an Epic, a Dante, or undying thing, that New England might boast in after times of this feat of hers; and put stupid, poundless, and penniless Old England to the blush about it! But after all, that is no matter; the feebler the well- meant Book is, the more "pathetic" is the whole transaction: and so we will go on, fuller than ever of "desperate hope" (if you know what that is), with a feeling ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, - 1834-1872, Vol. I • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson
... supporting its own weight for over two minutes," is given by Romanes as a proof that man is descended from a simian (ape-like) ancestor. As this same picture is widely copied in evolution text books, they must have failed to get the picture of any other infant performing a like feat. Just how this affords any convincing proof that man is a monkey, we leave the reader to figure out. Our attention is called to the way this child and another child, whose picture is likewise generally copied, ...
— The Evolution Of Man Scientifically Disproved • William A. Williams
... the mishap occurred. The emperor also discovered that on the previous day the princess had, without any escort whatsoever, skated alone all the way from Potsdam to Brandenburg and back, a remarkable feat, calling for much endurance and attended by no little danger. Now, as I have already stated, it is contrary to the rules of court etiquette and usage for any prince or princess of the blood to leave their residence, ...
— The Secret Memoirs of the Courts of Europe: William II, Germany; Francis Joseph, Austria-Hungary, Volume I. (of 2) • Mme. La Marquise de Fontenoy
... bade all his knights to attempt this feat, and all tried their best, but it was of ...
— King Arthur's Knights - The Tales Re-told for Boys & Girls • Henry Gilbert
... a poor, illiterate tinker, was able to take the first place among writers of allegory, and to accomplish the extraordinary intellectual feat of producing a work which charmed alike the ignorant, who could not perceive its literary merits, and cultivated critics, who viewed it only from a literary standpoint, depended partly on his own natural gifts, and partly on the character of Puritan thought. ...
— A History of English Prose Fiction • Bayard Tuckerman
... among several of us, was of course nobly to defy the danger, and I feel again the emotion with which I both hoped and feared that the red flags, lurid signals descried from afar, would enable or compel us to renew the feat. That I didn't for myself inveterately renew it I seem to infer from the memory of other perambulations of the period—as to which I am divided between their still present freshness and my sense of ...
— A Small Boy and Others • Henry James
... Pompey, the greatest Roman general of the day, landed twice in Britain, and spent a few weeks there without accomplishing anything in particular. But it was the central seat and last stronghold of the Celts; and his greatest triumph was accorded him for this feat; and he was prouder of it than anything else he ever did. He set it above his victories over Pompey. Second: the Gauls, in the first century B.C., were able to put in the field against him three million men: not so far short of the number France has been able to put in ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... Lambert into the Bad Lands and established his name and fame. Within three months after going to work for the Syndicate ranch he was known for a hundred miles around as the man who had broken Jim Wilder's outlaw and won the horse by that unparalleled feat. ...
— The Duke Of Chimney Butte • G. W. Ogden
... in an incredibly short time, while the stomach of its author was digesting a series of stout English dinners, and his attention dissipating among speech-makings and speech-listenings, feasts, meetings and visits. Only a New York reporter could have achieved the feat. The faculty acquired by men of Mr. Stanley's trade, of acting with the intense decision and energy of great military captains, and then relating the action with the voluble unction of bar-rooms or political stumps, is a strange mixed faculty, and is found to perfection in the reporters' ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 11, No. 24, March, 1873 • Various
... writers instruct us first to catch our hero. As, however, Mr. Carlyle is the only person on record who has ever performed this feat, it will be best for the rest of mankind to be content with the nearest approach to a hero available, namely a prig. These animals are very plentiful, and easy to catch, as they delight in being run after. There are however many different ...
— Every Man His Own Poet - Or, The Inspired Singer's Recipe Book • Newdigate Prizeman
... urge that "to send a spear through the back of a stag" is not, as Mr. Monro thought, "an improbable feat," and that a man wounded to death as Leiocritus was wounded, would not, as Mr. Monro argued, fall backwards. He supposes that the poet of the Odyssey borrowed the forward fall from a passage in the Iliad, where the fall is in keeping. ...
— Homer and His Age • Andrew Lang
... of a cat seemed, indeed, to come from the dish. This delicate joke was perpetrated by Coupeau in the throat, without the smallest movement of his lips. This feat always met with such success that he never ordered a meal anywhere without a rabbit stew. The ladies wiped their eyes with their napkins because ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... drew near each other on the interminable plains and the two engines could talk. Of course what they said was poetry. There was a time when even the Erie Canal was poetic. The Panama Canal to-day, in the eyes of most Americans, is something other than a mere feat of engineering. We are doing more than making "the dirt fly." The canal represents victory over hostile forces, conquest of unwilling Nature, achievement of what had long been deemed impossible, the making not of a ...
— The American Mind - The E. T. Earl Lectures • Bliss Perry
... upon the jeweled hilt, to the effect that none but the man who could draw out the sword should dare to take possession of the throne. Of course all present immediately tried to accomplish this feat, ...
— Legends of the Middle Ages - Narrated with Special Reference to Literature and Art • H.A. Guerber
... a deeper complexion than any that had been made to the old magistrate for many months or years past. The fact was that, having arrived at the stage of existence in which the difficult intellectual feat of suspending one's judgment becomes possible, he was now putting it in practice, though not without ...
— Desperate Remedies • Thomas Hardy
... captain's guard, and, pressing on, thrust, as it seemed, his sword clear through the body of his antagonist, who, with a deep groan, measured his length on the ground. A score of voices cried to the conqueror, as he stood fixed in astonishment at his own feat, "Away, away with you!—fly, fly—fly by the back door!—get into the Whitefriars, or cross the water to the Bankside, while we keep off the mob and the constables." And the conqueror, leaving his vanquished foeman on the ground, fled ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... effort of seamanship the dangerous movement was effected safely that night, and it proved an entire success. Till Howe was met with and defeated, the allies would not venture into the Channel, and his unprecedented feat had effectually thrown them off. Assuming apparently that he must have passed round their rear to seaward, they sought him to the southward, and there for a month beat up and down in ineffective search. Meanwhile Howe, sending his cruisers ahead to the convoy's rendezvous off the south-west coast ...
— Some Principles of Maritime Strategy • Julian Stafford Corbett
... mentioning names. One individual, exulting in his strength, undertook, for a wager, some time in the thirties, to drag a dung cart from Lincoln to Horncastle, a distance of 21 miles, and successfully accomplished the feat in eight hours, but he is said to have suffered from hæmorrhage for the rest of his days. Another man made a bet that he would start from Lincoln on horseback when the moon rose there, and would have his horse in his own stable at Horncastle before the moon had risen there. Lincoln being ...
— Records of Woodhall Spa and Neighbourhood - Historical, Anecdotal, Physiographical, and Archaeological, with Other Matter • J. Conway Walter
... while a few have strayed into Mexico and South America, and only two or three belong to Europe, where many of ours are tenderly cultivated in gardens, as they should be here, had not Nature been so lavish. To name all these species, or the asters, the sparrows, and the warblers at sight is a feat probably no one living can perform; nevertheless, certain of the commoner goldenrods have well-defined peculiarities that a little field practice soon fixes in ...
— Wild Flowers, An Aid to Knowledge of Our Wild Flowers and - Their Insect Visitors - - Title: Nature's Garden • Neltje Blanchan
... special conditions of Italian chivalry, it followed that the new knight, having won his spurs by no feat of arms upon the battlefield, was bounden to display peculiar magnificence in the ceremonies of his investiture. His honour was held to be less the reward of courage than of liberality. And this ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... you have cross'd where I shall cross, Say that you'll neither sleep nor eat." James proudly took him at his word, But did not like the feat. It was a spot, which you may see If ever you to Langdale go: Into a chasm a mighty Block Hath fallen, and made a bridge of rock; The gulph is deep below, And in a bason black and small ...
— Lyrical Ballads with Other Poems, 1800, Vol. 2 • William Wordsworth
... half inflated balloons. Enormous buttresses supporting nothing leaned incapable against the building. Bottles and wine cups formed part of the mad construction. Satyrs' heads leered instead of windows. The whole palace looked reeling drunk. It was a tremendous feat of imagination and skill. The hour that he spent in elaborating it passed like five minutes. When he had finished he threw ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke
... tack into a whiplash, and then, whirling it round and round, drove it to the head in a target marked out on the weather-boarding. Some of them had a perfect aim; and in fact it was a very pretty feat, and well ...
— A Boy's Town • W. D. Howells
... in!" shouted the boy, jumping up like a grasshopper, and preparing to go through some fresh gymnastic feat. ...
— Quicksilver - The Boy With No Skid To His Wheel • George Manville Fenn
... syne," or some more serious things, Which tends to make his work more easy seem, Or drive away some foolish, waking dream. The Bush, if large, will need another band To tend the fire; and this one must command Sufficient knowledge of the Sugaring feat To guard the syrup from too great a heat. He must mind, too, to fill the boilers up; And if he choose, he may ev'n take a sup Of maple-honey, whose delicious flavor More than repays their outlay and hard labor. It now has reached that point when constant watch Must be kept o'er it, lest ...
— The Emigrant Mechanic and Other Tales In Verse - Together With Numerous Songs Upon Canadian Subjects • Thomas Cowherd
... getting inside the brain of that boy, seeing things as he saw them, writing as he would have written, and acting as he would have acted; and presenting to the world true, faithful, and living effigies of that boy. The feat has been accomplished; there is no character in fiction more fully, more faithfully, presented than the character of Huckleberry Finn. . . . It may be objected that the characters are extravagant. Not so. They are all exactly and literally true; they are quite possible in a ...
— Mark Twain • Archibald Henderson
... his head under his arm, and another with one leg around his neck; all eliciting more or less laughter, as the feat was more or less comical. During the dance every species of deformity was imitated and caricatured, for this is the tagarota. It was a series of grotesque and repulsive pictures. Some of the dancers, flinging themselves flat, would roll across the ...
— The Rifle Rangers • Captain Mayne Reid
... Van Dorn had in mind was the relief of Missouri. And he may have dreamed, that feat accomplished, that it would be possible to carry the war into the enemy's country beyond the Ohio; but, alas, it was his misfortune at this juncture to be called upon to realise, to his great discomfiture, the truth ...
— The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War • Annie Heloise Abel
... did not go near Mr. Lord nor his candy stand, for Mr. Castle kept him and Ella busily engaged in practicing the feat which they were to perform in the afternoon, and it was almost time for the performance to begin before they were allowed even to go ...
— Toby Tyler • James Otis
... this great achievement of Mrs. Secord carefully, that we may be the better able to realize the greatness of the feat. To assist in so doing, it will not be amiss to quote the following, from Coffin's Chronicles of the War, bearing on the prudential reasons of Proctor's retreat at Moravian Town. "But whether for advance or for retreat, the by-paths of the forest intermediate ...
— Laura Secord, the heroine of 1812. - A Drama. And Other Poems. • Sarah Anne Curzon
... would die of despair and anger. What other course then? She must dissemble, mask her face with indifference, if possible with tenderness, and undertake the difficult task of separating Micheline from the man whom she adored. It was quite a feat of strategy to plan. To bring out the husband's faults and to make his errors known, and give her the opportunity of proving his worthlessness. In a word, to make the young wife understand that she had married an elegant manikin, unworthy ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet
... boudoir, in such circumstances, can follow the example of the primitive logician who preceded the Pyrrhonists and denied movement. Montriveau was not equal to this feat. With all his audacity, he lacked this precise kind which never deserts an adept in the formulas of feminine algebra. If so many women, and even the best of women, fall a prey to a kind of expert to whom the vulgar give ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac
... route that the Chinese finally conquered Tibet in the eighteenth century, and to-day most of the trade goes the same way. Those who deny the Chinese all soldierly qualities must have forgotten their achievements against the Tibetans, let alone the still more extraordinary military feat of their victory over the Gurkhas of Nepal, when a force of seventy thousand men of the Middle Kingdom crossed the whole width of the most inaccessible country in the world, and, fighting at a distance of two thousand miles from ...
— A Wayfarer in China - Impressions of a trip across West China and Mongolia • Elizabeth Kendall
... Feat of Poetical Activity mentioned by Horace, of an Author who could compose two hundred Verses while he stood upon one Leg, [3] has been imitated (as I have heard) by a modern Writer; who priding himself on the Hurry of his Invention, thought it no ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele
... A terrific feat of horsemanship is in progress. A daring rider, mounted on a broad platform, which is borne on the back of a placid horse, is carried on a slow canter around the ring. He evidently impersonates a member of the horse ...
— Punchinello, Vol. II., No. 35, November 26, 1870 • Various
... that Prussia then experienced was the cause of her subsequent greatness; and if she has wrested European supremacy from Napoleon III., she should thank Napoleon I. for enabling her to accomplish so great a feat of arms. The Prussian government had to undertake the task of reform, to save itself and the country from perishing. The chief man in this great work was the celebrated Baron von Stein, whose name is of infrequent ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 109, November, 1866 • Various
... the crest of one such roller on a piece of board and leap upon the shore, is a feat peculiar to South Sea islanders, who are trained to the water from earliest infancy. To do the same thing in a small boat, without oars, without strength, without experience, almost without courage, is a feat that no South Sea islander would attempt, ...
— The Island Queen • R.M. Ballantyne
... even for a skilled oarsman, through the Gorge of the Grey River. In times of flood no man who laid claims to sanity would attempt the feat; but, even when the river is low and flows quietly if swiftly, there are rocks and snags that obstruct the passage. To strike one of these ...
— Grey Town - An Australian Story • Gerald Baldwin
... the shoulder to the nipple of his breast, so that he fell dead. Sakurai Jinsuke, seeing his brother killed before his eyes, grew furious, and shot an arrow at Matayemon, who deftly cut the shaft in two with his dirk as it flew; and Jinsuke, amazed at this feat, threw away his bow and attacked Matayemon, who, with his sword in his right hand and his dirk in his left, fought with desperation. The other Ronins attempted to rescue Jinsuke, and, in the struggle, Kazuma, who ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... word," I said; and as we remained to abuse Bobbie for another ten minutes with much mutual goodwill I suppose he had once more justified his existence by a successful feat ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, May 6, 1914 • Various
... bullets. Big game hunting is done so frequently from canoes that it is well to get practice from a boat, both moving and stationary. To shoot successfully from a sitting position in a canoe is a very difficult feat. Just as with a shot-gun the universal tendency is to shoot too quickly, with a rifle it is to shoot too high. The reason is that we hold our head so high up in looking at our game that we fail to see the rear sight at all. Be sure your head is ...
— Outdoor Sports and Games • Claude H. Miller
... "gone together" ever since the time when he first perceived that a "girl" was as necessary to man's estate as a dressy lounge suit and a Homburg hat. He did not like to behave badly to her. And now he had been rewarded. He had achieved the difficult feat mentioned in those articles he so casually read in the train, of keeping one eye on the main chance and the other on the example of Sir Galahad. Now he was still engaged to somebody who took tickets on the prom. and was a young lady—and was yet Caroline. ...
— The Privet Hedge • J. E. Buckrose
... the frying-pan into the fire!" This should have been my chosen motto from the beginning. The performance of the maddening feat indicated in the proverb has been the principal business of my life. I am always finding myself in the frying-pan, and always flopping out into the fire. My father's interference saved me from the dreadful ...
— The Blunders of a Bashful Man • Metta Victoria Fuller Victor
... found himself, in some sort, famous. "Tacklin' Bill Bluffy without a gun and cleanin' him up," as one of his new friends expressed it, was no mean feat, and Keith was not insensible to the applause it brought him. He would have enjoyed it more, perhaps, had not every man, without exception, who spoke of it given him the same advice Dave had given—to look out for Bluffy. To have to kill a man or be killed oneself is not the ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... we were in the fatal building. I should like to pause here and describe my costume to you, which was a quiet grey in the best of taste, but Myra says that if I do this I must describe hers too, a feat beyond me. Sufficient that she looked dazzling, that as a party we were remarkably well-dressed, and that Simpson—murmuring "dix-sept" to himself at intervals—led the way through the rooms till he found ...
— The Sunny Side • A. A. Milne
... to be in danger, but she would have loved saving it. She fell to pondering possible conditions in which she could perform this feat, while ...
— The Dust Flower • Basil King
... colonial enterprise of that time, and in all some forty ships. The voyage occupied more than two months. Apparently the hardy carpenter-sailor, able enough to carry through a difficult undertaking with a single ship, lacked the organizing skill to manage a great expedition. He performed, however, the feat of navigating safely with his fleet the treacherous waters of the lower St. Lawrence. On the morning of October 16, 1690, watchers at Quebec saw the fleet, concerning which they had already been warned, rounding ...
— The Conquest of New France - A Chronicle of the Colonial Wars, Volume 10 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • George M. Wrong
... He had duplicated his feat of the afternoon at the bridge in Red Creek. Terry, in her first astonishment that the man should turn and run straight on in front of her, slowed down, hesitation in her mind. What was he up to? Then ...
— Man to Man • Jackson Gregory
... bull by the horns", as the saying is, and cleverly straddled him on the neck. The buffalo had no means of harming his enemy, but pawed the earth and struggled until his strength was exhausted, when the Indian used his knife on the animal's throat. On account of this feat ...
— Indian Heroes and Great Chieftains • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... Another feat is, keeping your feet together and one arm behind you, to see how far back from the wall it is possible to place your feet (remembering that you have to get into an upright position again) while you lean forward ...
— What Shall We Do Now?: Five Hundred Games and Pastimes • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... into boxes difficult to open, there is evidence (1) of attentive persistent experiment (2) of the rapid elimination of ineffective movements, and (3) of remembering the solution when it was discovered. Kinnaman taught two macaques the Hampton Court Maze, a feat which probably means a memory of movements, and we get an interesting glimpse in his observation that they began to smack their lips audibly when they reached the latter part of their course, and began to feel, dare one say, "We are right ...
— The Outline of Science, Vol. 1 (of 4) - A Plain Story Simply Told • J. Arthur Thomson
... could perform the feat," said Andrew, "thousands and thousands of people would come to see me; ...
— The Mountebank • William J. Locke
... to the breakers, just as the crest rose and broke at his back, he stood on its edge, the foam rose on each side of his neck like boars' tusks. Then all on shore shouted and for the first time Laieikawai smiled; the feat was new to her eyes and ...
— The Hawaiian Romance Of Laieikawai • Anonymous
... head, and a long German sword in his hand, being by his head and shoulders taller than the crowd. Then he and his knights charged the Saracens, who by this time had taken a stand again on the river bank. It was a great feat of arms. No man drew long-bow that day or plied cross-bow. The Crusaders and the Saracens fought with mace and sword, neither keeping their ranks, but all ...
— Heroes Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... opponent until he reeled into the water, following him up until he tumbled, and then holding his head down in the mud until he was almost stifled. I then allowed him to get up, and he went home crying to his mother. For this feat I was rewarded with the plaudits of the old pensioners and others who were looking on, and with a shilling which was thrown to me from the window of the inn. Ben the Whaler, who had witnessed the fray, told me, the next day, that I handled my fists remarkably ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... taking off his hat and dashing it on the floor, and insanely casting his spectacles into the middle of the kitchen. At this humorous feat ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... in the House probably saved him from serious humiliation and even disaster. The President's style of dealing had roused Mr. Adams's spirit, and he spoke with a fire and vehemence which accomplished the unusual feat of changing the predisposed minds of men too familiar with speech-making to be often much influenced by it in the practical matter of voting. He thought at the time that the success of this speech, brilliant as it appeared, was not unlikely ...
— John Quincy Adams - American Statesmen Series • John. T. Morse
... flicks him in the nostrils with his pocket-handkerchief and calls him vacca (cow)! At last, seemingly out of good nature, the bull rushes at the red flag, has the highly decorated dart stuck between his shoulders, by the daring espada who may perform some other feat, listens to the applause, and laughs to himself when he hears the bugle-call and sees the trained oxen rush in with their long bells and their attendant herdsmen, and with more or less of a frolicsome air he trots out of the arena in their company and, having had his sore shoulders ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... Lizzie herself was built on that scale, with broad hips and bosom, big brown eyes and heavy dark hair. She was a fine strong woman when she had shed her bedraggled house gown, and Jimmie was proud of his capability as a chooser of wives. It was no small feat to find a good woman, and to recognize her, where Jimmie had found Lizzie. She was five years older than he, a Bohemian, having been brought to America when she was a baby. Her former name—you could hardly call it her "maiden" name, considering the circumstances—was ...
— Jimmie Higgins • Upton Sinclair
... circle as a painter naturally would draw it; that is to say, that he set the vellum upright on the wall or panel before him, and then steadying his arm firmly against his side, drew the circular line with one sweeping but firm revolution of his hand, holding the brush long. Such a feat as this is completely possible to a well-disciplined painter's hand, but utterly impossible to any other; and the circle so drawn, was the most convincing proof Giotto could give of his decision of ...
— Giotto and his works in Padua • John Ruskin
... Filled with rage at this, Bhimasena, endued with great activity, sped at thy son a fierce dart. Beholding that terrible dart impetuously coursing towards him like a blazing brand, thy high-souled son cut it off with ten shafts shot from his bow drawn to its fullest stretch. Seeing that difficult feat achieved by him, all the warriors, filled with joy, applauded him highly. Thy son then once more pierced Bhima deeply with another shaft. Blazing with wrath at sight of Duhshasana, Bhima then addressed him, saying, "Pierced I have been, O hero, quickly and deeply, by thee. ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... The feat might not seem miraculous to a captain of frontier irregulars in hard training; but for a delicate novelist in weak health it was pluckily done. These letters would be readable if Stevenson had written nothing else, though of course their worth is doubled by our interest in a man of ...
— Studies in Literature and History • Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall
... After this triumphant exploitation feat (which ought to commend him to every lying advertiser in the world) Licorice Stick had shuffled into a new path of glory, going to the carnival, where (not finding the sperrit in evidence) he had accepted a position to stand behind ...
— Pee-wee Harris • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... is another side to the matter. A high price has been paid for this feat of manufacturing a portable literature: no less a price than the effacement from the books of the Bible of their whole literary structure. Where the literature is dramatic, there are (except in one book) no names of speakers nor divisions of speeches; there are no titles to ...
— Select Masterpieces of Biblical Literature • Various
... gardens, suspended from the rigid side of the tower by a feat of architectural engineering surpassing ...
— Mr. World and Miss Church-Member • W. S. Harris
... of these patients had a due discharge of urine, and of the natural colour, was not the feat of the disease confined to some part of the thorax, and the swelling of the legs rather a symptom of the obstructed circulation of the blood, than of a paralysis of the cellular lymphatics ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. I - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin
... before, as storks generally stand, with head bent downward and the bill pressed against the neck. But now a gurgle was heard deep down in his windpipe; as though he would have laughed. Quick as a flash, he lowered the bill, grabbed the boy, and tossed him a couple of metres in the air. This feat he performed seven times, while the boy shrieked and the geese shouted: "What are you trying to do, Herr Ermenrich? That's not a frog. That's a human being, ...
— The Wonderful Adventures of Nils • Selma Lagerlof
... calling as they are at present, after three additional centuries of development for their delicate craft; for the learned Tobias Salander, the travelling companion of Paul Hentzner, finding himself at a Lord Mayor's Show, was eased of his purse, containing nine crowns, as skilfully as the feat could have been done by the best pickpocket of the nineteenth century, much ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... walk through this forest, but as there was no way of getting around it Bartholemy determined to go through it, even if he could not walk. No athlete of the present day, no matter if he should be a most accomplished circus-man, could reasonably expect to perform the feat which this bold pirate successfully accomplished. For five or six leagues he went through that mangrove forest, never once setting his foot upon the ground,—by which is meant mud, water, and roots,—but swinging himself ...
— Buccaneers and Pirates of Our Coasts • Frank Richard Stockton
... but, as I need hardly say, a hogshead of that fluid would not keep a hungry man from starving, nor would it save any animal whatever from a like fate. An animal cannot make protoplasm, but must take it ready-made from some other animal, or some plant—the animal's highest feat of constructive chemistry being to convert dead protoplasm into that living matter of life which is appropriate ...
— Lay Sermons, Addresses and Reviews • Thomas Henry Huxley
... or spiked. The last users of the punt had also taken peculiar care to fasten it up. It was anchored by a grapnel, and by an iron pin on a chain, the pin eighteen inches long and driven hard into the bank. In a desperate hurry I hauled up the grapnel, did a regular Sandow feat in pulling up the iron peg, seized a punt pole apparently weighted with lead, but made out of an ash sapling, and started the punt. It would not move. I found there was another mooring, so picking my way among the scythes, spikes, rakes, &c., I hauled this in. It was most ...
— The Naturalist on the Thames • C. J. Cornish
... province, has felt much interest in these people, and two years ago performed the very difficult feat of traversing the forests from these first communities northward to the province of Isabela. This hazardous exploration occupied about two weeks before the party emerged from the forest into the open country. The greatest difficulty and peril was lack of food, which can not be carried ...
— The Negrito and Allied Types in the Philippines and The Ilongot or Ibilao of Luzon • David P. Barrows
... young hero?" cried the amazed king. "How may that be? Have we a Duke Samson among us to do so great a feat?" ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... of the class of bricklayers, are no great readers, otherwise we might suspect that the feat of the skipper-boys had conveyed some inspiration to Steeple Jack. Who is Steeple Jack? asks some innocent reader at the Antipodes. He is a little spare creature who flies his kite over steeples when there is ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal Vol. XVII. No. 418. New Series. - January 3, 1852. • William and Robert Chambers
... bundled out of the chaise when the door was opened, with a movement so closely resembling what would have ensued had he been dragged out by the collar, that one was tempted almost to believe that such a feat must have been accomplished all at ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... of the Lord I have luppen ower a wall," cried poor Mause, as her horse was, by her rude attendants, brought up to leap the turf enclosure of a deserted fold, in which feat her curch flew off, leaving her grey ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... even his animal needs, but merely supplying them for the moment as he can, and living in squalor, filth, and extreme discomfort, yet daubs himself with grease and paint, and decorates his head with feathers, his neck with bear's claws, and his feat with gaudily-stained porcupine's quills? What of your black barbarian, whose daily life is a succession of unspeakable abominations, and who embellishes it by blackening his teeth, tattooing his skin, and wearing a huge ring in the gristle of his nose? Either of them will ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... feat of marksmanship had either lad brought him down, when so many and varying objects intervened, and neither of the youths made the attempt. When the terrified fugitive vanished, he was without a wound or scratch to tell of the danger ...
— The Lost Trail - I • Edward S. Ellis
... that no danger might attend the preparation of his powder had already gone by; and now, unless someone should dare to approach that terrible tap, and boldly turn it, a fearful explosion might take place. Doubtless it was too late already, and whoever might have the bravery to attempt the feat would be blown ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... has been left to be dealt with by the best man for the purpose. Given the title of the book and the name of the author, there is no more need of recommendation to the English public; but I beg Messrs. WILSON and BRYAN (of the U.S.A.) to read, mark, learn and, if their physique is capable of the feat, inwardly digest it. They should know, in glaring detail, the ills general and individual resulting from what the American resident in Mexico calls ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, March 25, 1914 • Various
... will. By the process of selection from what she found in the pantry and refrigerator she concocted a good dinner and had it on the table at seven o'clock. This was something of a feat, because every cooking utensil had to be scoured before she could use it and even the china and silver was not fit to put on the table without a ...
— Mary Louise and Josie O'Gorman • Emma Speed Sampson
... something of a feat to bring Tubby Blaisdell alongside the skiff and haul him inboard without overturning the boat. But Dave accomplished it to the admiration of the girls—even to ...
— Wyn's Camping Days - or, The Outing of the Go-Ahead Club • Amy Bell Marlowe
... as the sun rose and we descended, it became very hot indeed, for we were then well south of the Equator and it was summer in the Lower Congo. The scenery through the Palabala mountains improved, if possible, on a second acquaintance and the railway as a feat of engineering, appeared still more marvellous. After a dusty, hot journey, we arrived at Matadi at 5 p.m. and found Mr. de Rache, the Commissaire of the District, on the platform. He had kindly taken a room at one of the hotels, but as ...
— A Journal of a Tour in the Congo Free State • Marcus Dorman
... representative in the west and the first to hold office in the east. Summoned to Nanking, he offended the emperor by asserting that real merit lay, not in works, but solely in purity and wisdom combined. He therefore retired to Lo-yang, crossing the swollen waters of the Yangtsze on a reed, a feat which has ever since had a great fascination for Chinese painters and poets. There he spent the rest of his life, teaching that religion was not to be learnt from books, but that man should seek and find the Buddha in his ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... pages long. It is the height of the author's art, according to the old maxim, that the ordinary spectator should never be clearly conscious of the skill and travail that have gone to the making of the finished product. But the artist who would achieve a like feat must realise its difficulties, or what are his ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson - a Record, an Estimate, and a Memorial • Alexander H. Japp
... "jolly good ale and old," I suppose, of free and easy Bishop Still's song,—found that he both could and did oftentimes drink New England water very well,—which he seems to look upon as a remarkable feat. He could go as lightclad as any, too, with only a light stuff cassock upon his shirt, and stuff breeches without linings. Two of his children were sickly: one,—little misshapen Mary,—died on the passage, ...
— Medical Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... me before I had being, or did he think of me during my begetting? or did he wish for me at the moment? Did he know what I should be? If so I would not advise him to acknowledge it or I should pay him off for his feat. Am I to be thankful to him that I am a man? As little as I should have had a right to blame him if he had made me a woman. Can I acknowledge an affection which is not based on any personal regard? Could personal regard be ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... CONWAY does mention some of his mountaineering feats this book is concerned primarily with the spirit rather than with the body. "A Pilgrimage of Romance" is its sub-title, and, though there can't be many Pilgrims who have done better climbing, I doubt if any more difficult feat stands to his credit than this of putting these impressions of the quest of beauty so clearly and delicately before us. The least deviation from the path of modesty would have led him into trouble, but he never makes it. "Reader," he writes, "if you and I are to be real comrades ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, May 5, 1920 • Various
... The difficulties of the feat are these: to get ashore soundly, and then to make it good; and after that to clinch the exploit by getting on land, which is yet a harder step. Because the steep of the ground, like a staircase void of ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... this record the player who used the tablets decorated with the design called "Young Pine," made but two mistakes; while the holder of the "White-Lily" set made only one correct guess. But it is quite a feat to make ten correct judgments in succession. The olfactory nerves are apt to become somewhat numbed long before the game is concluded; and, therefore it is customary during the Ko-kwai to rinse the ...
— In Ghostly Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... it, dear. He's headstrong and means to see this thing through. Had I thought that he would ever dream of contemplating such a suicidal feat as attempting that path, I'd never have let him see the cattle cross last night. My God! it turns me sick to ...
— The Story of the Foss River Ranch • Ridgwell Cullum
... flashing, so keen, that a critic compares it to the exploit of Saladin (in The Talisman) who could not with his sword hack through an iron mace, as Richard did, but who accomplished the more difficult feat of slicing a gossamer veil as it ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long
... American lady suggest that if they could somehow distinguish the spirit from the body it would be better for our illusions. To which her neighbour expressed the opinion that they would eventually manage to do that feat. I await, less hopefully, this development in stage mechanism. Meanwhile Mary Rose has ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, September 22, 1920 • Various
... recommendation that it do pass. On March 19, with twenty-two Senators opposed to its passage, and eighteen favoring it, with twenty-one votes necessary for its passage, the bill passed the Senate. This apparently impossible feat was, in the last two weeks of the session, a comparatively easy task ...
— Story of the Session of the California Legislature of 1909 • Franklin Hichborn
... had guns or revolvers shooting frantically up the slope, splintering rocks and spattering dirt as they bit at the heels of the rescuers. It was a desperate, do or die, neck or nothing, bit of daring and devotion—Nolan's third and Geordie's first experience in just such a feat. But the blood of the Graemes was up, and the younger soldier was not to be outdone by the old. The guards at the office burst into a cheer as the two came staggering up to the level, with poor Shiner groaning between them, and then quick work and hot was needed, for the ...
— To The Front - A Sequel to Cadet Days • Charles King
... caught the ass, mounted, and again resumed the trail of the unconscious horseman, which feat may have been possible to a nautical young fellow, though one can hardly understand how a sailor would ride such an animal without bridle or saddle, and strange to his hands, unless the creature were extraordinarily ...
— A Changed Man and Other Tales • Thomas Hardy
... he was not constitutionally suited, but played with the greatest courage and sincerity. Mr. DION BOUCICAULT'S study of Mr. Pim was extraordinarily effective; and the way in which he made the attenuated pipings of this futile old gentleman carry like the notes of a bell was in itself a remarkable feat. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, January 14, 1920 • Various
... cessation of the absolute necessity for exertion the power for exertion ceased also. Worn out, silent, exhausted, and almost despairing, the army of Hannibal presented the appearance of one which had suffered a terrible defeat, rather than that of a body of men who had accomplished a feat of arms unrivalled ...
— The Young Carthaginian - A Story of The Times of Hannibal • G.A. Henty
... pieces as Chose vue un Jour de Printemps, Les Pauvres Gens, the well-known pieces in L'Annee Terrible, and a hundred other lively touches and fragments of finished loveliness and penetrating sympathy. In prose it is a more difficult feat to collect the trivial details which make up the life of the tiny human animal into a whole that shall be impressive, finished, and beautiful. And prose can only describe by details enumerated one by one. This most arduous feat is ...
— Studies in Literature • John Morley
... gentlemen, I can keep on like an alarum clock. What nonsense have some of you fellows been talking! Some of you have remarked that you shall be able to exchange messages with England in a few hours. Allow me to assure you that before long you will accomplish that feat in a few minutes." ...
— The Battery and the Boiler - Adventures in Laying of Submarine Electric Cables • R.M. Ballantyne
... with perfume and glittering particles, the latter looking very pretty on black floating hair. Etiquette demanded that only one egg should be thrown by the same hand at a time, but quick turns of supple wrists followed each other very rapidly. To really accomplish a feat the egg must crash on the back of the head, and each occupied in attack was ...
— The Doomswoman - An Historical Romance of Old California • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... and fastidious workmanship. You'll find, if you read a scene over again, that there's more, not less, in it than you thought. Mr. MARRIOTT makes his characters alive by realisation of their subtleties rather than of their obviousnesses, and that's a feat to which I doff my beaver. The main theme, sensitively felt and developed, is a delicate one—the love of a middle-aged woman for a man who is rapt in worship at a distance of a younger woman, the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, November 4, 1914 • Various
... his world-famous play, "Overheard," had taken precedence of all other topics in the Five Towns during the previous week. He had crammed the theatre and half emptied the Empire Music Hall for six nights; a wonderful feat. Incidentally, his fifteen hundredth appearance in "Overheard" had taken place in the Five Towns, and the Five Towns had found in this fact a peculiar satisfaction, as though some deep merit had thereby been acquired or rewarded. Seven Sachs's tour was now closed, and on the Sunday he ...
— The Regent • E. Arnold Bennett
... vogue and reverence as men of a notable talent, and very serviceable to their party? so that slander seemeth to have lost its nature and not to be now an odious sin, but a fashionable humor, a way of pleasing entertainment, a fine knack, or curious feat of policy; so that no man at least taketh himself or others to be accountable for what is said in this way? Is not, in fine, the case become such, that whoever hath in him any love of truth, any sense of justice or honesty, any spark of charity towards his brethren, shall hardly be able ...
— The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) • Various
... substantial reduction in Federal employment, a feat accomplished only once before in the last 10 years. While maintaining the full strength of our combat defenses, it will call for the lowest number of civilian personnel in the Department of ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Lyndon B. Johnson • Lyndon B. Johnson
... told to Lightfoot. That intelligent and reliable young helpmate of a few hours, who had looked upon what had occurred with an awed admiration, did not exhibit any depression. Her husband, fortunate Benedict, had produced a great effect upon her by his feat. She felt herself something like a queen. Had she known enough and had the fancies of the Ruth of some thousands of decades later she would have told him how completely thenceforth his people were her people ...
— The Story of Ab - A Tale of the Time of the Cave Man • Stanley Waterloo
... adventures. His Majesty received them with marked deference. Elcano was rewarded with a life pension of 500 ducats (worth at that date about L112 10s.), and as a lasting remembrance of his unprecedented feat, his royal master knighted him and conceded to him the right of using on his escutcheon a globe bearing the motto, "Primus ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman |
