"Fist" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... said Geoff. Oh, how good the coffee smelt! He had never enjoyed a meal so much, and yet, had it been at home, how he would have grumbled! Coffee in a bowl, with brown sugar—bread cut as thick as your fist, and no butter! Truly Geoff was already beginning to taste some of ...
— Great Uncle Hoot-Toot • Mrs. Molesworth
... lever or tongue at the head of the handle, the connection between the hammer at the distal end and the lever at the proximal end being effected by means of a steel-wire spinal cord down the dorsal side of the handle. Over the fist of a hammer spread a jaw of sharp teeth to take hold of the carpet. The thing could not talk; but it could do almost anything else, so fearfully and wonderfully was ...
— The Hills of Hingham • Dallas Lore Sharp
... answer. So all round the class: all voted for the big sullen-looking blockhead. One or two did not give their votes quite promptly; and I could discern a threatening glance cast at them by the big sullen-looking blockhead, and an ominous clenching of the blockhead's right fist. I went round the class without remark; and the blockhead made sure of the prize. Of course this would not do. The blockhead could not be suffered to get the prize; and it was expedient that he should be made to remember the occasion on which he had ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IX., March, 1862., No. LIII. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics, • Various
... he came swiftly. I can see him now, in my wake-a-day life, as I write this, swinging along through the trees, a four-handed, hairy creature, howling with rage, pausing now and again to beat his chest with his clenched fist, leaping ten-and-fifteen-foot gaps, catching a branch with one hand and swinging on across another gap to catch with his other hand and go on, never hesitating, never at a loss as to how to proceed on his ...
— Before Adam • Jack London
... her fist and grinned horribly at the broad-mouthed, innocent yellow flower, down whose throat the varlet had leaped—but chancing at that moment to catch a glimpse of her own face in a little bit of mica, which served her for a toilet-mirror, she uttered the least bit of a little ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 4 October 1848 • Various
... should be removed, that very instant the whole edifice would come thundering down in a heap of dusty ruin. All through the foregoing conversation between Mr. Pyncheon and the carpenter, the portrait had been frowning, clenching its fist, and giving many such proofs of excessive discomposure, but without attracting the notice of either of the two colloquists. And finally, at Matthew Maule's audacious suggestion of a transfer of the seven-gabled structure, ...
— The House of the Seven Gables • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Achilles. The victor, on taking off the helmet of his fair enemy as she lay on the ground, was profoundly affected and captivated by her charms, for which he was scornfully taunted by Thersites; exasperated by this rash insult, he killed Thersites on the spot with a blow of his fist. A violent dispute among the Grecian chiefs was the result, for Diomedes, the kinsman of Thersites, warmly resented the proceeding; and Achilles was obliged to go to Lesbos, where he was purified from the act ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 • Various
... some smiling and some crying. I went to look at my children, and thanked God for their happy sleep. The tears fell as I leaned over them. As I moved to leave, Benny stirred. I turned back, and whispered, "Mother is here." After digging at his eyes with his little fist, they opened, and he sat up in bed, looking at me curiously. Having satisfied himself that it was I, he exclaimed, "O mother! you ain't dad, are you? They didn't cut off your head at the plantation, ...
— Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl - Written by Herself • Harriet Jacobs (AKA Linda Brent)
... His fist was raised to deliver a blow when Tom happened to straighten up and look around. He saw the form behind him and the upraised arm and ...
— The Rover Boys on Land and Sea - The Crusoes of Seven Islands • Arthur M. Winfield
... reports—an intelligencer, malignant from choice. He treasured this assertion, therefore, together with one or two others. Sam, now at his third glass, felt his heart warm to Will. He would have fought with tongue or fist on his behalf, and presently added to the mischief he ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts
... the driver, who, exasperated at the interference, took up the whip in a threatening way, as if with intent to strike the professor. In one instant the well-nerved hand of Wilson, not new to these encounters, twisted the whip from the coarse fist of the driver, and walking up to the cart, he unfastened the trams and hurled the whole weight of the coals into the street. He then took the horse and led it away, depositing it in the hands of the authorities, with injunctions to see ...
— Home Life of Great Authors • Hattie Tyng Griswold
... and also paid double fees. A few students from poorer social classes were accepted if they had good references. "Town and Gown" refers to the animosity between the local permanent residents of the town and the rowdy students, occasionally descending into actual fist fights. To be "gated" was to be confined to college and to be "rusticated" was to ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... 'that's a fit punishment for a gentleman. You'll see to it, Sergeant, that I get ten days in the guard house, and my wife breakin' her heart with shame, and the other children tauntin' my boy!' With that, sir, he hit me on the side of the head with his fist. I was so unprepared that it knocked me down, but I saw Lawrence runnin' toward the station. I picked myself up and went and sat down on the bench outside the sheds to think what I ought to do. I knew, as well as I know now, that Lawrence was runnin' away, and I had drove ...
— Betty at Fort Blizzard • Molly Elliot Seawell
... his own barrack. He could hardly hear himself speak. Eighty men were pounding with fist and heel the tables and trestles - eighty men, flushed with mutiny, stripped to their shirt sleeves, their knapsacks half-packed for the march to the sea, made the two-inch boards thunder again as they chanted, to a tune that Mulcahy knew well, the Sacred War Song ...
— This is "Part II" of Soldiers Three, we don't have "Part I" • Rudyard Kipling
... Betty holding one of the child's hands, the other small fist tightly clutching some sticky chocolates, when a turn of the road brought the outdoor girls in sight of a lad who was seated on a roadside rock, tying a couple of rags around his ...
— The Outdoor Girls of Deepdale • Laura Lee Hope
... numberless short prickly pendent branchlets, which roll outward, and then down, and then up again in graceful curves, and carry large pale crimson flowers, each with a pink hood in the middle, looking like a new-born baby's fist. Those flowers, when torn, turn blue on exposure to the light; and when they fall, leave behind them the cannon-ball, a rough brown globe, as big as a thirty two pound shot, which you must get down with a certain caution, lest that befall you which befell ...
— At Last • Charles Kingsley
... in its place came an indescribable anger, a longing to drive his fist into that grinning mask. He turned and ran lightly down the stairs, conscious of a sudden glow of energy. Reaching the floor, he saw the mask making across the hall, in the direction of the outer door. As rapidly ...
— Brood of the Witch-Queen • Sax Rohmer
... three feet, and a small faceted carafe with a round glass stopper and a narrow neck; then he announced to Lavretzky, in a chanting voice, that the meal was ready,—and took up his post behind his chair, having wound a napkin around his right fist, and disseminating some strong, ancient odour, which resembled the odour of cypress wood. Lavretzky tasted the soup, and came upon the hen; its skin was all covered with big pimples, a thick tendon ran down each leg, its flesh had a flavour of charcoal and lye. When he had finished his dinner, ...
— A Nobleman's Nest • Ivan Turgenieff
... me that I more detest. The queen does not know herself how hideous she is; for a goat's horn is standing out on her head, and the better I liked her before the worse I like her now." Thereupon he cast the book on the fire which was burning on the hall-floor, and gave the queen a blow with his fist between the eyes. The queen wept; but more at the king's' illness than at the blow, or ...
— Heimskringla - The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway • Snorri Sturluson
... a man sixty-five years of age, and he made such resistance as he could, crying out loudly for help. I turned, ran to Hall, and with one blow of my fist knocked him nearly senseless; then help came and we secured the mad man. Morey was profuse in protestations of gratitude to ...
— Seven Wives and Seven Prisons • L.A. Abbott
... in the course of a few minutes, finding that search was not being made, he asked for the sword again. Another interval followed; and still it was not forthcoming. His anger was now roused. He vehemently reproached the slaves, and even struck one of them with his fist, which he injured by the blow. "My son and my slaves," he said, "are betraying me to the enemy." He would listen to no entreaties, "Am I a madman," he said, "that I am stripped of my arms? Are you going to bind my hands and give me up ...
— Roman life in the days of Cicero • Alfred J[ohn] Church
... to seat himself and strike his fist on the table, which, in the language of all taverns, means "Some wine," than a second guard, dressed exactly like the first, appeared at the door, murmured some words, and, after a little hesitation, seated himself by ...
— The Regent's Daughter • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... "and once you nailed him, it wouldn't be so hard to make him own up who his cronies were. He's a coward, when you pin him down. I'd dare him to stand up and have it out with me. Then p'raps it was C.J. who rammed his old eye so hard against my fist, trying to feaze me. Oh! the evidence is going to accumulate against him like a regular old mountain. There's that rabbit of yours moving again, Fred. Queer all this row didn't start him off, ...
— Fred Fenton Marathon Runner - The Great Race at Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... was Gerda. And then, as an acolyte, he was proscribed by law from brawling. No one would hit an acolyte; and if the acolyte were built like Forrester, striking another man might be the equivalent of murder. One good blow from Forrester's fist might break the average ...
— Pagan Passions • Gordon Randall Garrett
... into the most furious exclamations against the wounded man, and rushing up to him, struck him a blow with his fist. But Le Blondin, wounded as he was, as quick as thought seized the bayonet of one of the soldiers who supported him, and plunged it into the officer's breast. 'Scoundrel and monster,' said he, 'I shall have the consolation of sending you out of the world before ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... was a patent contrivance in dentistry. Sometimes the scheme was nothing more than a risky venture in stocks. These affairs were conducted with an air of great secrecy in violent whisperings, emphasized by blows of the fist upon the back of the chair. The favored patients were deftly informed of "a good thing," the dentist taking advantage of the one inevitable moment of receptivity for his thrifty promotions. The schemes, ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... fist upon the table savagely, "marry her! There you have it. I'm in for it. No escape. Escape—ha! ha! Nabbed, sir. All up! Married and ...
— The Lady of the Ice - A Novel • James De Mille
... momentary shadow passed over Martin's face, then came one of his big broad smiles, then out shot his clinched fist, and . . . the poor doctor and his garden seat were rolling over each other on ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... he would say. "I've prayed for it an' I kno' it—tho' it may be by the crushing of him. Some men repent to God's smile, some to His frown, and some to His fist. I'm afraid it will take a blow to save ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore
... to the rear wall, and with a blow of his fist would have broken an opening through the rotted bank, but the Indian caught ...
— The Road to Frontenac • Samuel Merwin
... as the watchers looked on that Dick relieved his feelings by pinching Tom's leg, and then holding up his fist, as if in promise of what was to follow if he ...
— Dick o' the Fens - A Tale of the Great East Swamp • George Manville Fenn
... took away the lamp to his own room, shaking his fist at himself for allowing his mother's door to creak. He pulled up his blind. The town lay as still as salt. But a steady light showed in the south, and on pressing his face against the window he saw another in the west. Mr. Carfrae's words about the night-watch ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... is loud, blustering, threatening. The eyes stare; the eyebrows draw down; the face red and bloated; the mouth pouts out; the voice hollow and thundering; the arms are set a-kimbo; the head often nodding in a menacing manner; and the right fist, clenched, is brandished, from time to time, at the person threatened. The right foot is often stamped upon the ground, and the legs take such large strides, and the steps are so heavy, that the earth seems ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... was agreeable to Sir Stentor. To this compliment the knight replied with an air of surprise: "Waunds! I find here's another countryman of mine in this here company. Sir, I am proud to see you with all my heart." So speaking, he thrust out his right hand across the table, and shook our hero by the fist, with such violence of civility, as proved very grievous to a French marquis, who, in helping himself to soup, was jostled in such a manner, as to overturn the dividing-spoon in his own bosom. The Englishman, seeing the mischief he had produced, ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... feels good to shake your fist again!" his step-father said, taking him in a friendly grasp; and his mother, who looked handsomer and taller and more splendidly dressed than ever, exclaimed: "Mercy! how they've cut his hair!" before ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... Cezanne, in the new world of emotion; there was Tolstoi, and there was Ibsen; but who can say that these did not set out in search of Eldorados of which already they had heard travellers' tales. Ruskin shook his fist at the old order to some purpose; and, if he could not see clearly what things counted, succeeded at least in making contemptible some that did not. Nietzsche's preposterous nonsense knocked the bottom out of nonsense more preposterous and far ...
— Art • Clive Bell
... leave me; what love bids retrieve me? can June's fist grasp May? Leave me and love me; hopes eyed once above me like spring's sprouts decay; Fall as the snow falls, when summer leaves grow false—cards ...
— The Heptalogia • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... that hitherto their priesthood have endeavoured, as much as possible, to keep them blinded. There is one fellow amongst them for whom we entertain a particular aversion; a big, burly parson, with the face of a lion, the voice of a buffalo, and a fist like a sledge-hammer. The last time I was there, I observed that his eye was upon me, and I did not like the glance he gave me at all; I observed him clench his fist, and I took my departure as fast as I conveniently ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... fourth generation afterwards, one "Friedrich the Second," not unknown to us,—a sharp little man, little in stature, but large in faculty and renown, who is now called "Frederick the Great,"—clutched hold of the Imperial fist (so to speak), seizing his opportunity in 1740; and so wrenched and twisted said close fist, that not only Jagerndorf dropped out of it, but the whole of Silesia along with Jagerndorf, there being other claims withal. And the account ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. III. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Hohenzollerns In Brandenburg—1412-1718 • Thomas Carlyle
... it,' he broke out a minute later, 'd'ye think I heed the cacklin' o' fifty parishes? Na, not I,' and, with a short, grim laugh, he brought his fist down ...
— Victorian Short Stories • Various
... the spade, stepped nimbly aside, and as Pete lunged past him the young farmer doubled his fist and struck his ...
— Hiram The Young Farmer • Burbank L. Todd
... body, in a whirling melee. Neither had much skill in real boxing, and such fashion of fight was unknown in that region, the offensive being the main thing and defense remaining incidental. The thud of fist on face, the discoloration that rose under the savage blows, the blood that oozed and scattered, proved that the fighting blood of both these mad creatures was up, so that they felt no pain, even as they ...
— The Covered Wagon • Emerson Hough
... he crawls up to the window and peeps in, and watches there till Bill should go to bed, thinking the best way to catch them 'ere sort of animals is to catch them asleep. Well, he kept Nabb a-waiting outside so long, with his talking and singing, that he well nigh fell asleep fist himself; at last Bill began to strip for bed. First he takes out a long pocket pistol, examines the priming, and lays it down on the table, near the head of ...
— The Clockmaker • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... expressionless. But she moved the coin nearer to her eyes and a smile broke and widened until her whole face was a wrinkle of joy. When she turned in the doorway, the interviewer noticed that the hand jammed into an apron pocket was clutched into a possessive fist, cradling the ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - Volume II. Arkansas Narratives. Part I • Work Projects Administration
... with her on the ground, either on your hands and feet, or you can lay her on her side, or stand before her with bent knees, or, well rubbed with oil, you can boldly enter the lists, as in the Pancratium, belabouring your foe with blows from your fist or otherwise. The next day you will celebrate equestrian games, in which the riders will ride side by side, or else the chariot teams, thrown one on top of another, panting and whinnying, will roll and knock against each other on the ground, ...
— Peace • Aristophanes
... chessmen, or I'll wring your neck for you." The fellow made a blow at him with his free hand, a blow that Coristine parried, and then the Irishman, letting go of his antagonist's arm, gave him a sounding whack with all the might of his right fist, that sent ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell
... fist of Smithson major described a half circle and hurt his ear very much, Quentin suddenly screwed himself up and hit out with his right hand, straight, and with his whole weight behind the blow as the grocer's boy had shown him. All his grief for ...
— The Magic World • Edith Nesbit
... might have heard a watch tick, Doble leaned forward, his body rigid, danger written large in his burning eyes and clenched fist. ...
— Gunsight Pass - How Oil Came to the Cattle Country and Brought a New West • William MacLeod Raine
... more to the purpose; as my business is wonderfully on the increase, I shall want somebody to help me in serving my customers, and keeping them in order. If you choose to come and serve for your board, and what they'll give you, give me your fist; or if you like ten shillings a week better than their sixpences and ha'pence, only say so—though, to be open with you, I believe you would make twice ten shillings out of them—the sneaking, fawning, ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... appeared, to ask if Idella might go up to the orchard with him. Idella ran out of the room and came back with her hat on, and tugging to get into her shabby little sack. Annie helped her with it, and Idella tucked her hand into Bolton's loose, hard fist, and gave it a pull ...
— Annie Kilburn - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... up, and tried to fly, but he was met with a blow from Jefferson's fist which might have felled an ...
— Jack Harkaway and his son's Escape From the Brigand's of Greece • Bracebridge Hemyng
... cease, for why should I prolong My notes, and vex a Singer with a Song? Oh thou with pen perpetual in thy fist! Dubbed for thy sins a stark Miscellanist, So pleased the printer's orders to perform For Messrs. Longman, Hurst and Rees and Orme. Go—Get thee hence to Paternoster Row, Thy patrons wave a duodecimo! (Best form for letters from a ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron
... happily. Then she did a reckless thing, showing herself at the window, and shaking her fist defiantly as the car, with rapidly gathering speed, passed the disconsolate group on the station platform. Holmes was the first to see her, and his face darkened with a swift scowl. Then he caught sight of Bessie, and, seizing Brack's arm, pointed ...
— The Camp Fire Girls on the March - Bessie King's Test of Friendship • Jane L. Stewart
... stood still for a second or two, as if the meaning of the words had hardly reached him, and then rushed at the attorney with his clenched fist; but the man of law was too quick for him, for striking out with ...
— The Macdermots of Ballycloran • Anthony Trollope
... background of the carving, bare-foot and bare-headed, his face cleanshaven, dressed in a long robe embroidered in a chessboard pattern, and with a tunic pleated in horizontal rows; his right elbow is supported by the left hand, while the right is raised to a level with his eyes, his fist is clenched, and the thumb inserted between the first and second fingers in ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 7 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... the Hermit, (well known to the curious in penny-histories of Robin Hood, by the name of Friar Tuck,) "it is not the crosier I fear, but the sceptre.—Alas! that my sacrilegious fist should ever have been applied to the ear of ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... goes!" yelled the sailor in charge of the line; he began to haul in the slack like a madman; Coke's fist fell heavily ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... that I was absolutely unrecognisable, a low blackguard with a blackened face. 'I don't know what you mean,' says he, 'and I'm damned if I care.' 'Das halsband, says I, which means the necklace. 'Go to hell,' says he. But I struck myself and shook my head and then my fist at him and nodded. He laughed in my face; and upon my soul we were at a deadlock. So I pointed to the clock and held up one finger. 'I've one minute to live, old girl,' says he through the doors, 'if this rotter has the guts to shoot, and I don't think he has. Why the hell don't ...
— Mr. Justice Raffles • E. W. Hornung
... throat in a belated effort at rescue, but Powell smashed a solid fist squarely into its snarling face, and the brute collapsed with ...
— Devil Crystals of Arret • Hal K. Wells
... her foreign policies in exactly the same way that the people of the United States were taught to regard Germany and her foreign policies. To them the United States is a great, rich, brutal Empire, setting her heel and laying her fist where necessity calls. Men and women inside the United States think of themselves and of their fellow citizens as human beings. The people in the other countries read the records of the lynchings, the robberies and the murders inside ...
— The American Empire • Scott Nearing
... is some one?" She clenched her fist, and hit out at the air with her parasol, and knit her brows as she looked up at him with a glance of fire in her eye which he had never seen there before. "Believe me, Mary," he said; "if ever a girl had a sincere friend, you have one in me. ...
— The American Senator • Anthony Trollope
... could be made in the centre the Lowlanders were ordered to cease their heroic attempts, which they did most unwillingly. As the order to withdraw reached a brigade which had been hammered unmercifully all day with little chance of retaliation, one of the men shook his fist at Ali Muntar and, almost choking with rage, cried out: "Damn ...
— With Our Army in Palestine • Antony Bluett
... is all principally due to cigarettes!" he broke forth, savagely, emphasizing his words with his fist and speaking more excitedly. "Just look at me and behold a splendid example of the cigarette curse. Why, I was naturally bright; I might have been a man to honor. But a bad habit, uncontrolled, soon ruins one. My nerves are gone. I am only ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... man sprang to his feet and another thumped the table with his fist. Suddenly they all threw back their heads and laughed, rose and left the ...
— Ethel Morton's Holidays • Mabell S. C. Smith
... sleep, sonny!" returned La Cibot. "Your eyes look tired, they are as big as my fist. But there! if anything could comfort me for losing Cibot, it would be the thought of ending my days with a good man like you. Be easy. I will give Mme. Chapoulot a dressing down. . . . To think of a retired haberdasher's ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... contempt of the insult shattered Bud Ellis's self-control. Prompted by blind fury, the great fist of the man shot out, hammer-like, and Clayton crumpled at his feet. It was a blow that would have felled the proverbial ox; it was the counterpart of many other blows, plus berserker rage, that had split pine boards for sheer joy in the ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge
... eyes upon the ground. Then she looked up. She struck the arm of her chair with her closed fist and cried in a quick petulance, ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... when Jorunn was going to bed, Melkorka was undressing her, and put her shoes on the floor, when Jorunn took the stockings and smote her with them about the head. Melkorka got angry, and struck Jorunn on the nose with her fist, so that the blood flowed. Hoskuld came in and parted them. After that he let Melkorka go away, and got a dwelling ready for her up in Salmon-river-Dale, at the place that was afterwards called Melkorkastad, which is ...
— Laxdaela Saga - Translated from the Icelandic • Anonymous
... can contribute at election time. Say what you will, Mr. Hand, but it's the two, and five, and ten dollar bills paid out at the last moment over the saloon bars and at the polling-places that do the work. Give me enough money"—and at this noble thought Mr. Gilgan straightened up and slapped one fist lightly in the other, adjusting at the same time his half-burned cigar so that it should not burn his hand—"and I can carry every ward in Chicago, bar none. If I have money enough," he repeated, emphasizing the last two words. He put his cigar back in his mouth, blinked his eyes defiantly, ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... by vast groves of oaks and beeches. Ancient Badahuennan forests of sanguinary Druids, the "wild wood without mercy" of Saxon savages, where, at a later period, sovereign Dirks and Florences, in long succession of centuries, had ridden abroad with lance in rest, or hawk on fist; or under whose boughs, in still nearer days, the gentle Jacqueline had pondered and wept over her sorrows, stretched out in every direction between the city and the neighbouring sea. In the heart of the place ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... meals a day, I gave the order to start. Beaulieu demanded insolently: 'Oh! who's boss?' My patience was worn out. I said: 'I am, and I'll show you right now,' and proceeded to do so, meaning to let him have my fist with all the steam I could get back of it. But he did not wait. At a safe distance he turned and in a totally different manner said: 'I only want to know; I thought maybe the old man (the guide). I'll do it, all ri, all ri,' and he ...
— The Arctic Prairies • Ernest Thompson Seton
... support the church, in which they had no voice, but the State, too, with its army and navy. Mr. Fawcett was not an orator, but a simple, straightforward speaker. He made but one gesture, striking his right clenched fist into the palm of the left hand at the close of all his strongest assertions; but being sound and liberal, he was a great favorite with ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... building to write in the light of the gas lamp. Gentlemen of nocturnal habits have often wondered what it is that Policeman Hogan and his brethren write in their little books. Here are the words that are fashioned by the big fist of the policeman: ...
— Literary Lapses • Stephen Leacock
... did so that to move at the same time he did, he could not hear the noise made by me. When I was close enough I laid flat on the ground, shut my left hand, and placing it on the ground, resting my gun on my fist, took good ...
— Thirty-One Years on the Plains and In the Mountains • William F. Drannan
... a rare skin disease, chiefly from the absolute increase of the lymphocytes alone, although no swelling of the glands was palpable. The post-mortem shewed that the chief condition was a swelling of the retro-peritoneal lymph glands to lumps as large as a fist. ...
— Histology of the Blood - Normal and Pathological • Paul Ehrlich
... one can flater, and beare a Hauke on his fist, He shalbe made parson of Honington ...
— The Ship of Fools, Volume 1 • Sebastian Brandt
... his fist and threw it on the floor, frowning angrily at the thought of the man's audacity. But after a while he picked the crumpled note up and straightened it out upon the table, carefully rereading it. Its very touch seemed to soil his fingers, but he studied it for a long while, and then folded ...
— The Vagrant Duke • George Gibbs
... without dancing turkey-trots think I'm going to the devil because I can drink whiskey? I'm not afraid of whiskey," he laughed tolerantly. "It amuses me, that's all it does to me; it amuses me." He pulled back the coat of his pajamas and showed his giant chest and shoulder. With his fist he struck his bare flesh and it glowed instantly a ...
— The Lost Road • Richard Harding Davis
... him unclose his clenched fist, in which there appears to be one or two cloves, and then says: "I am shocked to hear this, Mr. PENDRAGON. As you have no political influence, and have never shot a Tribune man, neither New York law nor society would allow you to commit ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 14, July 2, 1870 • Various
... a stable, pulling up a rope by which one "Tommy," an infant scion of an adjacent and wealthy house, was suspended in mid-air. In vain the female relatives of Tommy, congregated in the back-yard, expostulated with Melons; in vain the unhappy father shook his fist at him. Secure in his position, Melons redoubled his exertions and at last landed Tommy on the roof. Then it was that the humiliating fact was disclosed that Tommy had been acting in collusion with Melons. He grinned delightedly back at his parents, as if "by merit raised to that ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various
... de man," said the negro, smiting his broad chest with his fist, "what's ready to serve as a rocket-stick to bof, an' go ...
— Blown to Bits - or, The Lonely Man of Rakata • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... rifle[5] me, for I'm danngerous!" yelled the demibarbarian, springing on his stolen horse, and riding up to Edith. "Say the word, marm," he cried; "for I'll fight for you, or run for you, take scalp or cut stick, shake fist or show leg, anything in reason or out of reason. Strannger thar's as brash[6] as a new hound in a b'ar fight, or a young boss in a corn-field, and no safe friend in a forest. Say the word, marm,—or if you think it ar'nt manners to speak to a strannger, jist shake your little ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird
... me, but the Coras are not easily scared, anyhow. A stranger may enter a house without any further ceremony than the customary salutation, "Axu!" One day when I approached a dwelling, a nice-looking little girl, scarcely three years of age, came running out with a big knife in her little fist, her mother following after her to catch her. The small children curiously approach you, rather than run away. My two dogs intruded into a house and met in the doorway a little girl, about four years old, who was just coming out. The family dog was inside and began at once to bark at the new-comers, ...
— Unknown Mexico, Volume 1 (of 2) • Carl Lumholtz
... "straight up in the air." "They sha'n't burn Eeny-Meeny!" she declared, shaking her fist above her head. "They'll only touch her ...
— The Campfire Girls on Ellen's Isle - The Trail of the Seven Cedars • Hildegard G. Frey
... distinct notice of Peru was about the year 1511, when Vasco Nunez de Balboa, the discoverer of the Southern Sea, was weighing some gold which he had collected from the natives. A young barbarian chieftain, who was present, struck the scales with his fist, and, scattering the glittering metal around the apartment, exclaimed,—-"If this is what you prize so much that you are willing to leave your distant homes, and risk even life itself for it, I can tell you of a land where they eat and drink out of golden vessels, and gold is as cheap as iron is ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... confronted with the rival chieftain, the redoubtable Chippy. Arthur swung his books at Chippy's head, but the latter was far too quick for so slowly delivered a stroke, and was inside his opponent's guard in a flash. Chippy's dirty fist was planted with stinging force in Arthur's right eye, and Arthur went ...
— The Wolf Patrol - A Tale of Baden-Powell's Boy Scouts • John Finnemore
... A thousand times I have told you not to bother me with your politics! This is no question of politics! And you," said Chubikoff, turning to Dukovski and shaking his fist, "I won't forget this ...
— The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales • Various
... eyes the tragic eyes of a Jane Addams. In a whisper she uttered the great heresy: 'German salvation lies in Germany's defeat. If Germany wins when so many of her progressive young men have been slain, the people will be utterly crushed in the grip of the mailed fist.' ...
— The Better Germany in War Time - Being some Facts towards Fellowship • Harold Picton
... struck her shoulder with a fist as hard as iron, and Pilar stumbled on. She knew that if she refused to walk, her mother would carry her. They entered the Presidio. Pilar, raising her eyes for one brief terrible moment, saw that Tomaso, her mother's head ...
— The Splendid Idle Forties - Stories of Old California • Gertrude Atherton
... in Paris or in London, these scarfs, which are from twelve to fifteen feet long, would fetch a large sum among the ladies of the haut ton. I have often had one of them shut up in my hand so that it was scarcely to be perceived that I had anything enclosed in my fist. ...
— Monsieur Violet • Frederick Marryat
... words," said Stuart Farquaharson slowly, "is made with a clenched fist. The triple immunity of your cloth, your age and your infirmity denies ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... running along the slope of an upland, so that the left hand was higher and the right lower. It was more as if we were crossing the face of some prodigious rapid, whose surges were the measureless granite boulders tossing everywhere in masses from the size of a man's fist to the size of a house. In a wild chaos they wallowed against one another, the greater bearing on their tops or between them on their shoulders smaller regular or irregular masses of the same gray stone. Everywhere among their awful shallows grew gray live-oaks, and ...
— Familiar Spanish Travels • W. D. Howells
... with the sculptures of St. Mark's, in their expression of the varieties of climate and agricultural system. Observe that the letter (f.) in some of the columns, opposite the month of May, means that he has a falcon on his fist; being, in those cases, represented as riding out, in high exultation, on a caparisoned white horse. A series nearly similar to that of St. Mark's occurs on the door of the Cathedral of Lucca, and ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume II (of 3) • John Ruskin
... who called himself Jeremy Rofflash had not time to draw his sword; the fist of the man he had thought to frighten had shot out swift as an arrow, catching him between the eyes and tumbling ...
— Madame Flirt - A Romance of 'The Beggar's Opera' • Charles E. Pearce
... dirty little girl, with sores upon her face, stretches out a bunch of wilting violets, in a pitifully thin little fist, and interrupts my speech. "Bunch o' vi'lets—on'y ...
— A Modern Utopia • H. G. Wells
... they felt for their unfortunate companions in the darkness, with the result that Titely flung out one fist with the accompaniment of an angry growl, and at the first touch of Murray's fingers, Roberts uttered an angry expostulation, taking all the stiffness out of his brother middy's joints as the lad started, broke out in a violent perspiration, and caught hold of his wakeful ...
— Hunting the Skipper - The Cruise of the "Seafowl" Sloop • George Manville Fenn
... callant, sir,' said the Baron, who had a great liking to this young man, perhaps because he sometimes teased him—'Ye're a daft callant, and I must correct you some of these days,' shaking his great brown fist at him. 'But what I meant to say, Colonel Talbot, is, that yours is an ancient prosapia, or descent, and since you have lawfully and justly acquired the estate for you and yours which I have lost for me and mine, I wish it may remain in your name as many centuries ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... confine his teaching to these two exercises only with regard to his companions; for although men were sometimes seriously hurt by blows given by the masses of leather and lead, which, wound round the fist, were used to give weight to the blows, a final termination to the contests was rare. In the exercises the men practised with many wrappings of wadding and cotton wound round the caestus, answering the purpose of the ...
— Beric the Briton - A Story of the Roman Invasion • G. A. Henty
... affrighted animals sprang forward he blocked the window, placing one hand on her shoulder. He felt her escape from his grasp, but not daring to leave his post, he leaned out of the window when they were opposite the square, and shook his fist at the anti-renters, exclaiming: ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... into his eyes, and he burst forth in a loud bellow. It was the first time Miss Fosbrook had heard him cry, and she feared that he had been hurt by the fall, or cut by the broken crockery; but he struck out with foot and fist, as if his tears were as much anger as grief, and roared out, "I want the halfpence ...
— The Stokesley Secret • Charlotte M. Yonge
... with the article man in his theoretical than in his real presence. You may succeed in showing by every convincement, that you are his natural master and superior, and that there is every reason on earth why you should command and direct him. "No! —— ," says the wretch, shaking his fist, or shrugging his shoulders; and whatever your intimate convictions may be, the end is, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... unawed by the situation, and with my small fist clutching the bonbons, was passed on to Queen Adelaide. She gave me a kiss, for form's sake, I thought; and I ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke
... not the net figure—and how can you tell what was the original cost of the road?" "Ah, that's just it," shouted Harran, emphasising each word with a blow of his fist upon his knee, his eyes sparkling, "you take cursed good care that we don't know anything about the original cost of the road. But we know you are bonded for treble your value; and we know this: ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris
... so! you lawyers are ever writing leaf after leaf, and never do ye write all; and then the upright judges begin to gloze, to interpret, to take bribes for dark passages. The law ought to be like an open hand without a glove, (the Prince opened his fist;) every simple man ought to see what is in it, and it should not be able to conceal a grain of corn. Short and clear; and, when needful, seizing firmly!... But as it is, they have put a ragged glove on law; and, besides, they close the fist. Ye may ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various
... out with it, over with it, away with it, and the like; in which construction, the adverb seems to be used elliptically as above, though the insertion of the verb would totally enervate or greatly alter the expression. Examples: "She up with her fist, and took him on the face."—Sydney, in Joh. Dictionary. "Away with him!"—Acts, xxi, 36. "Away with such a fellow from the earth."—Ib., xxii, 22. "The calling of assemblies I cannot away ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... parallel. A wretch had crept into his bosom! A viper had hidden herself at his fireside! Where could words be found to brand her with the infamy she deserved? He stopped, with a suffocating sense in him of his own impotent rage—he stopped, and shook his fist tremulously in the ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... in person, he found that there was scarcely more than a dozen of port in the wine-cellar. He turned white with dismay, and, till he had brought the blood back to his countenance by swearing, he was something awful to behold in the dim light of the tallow candle old Jacob held in his tattooed fist. I will not repeat the words he used; fortunately, they are out of fashion amongst gentlemen, although ladies, I understand, are beginning to revive the custom, now old, and always ugly. Jacob reminded his honour that he would not have more put down till he had got a proper cellar built, ...
— Stephen Archer and Other Tales • George MacDonald
... was broken. This morning, after a moment or two's consideration behind her veil of unbrushed hair, Straighty came and clambered upon the arm of the courting chair—dabbed a clammy little hand down my neck, whilst Curley plumped her fist on my knee and stayed looking into my face with very wondering smiling blue eyes. By the simple act of jumping a rope, I had gained their confidence; had proved I was really a fellow creature, I suppose. ...
— A Poor Man's House • Stephen Sydney Reynolds
... Delegates were on their feet, standing on chairs, the air was full of hats, and the cheers deafening for Greeley for some minutes. Mr. Demers, the preacher delegate, lost his equilibrium, rushed up to me, shaking his fist excitedly, and shouted: "Damn you! you have nominated him ...
— My Memories of Eighty Years • Chauncey M. Depew
... had not escaped the notice of Snarley Bob, and I could see wrath in his eyes. Being near him, I asked what it meant. "By God!" he said, "it's a good job for Tom Barter as the rheumatiz has crippled my old hands. If I could only double my fist, I'd put a mark on his silly jaw as 'ud stop him singing that song for many a day to come. Not that there's any sense in it. But it's just because there's no sense in 'em that such songs oughtn't to be ...
— Mad Shepherds - and Other Human Studies • L. P. Jacks
... rattletrap of a wagon, drawn by a big, loose-jointed mule, the large ears of which were flapping to and fro. The animal was advancing rapidly, in response to blows and words from the colored driver, and, before the uplifted fist of Morse could fall on Tom's head, ...
— Tom Swift and his Airship • Victor Appleton
... someday. But I shan't consent to invite you, until we can receive you in style. But I guess we shall be able to do that, one of these days. I intend that Pamela shall live on Lake Bigler until she can knock a bull down with her fist—say, ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... the man beside him he hit, and as his clenched fist came in contact with the bearded ...
— The Rider of Waroona • Firth Scott
... itself, as Holman had remarked, it cultivates a strength that tries the nerves of an explorer, more especially if it is situated near the equator. Places like Papua, the Caroline Islands, parts of Borneo, and the Never Never country in inland Australia seem to possess a fist that attempts to push you off when you endeavour to bring the atmosphere of civilization into a silence that has ...
— The White Waterfall • James Francis Dwyer
... that he had been conquered by a boy, and trampled under foot by him, ere, on account of his youth, he could commit sin. He therefore began to tempt his senses; but he, enraged with himself, and beating his breast with his fist, as if he could drive out thoughts by blows, "I will force thee, mine ass," said he, "not to kick; and feed thee with straw, not barley. I will wear thee out with hunger and thirst; I will burden thee with heavy loads; I will hunt thee through heat and cold, till thou thinkest more of ...
— The Hermits • Charles Kingsley
... man burst in fiercely, 'Of gourse it vas der vimmen! It is always der vimmen. Dese dam vimmen, dey makes all der drabble!' He thumped the table with his fist, and then, catching the Hebrew's eye, ...
— The Uttermost Farthing - A Savant's Vendetta • R. Austin Freeman
... do be for slippin' off, and showin' a clane pair of heels; but the other sames to be a wicked sort. He swipes his fist jist so," making a furious gesture as he spoke, "and will be hanged if he goes till he taches thim silly fools ...
— Motor Boat Boys Mississippi Cruise - or, The Dash for Dixie • Louis Arundel
... signed to keep the town open that year you fellows were masquerading on that Law and Order Committee: You all voted for Wimply! I've enough signatures here to put half of you in stripes!" he exclaimed, striking the desk with his clenched fist. ...
— The Co-Citizens • Corra Harris
... I saw the coxswain and another, two very hard-faced men, with grizzled heads, who had been the heartiest of the hearty all along, close with one another, get each of them the other's head under his arm, and pommel away at it with his fist as hard as he could, ...
— The Perils of Certain English Prisoners • Charles Dickens
... unparalleled within that dingy suburban semi-detached, and there was a great banging of gorgeous drums and a tootling of glittering trumpets, and little Fay was round-eyed with delight in the acquisition of the wondrous locomotive, ultimately declining to go to sleep save with one tiny fist shut tight round the chimney thereof. That would counteract any passing effect that might be inspired by a vacant chair, thought Laurence Stanninghame, amid the roar of the mail train speeding through the raw haze of the early morning. Sentiment? feelings? What ...
— The Sign of the Spider • Bertram Mitford |
