"Life-preserver" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... I have to overcome in making a few tolerable verses. A happy combination by nature, an irrepressible and fruitful intellect, made you a great poet without any effort of your own. I feel and acknowledge the inferiority of my talent. I swim about in the ocean of poetry with my life-preserver under my arm. I do not write as well as I think. My ideas are stronger than my expressions; and in this embarrassment, I am often content if my verses are as little indifferent as possible, and do not expect them to be good." [Footnote: The king's ...
— Berlin and Sans-Souci • Louise Muhlbach
... flew across the deck to where there was a life-preserver, attached to a hundred feet of small, but strong, rope. Once at the stern again, he threw the life-preserver as far out ...
— The Rover Boys on the Great Lakes • Arthur M. Winfield
... back across the room once more, turning out the light as he passed the gas-jet. The leather girdle, that went on much after the fashion of a life-preserver, was fastened over his shoulders and secured around his waist. The remainder of his clothes were stripped off with lightning speed, and in their place were donned the fashionably tailored, immaculate tweeds of Jimmie Dale. It was like some quick-moving, shadowy pantomime in the moonlight. ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... city of New York, his eye was attracted by the words "INDIA RUBBER FOR SALE." Having heard much of this new article of late, he purchased a life-preserver which he carried home and so materially improved, in conception, that he was induced to return to the store for the purpose of explaining his ideas. At the store he was now told of the great discouragements with which the rubber trade was contending, the merchants ...
— Hidden Treasures - Why Some Succeed While Others Fail • Harry A. Lewis
... put that thing on me!" exclaimed Sylvia, eyeing with scorn the life-preserver he had picked up. "I thought that was something to sit on." She pinioned her elbows to her side. "Oh, I'd much rather drown than wear ...
— The Opened Shutters • Clara Louise Burnham
... I would add, possibly called "The Whale," as some craft are nowadays christened the "Shark," the "Gull," the "Eagle." Nor have there been wanting learned exegetists who have opined that the whale mentioned in the book of Jonah merely meant a life-preserver—an inflated bag of wind—which the endangered prophet swam to, and so was saved from a watery doom. Poor Sag-Harbor, therefore, seems worsted all round. But he had still another reason for his want of faith. It was this, if I remember right: Jonah was swallowed ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... hasn't spoken yet. It looks as if he were getting ready to do some outside cleaning, for he had on a life-preserver. Funny thing about it, though, that's not his work. He's not even on duty during the starboard watch. The man in the lookout saw him climb out on the bow, shout something up to him, then fall backward into the water. I'll be hanged if I can ...
— Miss Mink's Soldier and Other Stories • Alice Hegan Rice
... "What about Halarkenden?" asked the man, holding a slim hand tight as if he held to a life-preserver. ...
— August First • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews and Roy Irving Murray
... also closely examined the wound by this time. "The cut's too wide for a blackjack, or what the English call a 'life-preserver'; and it's too deep. It was made with something with a sharp edge—something wide ...
— Ashton-Kirk, Criminologist • John T. McIntyre
... pump suddenly stopped; and then the captain turned pale as death and demanded to know who stopped that pump, while Bradley buckled a life-preserver around him, corked up a note to his wife in a bottle, and said that now that the pump had ceased he would give that steamer just ...
— Elbow-Room - A Novel Without a Plot • Charles Heber Clark (AKA Max Adeler)
... Street and had returned to the basin laden each time with mysterious packages, many of which rattled or clinked when deposited in the galley. Perry had purchased an inexpensive talking machine and a dozen records. Neil had contributed a patent life-preserver that looked like a waistcoat to be used by an Arctic explorer and was guaranteed to keep Barnum and Bailey's fat man afloat. Phil had supplied the cabin with magazines, few of them, to Perry's chagrin, of the sort anyone but a "highbrow" would care to tackle. Joe, as an after-thought, had stocked ...
— The Adventure Club Afloat • Ralph Henry Barbour
... hour I made out that it was something round, with something white raised above it, and then I discovered that it was a life-preserver, which supported a little stick, to which a white flag, probably a handkerchief, was attached. Then I saw that on the life-preserver lay a little ...
— The Rudder Grangers Abroad and Other Stories • Frank R. Stockton
... gallant sorter to a still suburban square; He watched his opportunity and seized him unaware; He took a life-preserver and he hit him on the head, And Mrs. Brown dissected him before she went ...
— A Nonsense Anthology • Collected by Carolyn Wells
... tranquillity. He is tormented with no doubts as to the efficacy of faith or works, and has no fears that his past life may possibly have rendered him unfit for eternal felicity. Like a man in a sinking ship who has buckled on his life-preserver, he feels perfectly secure. With no fear for the future and little regret for the present or the past, he awaits calmly the dread summons, and dies with a resignation which a Stoic ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... bone and only a half of 1 per cent. fat; while Neewa, weight thirteen pounds, was about 90 per cent. fat. Therefore Miki had the floating capacity of a small anchor, while Neewa was a first-class life-preserver, and ...
— Nomads of the North - A Story of Romance and Adventure under the Open Stars • James Oliver Curwood
... when there was a cry of 'A man overboard!' We went on deck. After a while, the man—who had enormous water-boots on, but who was fortunately a good swimmer—appeared on the surface, caught hold of a life-preserver which had been thrown out to him, was picked up by a boat, and hoisted on board. After a bumper of brandy, he seemed none the worse. But in the meantime we had sprung our rudder-head (the same sort of ...
— Letters and Journals of James, Eighth Earl of Elgin • James, Eighth Earl of Elgin
... of his one-armed condition, had the only life-preserver. The preserver was rubber of the inflating type and is in the Smithsonian Institution, presented by Mr. Stanton who obtained it from one of the survivors ...
— The Romance of the Colorado River • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... Pascagoula, and its surroundings, as I was. Both were the picture of happiness. They engaged in many amusements, of which I was incapable, and could only look on and laugh at—such as catching crabs, and speering flounders by torchlight. They bathed and swam, too, (the latter with a life-preserver), but they were afraid to venture out too far, on account of sharks, which were occasionally seen near the shore. At a certain season of the year there was frequently heard, near the bath-houses, a strain of music, like the Aeolian harp, which had never been satisfactorily accounted ...
— A Biographical Sketch of the Life and Character of Joseph Charless - In a Series of Letters to his Grandchildren • Charlotte Taylor Blow Charless
... Lincoln's life-preserver, as it has been of thousands of others. "If it were not for this," he used to say, "I should die." His jests and quaint stories lighted the gloom of dark ...
— Cheerfulness as a Life Power • Orison Swett Marden
... than ever at the joking question. A present! A little present, that was all! She thought it would ease her mind. So she had taken what money she had saved—a few pennies it was—and had bought something for him. A life-preserver! A neighbor of hers had gotten it from an engineer on an English steamer! And she produced the huge vest of padded cork, which folded up so easily along the seams! The Rector looked at the strange mechanism and smiled. Did you ever! What things people could think of! ...
— Mayflower (Flor de mayo) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... poacher's on even terms! Of course, if they suffice, I shall only treat him to my knuckles; but if not—if he be a giant, or there be more than one of them—then here is a better ally than mere bone and sinew." Yorke took out of a drawer a life-preserver, made of lead and whalebone, struck with it once, to test its weight and elasticity, then slipped it into his shooting-jacket pocket. "That will enlarge their organs of locality," said he, grimly; "they ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn
... her with a cord to the box, having first placed beneath her arms the life-preserver. Placing another life-preserver around himself, he stood by Mary's side with watchful anxiety. Suddenly a heavy sea threw the boat forcibly to one side, and Albert mechanically stretching forth his hand to save ...
— Autographs for Freedom, Volume 2 (of 2) (1854) • Various
... personal freedom, but the joy at my mother's escape was greater than anything I had ever known. It was a joy that reaches beyond the tide and anchors in the harbor of eternal rest. While in oppression, this eternal life-preserver had continually wafted her toward the land of freedom, which she was confident of gaining, whatever might betide. Our joy that we were permitted to mingle together our earthly bliss in glorious strains of freedom was indescribable. My mother responded with the children of Israel,—"The ...
— The Story of Mattie J. Jackson • L. S. Thompson |
