"Switching" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... lips, as she pointed to something behind him, awoke the mountain man to instant action. Instinctively, he snatched his long dagger from its sheath and turned quickly. Not twenty feet from them a huge cat-like beast stood half crouched on the edge of the darkness, his long tail switching angrily. The feeble light from the depth of the cave threw the long, water-soaked visitor into bold relief against the black wall beyond. Apparently, he was as much surprised as the two who glared at him, as though frozen to the spot. A snarling whine, a fierce growl, indicated his fury ...
— Beverly of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... Switching on his electric torch, he consulted his watch. Nearly half-past four—why not ...? It was no distance to the lower gate, and only a mile of zigzag road up to ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... once, the evil switching of her tail ceased, she half rose; she began to purr, a purr that sounded to me as loud as the roar of a water-fall in a gorge; she took a few steps towards me, then, suddenly, she made a peculiar movement hard to describe, something like the curvetting ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White
... along the barrel, which glistened in the dying flame of the match. He unlocked his door, closed it, and shot the bolt. Switching on the electric light, he cautiously drew back the sheet. Apparently satisfied, he sniffed the air. It was nothing more than stuffy, as a stateroom that has been closed for a week or ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... added their horses to the tail-switching string in front of the saloon. Racey did not fail to note that none of the other horses gave any evidence of having been ridden either hard or lately. Which, in the face of Thompson's assertion that the men he left ...
— The Heart of the Range • William Patterson White
... since breakfast time; old pupils, both married and single, with and without families, streamed back to the dear old village. The two livery stables were crowded with vehicles of all sorts, and lines of buggies and wagons were drawn up along the sides of the shady roads, the horses switching their tails in luxurious idleness. The streets were filled with people wearing their best clothes, and the fashions included not only "the latest thing," but the well preserved relic of a bygone day. There were all sorts ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... went away, switching his cane as he walked towards the upper part of the village, while, after stopping to gaze after him for a few minutes, Dick sighed, and strolled down to his favourite post, the pier, to tell Will Marion that ...
— Menhardoc • George Manville Fenn
... sharp metallic "snick," an electric bulb hanging from the ceiling flamed out luminously, a cupboard door flashed open, a voice cried out in joyous, perfect English: "Thank God for a man!" And, switching round with a cry of amazement, he found himself looking into the face and ...
— Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces • Thomas W. Hanshew
... in, saying, "We've another locomotive; now we're going!" And everybody else who was outside hurried into the cars; the new propelling power was attached to the other end of the train, and after a deal of switching, there they were at last—off on ...
— Five Little Peppers at School • Margaret Sidney
... lump of sugar. There followed an exhibition of equine delight; the mare's lips twitched, her nose wrinkled ludicrously, she stretched her neck and tossed her head as the sweetness tickled her palate. Even the nervous switching of her tail was eloquent of pleasure. Meanwhile the owner showed his white ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach
... hasty quarrels, the coarseness of their manners, and the choice of weapons and places in their mode of butchering each other, we must confess that they rarely partake of the spirit of chivalry. One gentleman biting the ear of a Templar, or switching a poltroon lord; another sending a challenge to fight in a saw-pit; or to strip to their shirts, to mangle each other, were sanguinary duels, which could only have fermented in the disorders of the times, amid that wanton pampered indolence which made them so petulant and pugnacious. Against ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli
... couple of boy herds, and it seemed to me that the mysterious movement in the grass was progressing toward them. Presently one of the oxen suddenly flung up his head, seemed to sniff the air for a few moments, and then, with a low moan, rose to his feet, switching his tail from side to side. The movement aroused the rest of the herd, who in turn scrambled to their feet and stood, switching their tails, and all facing the same way, namely, toward the spot where I had observed ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood
... siding. A crew of men recruited from the office force of the railroad was trying to make up a train. The rabble that had gained entrance to the yards were blocking their movements by throwing switches at the critical moment. As Sommers came up to the fence, the switching engine had been thrown into the wrong siding, and had bunted up at full speed against a milk car, sending the latter down the siding to the main track. It took the switch at a sharp pace, was derailed, and blocked the track. The crowd in ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... took the pistols from the box and loaded them. Sir John stood apart, switching the heads of the tall ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas
... ones, marched majestically through the chickens, rooting them out of the way. The hens, in turn, took it out on the little porkers, pecking them when they strayed too far from their mother. And over the top rail a horse looked drowsily on, ever and anon, at mathematically precise intervals, switching a lazy tail that flashed ...
— The Valley of the Moon • Jack London
... frightening experience of having his telepathic call refused by Central. Then he refused in turn to accept a call being projected at him, but when an Urgent classification was added he had to take it. "For your unfounded slander of Central Switching's functioning," announced the mechanically-synthesized voice, "you are hereby Suspended indefinitely from the telepathic net. From this point on all paraNormal privileges are withdrawn and you will be able to communicate ...
— Cerebrum • Albert Teichner
... and said that he was come to be flogged; whereon the old schoolmaster, whose pate had been plastered meanwhile, wept tears of joy over the returning prodigal, and then gave him such a switching as he did ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... and affection for Ladrone increased. He had never seen a big town before, or heard a street car, or met a switching engine, and yet he followed me through the city like a trustworthy dog, his nose pressed against my shoulder as if he knew I would protect him. At the door of the freight car which I had chartered, ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... patted the nearest animal gently. Then he mounted to his place and drove off. The professor had taken his seat beside the driver, but Yates, putting on his coat and picking up his cane, strode along in front, switching off the heads of Canada thistles with his ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr
... a minute until we can size you up," cried Jack, stepping into the pilot house and switching on the searchlight, which he trained upon the man standing on the wharf. "We're not unprepared for callers and we want to make sure, you know. ...
— Boy Scouts in Southern Waters • G. Harvey Ralphson
... precise moment my prancing brought me in front of the long mirror, and what I beheld therein brought me up with a gasp. Twenty-six is quite a venerable age, but at moments of happiness and exhilaration it has a disconcerting trick of switching back to seventeen. That smiling, bright-eyed, pink-and-white-cheeked girl in the glass, with two long pigtails of hair hanging to her waist, looked really absurdly juvenile! Given a small stretch of imagination, you might have ...
— The Lady of the Basement Flat • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... Copy cats! (Makes face) Dat's right, follow on behind us lak uh puppy dog tail. (They start walking toward right exit switching their clothes behind.) ...
— De Turkey and De Law - A Comedy in Three Acts • Zora Neale Hurston
... begin to notice a change in Jerry. He never had been what you'd call a champion catch-as-catch-can talker, but now he was silenter than ever. And he got a habit of switching Gentleman off from his theories on Life in general to Woman in particular. This suited Gentleman just right. What he didn't ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... commences with songs and dances, which continue till midnight, about which time Mumbo fixes on the offender. The unfortunate victim being thereupon immediately seized, is stripped naked, tied to a post, and receives a severe switching with Mumbo's rod, amidst the derisive shouts of the whole assembly, the rest of the women being the loudest in their exclamations against their unhappy sister. Daylight puts an ...
— Great African Travellers - From Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley • W.H.G. Kingston
... and he hailed from Richmond, we believe, and built some consequence upon the fact that he was a son of the Old Dominion. He dressed in the extreme of fashion; spent a good deal of time strutting up and down Market street, switching his rattan; boarded at one of the hotels; drank wines freely, and pretended to be quite a judge of their quality; swore round oaths occasionally, and talked of his honour as ...
— Off-Hand Sketches - a Little Dashed with Humor • T. S. Arthur
... I give way to him. But I ceased switching, drew back a step, and looked at him with more respect than I ever before ...
— Roof and Meadow • Dallas Lore Sharp
... better than "he used to hear they was on the other places." Campbell himself is described as moderate, if not actually kindly. He did not permit his slaves to be beaten to any great extent. "The most he would give us was a 'switching', and most of the time we could pray out ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - From Interviews with Former Slaves - Florida Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... President was the center, was stopped at a railroad by Harper's Ferry, to let a locomotive pass, and look at the old engine-house where John Brown, the raider, was penned in and captured. The little switching-engine ran past with much noise and bustle, the engineer blowing the ludicrous whistle in salute to the distinguished visitors. Lincoln referred to the recollections of the scene, where old "Pottowatomie" thrilled the natives with ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... saw the bulky, swaying shadow not twenty feet above the garden. Slowly it drew nearer the grass-covered floor—foot by foot, straining, struggling, gasping in the final supreme effort—and then, with a sudden rush, the black mass collapsed and the taut rope sprung loose, the end switching ...
— The Man From Brodney's • George Barr McCutcheon
... was in a more savage humour than usual when the young man walked up to his dwelling. The farmer's back was towards him as he approached. He stood nervously switching a sjambok in his right hand, while he stormed in Dutch at three of his unfortunate people, or rather slaves. One was a sturdy Hottentot named Ruyter, one a Malay named Abdul Jemalee, both of whom had travelled with Considine on the up journey. The third was the Bushman whom he had encountered ...
— The Settler and the Savage • R.M. Ballantyne
... that his search of the night before and of the morning following had been to the north and west of the settlement, so that it was hardly worth while to continue the hunt in that direction. The cows sometimes stood in the water, where so much switching of their tails was not needed to keep away the flies, and, though there was quite a growth of succulent grass on the clearing, the animals often crossed the creek and browsed through the woods and undergrowth on ...
— The Hunters of the Ozark • Edward S. Ellis
... Instead of switching on the lights, Kennedy first looked about carefully until he was assured that there was no one there. It seemed to me to be an unnecessary caution, for we knew Whitney was down-stairs and would probably be there a long time. But ...
— The Gold of the Gods • Arthur B. Reeve
... lightly in his large hand, the stable and sure intelligence beside me calmly chirruped, and then as calmly switched his long whip at the distant rebel brute. How the switching and snapping galled his proud neck! How his black back curved, and his small head tossed! Still, he would not pull an ounce, but just pawed like a fairy horse, or as if he were born to tread on clouds alone, or to herald in ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. September, 1863, No. LXXI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... and the yardmaster nearly goes out of his mind. People are so anxious to get out of the cars, in which they have been packed and jammed for hours, that they don't mind a little thing like being run over by a switching engine. Every platform is just one solid chunk of summer hats and babies and red shirts and alto horns. They have been nearly five hours coming fifty miles. Stopped at every station and sidetracked for all the regular trains. Such a time! Lots of fun, though. The fellows got out and pulled ...
— Back Home • Eugene Wood
... Switching on a lamp near by, she examined her find. It carried no address. How it could have got there she could not imagine ... unless Chou Nu had dropped it by inadvertence, which seemed as far-fetched as to suppose she had left it there by design; for that would mean Chou Nu had been ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance
... uncanny mingling of repose and terror, a flavour of such concentrated poignancy and delight as to contrast sharply with the blind and distempered anxiety of its other aspects. This contrast, often emerging with startling suddenness, is like the momentary switching on of some new current, or the passing ray of a brighter light, illuminating the outlook upon perhaps the most ordinary and familiar objects—an impression which we experience sometimes in instants of direst extremity, when our practical interest snaps like a wire from sheer over-tension, and ...
— Ancient Art and Ritual • Jane Ellen Harrison
... upon the road slowly and stopped there, switching his legs absently with the stalk of a horseweed. He was in his shirtsleeves—a respectable, snuffy old figure; evidently a man deliberate in words and thoughts and actions. There was something about him suggestive of an old staid ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... standing in an attitude of expectancy—a very handsome man clothed in the picturesque costume of a ranchero. He leaned upon his rifle, but betrayed both anger and impatience in the rapid switching to and fro of his riding-whip. "Plato, she has not come!" He said it reproachfully, as if the ...
— Winter Evening Tales • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... picked up the maize, touched it, tasted it, said something to the girls that made them laugh, and something to the head farmer that made him look very glum; and then led me into a huge stable, where some twenty or thirty white bullocks were stamping, switching their tails, hitting their horns against the mangers in the dark. Alvise III. patted each, called him by his name, gave him some salt or a turnip, and explained which was the Mantuan breed, which the Apulian, which the Romagnolo, and so on. Then he bade me jump into ...
— Hauntings • Vernon Lee
... am acting like," returned Tim, stepping past the other and switching on the lights. "And you'll acknowledge it tomorrow. Just now you're sort of crazy in the head. I'll humour you as much as possible, Donald, but not to the extent of letting you make a perfect chump of yourself. Sit ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour
... basking in the sunshine. At the point of the stream nearest to me an old man was seated on the ground, apparently washing himself, for he was stooping over a little pool of water, while behind him stood his horse with patient, drooping head, occasionally switching off the flies with its tail. A mile farther on stood a dwelling, which looked to me like an old estancia house, surrounded by large shade trees growing singly or in irregular clumps. It was the only house near, but after gazing at it for some time I concluded that it was uninhabited. ...
— The Purple Land • W. H. Hudson
... I beg your pardon, Master Edward, for the good switching you so kindly gave me; I beg your pardon for the damage you did to the garden; you will oblige me by continuing to tumble everything topsy-turvy, and break ...
— The Two Story Mittens and the Little Play Mittens - Being the Fourth Book of the Series • Frances Elizabeth Barrow
... dans une langue que je ne parle pas, et que personne ici ne comprends, j'en impute la faute entierement a l'example malheureux de Monsieur Coudert. Ce que je veux dire est que—this is the fault of Coudert. He has been switching the languages round in every direction, and has done all he ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol III, After-Dinner Speeches P-Z • Various
... and scrub oak above the mass of snowy vapor that floated lazily across that grim-visaged southward scarp. The drowsy hum of insects, the plash of cool, running waters fell softly on the ear. Under the shade of willow and cottonwood cattle and horses were lazily switching at the swarm of gnats and flies or dozing through the heated hours of the day. Out on the level flat beyond the corral the troopers had unsaddled, and the chargers, many of them stopping to roll in equine ecstasy upon the turf, were being driven ...
— Warrior Gap - A Story of the Sioux Outbreak of '68. • Charles King
... Henry Kelsey, the London apprentice boy, to the country of the Assiniboines, was put on file in the Company records. Kelsey had not at first fitted in very well with the martinet rules of fort life at Nelson, and in 1690, after a switching for some breach of discipline, he had jumped over the walls and run away with the Indians. Where he went on this first trip is not known. Some time before the spring of the next year an Indian runner brought word back ...
— The "Adventurers of England" on Hudson Bay - A Chronicle of the Fur Trade in the North (Volume 18 of the Chronicles of Canada) • Agnes C. (Agnes Christina) Laut
... Jason," said Jimmie Dale—and, crossing the reception hall, with its rich, oriental rugs, he ran up the wide staircase, opened the door of his "den," locked it behind him, and, switching on the lights, began to strip off his coat and vest, as he hurried toward the further end of the great, spacious, luxuriously appointed room that ran the entire ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... yet! leastways it isn't opened yet! Fan that fire, you little black imp, you! and make that kittle bile; if you don't, I shall never git this wafer soft! and then I'll turn you up, and give you sich a switching as ye never had in your born days! for I won't be trampled on by you any longer! you little black willyan, you! 'Scat! you hussy! get out o' my way, before I twist your neck ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... of the lines are residential; telephone service is available in most villages; a fairly modern digital cable trunk line now connects switching centers in most of the regions, the others are connected ...
— The 2001 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... down the circular stairway, grumbling at the delay to which they had been put. Lermontoff took advantage of the clamping of their heavy boots in the echoing stairway to shove in the bolts once more, and then followed them, himself followed by Drummond, into the Governor's room. Switching on ...
— A Rock in the Baltic • Robert Barr
... promise that Tom would call him at the end of two hours. The old cowman, however, had no such intention. It was not until eight hours later that he summoned Jack. The lights in the cave still burned brightly, for Tom had refrained from switching them off for the obvious reason that they made it easy to keep an eye on the prisoners. Day-light, however, showed at the mouth of the cave. When Jack noted the ...
— The Radio Boys on the Mexican Border • Gerald Breckenridge
... groomed and bedded down for the night. Again the pungent odors from the stalls, the scent of the straw and the hay in the loft, the smell of harness leather damp with sweat was in his nostrils and in his ears, the soft swish of switching tails, the thud of stamping hoofs, the contented munching of grain, the rustle of hay, with now and then a low whinny or an angry squeal. And fearlessly to and fro in this strange world moved the hired man. In and out among the horses he passed, ...
— Their Yesterdays • Harold Bell Wright
... that," yawned the young inventor at length, locking up his desk. "Guess I'd better put the valuable disk back in the vault before I go home," he decided, switching on the ceiling lights and glancing toward the corner where Koku had ...
— Tom Swift and His Giant Telescope • Victor Appleton
... commotion was raised, when I noticed the police officers augmenting in number; and by and by, they began to glide through the crowd, politely hinting at the propriety of dispersing. The first persons thus accosted were the soldiers, who accordingly sauntered off, switching their rattans, and admiring their high-polished shoes. It was plain that the Charter did not hang very heavy round their hearts. For the rest, they also gradually broke up; and at last I saw ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... The troubled spirit of Paul paced the chamber till morning; when, copiously bathing himself at the wash-stand, Paul looked care-free and fresh as a daybreak hawk. After a closeted consultation with Doctor Franklin, he left the place with a light and dandified air, switching his gold-headed cane, and throwing a passing arm round all the pretty chambermaids he encountered, kissing them resoundingly, as if saluting a frigate. All barbarians ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... communication more popular than any arrangement of telephones on a single line. Beginning in 1877, telephone exchanges were developed with great rapidity in all of the larger communities of the United States. Telegraph switching devices were utilized at the outset or were modified in such minor particulars as were necessary to fit them to ...
— Cyclopedia of Telephony & Telegraphy Vol. 1 - A General Reference Work on Telephony, etc. etc. • Kempster Miller
... of the electrical shop and Went back to his interrupted problem. From Jackson he learned that Koku and Eradicate had merely happened to stroll into the forbidden place, which had been left open by accident. There, it appeared, Koku had handled some of the machinery, ending by switching on the current of the machine the handles of which he later unsuspectingly picked up. Then he received a shock he long remembered, and for many days he believed Eradicate had been responsible for it, and there was more than ...
— Tom Swift and his Air Scout - or, Uncle Sam's Mastery of the Sky • Victor Appleton
... decided to give up trying to learn where the woman with the little child came from?" asked Thad, again switching the subject in ...
— The Chums of Scranton High at Ice Hockey • Donald Ferguson
... a trial, anyway. There were three at Tillman: 33 that had just brought in No. 14, 7 on a siding waiting to take the train to Manchester, and 10, the regular yard engine. The two passenger engines were out of the question, for they were already well guarded, but the little switching locomotive lay at the northern end of the yard, and had not as yet been seized by the deputies. In the confusion, and aided by the gathering dusk of the early October ...
— The Short Line War • Merwin-Webster
... to furnish it more suitably. Archie Dunn brought a lot of hay from the loft in his mother's barn, and when a piece of old carpet was spread upon it it made an acceptable couch. A piece of old carpet was laid in front of the hut, too, where the boys could sit and watch the trains switching back and forth on the railway, and the tramps who were heating coffee in ...
— The Adventures of a Boy Reporter • Harry Steele Morrison
... very confusing to Phil, and he was in constant fear of being run down by switching engines that were shunting cars back and forth as fast as they were loaded, rapidly making up the circus train. The Circus Boy wondered if he ever could get used to being ...
— The Circus Boys Across The Continent • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... actually might be buried many thousand feet from the outside wall of the city, it was none the less an "outside" one, by virtue of its viewplate walls. There was even a tube system, with trunk, branch and local lines and an automagnetic switching system, by which articles within certain size limits could be despatched from any apartment to any other one in ...
— The Airlords of Han • Philip Francis Nowlan
... The Barsoomian day had ended, and then the brief period of twilight that renders the transition from daylight to darkness almost as abrupt as the switching off of an electric light, and Tara of Helium had found no sanctuary. But perhaps there were no beasts to fear, or rather to avoid—Tara of Helium liked not the word fear. She would have been glad, however, had there been a cabin, even a very tiny cabin, upon ...
— The Chessmen of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... standing in the walled garden switching a limber trout-rod when Miss Erith came upon him next morning,—a tall straight young man in his kilts, supple and elegant as the lancewood ...
— In Secret • Robert W. Chambers
... up his tale. "He's over there with the C.O. now," and switching: "Shell splinter got him in the eye. Guess it's gone and maybe the other ...
— The Escape of a Princess Pat • George Pearson
... cabin door she heard a little noise and guessed that Jimmy was within. Opening it quickly, without switching on the light, she cried, "Here comes a big bear to eat you all up," as Jimmy often did to her. She grasped someone, and cried out in fear. It was someone grown up, ...
— Captivity • M. Leonora Eyles
... in the first darkness of the night, a freight train rumbled into the station. When the engine was switching cars on to the side-track, Johnny crept along the side of the train. He pulled open the side-door of an empty box-car and awkwardly and laboriously climbed in. He closed the door. The engine whistled. Johnny was lying down, and in ...
— When God Laughs and Other Stories • Jack London
... a thousand reasons,' answered Lesbia, switching the flowers in the balcony with her light little whip. 'First and foremost it is absurd to think of any one so buried alive as poor Mary is finding an admirer; and secondly—well—I don't want to be rude to my own sister—but Mary is not ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... followed me into the study. He placed a little table beside the chair on which I sat. He set a decanter of whisky, a syphon of soda water and a box of cigars at my elbow. He brought a reading lamp and put it behind me, switching on the electric current so that the light fell brightly over my shoulder. He turned off the other lights in the room. He asked me if there were anything else he could do for ...
— Gossamer - 1915 • George A. Birmingham
... madam," I exclaimed, switching the heat-lever to "Froid." "So was I, but being merely an Upper Berth, with no rights, I was suffering in silence. I watched you turn the heat full on, and shut the window tight. I saw you go to bed in all your clothes, which looked terribly thick, and cover yourself up with both your ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... I noticed that Brindle turned on me a vicious look. No doubt I was awkward and hurt her a little, also; for the first thing I knew the pail was in the air, I on my back, and Brindle bellowing around the yard, switching her tail, Junior and Merton meanwhile roaring with laughter. I got up in no amiable mood and said, roughly, to ...
— Driven Back to Eden • E. P. Roe
... instead of reading the books, spent all their time in hiding them in these chests. Next, my friend John came and nailed covers on the chests. After the first was nailed down, I jumped upon it, and sat watching John while he hammered the others; switching my tail, and winking my eyes at every stroke of his hammer, rather surprised at all that went on, ...
— Cat and Dog - Memoirs of Puss and the Captain • Julia Charlotte Maitland
... white room was full of rose-coloured twilight, so pink, it seemed, that if you closed your hand tightly you might find a little ball of crushed rose-petals there when you opened it. It would be a pity to shut out so much loveliness by switching on the electricity, so when Nick came he found Angela, a tall, slim black figure, with a faint gold nimbus round its head, silhouetted against a background of flaming sky. Standing as she did with her back to the ...
— The Port of Adventure • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... breaths that had been held came in a shout together. Everyone who saw the pause yelled to the bull to go on and prove his courage. And the bull, when the first shock of surprise and distaste had passed, backed ominously, head lowered, tail switching in spasmodic jerks from side to side. The bear stood a little straighter in her defiance; her head went forward an inch; beyond that she did not move, for her tactics were not to rush but to wait, and to put every ounce of her ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... would have made any place attractive, but the brow of the swelling hill with its wide outlook, its background of grove and intervening vistas, left nothing to be desired. The horses were soon contentedly munching their oats, and yet their stamping feet and switching tails indicated that even for the brute creation there is ever some alloy. Graham, however, thought that fortune had at last given him one perfect day. There was no perceptible cloud. The present was so eminently satisfactory that it banished the past, or, if ...
— His Sombre Rivals • E. P. Roe
... Ears. She darted across the room and squeezed through the tiniest hole just as Tom's sharp claws reached out to grab her. She slipped safely through to the other side and Tom went angrily back to the empty bed, switching his long tail. He had to be content with a piece of cold chicken ...
— The Graymouse Family • Nellie M. Leonard
... down full length and watched Jim out of the corners of his eyes. Jim on his side of the creek stood thinking and switching his leg. The houses in view were silent, as if a pestilence had swept them clean of every breath of life; but many invisible eyes were turned, from within, upon the two men with the creek between them, a stranded white boat, and the body of the third man ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... were there to remind him that he was a man who had made a record career for himself and who was going farther. In the day-time he took them as a matter of course, but now he regarded them rather solemnly. He went from one to another, handling them, testing them, switching the lights of special electrical devices on and off, like a boy with a new and serious plaything. There was no one to laugh at him, and he did not laugh at himself. He stood in the midst of his possessions, ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... sort of spiritual sneer—played over his face when he speculated on his father's reception of the coming news; and very soon he ceased to think of it at all, burying himself in the work he had brought with him for the journey. For he had in high degree the faculty, so essential to public life, of switching off his whole attention from one ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... your precious proposition, is it?" snarled Mr. Dale, switching the whip about furiously. "No, I couldn't. The hand I've got now is idle half the time. See here, Wildwood, arson is a pretty serious crime. You'd better square this thing some way. In fact you've got to do it, or there's going ...
— Andy the Acrobat • Peter T. Harkness
... Chislehurst by Mr. W. J. Nichols. [Footnote: Nichols (W. J.), "The Chislehurst Caves," Journal of the Archaeological Association, Dec. 1903.] "At the foot of the hill is a gap, which is the present entrance to the caves. A guide meets us here, who, unlocking a door, and switching on the electric light, introduces the visitor to a gallery or tunnel, about 150 feet long, 10 feet to 12 feet high, and with a width of 12 feet to 15 feet, narrowing to about 7 feet at the roof. ...
— Castles and Cave Dwellings of Europe • Sabine Baring-Gould
... switching near woke him at last, and he slowly sat up and stared about. He looked out of the window and saw that the sun was lightening the hills across the river. He rose and brushed his hair as well as he could, folded ...
— Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... the head of the swirling fall. The underlying cause of the Big Cascade is a limestone ledge which cuts the channel diagonally and makes ugly-looking water. We plan to run the rapid one boat at a time. The crews are doubled. Our steersman is alert, expectant, and as agile as a cat, his black hair switching in the wind. Sitting in the centre of the scow, as we do, the sensation is very different to that which one experiences in running rapids in a canoe. Then it is all swiftness and dexterity, for your craft is light, and, in expert hands, easily dirigible with one clever turn of the wrist. With ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron
... mare would not budge. Switching was of no avail. Saterlee brought down the whip upon her with a sound like that of small cannon. She sighed and walked ...
— The Spread Eagle and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... catch you leaving this room!" said Mrs. Horton. She went out and closed the door. Rosanna nodded her head. Her mind was made up. She crossed to the dainty dresser, and switching on the lights did something she had never done in her life. Rosanna was not vain in the least, but if you could have seen her then, turning this way and that, lifting her long, heavy curls, wadding them on top of her head, or trying them in ...
— The Girl Scouts at Home - or Rosanna's Beautiful Day • Katherine Keene Galt
... Lily went to South End; the old people were delighted to see her, and detained her for some time by a long story about their daughter at service, while Reginald looked the picture of impatience, drumming on his knee, switching the leg of the table, and tickling Neptune's ears. When they left the cottage it was much later and darker than they had expected; but Lily was unwilling again to encounter the perils of the lane, and consulted her brother whether there was not some other way. He gave notice of a cut ...
— Scenes and Characters • Charlotte M. Yonge
... and again, switching over to the receiving set to get an answer. At length he evidently reached the station he was after, for he listened intently for a few minutes. Then the generator hummed again, and Bob heard the ...
— The Radio Boys Trailing a Voice - or, Solving a Wireless Mystery • Allen Chapman
... "receivers" fitted against the ship's side, one on the port and one on the starboard side, near the bows, and as far down below the water level as is possible. The direction of sounds coming to the microphones hanging in these tanks can be estimated by switching alternately to the port and starboard tanks. If the sound is of greater intensity on the port side, then the bell signalling is off the port bows; and similarly ...
— The Loss of the SS. Titanic • Lawrence Beesley
... of the wild flurry of work on the bridge, an engine from the junction had puffed into the switching yards with a single coach, the private car ...
— Out of the Primitive • Robert Ames Bennet
... friend Corliss's note, and the morning following his lean guest's arrival at the ranch the jovial Irishman himself saddled and bridled the swiftest and most vicious horse in the corral; a glass-eyed pinto, bronc from the end of his switching tail to his pink-mottled muzzle. He was a horse with a record which he did not allow to become obsolete, although he had plenty of competition to contend with in the string of broncs that Murphy's riders variously bestrode. Moreover, the pinto, ...
— Sundown Slim • Henry Hubert Knibbs
... and saw Ted approaching him, he ceased pawing, and stood with watchful eyes. Occasionally he sent forth a challenging bellow. His tail was switching from side to side, like that ...
— Ted Strong's Motor Car • Edward C. Taylor
... the sneak exclaim. And then followed the switching on of an electric light. "It's only one of their rotten jokes! I knew it ...
— The Rover Boys Under Canvas - or The Mystery of the Wrecked Submarine • Arthur M. Winfield
... course of the nineteenth century and of the one which has begun so badly brought such sudden and enormous enrichment to the aesthetics of sight and hearing—apart from such considerations—the influence of one philosopher, one thinker, one writer, can modify the whole literature of an epoch, switching the mind on to a new road in psychological, moral, aesthetic, or social research. If any one wish to be isolated, isolated let him be! But the republic of the mind tends to enlarge its frontiers day by day. The greatest men ...
— The Forerunners • Romain Rolland
... said Jacob, switching off a thistle's head, for he knew already that Mr. Floyd was going to teach them Latin, as indeed he did for three years in his spare time, out of kindness, for there was no other gentleman in the neighbourhood whom Mrs. Flanders could have asked to do such a ...
— Jacob's Room • Virginia Woolf
... Last Bull's sullenness of temper appeared to grow upon him. He was fond of drawing apart from the little herd, and taking up his solitary post on the knoll, where he would stand for an hour at a time motionless except for the switching of his long tail, and staring steadily westward as if he knew where the great past of his race had lain. In that direction a dense grove of chestnuts, maples, and oaks bounded the range, cutting off the view of the city roofs, the roar of the city traffic. Beyond ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... the fiendish noises which can be made by man or machinery. The whack of heavy falling bodies, the sudden shivering splinter of chopped logs, the crystal shatter of pounded ice, the crash of a tree hurled to the earth by a hurricane, the irrational, persistent chaos of noise made by switching freight-trains, the explosion of gas, the blasting of stone, and the terrific grinding of rock upon rock which precedes the collapse—all these have been in my touch-experience, and contribute to my idea of Bedlam, of a battle, a waterspout, an earthquake, ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller
... It is situated on a mound overlooking the Ganges. There is no garden about it, but a grass field, with a few trees here and there. Between the window at which I am writing and the river is an open shed, in which two elephants are switching their tails, and knocking about the hay which has been given them for their breakfast. This is a much more quiet and rural place than any which I have visited since I have been in India; for Barrackpore is a great military station, and the park, &c., there are quite public. Here there are not altogether ...
— Letters and Journals of James, Eighth Earl of Elgin • James, Eighth Earl of Elgin
... Sector Leader Bond." He snapped the communicator off almost before the operator could acknowledge, then spun about, switching his entertainment screen to ground surface scan. A scene built up, showing a view from ...
— Final Weapon • Everett B. Cole
... Control Officer slapped his hand down on a red push-button set into the arm of his chair, and spoke into his mike. "Red Alert. Attack is in progress." Then switching to another channel, he spoke to his assistants: "Take your preassigned sectors. Launch one interceptor at each track identified as hostile." He hadn't enough interceptors to double up on an attack of this size, and a quick glance at the screens ...
— Pushbutton War • Joseph P. Martino
... in the least offended. She paraded, jauntily switching her great hips and laughing. "Jealous!" she teased. "You poor ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips
... little the pace slackened and I felt a sharp jolt. They were switching me on to the down line, an improvement upon the original plan so like the Count's manner that it almost proves he must have been on the spot superintending operations. Next it was a face at the window. I used my revolver, but they stunned me and robbed me and left it to ...
— A Modern Mercenary • Kate Prichard and Hesketh Vernon Hesketh-Prichard
... cannot be held responsible. It cannot be permanently changed or even modified. No power can keep it modified. For it is inherent and enduring, as unchanging as the lines upon the thumb or the conformation of the skull. Throughout his life, circumstance seemed like a watchful spirit, switching his temperament into those channels of experience and development leading unerringly to ...
— Mark Twain • Archibald Henderson
... preparation for cutting through the sudd, and we were well prepared with many hundred sharp bill-hooks, switching-hooks, bean-hooks, sabres, &c. I had also some hundred miners' spades, shovels, &c., in case it might be necessary to deepen the shallows. While the whole English party were full of spirit and determined to succeed, I regret to say there was a general ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker
... Nevertheless the unpaid cattle, like every other beast and man, must nolens volens transplant the burs far away from the parent plant to found new colonies. Literally by hook or by crook they steal a ride on every switching tail, every hairy dog and woolly sheep, every trouser-leg or petticoat. Even the children, who make dolls and baskets of burdock burs, aid them in their insatiate love of travel. Wherever man goes, they follow, until, having crossed ...
— Wild Flowers, An Aid to Knowledge of Our Wild Flowers and - Their Insect Visitors - - Title: Nature's Garden • Neltje Blanchan
... my eyes with long looks at the broad and lengthy reaches of water to which I was so long a stranger, I came upon a scene which delighted the innermost recesses of my soul; five, six, seven, eight, ten zebras switching their beautiful striped bodies, and biting one another, within about one hundred and fifty yards. The scene was so pretty, so romantic, never did I so thoroughly realize that I was in Central Africa. I felt momentarily proud that I owned such a vast domain, inhabited ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... boy led her from the stable she came out with her ears laying back and her short tail switching; and I said to myself, "here will be a job breaking a ...
— Twenty Years of Hus'ling • J. P. Johnston
... matter of twenty yards, Mr. Thorn went softly humming a tune to himself, and leisurely switching the flies ...
— Queechy, Volume I • Elizabeth Wetherell
... his bag. "Actually, I suppose I am one of the many. Going to the new world to see whether or not it is worth switching alliances from ...
— Combat • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... fillies in the meadow. Avdey was ill-tempered and shy, as usual. Not yet convinced of Masha's love, he felt wrathful with her and annoyed with himself... but his excitement smothered his annoyance. He stopped at last before a large nut bush, and began with his riding-whip switching off the leaves at ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... goodness was rewarded. The next morning, Ida sat at the door of the cottage, studying her lesson, while her new pet, little Carlo (as she had named the dog) played at her feet. A pleasant looking young lad, who was walking slowly down the road, switching the tall grass as he came, stopped to look at the pretty picture. His name was Eugene Morris, and he was the son of a rich gentleman, who lived near by. "Good morning, Ida," he said, with a bow and a smile, "is that pretty little dog yours?" "Yes, sir," said Ida, blushing a little; "but Mamma ...
— Carlo - or Kindness Rewarded • Anonymous
... cared for old Brummem and his white-faced nag?" In fact, he had the pleasure of seeing the parson's venerable chaise lumbering along the public road at a safe distance away, an hour before noon; and he half wished he were near enough to give the jolly old nag a good switching across the flanks. He had begged a bit of warm breakfast in the morning at an outlying house, and at the hour when he caught sight of his pursuer he was lying under the edge of a wood, lunching upon the gingerbread Keziah had provided, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 93, July, 1865 • Various
... sprouting," ceremony occurs, with very elaborate ritual signifying consecration of fields for planting. Various masks and symbolic costumes are used, and the children's initiation is accompanied with a ceremonial "flogging"—really a switching by kachinas. Dr. Dorsey considers this the most colorful of all Hopi ceremonies and says that nowhere else on earth can one see in nine days such a wealth of religious drama, such a pantheon of the gods represented by masked and costumed actors, ...
— The Unwritten Literature of the Hopi • Hattie Greene Lockett
... himself. "Surely I locked the door?" He walked to the front of the shop, switching on the cluster of lights that hung from the ceiling. The door was ajar, but everything else seemed as usual. Bock, hearing his footsteps, came trotting out from the kitchen, his claws rattling on the bare wooden floor. He looked up with the patient inquiry of a dog accustomed ...
— The Haunted Bookshop • Christopher Morley
... wits together Kent hurried into the bedroom—it was empty; so also was the bathroom opening from it. From there Kent made the rounds of the apartment, switching on the light until the place was ablaze, but in spite of his minute search of closets and under beds and behind furniture he could find no trace of his late adversary. Kent stopped long enough in the pantry to refresh himself ...
— The Red Seal • Natalie Sumner Lincoln
... eye rests first upon the phalanx of snow-crests to the south, then down upon the lake, lying outstretched like some wriggling monster, switching its tail, and finally off to the many places where early Swiss history was made. In point of fact, you are looking at quite a large slice of Switzerland. Victor Hugo seized the meaning of this view when he wrote: "It is a serious hour, and full of meditations, when ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume VI • Various
... and he could see, across the flats and over the tracks, where tiny signal lanterns were waving and circling, and freight trains were bumping and rumbling, the glow of the arc lamps on the elevator, and its square outline against the sky. Now and then, when the noise of the switching trains let down, he could hear the hoisting engines. Once he stopped and looked eastward at the clouds of illuminated smoke above the factories and at the red blast of the rolling mill. He went nearly to the river and had to turn back and walk slowly. ...
— Calumet 'K' • Samuel Merwin
... now came running from every direction, while sounds from within the nearby farmhouse told that Old Peleg must be switching on his heavy boots. ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts - Or, The Struggle for Leadership • George A. Warren
... make the mouth of the swamp-stream. Switching on the strong search-light in the bow, he headed on. And because he was moving now against the current, it seemed that he lost two feet for ...
— Ralestone Luck • Andre Norton
... country, and especially from the Northwest. More and more I realized the justice of President Wayland's remark, which had so impressed me at the Yale Alumni meeting just after my return from Europe: that the nation was approaching a "switching-off place''; that whether we were to turn toward evil or good in our politics would be decided by the great Northwest, and that it would be well for young Americans to cast in their lot with that ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... Before switching on the light she went to one of the windows that looked out on the lake. Bliss Island was easily visible from this point. The snow was still falling, but not heavily enough to obstruct her vision much. The white bulk of the island rose in the midst of the field of snow-covered ...
— Ruth Fielding At College - or The Missing Examination Papers • Alice B. Emerson
... charging or when idle. In the first case it ought to be from 2.4 to 2.6 volts, according to conditions. In the second ease it ought to be just over 2 volts, provided that the observation is not taken too soon after switching in the charging current. For about half an hour after that is done, the E.M.F. has a transient high value, so that, if it be desired to get the proper E.M.F. of the cell, the observation must be taken thirty minutes after the ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... heel, he quitted the office, leaving Cayrol quite abashed. He passed along the corridor switching his cane with suppressed rage. Madame Desvarennes had, with one word, dried up the source from which he had been drawing most of the money which he had spent during the last three months. He had to pay a large sum that evening at the club, ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet
... squire!' she suddenly exclaimed. There they were coming across the flower-garden from the stable-yard, her father switching his boots with his riding whip, in order to make them presentable in Mrs. Hamley's drawing-room. He looked so exactly like his usual self, his home-self, that the seeing him in the flesh was the most efficacious ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... before, nothing would have induced her to believe that she would be staying with Susie this March at Whitethorn. Mr. Crawfurd walked with his daughters to the great gate, and Joanna, looking back, saw him, on his return, switching the thistle-heads in the hedge, as she had never witnessed him attempt in her experience; she could almost fancy he was whistling, as Harry Jardine went piping along before he fell in ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... briskly up the wooded road, chatting and laughing, with now and then a sage and critical glance at the water, of which they caught many glimpses through the trees. Gethryn and Ruth were soon far ahead. The colonel sauntered along, switching leaves with his rod and indulging in bursts of ...
— In the Quarter • Robert W. Chambers
... reddened with blood! He woke at the horror of it: found himself in bed in the dark, pressed an electric knob, and looked at the ceiling. It was dry and white. 'I certainly have been smoking too much lately,' thought Merton, and, switching off the light, he slumbered again, so soundly that he did not hear the piper playing round the house, or the man who brought his clothes and hot water, or ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang
... of treating overwrought nerves is to get the patient away from himself—to make a new man of him; and this trick can be done only by switching him off from his usual environment, his usual habits. The ordinary rest-cure, by its very harshness, intensifies a man's personality at first, drives him miserably within himself; and only by its long duration does it gradually wear him down and build him up anew. ...
— Yet Again • Max Beerbohm
... of a hell of a scrap. It had all started a couple years back, when the final design had been approved for a whole sky-full of communications satellites. Well, eighteen, to be exact. One of the parts in the design had been a solenoid, part No. M1537, which handled a switching operation too potent for a solid-state switch. That solenoid was one of the few moving parts in the Telstars, and it had been designed for skeighty-eight million cycles before ...
— The Trouble with Telstar • John Berryman
... enthusiasm which he did not in the least share, "that it never occurred to you what Burke's game might be? With the connivance of these Burmese, he was deliberately attempting to swindle you; he meant to practise the old familiar game of 'switching' the false for the real stone. The Burmese want the stone, not the money without the stone; but for a generous share in the proceeds, they were willing to lend themselves to Burke's fraud. There 's the Oriental ...
— The Paternoster Ruby • Charles Edmonds Walk
... was just plain damn mule, sloughed off from the army, blase beyond words,—any words at Casey's command, at least. A lopeared buckskin mule with a hanging lower lip and a chronic tail-switching, that shacked along hour after hour and saved Casey's legs and, more particularly, a bunion that had developed in the ...
— Casey Ryan • B. M. Bower
... all else in sight—except the "rough-necks," who are far too fast on their feet to be buried against their will. One by one I dragged shovel gangs away to a distance where my shouting could be heard, one by one I commanded drillmen to shut off their deafening machines, all day I dodged switching, snorting trains, clambered by steep rocky paths, or ladders from one level to another, howling above the roar of the "cut" the time-worn questions, straining my ear to catch the answer. Many a negro did not know the ...
— Zone Policeman 88 - A Close Range Study of the Panama Canal and its Workers • Harry A. Franck
... hairs straggling under her hat and her fierce eyes holding back the tears, telling him haughtily that a great cause made one indifferent to discomfort; and he nearly laughed aloud. He looked across the hall at her and just caught her switching her gaze from him to the platform. He felt a curious swaggering triumph at the flight ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... of abdominal pain, and therefore of colic, are restlessness, cessation of whatever the horse is about, lying down, looking around toward the flank, kicking with the hind feet upward and forward toward the belly, jerky switching of the tail, stretching as though to urinate, frequent change of position, and groaning. In the more intense forms the horse plunges about, throws himself, rolls, assumes unnatural positions, as sitting on the haunches, and grunts loudly. Usually the pain is ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture
... city vegetable gardener, I'd consider growing vegetables in the front yard for a few years and then switching to the back yard. Having lots of space, as I do now, I keep three or four garden plots available, one in vegetables and the others restoring their ...
— Gardening Without Irrigation: or without much, anyway • Steve Solomon
... habit of thought most favorable for the persistence of a single group of ideas is attained by the practice of switching the attention back ...
— Industrial Progress and Human Economics • James Hartness
... door, quaffing ale, or lay beneath the shade of the broad-spreading oak trees, talking and jesting and laughing. All around stood the horses of the band, with a great noise of stamping feet and a great switching of tails. To this inn came the King's rangers, driving the widow's three sons before them. The hands of the three youths were tied tightly behind their backs, and a cord from neck to neck fastened them all together. So they were marched to the room where the Sheriff sat at meat, ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... experience, and thinking new deep thoughts of wonder, regret, sadness, joy, and when night fell and the great moon rose lighting the world again, she knelt beside her car window, looking long into the wide clear sky, the sky that covered him and herself; the moon that looked down upon them both. Then switching on the electric light over her berth she read the psalm once more, and fell asleep with her cheek upon the little book and in her heart a ...
— The Man of the Desert • Grace Livingston Hill
... impossible, owing to the section of the slopes of the French position, to carry out the old-fashioned case-shot attack at all. Nowadays there would be no difficulty in turning on the fire of two thousand guns on any point of the position, and switching this fire up and down the line like water from a fire-engine hose, if ...
— On War • Carl von Clausewitz
... night, and the punkah-wallah outside kept the punkah, or mechanical fan, switching back and forth over our heads with a rapidity that made us fear its ropes would break, ...
— Tales of the Malayan Coast - From Penang to the Philippines • Rounsevelle Wildman
... officer thought it very doubtful. He stood in the snow switching his wet puttees and looking out across a world of tumbled mountains. Over on his right lay Germany; on his left, France; Switzerland towered in ice behind him ...
— Barbarians • Robert W. Chambers
... board or tablet to which wires are led connecting with cross bars or other switching devices, so as to enable connections among themselves or with other ...
— The Standard Electrical Dictionary - A Popular Dictionary of Words and Terms Used in the Practice - of Electrical Engineering • T. O'Conor Slone
... moment, or rather minute, when the huntsmen stood on the green lawn round the moving, tail-switching, dapple mass of hounds; and the red coats trotted one by one from behind the screens of bare trees, delicate lilac against the slowly moving grey sky. A delightful moment, followed, as the hunt swished past, by the sudden sense that these ...
— Laurus Nobilis - Chapters on Art and Life • Vernon Lee
... realize that it wasn't functioning. A yell would stop Dr. Bernais, and the gantry would be wheeled back into place. Gee-Gee and Dick would probably come personally to check the circuit and find out why the board had shown red instead of switching ...
— The Scarlet Lake Mystery • Harold Leland Goodwin |
