"Alert" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to fish. You throw in your hook with such blissful certainty that no fish can possibly resist the temptation you are dangling before its eyes. There is suppressed excitement all over you. You are all on the alert, feeling for imaginary nibbles, for bites that are not there. Sometimes, of course, the dreams come true, and the bites are realities; but these occasions are sadly outnumbered by the times when you keep ...
— A Little Bush Maid • Mary Grant Bruce
... enringed a house with its tendrils, creeping under window-ledges and across mellow brickwork, had been suddenly cut off at the root, and hung faded and lustreless, not even daring to be torn away. Yet I am alive and well, my mind is alert and vigorous, I have no cares or anxieties, except that my heart ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... offer him up as a victim to the outraged laws of his country, and to a government that had set a price upon his head, as the leader of the outlaws; or, what came nearer to his wish, either to shoot him down with his own hand, or have him shot by those who were on the alert for such persons. The first individual to whom he applied upon the subject was his benevolent step-father, who he knew was a magistrate, and whose duty was to have the wretched class of whom we write arrested or ...
— The Evil Eye; Or, The Black Spector - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... of canvas, the ship headed right into the swirl of waters agitated by the wind. As night settled down the captain prepared for the worst. It was evident that he feared something, and every man was on the alert. ...
— Bob the Castaway • Frank V. Webster
... and accent rather hard to follow, a difficulty not shared by the strong Jewish element in an audience that was extremely quick to appreciate the humour that kept one always on the alert. It is profitless to ask how much of the fun was due to the things said and how much to the manner of saying them. The essential matter is that actors and author between them gave us an unusually good time, and I am ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, April 22, 1914 • Various
... they did so. True, the use of black troops was made difficult because their schooling had been largely inferior and their work therefore chiefly unskilled. Nevertheless, the Army staff concluded, all races were equally endowed for war and most of the less mentally alert could fight if properly led.[2-40] A manual on ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.
... the explorer, the experimenter, the excavator, the student, is a joyous labor. Every sense is alert There is no drudgery, no fatigue. The "eureka" stirs a song of gladness. There is much joy in bearing this testimony: "I have found Micah 6:8, or Isaiah 12, or Jeremiah 45:5, or ...
— A Bird's-Eye View of the Bible - Second Edition • Frank Nelson Palmer
... his youthful companion, and then walked forward, scrutinizing each scowling face in turn, while Johnny stood with his back to the door, keenly alert, his right hand resting lightly on his belt not far from ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Campfire Stories • Various
... it is. But not quite in the manner that you suppose. I am going to set you free now in order to set your mind at rest. But let me warn you that I shall be just as much on the alert against another attack from you as ever I was before, and that I could ward off two or even three assailants with my left arm and knee as easily as I warded off one. It is a way ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy
... slight edifice, and to shake the speaker so strongly that he was obliged while speaking to steady himself by the sashless frame of the window at which he stood. He had a face of good-natured and alert intelligence, a master's independence and authority of manner, in spite of his blue jean ...
— A Phyllis of the Sierras • Bret Harte
... within two bowshots of the sleeping warriors. All at once, with a voice that penetrated every glade of the forest, this great sentinel over mankind shouted "Up! up! danger! danger!" All the birds of the species were alert at their posts, and all within hearing of the shout of their chief repeated the words of alarm. "Up! up! danger! danger!" rung through the hollow woods, and reverberated among the hills. Up sprung the Unamis, and sallied cautiously out to find the cause of alarm. They were just in time to ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 1 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones
... hundred and fifty miles. I have quite a large magnification, but they may spot us if they're alert. Are you ready to ... ...
— This World Must Die! • Horace Brown Fyfe
... We stayed on the alert until daylight, getting ready for action. Whaling gear was set up along the railings. Our chief officer loaded the blunderbusses, which can launch harpoons as far as a mile, and long duck guns with exploding bullets that can ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... Her pose was unconsciously graceful; her tall figure and plain gray dress harmonized with the background of straight trunks and rocks. Her head was slightly tilted back as she breathed the resin-scented air. Jim thought she looked strangely virile and alert. ...
— Partners of the Out-Trail • Harold Bindloss
... number ready to be sent down. While he examined them, Charnock, sprinkled with dusty snow, came up, leading a heavy Percheron team. They dragged a log into place, and then Charnock unhooked the chain and beat his hands. His skin-coat was ragged and his fur-cap battered, but he looked alert and virile as he stood by the steaming horses' heads. The gray trunks of the pines made a good background for his tall figure, which had ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss
... and tore them off with his teeth, but I think he has discovered that they lessen his sufferings, which shows that he has some good dog sense left, and that probably his name "Booby" is a misnomer. I think there is a great deal of good in the animal. He is ever on the alert for unusual noises or sounds, and the assurance which I have that he will give the alarm in case any thieving Indians shall approach our camp in the night is a great relief to my anxiety lest some straggling ...
— The Discovery of Yellowstone Park • Nathaniel Pitt Langford
... ability to yield to the flexures of its bed. The intentness of his vision in any direction did not apparently diminish his power of perception in other directions; and when he attacked a subject, expecting results, he had the faculty of keeping his mind alert, so that results different from those which he expected should not escape him ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: - Invention and Discovery • Various
... curious piece of news that Mr. Fenwick was going to marry Mrs. Nightingale, she did not even look up from her knitting to reply: "What did I say to you, Conny?" For his name was Conrad, as Sally had reported. His discretion was not on the alert on this occasion, ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... very apparent. The homesteader showed no sign of drowsiness or relaxed vigilance, but sat tranquilly alert, watching him through the curling smoke. It was also some distance to the door, which, from where Clavering sat, appeared to be fastened and he knew the quick precision with which the bushman can swing up a rifle, or if it ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... alert young widow made her court and ruled as a queen. Here little Jim slept away his babyhood and grew to consciousness with sounds of coming horses, going wheels; of chicken calls and twittering swallows in their nests; shouts of men and the ...
— The Preacher of Cedar Mountain - A Tale of the Open Country • Ernest Thompson Seton
... into a tough thicket of willows with a crash. Matcham, pale, but steady and alert, at a sign from Dick ran along the thwarts and leaped ashore; Dick, taking the horse by the bridle, sought to follow, but what with the animal's bulk, and what with the closeness of the thicket, both stuck fast. The horse neighed and trampled; ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... between doubt and hope, on the alert for any sound on the other side which should suggest the presence of the girl herself and give him the cue to knock at the door again, his attention was attracted by a slight noise which thrilled him to the marrow; for it came, not from outside, ...
— The Wharf by the Docks - A Novel • Florence Warden
... thrill of moving machinery. A man who hears for the first time the buzz of the rattlesnake's signal, like the shaking of dry peas in a pod, springs instinctively aside, even though he knows nothing of snakes. How much more, therefore, would a suspicious waiter, whose nerves were all alert for the soft, deadly purr of dynamite mechanism, spoil everything the moment his hand touched the bag? Yes, Dupre reluctantly admitted to himself, the handbag theory was not practical. It led ...
— Revenge! • by Robert Barr
... this instance, on the first occasion the continuous observation of the same "field" for five days failed to disclose to us any other method of increase but this multiple-fission, and it was only the intense suggestiveness of past experience that kept us still alert and prevented us from inferring that it was the only method. But eventually we perceived that while this was the prevailing phenomenon, there were scattered among the other forms of the same monad larger than ...
— Scientific American Supplement, Vol. XIX, No. 470, Jan. 3, 1885 • Various
... as much as you please. Our enemies are on the alert, and we must crush them instantly, or not at all. I have made a mistake. I have been on the wrong track; it is an accident liable to happen to any man, no matter how intelligent he may be. I took the effect for the cause. The day I was convinced that culpable relations existed between Raoul ...
— File No. 113 • Emile Gaboriau
... had made him in the course of his life!), and was much astonished to see him. Aratov rarely went up to her, and if he wanted anything, used always to call, in his delicate voice, from his study: 'Aunt Platosha!' However, she made him sit down, and sat all alert, in expectation of his first words, watching him through her spectacles with one eye, over them with the other. She did not inquire after his health nor offer him tea, as she saw he had not come for that. Aratov was a little disconcerted ... then he ...
— Dream Tales and Prose Poems • Ivan Turgenev
... by the intense excitement of meeting the enemy so soon. We hurried back to our companies, imparting the news to the men, who broke forth into shouts of enthusiasm. All the fatigue so plainly noticeable only a few minutes before, suddenly vanished as if by magic, and every one seemed alert, springy, and full of spirit. We energetically resumed the march in the direction of the distant rumbling, which indicated that the artillery of our advance guard had engaged the enemy. My regiment then was part of the ...
— Four Weeks in the Trenches - The War Story of a Violinist • Fritz Kreisler
... at Sister Constance's door. Sister Constance was alert at once. Every faculty of hers was trained to respond intelligently to taps on the door in the ...
— The Shield of Silence • Harriet T. Comstock
... hair, caught easily at the neck, makes the contour of her head strong and graceful. Tiny, fragile hands that look more like an X-ray picture of hands, rest in her lap in Quakerish pose. Her whole atmosphere when she is not in action is one of strength and quiet determination. In action she is swift, alert, almost panther-like in her movements. Dressed always in simple frocks, preferably soft shades of purple, she conforms to an individual style and taste of her own rather than to ...
— Jailed for Freedom • Doris Stevens
... the religious reformation that permitted freedom of belief, and the French Revolution, which permitted freedom of political action. It was the rediscovery of the human mind, a quickening of intellectual liberty, a desire of alert minds for something new. It was a call for ...
— History of Human Society • Frank W. Blackmar
... when the shot sounded, detonating, like a cannon in the channel of the street. Where the bullet went he did not guess; he was round the corner, running in the middle of the street for the next turning, with eyes alert for any entrance in which he might find a refuge. But the firing had had its intended effect of bringing every dvornik to his gate, and there was nothing for it but to run on. He heard the chase round the corner behind ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... England in the first half of the eighteenth century the sentiment of education was universal. Among the leading people, the sentiment was intense. Colonel Otis, of Barnstable, was alert with respect to the discipline and development of his children. He gave to them all, to the sons especially, the best advantages which the commonwealth afforded. James Otis was assigned to the care of Reverend Jonathan Russell, the minister at Barnstable, ...
— James Otis The Pre-Revolutionist • John Clark Ridpath
... bit of driftwood and cautiously threw in, his arm extended, his figure alert. The squint on his face took a firmer grip. Suddenly his pole gave a leap, the water splashed, his line sang in the air and a fish went up like a rocket. As we were looking into the treetops it ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller
... would be permitted to turn in and take a long night's rest. But they were warned that, secluded and cut off as the place appeared to be, it was not without its dangers, and they must hold themselves prepared to turn out and fight for their lives at a moment's notice, while a strong and alert anchor watch must be ...
— The Cruise of the Nonsuch Buccaneer • Harry Collingwood
... walk for all time in a slippery way. This claim of the real Ida May might be perennial; the girl might return again and again to the attack. For years—as long as the Balls lived and Sheila remained with them—she must be ever on the alert to defend her position ...
— Sheila of Big Wreck Cove - A Story of Cape Cod • James A. Cooper
... a sense of disappointment when he met Mary. In his reaction from Sheila Morgan, he had imagined Mary coming to greet him with something of the alert youthfulness with which she had met him when he first visited Boveyhayne, but when she came into the hall, a book in her hand, he felt that there was some stiffness in her manner, a self-consciousness which had not been ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... Mihul again. Good friend Mihul never before had looked quite so large, lithe, alert and generally fit for a rough-and-tumble. That un-incentive idea was fiendishly ingenious! It was difficult to plan things through clearly and calmly while one's self-esteem kept quailing at vivid visualizations of the results of ...
— Legacy • James H Schmitz
... the day would break in about an hour's time; and during that hour, but always on the alert, we stretched ourselves upon the sand to rest, listening to every sound; for there was the possibility, we knew, of there being enemies, biped or quadruped, within a few yards of where ...
— The Golden Magnet • George Manville Fenn
... for herself and Rachel. They were rather conspicuous, luckily for Biddy's plan, for among the many gorgeous dresses in the Casino she had no difficulty in tracking those two. Until half past eleven, she told herself, she need not be on the alert every instant; but therein had lain her mistake. Sir Marcus Lark had appeared, dressed (more or less) as a Roman officer of the Occupation days, he having heard Mrs. East remark that, "whatever anybody said, it was her favourite period." The lady, ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... opportunity. Shanghai has held the trump card formerly. This cannot be denied. But I think the railway is destined to turn the trade route to the other side of the empire. It is merely a question as to who is to get the trade—the French or the British. The French are on the alert. They cannot get territory; now they are after ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle
... street door, and she listened to his slow step as he ascended the stairs. She heard him pause, too, and waited for the sound of the opening of his room door, which was situated exactly above her own. But she listened in vain, her ears, brain and heart on the alert with surprise, curiosity, and at last suspicion. The Baroness was as full of curiosity as ...
— An Ambitious Man • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... exciting again. The enemy (the Jocelyn party) was alert, but powerless. The three sisters were almost wrought to perform a sacrifice far exceeding Evan's. They nearly decided to summon him to the house: but the matter being broached at table one evening, Major Strike objected to it so angrily that they abandoned it, with the satisfactory conclusion ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... left, and that only in name. Messengers from newspaper offices, representatives of storage and commission houses, merchants looking for consignments of goods, residents looking for friends, and the ever alert dealers in town lots on the scent of fresh victims, were among the crowds that daily congregated at the levee whenever the arrival of one of the packet company's regular steamers was expected. At one time there was a daily line ...
— Reminiscences of Pioneer Days in St. Paul • Frank Moore
... looked timidly at the Doctor; he, the great fellow, in straining bondage to his heart, leaning forward with embarrassed tension in every muscle, Dr Drummond alert, poised, critical, balancing his little figure ...
— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan
... this unexpected peace and quiet on Stratton, however, was precisely opposite from the one he presumed was intended. He had a feeling that it was a calm before the storm, and became more alert than ever. The unnatural placidity weighed on him, and as day followed day serenely his ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... made an observation which the surgeon apparently did not hear. He was thinking, now, his thin face set in a frown, the upper teeth biting hard over the under lip and drawing up the pointed beard. While he thought, he watched the man extended on the chair, watched him like an alert cat, to extract from him some hint as to what he should do. This absorption seemed to ignore completely the other occupants of the room, of whom he was the central, commanding figure. The head nurse held the lamp carelessly, resting her hand over one hip thrown ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... You'll find a pretty view from that bay window if you care to look at our scenery." The busy doctor was gone, and the black-clad figure, left to her own devices for the next thirty minutes, turned with a heavy sigh toward the window her companion had indicated, but paused at sight of a bright, alert little face, peeping around the back of an invalid's chair which she ...
— Heart of Gold • Ruth Alberta Brown
... Italy, as every schoolboy knows, resembles in shape an enormous boot. We had drifted within sight of it. The cats in the fabric had spied it, and their alert imaginations were instantly affected with a lively sense of the size, weight and probable momentum of its ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce
... a call to the man on point!" exclaimed Collins, all alert at once. "Excuse me, mum. See you presently. Something's up. One of ...
— Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces • Thomas W. Hanshew
... his hat gone, his white coat sadly rent and gashed, flecked, too, with red, M. Beaucaire, wary, alert, brilliant, seemed to transform himself into a dozen fencing-masters; and, though his skill appeared to lie in delicacy and quickness, his play being continually with the point, sheer strength failed to beat him down. The young man was laughing ...
— Monsieur Beaucaire • Booth Tarkington
... concealment, the Iroquois naturally keeping their looks directed the other way. Not so with Chingachgook. This warrior was literally in the midst of his most deadly foes, and he could scarcely move without touching one of them. Yet he was apparently unmoved, though he kept all his senses on the alert, in readiness to escape, or to strike a blow at the proper moment. By carefully abstaining from looking towards those behind him, he lessened the chances of discovery, and waited with the indomitable patience of an Indian ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... had a hook nose, and a long sharp chin; and all the lines, wrinkles, curves, and furrows of which the human visage is capable seemed to have met in his cheeks. Nevertheless, his eye was bright and keen, his look alert, and his whole bearing firm, gallant, and soldier-like. He was attired in a sort of military undress; wore a mustachio, which, though thin and gray, was carefully curled; and at the summit of a very respectable wig was perched a small cocked hat, adorned ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... on! Take your medicine!" But the lesson of the last half hour had not been lost on Barney. Up and down the long room, circling about his man, feinting to draw his attack, eluding, and again feinting, Barney kept his antagonist in such rapid motion and so intensely on the alert that his wind began to fail him, and it soon became evident that he could not stand ...
— The Doctor - A Tale Of The Rockies • Ralph Connor
... wheels in the casino. He mingled with the diners upon the terraces of the principal hotels. He brushed elbows with the strollers along the promenade and about the Cercle des Etrangers, and all the while his studiously alert eyes wandered with seeming vacancy of expression over the faces of the men and ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... cartridge, they had the mortification of seeing her vanish round a bend of the creek on her way seaward, the lieutenant consoling himself with the assurance that she would infallibly be snapped up by the Barracouta, whose slender crew would be certain to be on the alert all through the night. When the skipper and I arrived on deck, after securing our prisoner, Ryan and a few of our lads were busily employed ramming home a charge in the long eighteen mounted upon the brig's forecastle, a cartridge ...
— The Pirate Slaver - A Story of the West African Coast • Harry Collingwood
... senselessly; and, while the Indian had not yet developed the hostility that later made a journey across the plains so dangerous, nevertheless the possibilities of theft were always near enough at hand to keep the traveler alert and interested. Then there was the sandy country of the Platte River with its buffalo—buffalo by the hundreds of thousands, as far as the eye could reach—a marvelous sight: and beyond that again the Rockies, by way of Fort Laramie and ...
— The Forty-Niners - A Chronicle of the California Trail and El Dorado • Stewart Edward White
... head that never studied any thing that in worldly language is called useful. The tranquillity of my remnant of life will be lost, or so perpetually interrupted, that I expect little comfort; not that I am already intending to grow rich, but, the moment one is supposed so, there are so many alert to turn one to their own account, that I have more letters to Write, to satisfy, or rather to dissatisfy them, than about my own affairs, though the latter are all confusion. I have such missives on agriculture, pretensions to livings, offers of taking care of my game as I am incapable of it, ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... gentleman who was soon to figure as their resident neighbour, became excited, speedily enthusiastic. All the bells of all the churches rang when Mr. Millbank commenced his canvass; the Conservatives, on the alert, if not alarmed, insisted on their champion also showing himself in all directions; and in the course of four-and- twenty hours, such is the contagion of popular feeling, the town was divided into ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... pulse quicken a trifle at the business manager's brusqueness, and upon him he kept an alert eye, for it was in that gentleman's trousers pocket that he divined the ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... soldiers show to ill advantage on parade, on the march they are gay, alert, and willing like a troop of fox-hunters. I remember once seeing a company pass through the forest of Fontainebleau, on the Chailly road, between the Bas Breau and the Reine Blanche. One fellow walked a little before the rest, and sang a loud, audacious marching song. The rest bestirred ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... them, because, since they must replace, among them, that of sight, they are more and better exercised than they are in the case of those who see. In the morning, in the dormitory, one asks another, 'Is the sun shining?' and the one who is the most alert in dressing runs instantly into the yard, and flourishes his hands in the air, to find out whether there is any warmth of the sun perceptible, and then he runs to communicate the good news, 'The sun ...
— Cuore (Heart) - An Italian Schoolboy's Journal • Edmondo De Amicis
... at Harton. From an early hour handsome equipages had been dashing down the street, and depositing their occupants at the masters' houses. The perpetual rolling of wheels distracted the attention every moment, and curiosity was keenly on the alert to catch a glimpse of the various magnates whose arrival was expected. At the Queen's Head stood a large array of carriages, and the streets were thronged with gay groups of pedestrians, and full ...
— Julian Home • Dean Frederic W. Farrar
... every faculty on the alert, and were ready to seize the first opportunity, however slight, which might offer itself. They agreed, that however much their guard might be reduced, it would be unsafe to make the attempt in the daytime, as they were wholly ignorant of ...
— Jack Archer • G. A. Henty
... the fires which burned within. To one who knew him well, perhaps, it might have seemed that for the two weeks which followed the mysterious disappearance of the tan satchel he was even a little quieter than usual, a little more restrained in his talk, and a little more alert in movement. Beyond this he gave no indication of the keen disappointment and mortification that ...
— Every Man for Himself • Hopkins Moorhouse
... art and the criticism of it. But no connected argument, no definition of terms, no formulation of claims, not so much as any ground really cleared and prepared for discussion—what is a novel-reader to make of such a condition and how is he to keep his critical interest alive and alert? ...
— The Craft of Fiction • Percy Lubbock
... He plucked at Robert's sleeve. A change had come over him in the last minutes. His sunken brown eyes had dried and become rather terribly alert. Something too fine—too exquisitely balanced in him had been ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... the size of the common Cigale, is known in Provence as the Cacan; the name, being a fairly exact imitation of the sound emitted by the insect. This is the Cigale of the flowering ash, far more alert and far more suspicious than the common species. Its harsh, loud song consists of a series of cries—can! can! can! can!—with no intervals of silence subdividing the poem into stanzas. Thanks to its monotony and its harsh shrillness, it is a most ...
— Social Life in the Insect World • J. H. Fabre
... lower, the seen;—a group of men, led by a man of executive force enough to control an empire, prone on their faces, with minds clear, quiet, alert, persistently, ceaselessly praying day by day. Here is the upper, the unseen:—a "wrestling," keen, stubborn, skilled, going on between two spirit princes in the spirit realm. And by Paul's explanation the two are vitally connected. Daniel and his companions are wrestlers too, active participants ...
— Quiet Talks on Prayer • S. D. (Samuel Dickey) Gordon
... little like the buffalo as he lowered his head and surveyed the alert, virile young figure and the insolent, high-bred face from under ominously scowling brows. He made no answer; only laid one finger upon the butt of his own revolver, and the slight action fanned Beauvayse's annoyance and ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... commonness which trade impresses on so many men, the result of the subjection of the intellect to the will, and of the impossibility of grasping things except as they relate to self. In this respect the American cousin was his antipodes. His whole body had a psychical expression—slim, elastic, alert. Over his bright gray eyes the eyelids drew themselves horizontally, showing his dexterity and acuteness of mind; indeed, ...
— The Man Between • Amelia E. Barr
... would mingle with the rest, lending with their silken gowns and silken manners a touch of picturesqueness to the scene. I can well remember seeing the famous Wu Ting Fang, whose alert manner made him a general favourite. He prided himself upon it—and rightly. "How old do you think I am?" he asked his host one day. "Perhaps forty-five," was the reply. "Forty-five! What a guess! Sixty-five would have been ...
— Sir Robert Hart - The Romance of a Great Career, 2nd Edition • Juliet Bredon
... rifles and cannon kept every one alert and watchful. Early in the night while it was yet clear Dick often saw the flashes from the firing, but, as the morning hours approached, heavy mists began to rise from that region of damp earth and great waters. ...
— The Rock of Chickamauga • Joseph A. Altsheler
... the Path by the Bazaar every eye among the hillsmen and among the handful of British was alert. Suddenly a savage murmuring among the natives in the Bazaar broke into a loud snarl, and it seemed as if a storm was about to break; but as suddenly, at a call from Cumner, the hillsmen, the British, and a thousand native soldiers, faced the Bazaar ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... that Yussuf Dakmar feels. I could hear him yawn through the window lattice. Now a man in that condition is likely to act early in the night for fear that sleep may otherwise get the better of him, and the sahib will do well to be keenly alert from the first. I shall be asleep on that couch outside the door and will come if called, so the sahib would better not lock the door but should call loud in case of need, because I also have been long awake ...
— Affair in Araby • Talbot Mundy
... sit down? I want to talk to you about myself." She sat down in the chair that an alert ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon
... was made, when the Government reward was offered, when the police were on the alert, when the whole country rang with the ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... inaudible even to themselves but clear to the ears of Joan. She was on her feet, with bright, wild eyes glancing here and there. There was no suggestion of childishness in her, but a certain willingness to flee from a great danger or attack a weaker force. She stood alert, rather than frightened, with her head back as if she scented the wind to learn what approached. The ball of gray fur straightened into the sharp ears and the flashing teeth of a coyote puppy. Buck Daniels' foot slipped on a pebble and at the sound the coyote darted to ...
— The Seventh Man • Max Brand
... iron, ain't you?" There was a chill in the question, and Drew saw that the long rifle was still held at alert by its owner. ...
— Rebel Spurs • Andre Norton
... but composed, his lips compressed, his keen eyes alert. Inwardly he was moved by this demonstration of goodwill, this very storm of fraternity, but his purpose remained adamant, and when at last the President's bell had tinkled his noisy judges into silence, his voice rose clear and steady as ...
— The Trampling of the Lilies • Rafael Sabatini
... always shewed the utmost readiness to carry into execution, in the most effectual manner, every measure I thought proper to take. Under such circumstances, it is hardly necessary to say, that the seamen were always obedient and alert; and, on this occasion, they were so far from wishing the voyage at an end, that they, rejoiced at the prospect of its being prolonged another year, and of soon enjoying the benefits of a ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World, Volume 1 • James Cook
... taking her eyes from him, she moved like an animal to the food and stooped slowly, keeping alert for any sudden move on his part, and picked up the food. She stood up, and stepped back a couple ...
— The Happy Man • Gerald Wilburn Page
... had often received them in a manner which did not make them desire its further acquaintance. As soon as the boar perceived the tailor it ran at him with foaming mouth and gleaming teeth, and tried to knock him down; but our alert little friend ran into a chapel that stood near, and got out of the window again with a jump. The boar pursued him into the church, but the tailor skipped round to the door, and closed it securely. So the raging ...
— The Blue Fairy Book • Various
... slow and sad; But Kai, a tireless shepherd-lad, Teeming with plans, alert, and glad 45 In work or play, Like sunshine went and came, and bade ...
— Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems • Matthew Arnold
... to last long, and on July 31 we were again on the alert from the report that several thousands of rebels, with thirteen guns and mortars, were making for the open country to the right rear of ...
— A Narrative Of The Siege Of Delhi - With An Account Of The Mutiny At Ferozepore In 1857 • Charles John Griffiths
... store, as in everything that he undertook for others, Lincoln did his very best. He was honest, civil, ready to do anything that should encourage customers to come to the place, full of pleasantries, patient, and alert. ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott
... to learn in meeting our oversea friends face to face, and, if our errand succeeds, to be of any service possible. The great question then becomes: how can we serve best? By keeping our eyes, ears, minds and spirits open and alert to the facts and the possibilities founded on such facts which unfold before us in the course of our visit. Our trip has been announced as an investigation or survey of ...
— A Journey Through France in War Time • Joseph G. Butler, Jr.
... go to sleep without seeing Mamma, and had decided to kiss her at all costs, even with the certainty of being in disgrace with her for long afterwards, when she herself came up to bed. The tranquillity which followed my anguish made me extremely alert, no less than my sense of expectation, my thirst for ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... There were huge wheels of fortune, keno tables, crap outfits, faro layouts, and, above all, the dainty, fascinating roulette. Everything was in full swing. Miners with flushed faces and a wild excitement in their eyes were plunging recklessly; others, calm, alert, anxious, were playing cautiously. Here and there were the fevered faces of women. Gold coin was stacked on the tables, while a man with a pair of scales was weighing dust ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... hanging from the bough of some aged oak. Above all, the Captain of the Forecastle, old Ushant—a fine specimen of a sea sexagenarian—wore a wide, spreading beard, gizzled and grey, that flowed over his breast and often became tangled and knotted with tar. This Ushant, in all weathers, was ever alert at his duty; intrepidly mounting the fore-yard in a gale, his long beard streaming like Neptune's. Off Cape Horn it looked like a miller's, being all over powdered with frost; sometimes it glittered with minute icicles ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... philosophy was to him familiar. The itineracy he believed was a necessity for the preacher as well as for the people. A preacher should not remain so long in a place as to become cheap or commonplace. New faces keep one alive and alert. And the circuit-rider can give the same address over and over and perfect it by repetition until it is ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 9 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Reformers • Elbert Hubbard
... wanderings to re-create his life. When it awoke, she would have to share him; now he was hers alone. Her feelings towards this thing did not assume the proportions of jealousy or fear; they were merely alert, vaguely disquieting. The sleeping thing was not a monster. No, but it might grow into one, if its appetite were not ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... not burden nor weary the boys with excessive military drills and tactics. The movement is not a military one. The military virtues of obedience, neatness, order, endurance and erect, alert bearing, however, are scout virtues. Use everything that develops boys. This is ...
— Outdoor Sports and Games • Claude H. Miller
... of adventure blazed up once more. His moment of weakness had passed. The thrill was in his blood, his nerves were tightened. He was ready for what might come, seemingly still half asleep, yet, indeed, with every sense of intuition and observation keenly alert. ...
— Peter Ruff and the Double Four • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... set about to search for that unknown human being with as much ardor as the mathematicians of the Bureau give to longitudes. They literally ransack the whole kingdom. At the first ray of hope all the post-offices in Paris are alert. Sometimes the receiver of a missing letter is amazed at the network of scrawled directions which covers both back and front of the missive,—glorious vouchers for the administrative persistency with which the post has been at ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... writing about you; which has been my employment of late, at leisure moments,—that is, moments of leisure from idleness, not work. As you partly guessed, I took in hand a Review of Teufelsdrockh—for want of a better Heuschrecke to do the work; and when I have been well enough, and alert enough, during the last fortnight, have tried to set down some notions about Tobacco, Radicalism, Christianity, Assafoetida and so forth. But a few abortive pages are all the result as yet. If my speculations should ever see daylight, they may chance to get you into scrapes, but ...
— The Life of John Sterling • Thomas Carlyle
... be in his twenties, younger than I had expected. He was trim, well built, with a quietly alert face. Two rows of ribbons testified to his wartime service. When Jesse Stay introduced me, Boggs gave me a curiously searching look. It could have been merely his usual way of appraising people he met. But all through ...
— The Flying Saucers are Real • Donald Keyhoe
... Rojas, were all gathered amicably together. The Americans, saluting impartially their acquaintances, made their way to a table that remained empty in the middle of the room. They had hardly seated themselves when from a distant corner an alert young man, waving his hand in greeting, pushed his way toward them. They recognized the third vice-president of the Forrester Construction ...
— The White Mice • Richard Harding Davis
... steel: but that indeed It was some glorious form, some splendid weed, In which a spirit new come from the skies Might live, and show itself to human eyes. 'Tis the far-fam'd, the brave Sir Gondibert, Said the good man to Calidore alert; While the young warrior with a step of grace Came up,—a courtly smile upon his face, And mailed hand held out, ready to greet The large-eyed wonder, and ambitious heat Of the aspiring boy; who as he led Those smiling ladies, often turned his head ...
— Poems 1817 • John Keats
... Doctor, whose memory haunted every street and by-lane and even attained to something like apotheosis in the talk of the older inhabitants. They told what an eye he had, as a naturalist, for anything uncommon in the maunds; how he taught them to be observant, alert for any strange fish, and to bring it home alive, if possible; and how he was never so happy as when seated on a bollard near the Quay-head with a drawing-board on his knee, busy—for he was a wonder with pencil and brush—transferring ...
— Nicky-Nan, Reservist • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... guard, he gathered, was a little less than perfectly alert. This would be simple. He touched the controls of his body shield to raise himself a few inches above the cobblestones, and floated between the two sentries, going slowly ...
— Millennium • Everett B. Cole
... which offers profit-sharing and retiring allowances must formulate a protective theory and practice. A society clique too closely imitated by a lower stratum must regain its distinction and supremacy. A nation must be constantly alert to adjust itself to the changing conditions of international trade and to the war equipment and training of ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... and there's come down strict orders for the forces and volunteers to be alert; and there's a clever young officer to come here forthwith, to look at our means o' defenceI saw the Bailies lass cleaning his belts and white breeksI gae her a hand, for ye maun think she wasna ower clever at it, and sae I gat a' the news ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... in some pleasant scenes of Continental travel. There is something exceedingly quaint, almost ludicrous, in the author's way of employing the Spenserian stanza, and as it is not always clear that he is conscious of the humour there is in it, the reader's attention is kept on the alert in the very last way that would commend itself to ...
— The Contemporary Review, Volume 36, September 1879 • Various
... the lad, and henceforth they entered no houses save to buy bread and mead. Of meat they had plenty, for as they passed through the forests Wolf was always upon the alert, and several times found a wild boar in his lair, and kept him at bay until Edmund and Egbert ran up and with spears and swords slew him. This supplied them amply with meat, and gave them indeed far more than they could eat, but they exchanged portions of the flesh for bread in the villages. ...
— The Dragon and the Raven - or, The Days of King Alfred • G. A. Henty
... this digression. We remained encamped on this spot five days, during three of which the hunters were at work incessantly, and immense quantities of meat and hides were brought in. Great alarm, however, prevailed in the village. All were on the alert. The young men were ranging through the country as scouts, and the old men paid careful attention to omens and prodigies, and especially to their dreams. In order to convey to the enemy (who, if they were in the neighborhood, ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... very ill indeed for several days, but still hopeful and cheerful; and as the weather mended, and the calm brightness of October set in, he rallied, and came downstairs again, not looking many degrees more wan and hectic than before, with a mind as alert as usual, and his kind heart much gratified by the many attentions of his parishioners ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... quick eyes, had Mr. Iff, so alert and observant that they had made him alive to a circumstance which had altogether escaped Staff's notice—a trifling incident that took place just as they were on ...
— The Bandbox • Louis Joseph Vance
... alert for news, but suspecting no evil. Even Franky looked up from his toast and marmalade with an inquiring glance. Perhaps the circus was coming, and there would be another procession, with elephants and camels walking through the streets, and unseen but loudly roaring lions dragged ...
— Mrs. Day's Daughters • Mary E. Mann
... arise who, every bit as keen as sportsmen now are to get to close quarters with game animals, will want to get into positions from which they will be able carefully to observe animals of all kinds and take note of every characteristic. These artists will have to be fully as alert as the sportsmen, and be able on the instant, and from a fleeting glimpse, to note the lines and shades and character of the animal. But, if they do this, they will, in all probability, bring back more lasting ...
— The Heart of Nature - or, The Quest for Natural Beauty • Francis Younghusband
... in commerce, where men prey on their kind, must be alive and alert to what is going on, or while he dreams, his competitor will seize upon his birthright. And so you see why poets are poor and ...
— Love, Life & Work • Elbert Hubbard
... He noted them all; the faces of the men, the gestures of the women; but he did not show any special interest till he came to that portion of the road where the long line of half-buried fences began to give way to a few scattered houses. Then his spirit woke, and be became quick, alert, and persuasive. He entered houses; he talked with the people. Though evidently not a dissipated man, he stopped at several saloons, taking his time with his glass and encouraging the chatter of all who chose to meet his advances. He was ...
— The House of the Whispering Pines • Anna Katharine Green
... which you inquired. Even now I receive letters urging me to buy something or other about which I sent a letter of inquiry when I was in America. At night, if you stroll round the town you will be amazed by the ingenious and clever signs which the alert minds of the trades people have invented, such as revolving electric lights forming the name of the advertiser with different colors, or a figure or shape of some sort illustrating his wares. But even this is not thought sufficient. Circulars are often ...
— America Through the Spectacles of an Oriental Diplomat • Wu Tingfang
... within two miles of the town. Here arms were distributed and orders given by their leader, named Roche. Silently and quickly they reached the town they hoped to surprise. But the regular troops, of which the garrison was chiefly composed, were on the alert, though their preparations were made full as silently. When the peasantry emerged from Tullow Street, into an exposed space, a deadly fire was opened upon them from the houses on all sides. The regulars, in perfect security themselves, and abundantly supplied with ammunition, ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... now guessing at the course they were taking. Whether their frantic dash was leading them toward the Tavern, or whether they were circling back to Green Fancy, he knew not. Panting, he forged onward, his ears alert not only for the sound of pursuit but for the shot that would end the ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... appropriated him; he was the most interesting thing she had had to think about in many a month. She wished to do something with him—she hardly knew what. There was so much of him; he was so rich and robust, so easy, friendly, well-disposed, that he kept her fancy constantly on the alert. For the present, the only thing she could do was to like him. She told him that he was "horribly Western," but in this compliment the adverb was tinged with insincerity. She led him about with her, introduced him to fifty people, and took extreme ...
— The American • Henry James
... perform that which, as follows from the accounts given above of the aim of education, is the work most important in the case of boys—that is, it will draw out their faculties and make them useful in the world, alert, trained in industry, and able to understand, so far as their school lessons educated them, and make themselves master of any subject set ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... their young energies; he held his hat raised as he passed them; but that was all we could gain. Wise people whispered that he never would go whilst they were so evidently expecting him; that he liked to keep them always on the alert; it was good for discipline. The general took another plan, and once allowed no sign of life about the castle when the emperor passed—it was like a deserted place. But it did not take neither; he passed, as if there were no castle there. It was desesperant. When, lo! the next day but ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 268, August 11, 1827 • Various
... returned Hal; "nor can you. How many men it may kill, how many it may maim and what damage it will do cannot be estimated. But one thing sure, immediately afterwards every sleepy German soldier within fifty miles will be on the alert. The Germans will know it was not an accident. They will attribute the explosion to a bomb dropped from the air. We may have ...
— The Boy Allies At Verdun • Clair W. Hayes
... A certain stimulation for two, since the dress- due to dancing which suit engine of conquest quickens the mental needs two to run it ... $60.00 forces and makes one happier and more alert at ...
— Skinner's Dress Suit • Henry Irving Dodge
... us to the "alert zone," where gas masks must be adjusted and ready for instant use. The guard at the crossroad allowed us to pass with the warning, "Keep under cover or you will draw the fire of the Boche snipers." So we crawled through a hole in the camouflaged screen which ...
— The Fight for the Argonne - Personal Experiences of a 'Y' Man • William Benjamin West
... magnificent city is Milan! The great houses are all of stone, and stand regular and in order, along wide straight streets. There are swift cars, drawn by electricity, for such as can afford them. Men are brisk and alert even in the summer heats, and there are shops of a very good kind, though a trifle showy. There are many newspapers to help the Milanese to be better men and to cultivate charity and humility; there are banks full of paper money; there are soldiers, ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc
... were roused. They were surprised at the early call, for they had expected two or three days' rest, after the heavy work of the last eight days; but the company officers soon learned the news from their majors and, as it quickly spread through the ranks, the men were at once alert and ready. Fording the river, they marched at a rapid pace by the road to Coimbra and, soon after five o'clock, arrived within a few hundred yards of the town. Then they were halted and broken up into four columns, which ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty
... improvement. A child's vocabulary increases rapidly through new experiences. A mature person can create new surroundings. He can deliberately widen his horizon either by reading or association. The child is mentally alert. A man can keep himself intellectually alert. A child delights in his use of his powers of expression. A man can easily make his intercourse a source of delight to himself and to all with whom he comes in contact. A child's imagination is kept stimulated continually. ...
— Public Speaking • Clarence Stratton
... of my childhood and youth I try to define to myself wherein I differed from my brothers and from other boys in the neighborhood, or wherein I showed any indication of the future bent of my mind. I see that I was more curious and alert than most boys, and had more interests outside my special duties as a farm boy. I knew pretty well the ways of the wild bees and hornets when I was only a small lad. I knew the different bumblebees, and had made a collection of their combs and honey before ...
— Our Friend John Burroughs • Clara Barrus
... as we observed, filed THROUGH Prag,—Sunday, May 1st, not a pleasant holiday-spectacle to the populations;—and are all encamped on the Ziscaberg high ground, on the other side of the City. Had they been alert, now was the time to attack Friedrich, who is weaker than they, while nobody has yet joined him. They did not think of it, under Prince Karl; and Browne and the Prince are said to be in ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVIII. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Seven-Years War Rises to a Height.—1757-1759. • Thomas Carlyle
... the old free-born bird that gets thus to freedom; but I know not what manacled and hide-bound spirit, incapable of pleasure, the clay of a man. Go south! Why, I saw more beauty with my eyes healthfully alert to see in two wet windy February afternoons in Scotland than I can see in my beautiful olive gardens and grey hills in a whole week in my low and lost estate, as the Shorter Catechism puts it somewhere. It is a pitiable blindness, this blindness of ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... telling me about it. But Henderson couldn't be rushed, and I knew it. I kept the alert look on my face and thought of other things, while waiting for him to ...
— The Risk Profession • Donald Edwin Westlake
... Punch without JOHN LEECH is, as the Irishman said, unthinkable. From the third volume, when LEECH got really into his stride, until his lamented early death in 1864, LEECH'S genius was at the service of his young friend: his quick perceptive kindly eyes ever vigilant for humorous incident, his ears alert for humorous sayings, and his hand translating all into pictorial drama and by a sure and benign instinct seizing ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Aug 29, 1917 • Various
... and so unused was he to fear that he could not be frightened into running away. He ceased wagging his tail, and, though he continued to look up at her, his eyes no longer smiled. Her action and noise he identified as unfriendly, and he became alert and watchful, prepared for whatever hostile act she might ...
— Jerry of the Islands • Jack London
... of these and other facts of their appearance, and curiously questioned whether this were the best that a great material civilization could come to; it looked a little dull. The men's faces were shrewd and alert, and yet they looked dull; the women's were pretty and knowing, and yet dull. It was, probably, the holiday expression of the vast, prosperous commercial class, with unlimited money, and no ideals that money could not realize; fashion ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... failed utterly; and to the evident surprise of the silent Egyptian, who still sat in his place, had coolly seated herself upon the end of the divan nearest the street, our host, meantime, standing near the middle of the room, alert, ...
— Against Odds - A Detective Story • Lawrence L. Lynch
... With eyes on the alert, Tom made his way to one chimney and then another. The swindler was not there, nor was he on the adjoining roof. Then the youth got down on his hands and knees and looked over the edge of the tenement, on the alleyway side. Here was an iron fire escape, ...
— The Rover Boys on the Farm - or Last Days at Putnam Hall • Arthur M. Winfield (AKA Edward Stratemeyer)
... affection, which threatened great trouble both to himself and its object. He had no cause for jealousy, but his suspicious mind was always on the alert—he was jealous even of her friends, her favorite studies—he wanted every look and thought his own, yet he was too ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... dies, a dog must be present, as it is supposed to drive away evil spirits, who are on the alert to seize upon the dying man's soul. This precaution is called the sagdad, or dog-gaze. One of the chief reasons for the great veneration in which dogs are held by Parsees arises from the tradition that in their emigration from Persia to India their ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various
... in the country with our mother. This alert, which was called "The day of fear" surprised me and would probably have alarmed me, had I not seen my mother remain so calm. I have always thought that my father had discreetly warned her of what ...
— The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot, Translated by - Oliver C. Colt • Baron de Marbot
... appropriate merit of causing a pleasant surprise, and a perplexity that is grateful, because it stops short of confusion; while the awkward and grotesque predicaments, into which the persons are thrown by their mutual crossing and tripping, hold attention on the alert, and keep the spirits in a frolic. Yet the laughable proceedings of the scene are all easy and free; that is, the comic situations are ingenious without being at all forced; the ingenuity being hidden in the naturalness with which every thing comes to pass. The play well ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... her ears to listen. She had certainly heard a sound outside the door; but it might be only Peter who, she knew, crouched there, alert ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... dainty fly, a velvety flake, a soft fluff that astounds us by its contrast with the roughness of the depths whence it ascends. On this point, we know pretty well what there is to know. There remains the entrance into the cell, a puzzle that has kept me on the alert for a quarter ...
— The Life of the Fly - With Which are Interspersed Some Chapters of Autobiography • J. Henri Fabre
... in the ranks, and every one was on the alert; but still there came nothing more to cause alarm till they had arrived within half a mile of their landing-place, when, as they were passing through a more open portion of the track, there was a shout, and a shower of limbings came whizzing past ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... continuous strain (which none but such a trained actress could maintain for a single day) her spirit must have wearied. And if this part was hard to play in public, where we are all, I take it, actors of some sort and on the alert to sustain the character we would have our own, how much more difficult must it be in private when we drop our disguise and lay our hearts open to those we love! And here, as it seemed to me, I did hit ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett
... not many such moments of opportunity, because the days are evil; like a barren desert, in which, here and there, you find a flower, pluck it while you can; like a business opportunity which comes a few times in a life-time; buy it up while you have the chance. Be spiritually alert; be not unwise, but understanding what the will of God is. "Walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, buying up ...
— Days of Heaven Upon Earth • Rev. A. B. Simpson
... returned Omar impatiently, "but I also know that my enemy, Sidi Hassan, is more than usually on the alert just now; I think it well to delay for a time. Besides," he added, smiling, "you surely would not have me begin a revolution on the very eve of ...
— The Pirate City - An Algerine Tale • R.M. Ballantyne
... and on the very best of terms with the Nutcracker Grays. Young Tip Chipmunk, the oldest son, was in all respects a perfect contrast to Master Featherhead. He was always lively and cheerful, and so very alert in providing for the family, that old Mr. and Mrs. Chipmunk had very little care, but could sit sociably at the door of their hole and chat with neighbours, quite sure that Tip would bring everything out right for them, and have plenty ...
— Queer Little Folks • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... she came out, twenty minutes later, her step was more alert. For a little while, she had been ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... the other. The Hawk did not sit down until with old habit he had sized up the whole layout of laboratory, assistants and chances. The two chairs faced toward ward the high screen; to each side stood the five coolie-guards; mechanically alert as always; the four Caucasian assistants made a group of strange statues to ...
— The Affair of the Brains • Anthony Gilmore
... Friar. Children in long dresses ran into the cabins at sight of the strangers, like rabbits scuttling back to their burrows. Having found refuge they looked out over the half-doors as the car passed, their eyes sparkling, humorous, full of an alert inquisitiveness, their faces fresh as ...
— Waysiders • Seumas O'Kelly
... westering sun, so that for a moment it dazzled eyes yet clogged with the heaviness of sleep. Then I perceived what afforded me so severe a shock that I ducked hastily down into my covert, every faculty instantly alert. Close in against the reeds, as though skirting the low line of the shore, loomed the black outline of a ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... passed, but no sound rewarded my alert listening—until, very faintly, but echoing in a muffled, church-like fashion around that peculiar building, came a slight, almost sibilant sound, which I took to be the gentle closing of a ...
— Bat Wing • Sax Rohmer
... Gilmore, alert and sleepless, smoked on; he was thinking of Evelyn Langham. After his interview with her husband that afternoon he had gone to his own apartment. His bedroom adjoined North's parlor and through the flimsy lath and plaster partition he had distinctly heard a woman's voice. The sound of that ...
— The Just and the Unjust • Vaughan Kester
... gratefully Barine held out her arms to her sister! Her mother had been prevented from coming only by the warning that her disappearance would surely attract the attention of the spies. And the latter were very alert; for Mark Antony had not yet given up the pursuit of the singer, nor had the attorney Philostratus recalled the proclamation offering two talents for the capture of Dion, and both the latter's palace and Berenike's house were ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... through it. To Mr. Jefferson the word that he had audaciously used could have no significance. Treason! Traitor! Aaron Burr and his Jack-o'-Lantern ambitions, indeed, had long been looked upon with suspicion, vague and ill-directed, now slumbering and now idly alert. In this very room—in this very room the man had been talked of, discussed, analysed, and puffed away by the two who now held it with their estranged and troubled souls. Burr was gone; this August night he was floating down the Ohio toward New Orleans and the promised blow. Had some fool ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... Prince of the Power of the Air, The terror that walketh by night, and the horror by day, The legions of Evil, alert and awake and aware, Press round him each hour; and I pray here ...
— Many Voices • E. Nesbit |
