"Clap" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... these goblins are not like our Maori goblins," and, taking courage, offered them sweet potatoes, and even lit a fire and roasted cockles for them. When one of the strangers pointed a walking-staff he had in his hand at a cormorant sitting on a dead tree, and there was a flash of lightning and a clap of thunder, followed by the cormorant's fall there was another stampede into the bush. But the goblins laughed so good-humouredly that the children took heart to return and look at the fallen bird. Yes, it was dead; but what had killed it? ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves
... increased in violence. The air grew darker and darker. It was near evening, the clouds were dense, the thick woods increased the gloom. Suddenly a blinding flash of lightning pierced the darkness, followed by a sharp clap of thunder. There was a crash of falling timber. Terror-stricken, Rena flew forward through the forest, the underbrush growing closer and closer as she advanced. Suddenly the earth gave way beneath her feet and she sank into a concealed morass. ...
— The House Behind the Cedars • Charles W. Chesnutt
... succeeding in the general tide of success, established with a family and three young children, all seemed well. Now the Four Corners was rarely visited. The verandas broke down; grass and hardy roses grew into the cracks where the clap-boards had started. The Ellwells, father and son, were fashionable people; the ...
— The Man Who Wins • Robert Herrick
... was to me like a clap of thunder. "Commander of the faithful," I replied, "I am ready to do whatever your majesty shall think fit to command; but I beseech you most humbly to consider what I have undergone. I have also made a vow ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 1 • Anon.
... came a sound as of a thunder-clap, but the sound seemed to come from the ears of the girls. And as the echo was dying away, slowly the girls rose to their feet. For a moment they stood apart, a dazed expression on their faces. Then they clung ...
— Australian Legendary Tales - Folklore of the Noongahburrahs as told to the Piccaninnies • K. Langloh Parker
... under a towering rock, still a little languid, but full of an inrushing tide of happiness. The green waves came rolling in, their foaming crests catching the rosy pink of the sunset; the sea-gulls sailed lazily home from their day's fishing. The sheep on the hillside were folded, and the clap clap of the mill in the valley came on ...
— By Berwen Banks • Allen Raine
... than with a clap like thunder the sail was blown away, and flying out in tatters was quickly whisked round and round the yard. Whatever had been the intentions of the first mate, he now returned perfectly sobered, and taking the command, issued every subsequent order with ...
— Owen Hartley; or, Ups and Downs - A Tale of Land and Sea • William H. G. Kingston
... chance of contact with the Spirit. This compensating beat of the fully lived human life, that whole side of existence resumed in the word contemplation, has been left out. "All the artillery of the world," said John Everard, "were they all discharged together at one clap, could not more deaf the ears of our bodies than the clamourings of desires in the soul deaf its ears, so you see a man must go into the silence, or else he cannot hear God speak."[40] And until we remodel our current conception of the Christian life in such a sense as ...
— The Life of the Spirit and the Life of To-day • Evelyn Underhill
... Presbyterians like a thunder-clap. For, as they rightly interpreted, it was nothing less than a design to carry in Parliament a Toleration-clause to be inserted in the Bill for establishing Presbytery before that Bill was ready to be drafted. Of this Baillie and his friends complained bitterly. ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... such a captain and such a mate were worth the lives of a thousand Spaniards. To pleasure Kirby, they would depart this once from their ancient usage and let the prisoners go, though it was passing strange,—it being Kirby's wont to clap prisoners under hatches and fire their ship above them. At the end of which speech the Spaniard began to rave, and sprang at me like a catamount. Paradise put forth a foot and tripped him up, whereat the pirates laughed again, and ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... to gosther him an' ax him where he'd been, an' phat he'd been at, an' make him tell a hunderd lies about not gettin' home afore. So it came on to thunder an' lighten like as all the avil daymons in the univarse were fightin' wid cannons in the shky, an' by an' by there was a clap loud enough to shplit yer ...
— Irish Wonders • D. R. McAnally, Jr.
... said her brother, "when you see the herd making for the ravine, shout and and, clap your hands, and they will turn either to the ten right or to the left. Do not let them land, or we shall lose them. We must trust to Wolfe for their not escaping to the island. Wolfe is well trained, he ...
— Canadian Crusoes - A Tale of The Rice Lake Plains • Catharine Parr Traill
... impulse to clap my hands at St. Pierre de Chartreuse, as at some "setting" excellently designed and carried out by the most celebrated of scene painters. It was a place in which to stop a month, finding a new walk for each new day; but one does not discover walks in a motor ...
— The Princess Passes • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... in a few moments. Don't wait to close up or put away anything here, but clap that gold in the saddle-bags, and take Barker with you and 'lite' out for Boomville AT ONCE. I ...
— The Three Partners • Bret Harte
... suddenly clap his hands, and speak to the rowers. These did not look up, but continued to row on in the same leisurely way as before; nor did Pierre again glance at ...
— Saint Bartholomew's Eve - A Tale of the Huguenot WarS • G. A. Henty
... and 'when eating, he did not converse.' 'Although his food might be coarse rice and poor soup, he would offer a little of it in sacrifice, with a grave, respectful air.' 'On occasion of a sudden clap of thunder, or a violent wind, he would change countenance. He would do the same, and rise up moreover, when he found himself a guest at a loaded board.' 'At the sight of a person in mourning, he ...
— THE CHINESE CLASSICS (PROLEGOMENA) • James Legge
... with admiration, and when Hurlbut led the first attack on the monopolistic tendencies of the Republican party, Representative Rollinson, chuckling in his beard at the handsome youth's audacity, himself dared so greatly as to clap his hands aloud. Hurlbut, on the floor, was always a storm centre: tall, dramatic, bold, the members put down their newspapers whenever his strong voice was heard demanding recognition, and his "Mr. Speaker!" was like the first rumble of thunder. The tempest nearly always ...
— In the Arena - Stories of Political Life • Booth Tarkington
... up presently and looked out of the window. He could see but little excepting a stretch of snow. The cell-like room was almost without heat, and he had to clap his hands together, and stamp his feet, ...
— The Mystery at Putnam Hall - The School Chums' Strange Discovery • Arthur M. Winfield
... time I'd got her out to the farm and had heared her talk and seen her clap her hands at the chippies, and laugh at the birds, and go half wild over every little thing she'd see, I knowed I'd got hold o' something that filled up every crack o' my heart. And she didn't come a day too soon, ...
— The Underdog • F. Hopkinson Smith
... the weights come out," said Journeyman, "for if it happened to come to Courtney's ears that old Ben could be trained he'd clap seven-ten on him without ...
— Esther Waters • George Moore
... clap her hands, but wrung them instead, remembering with a sudden pang that the battle was not over yet, and it was much too soon ...
— Rose in Bloom - A Sequel to "Eight Cousins" • Louisa May Alcott
... I must be getting soured in my old age," she answered remorsefully. "What you say is dreadfully true. It's the saddest part of a singer's career. And I always clap my hardest at a farewell concert. ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... fire-mist a stone. He may at some time restore all force to consciousness again, and make every part of the universe thrill with responsive joy. "Then shall the mountains and the hills break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field clap their hands." One of these changes is to come to the earth. [Page 241] Amidst great noise the heaven shall flee, the earth be burned up, and all their forces be changed to new forms. Perhaps it will not then be visible to mortal eyes. Perhaps force will then be made conscious, ...
— Recreations in Astronomy - With Directions for Practical Experiments and Telescopic Work • Henry Warren
... up, 'Longside of the leader, an' hit him flat On his steamin' flank with a lightsome stroke Of the end of my limber lariat; He never swerv'd, an' we thunder'd on, Black in the blackness, red in the red Of the lightnin' blazin' with ev'ry clap That bust from the black ...
— Old Spookses' Pass • Isabella Valancy Crawford
... weeks, knowing as he says that his brig was sinking, when he could have put in at Gib, or the Azores, or Las Palmas, or brought up in one of the West Coast rivers, where he could run up on the tidal mud, careened his vessel, and set his ship's carpenter to work to clap patches upon her bottom outside and in. Don't you call ...
— The Ocean Cat's Paw - The Story of a Strange Cruise • George Manville Fenn
... November 12th Tuesday 1805 a tremendious thunder Storm abt. 3 oClock this morning accompanied by wind from the S W. and Hail, this Storm of hard Clap's thunder Lighting and hail untill about 6 oClock at intervals it then became light for a Short time when the heavens became darkined by a black Cloud from the S, W, & a hard rain Suckceeded which lasted ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al
... no longer, but, taking about four steps a minute, slunk past the kitchen like a thief—not so carefully, however, but that one of his soles yet looser than the other gave one clap upon the flagged passage, when Betty straightway stood in the kitchen door, a fierce picture in a deal frame. By this time Robert had closed the outer door, and was following ...
— Robert Falconer • George MacDonald
... to be born in. When she was a baby she used to lie on the short, sweet grass before the doorstep, and watch the cows and the goats feeding, and clap her little hands to see how rosy the sunset made the snow that shone on the tops of those high peaks. And the next summer, when she could run alone, she picked the blue-eyed gentians, thrusting her small fingers between their fringed eyelids, and ...
— The Seven Little Sisters Who Live on the Round Ball - That Floats in the Air • Jane Andrews
... to be his own reviewer, but the desire to be adequately reviewed still remained with him, a fond longing amid repeated disappointments. An author often feels that he has got too much praise, though he never has got all he wants. "Why don't they clap?" Doctor Holmes once whimsically demanded, speaking of his audiences in those simple early days when he went about lecturing like Emerson and Alcott and other saints and sages of New England. "Do they think I can't stand it? Why don't they give me three ...
— Imaginary Interviews • W. D. Howells
... the fall of this fortress came like a thunder-clap over Europe. It announced the reign of anarchy in France, and the helplessness of the King. On hearing of the fall of the Bastille, the King is said to have exclaimed to his courtiers, "It is a revolt, then." ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IX • John Lord
... where the late great fire begun Bill against importing Cattle from Ireland But my wife vexed, which vexed me Clap of the pox which he got about twelve years ago Come to us out of bed in his furred mittens and furred cap Court full of great apprehensions of the French Declared he will never have another public mistress again Desk fastened to one of the armes of his chayre Do outdo ...
— Widger's Quotations from The Diary of Samuel Pepys • David Widger
... tidings that one of their own body, and, until that day, an active participator in their discussions, had proved a Judas, and was now, with a band of his recreant neighbors, on his way to the British camp. The news fell like a thunder-clap on the council, producing, at first, a sensation not often witnessed in so grave an assemblage. But no formal comments were offered; and, after the commotion had subsided, all sunk into a thoughtful silence, which we will improve by our promised introduction to the reader ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... invasion of the French to the justice of retribution. "Thy crimes, O Florence! thy crimes, O Rome! thy crimes, O Italy! are the causes of these chastisements." And so terrible are his denunciations that the whole city quakes with fear. Mirandola relates that as Savonarola's voice sounded like a clap of thunder in the cathedral, packed to its utmost capacity with the trembling people, a cold shiver ran through all his bones and the hairs of his head stood on end. "O Rome!" exclaimed the preacher, "thou shalt be put to the sword, since thou wilt not be converted. O Italy! ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VI • John Lord
... Exile of Siberia," tolerably acted: but there was one trait introduced very characteristic of the place and people: Elizabeth in a tremendous snow storm, is pursued by robbers; and finding a crucifix, erected by the road side, embraces it for protection. The crucifix flies away with her in a clap of thunder, and sets her down safely at a distance from her persecutors. The audience appeared equally enchanted and edified by this scene: some of the women near me crossed themselves, and put their handkerchiefs to their eyes: the men rose from their ...
— The Diary of an Ennuyee • Anna Brownell Jameson
... instant, and then sighed deeply. "I suppose I'll stay," he murmured, and walked into the bar. Jerry Strann was smiling in the way that showed his teeth. As Barry passed he said softly: "I see we ain't going to have no trouble, you and me!" and he moved to clap his strong hand on the shoulder of the smaller man. Oddly enough, the hand missed, for Barry swerved from beneath it as a wolf swerves from the shadow of a falling branch. No perceptible effort—no sudden start ...
— The Night Horseman • Max Brand
... upon an old pitcher and thinking it might be silver he began rubbing it. Instantly there was a clap of thunder and a company of soldiers appeared. Their captain ...
— The Laughing Prince - Jugoslav Folk and Fairy Tales • Parker Fillmore
... religiously. At seven I began to fight with dirty little urchins in the street, who felt much scandalised at the goodness of my clothes. It is hard work fighting up-hill at seven years of age. Old Ford would wipe the blood from my nose, and clap the vinegar and brown paper on my bruises with words of sweet encouragement; though he always ended by predicting that his hopeful godson would be hung, and that he should live to see it. I have certainly not been drowned ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... is waved, and lo! Revealed Old Christmas stands, And little children chuckle and crow, And laugh and clap their hands. ...
— The Bab Ballads • W. S. Gilbert
... sitting in the garden with her baby. It came to be Benoix' habit to stop there for a while coming or going from his house beyond. The baby knew the pit-a-patter of his racking horse, and had learned to clap her hands and crow when she heard it. The Creole had the same grave simplicity for children, as for his equals. It never failed to ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... of the dwellings straggle over the ground without an upper story, and have very deep verandahs, through which I caught glimpses of cool, shady rooms, with matted floors. Some look as if they had been transported from the old-fashioned villages of the Connecticut Valley, with their clap-board fronts painted white and jalousies painted green; but then the deep verandah in which families lead an open-air life has been added, and the chimneys have been omitted, and the New England severity and angularity are toned down and draped ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... is quite a stir outside," agreed the agitator, blandly. He looked the chairman up and down with interest. "You may call me Sylvester—Talleyrand Sylvester. Yankee dickerer! Buy and sell everything from a clap o' thunder to a second-hand gravestone. It brings me round the country up here, and so I've been the Squire's right-hand man in the political game, such as there's been of it." He turned his back on the pondering Duke and continued, ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day
... like a thunder-clap on the poor boy, who seemed about sixteen. He rose at once, however, and stood before the minister, his arms hanging at his side and ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... the old man. "Cap'n Bonnet 'ud clap me in irons if I slew this filthy Ed'ard Teach and robbed him of that enjoyment. I'll pull no trigger save ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... stood together upon the platform, among hurrying crowds, in black fumes that poisoned the palate with sulphur. This way and that sped the demon engines, whirling lighted waggons full of people. Shrill whistles, the hiss and roar of steam, the bang, clap, bang of carriage-doors, the clatter of feet on wood and stone—all echoed and reverberated from a huge cloudy vault above them. High and low, on every available yard of wall, advertisements clamoured to the eye: ...
— In the Year of Jubilee • George Gissing
... how their daddy has sailed out across the seas, And they'll be going after when the May begins to bloom. Oh, they clap their hands together as they cluster round her knees— Then why should she be weeping as ...
— England over Seas • Lloyd Roberts
... love of the true, the beautiful, and the good. Intellectual masters like Emerson and Renan. ignore conscience; they refuse to acknowledge the selfishness, the baseness, the cruelty of society; they are deaf to the groans of creation; they smile, and expect us to smile, whilst they clap a purple patch of rhetoric on the running sores of humanity. No sackcloth must pass their gate, and no craftsman of Ind ever wove gossamer half so delicate and delightful as the verbal veil with which ...
— The world's great sermons, Volume 8 - Talmage to Knox Little • Grenville Kleiser
... gallery, he accompanied the players by audible recitation, till a friendly hint frighted him to silence. Pope countenanced Agamemnon by coming to it, the first night, and was welcomed to the theatre by a general clap; he had much regard for Thomson, and once expressed it in a poetical epistle sent to Italy, of which, however, he abated the value by transplanting some of the lines into ...
— Lives of the Poets: Gay, Thomson, Young, and Others • Samuel Johnson
... and the leaves on the sides, the leaves. They fall off every Year, and the skin upon which they grow, with them. [The Skins, and their use.] These skins grow upon the body of the Tree, and the leaves grow out on them. They also clap about the buds or blossoms which bear the Nuts, and as the buds swell, so this skin-cover gives way to them, till at length it falls quite off with the great leaf on it. It is somewhat like unto Leather, and of great use unto the Countrey ...
— An Historical Relation Of The Island Ceylon In The East Indies • Robert Knox
... "Brava!" and gave another clap. Then, becoming aware of Lord Grosville's open mouth and eye, he sat up, caught his wife's expression, and came back to prose and ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Sara, afraid to move, yet longing to clap her hand to her cheek; for she knew by a sudden terrible tickling there that something had happened to her southwest dimple—and she had meant to be so careful! And yet she had allowed herself to get so interested in the talk of the Plynck and her Echo that she had ...
— The Garden of the Plynck • Karle Wilson Baker
... should fully understand that the common method of supporting barefaced imposture at the present day, both in Europe and in this country, consists in trumping up "Dispensaries," "Colleges of Health," and other advertising charitable clap-traps, which use the poor as decoy-ducks for the rich, and the proprietors of which have a strong predilection for the title of "Professor." These names, therefore, have come to be of little or no value as evidence of the good character, still less of ...
— Medical Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... Lord Montjoie of my partner at the Hall," she said. "Ah, Milady, let him come and look! How he would clap his hands to see the lights and the flowers. But we could not have our gymnastique with ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... of water. It filled them with mitigated joy and excitement, on the simple principle that anything in the shape of variety was better than nothing. A clap of thunder would have raised in their depressed bosoms a gleam of hope. A flash of lightning would have been a positive blessing. Mr Sudberry at once suggested that it must be a stream, and that they could follow its course—wade down its bed, if necessary—till they should arrive at "something!" ...
— Freaks on the Fells - Three Months' Rustication • R.M. Ballantyne
... was first dramatised," he said, "the poem of the 'Walrus and the Carpenter' fell rather flat, for people did not know when it was finished, and did not clap in the right place; so I had to write a song for the ghosts of the oysters to sing, which made ...
— The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll • Stuart Dodgson Collingwood
... times before the court of session and won each time. I knew your father, who was a decent shoemaker in Cupar, and when he sent you to learn to be a lawyer he little thought he was making a tool for those he despised. Pick a man from the plow, clap on his back a black coat, send him to college, and in five years he is a Conservative, and puckers his mouth at anything so vulgar as a Reformer, booing and clawing to the gentry and nobility. Dod, set a beggar on horseback ...
— The Narrative of Gordon Sellar Who Emigrated to Canada in 1825 • Gordon Sellar
... the rustic, haggis-fed, The trembling earth resounds his tread, Clap in his walie nieve a blade, He'll mak it whissle; An' legs, an' arms, an' heads will sned, Like taps ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... poised on the wings of his imagination. His ideas, indeed, seem more distinct than his perceptions. He is the painter of abstractions, and describes them with dazzling minuteness. In the Mask of Cupid he makes the God of Love "clap on high his coloured winges twain;" and it is said of Gluttony in the ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... Swiveller; "they always clap their hands, instead of ringing the bell. Now for the two thousand black slaves with jars ...
— Ten Girls from Dickens • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... settlement. Cynicism is never more than a half-truth, and because man is imperfect it does not follow that he must be futile. Russia is a land of strange silences, but it is manifest that whatever the innermost quality of the Czar may be, he is no clap-trap vulgar conqueror of the Wilhelm-Napoleon pattern. He began his reign, and he may yet crown his reign, with an attempt to establish peace on a newer, broader foundation. His religion, it would seem, is his master and not ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... thought of at this date, it is certain that hearing your name awakened recollection amongst the old Vandemonians in the police here, and they have probably run the rule over you more than once. If I were to join with you, they'd clap the darbies ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson
... down each 'course' in the yard too, to be sure that it all fits, for we'll have no time out at the Rock to correct mistakes or make alterations. It'll be 'sharp's the word, boys, and look alive O!' all through; ship the stones; off to the Rock; land 'em in hot haste; clap on the cement; down wi' the blocks; work like blazes—or Irishmen, which is much the same thing; make all fast into the boats again; sailors shoutin' 'Look alive, me hearties! squall bearin' down right abaft of the lee stuns'l gangway!'—or somethin' like that; up sail, an' hooroo! ...
— The Story of the Rock • R.M. Ballantyne
... the saddle-bag, fell out upon the ground, and the horse picked it up. I did not know the hard-tack was in the saddle, and when it fell upon the ground I was as astonished as I would have been had a clap of thunder come from the clear sky, and when the horse went for it, my stomach rebelled and I grabbed one side of the hard-tack while the horse held the other side in his teeth. Something had to give, and as the horse's ...
— How Private George W. Peck Put Down The Rebellion - or, The Funny Experiences of a Raw Recruit - 1887 • George W. Peck
... in her eyes. Nothing of course could wholly take away the splendour of that glorious composition, and she was pleased that there was no applause between the movements, for she had rather expected that Olga would clap, and interrupt the unity of it all. Occasionally, too, she was agreeably surprised by the Brinton string-quartet: they seemed to have some inklings, though not many. Once she winced very much ...
— Queen Lucia • E. F. Benson
... made Dan clap his hands over his ears; and before Mrs Bhaer could answer her impetuous niece the Laurences, with Meg and her family, arrived, soon followed by Tom and Nan, and all sat down to listen to Dan's adventures—told in brief yet effective manner, as the varying expressions of interest, wonder, merriment, ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... happen to clap eyes on us and decided to search us, it would be all up with two Brighton boys," said Bob. "So it's my think that we'd better hide the certain evidences as ...
— The Brighton Boys with the Flying Corps • James R. Driscoll
... they went to look they found, like the clap of a hare, the mark of where a man had lain hidden, and close beside the javelin that was driven in the ground there lay a ...
— A Book of Myths • Jean Lang
... soon over. The whole nation was, at that time, on fire with faction. The whigs applauded every line in which liberty was mentioned, as a satire on the tories; and the tories echoed every clap, to show that the satire was unfelt. The story of Bolingbroke is well known. He called Booth to his box, and gave him fifty guineas for defending the cause of liberty so well against a perpetual dictator[178]. The whigs, says Pope, design ...
— Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1 • Samuel Johnson
... twice before you encourage him in his dreadful ways. We have studied him very carefully, and we know that the only way to live with him is to keep him in a sort of "pint pot" where we can hold the lid open just a little, and clap it down suddenly whenever he ...
— A Summer in a Canyon: A California Story • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... shuttered windows, lights burned in upper rooms. There were a thousand pretty secrets in the ways of people to each other. Then, too, there were ideas, as thick as sparrows in an ivied wall. One had but to clap one's hands and cry out, and there was a fluttering {195} of innumerable wings; life was as full of bubbles, forming, rising into amber foam, as a glass ...
— The Moral Economy • Ralph Barton Perry
... in consequence of Joey being missing, he was going to assist his father to look after him: and therefore they would have a holiday for that day. He then ranged them all in a row, made them turn to the right face, clap their hands ...
— The Poacher - Joseph Rushbrook • Frederick Marryat
... Pythia's ravings oracles not without elevation of tone and with an obvious political tendency. Occasions for superstition which baser minds would have turned to sheer lunacy or silly fears or necromantic clap-trap were seized by these nobler natures for a good purpose. A benevolent man, not inclined to scepticism, can always argue that the gods must have commanded what he himself knows to be right; and he thinks it religion on his ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... his wife to him and held her close. As far as he could estimate by the interval between lightning and thunder-clap, the heart of the storm was still some distance off, so he felt no present concern for their safety. Still, it was apparent that the course of the storm was moving swiftly in their direction. The lightning flashes came faster and faster and closer together; the thunder-roll was almost continuous, ...
— The Lair of the White Worm • Bram Stoker
... fell like a thunder-clap among us. The Brotherhood men took it up right away, and I went to see Joe, that very night. It was said that Joe had visited the Black Prince, the day before, and had been seen carrying away a large package, the night before ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... the Baronet stood up looking at the door, on which presently came a hurried rapping; and before he had answered, in the midst of a long thunder-clap that suddenly broke, rattling over the house, the good woman opened the door in great agitation, and cried with a tremulous uplifting ...
— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 3 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... that though his good fortune and prosperity was nothing to her, yet she could praise him for it. So, little by little, he gave her a peep into his affairs and found she was one of them rare people who can feel quite a bit of honest interest in their neighbour's good luck, with no after-clap of sourness, because their ...
— The Torch and Other Tales • Eden Phillpotts
... a place I have desired long to see: have you not good tippling houses there? May not a man have a lusty fire there, a good pot of ale, a pair of cards, a swinging piece of chalk, and a brown toast that will clap a white waistcoat on ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... pretty and feeble of the bronze-throated Eagle- barker to make it so. What! clap on an exit to these piled-up miseries?—he should have plunged us deeper in woe, and left us to stew in our juices; he Should have shunned this detestable effeminacy, worthy only of the Dantes and Shakespeares. But unfortunately he was an Esotericist, with the ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... Mr. Warren. "What would our property be worth if it wasn't for the British frigate lying in the harbour? Tell me that, Maxwell; tell me that, sir! They'd confiscate the whole lot, and clap us into prison for being paupers," and the thumbs revolved like the ...
— At the Point of the Sword • Herbert Hayens
... at heart, despite his forty odd years, and the quaint obstinacies of his gardener amused him too much to call for any serious remonstrance. Turning back to his study he took his hat and cane from their own particular corner of the room and started for the little clap gate which Bainton had been, as he said, 'keeping ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... obscure passages, slipshod verses, and much that worse is,—yet on the whole I am not much afraid of the issue, and I would give something to be allowed to read it some morning to you—for every rap o' the knuckles I should get a clap o' the ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... that are to be played upon the Theatre of Life are filled by gratuitous performers, and pass, among the world at large, as phases of idleness. For in that Theatre not only the walking gentlemen, singing chambermaids, and diligent fiddlers in the orchestra, but those who look on and clap their hands from the benches, do really play a part and fulfil important offices towards the general result. You are no doubt very dependent on the care of your lawyer and stockbroker, of the guards and signalmen who convey ...
— Essays of Robert Louis Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson
... into the new dining-room, and there you'd be. They've got so in the way of slidin' buildings along on timbers now that they can travel about almost like the old stage coaches, and you needn't have your cellar dug until you're ready to clap your new ...
— Mrs. Cliff's Yacht • Frank R. Stockton
... the iron spear upright in his hand, he brought it down with all his might right through the monster's lower jaw. Then quick as lightning he sprang from his horse before the Dragon had time to shut his mouth. A fearful clap like thunder, which could be heard for miles around, now warned him that the Dragon's jaws had closed upon the spear. When the youth turned round he saw the point of the spear sticking up high above the Dragon's upper jaw, and knew ...
— The Yellow Fairy Book • Various
... of rolling on the grass, as young animals do, and of running about madly, and she would clap her hands every morning, when the sun shone into her room, and would insist, by signs, on being dressed as quickly as possible, so that she ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... rock and care for, until it grew into a second Sun. So the Fire-child was cared for tenderly, and he grew fast; but one day the maidens were not watching him closely, and he escaped from them, and bursting through the clouds with a noise like a thunder-clap, he shot across the heavens ...
— Finnish Legends for English Children • R. Eivind
... "Clap your hand over his mouth, Barberry!" cried the burly man, as he struggled to regain his feet. "Confound you, boy, I'll teach you to ...
— Young Auctioneers - The Polishing of a Rolling Stone • Edward Stratemeyer
... all manly honour, of all sound honesty, all true self-respect? How shall a thief be other than a lurking cur, whose whole soul, such as it is, is bent to a mean suspicion that he is suspected, a continuous terror-stricken watchfulness, a sleeping and waking dread of an awful hand-clap on the shoulder? There are constitutional differences in thieves, no doubt, as there are in other people, but the key-note of the dishonest man's whole thought is fear. When, after a day or two, young ...
— Young Mr. Barter's Repentance - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... may thus be rendered: "In the year of the Lord 1492, on Wednesday, which was Martinmas eve, the 7th of November, a singular miracle occurred; for, between eleven o'clock and noon, there was a loud clap of thunder, and a prolonged confused noise, which was heard at a great distance; and a stone fell from the air, in the jurisdiction of Ensisheim, which weighed two hundred and sixty pounds, and the confused noise was, besides, much louder than here. Then a child saw it strike on ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... clap this in somewhere. I think there is a spirit through the lines; perhaps the 7th, 8th, and 9th owe their origin to Shakspeare, though no image ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas
... heard much said in denunciation of us, and have thought it political clap-trap and gasconade. But if we are made to believe in your hostility to us and the Government, we may conclude it is best to let you leave us. We have no fears in trusting ourselves, if necessary, to our industry, our habits, and enterprise, separate from ...
— A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention • Lucius Eugene Chittenden
... at the rate of one thousand one hundred and forty-two feet per second-about thirteen miles in a minute. So that if we hear a clap of thunder half a minute after the flash, we may calculate that the discharge of electricity is six and ...
— The Handy Cyclopedia of Things Worth Knowing - A Manual of Ready Reference • Joseph Triemens
... A three-er for Eric," cried Wildney to the scorer; and he began to clap his hands and dance about with excitement ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar
... had been right and that it was none of the Almighty's giving. Now in the sharp autumn morning he felt its justice. A cloud had come over his cheerful soul. "If only I knowed about Jim," he muttered "I wonder if I'll ever clap eyes or his old face again." Never before had he known such acute anxiety. Pioneers are wont to trust each other and in their wild risks assume that the odd chance is on their side. But now black ...
— The Path of the King • John Buchan
... a thunder-clap to me," said Mr. Balch: "the idea of there being another heir never entered my brain—I didn't even know ...
— The Garies and Their Friends • Frank J. Webb
... that I could simply give up or defend with a clear conscience. "You say you didn't," he said, very sombre. "But I heard." "Some mistake," I protested, utterly at a loss, and never taking my eyes off him. To watch his face was like watching a darkening sky before a clap of thunder, shade upon shade imperceptibly coming on, the doom growing mysteriously intense in ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... to be held very firmly together, were thus placed one above the other to the height of about ten feet. The interstices were filled with clay, which soon hardened, rendering the walls comparatively smooth, and alike impervious to wind or rain. Other logs of straight fiber were split into clap-boards, one or two inches in thickness, with which they covered the roof. If suitable wood for this purpose could not be found, the bark of trees was used, with an occasional thatching of the long grass of the prairies. Logs about ...
— Daniel Boone - The Pioneer of Kentucky • John S. C. Abbott
... the spot with his eyes fixed on the mysterious corner. Rustle, rustle, flap, flap, went the dreadful something, and presently there followed a sort of low hiss. At the same moment a sudden gust of wind burst through the window and banged the door behind him with a resounding clap. Panic-stricken he turned and tried to open it, but his cold trembling fingers could not move the rusty fastening. He looked wildly round for a means of escape, and his eye fell on a bright ray of moonlight resting on the lattice ...
— The Hawthorns - A Story about Children • Amy Walton
... of the towne, and so without breach of vowe did stay to endeavour to meet with her and carry her home; but she did not come, so I lost my whole afternoon. But pretty! how I took another pretty woman for her, taking her a clap on the breech, thinking verily it had been her. Staid till [Sir] W. Batten and [Sir] W. Pen come out, and so away home by water with them, and to the office to do some business, and then home, and my wife do tell me that W. Hewer tells her that Mercer hath no mind to come. So I ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... must make our escape—that same night, although the hatches were off, and all the boats were ashore. Of course the fact that the hatches were off was the merest trifle, for Gurney and I could soon clap them on and batten them down; but I did not at all like the idea of going to sea without even so much as a single boat on board; while, of all the boats belonging to the ship, I should most have preferred the longboat, because she was a fine, wholesome boat, and in the event of anything ...
— Overdue - The Story of a Missing Ship • Harry Collingwood
... helot was roughly put down and told to mind her own business. But this attempt at a will of her own in her sister-in-law had already put the old maid in a vile humor, and Phellion, coming to reopen the subject, exasperated her. Josephine, the cook, and the "male domestic," received the after-clap of the scene which had just taken place. Brigitte found that in her absence everything had been done wrong, and putting her own hand to the work, she hoisted herself on a chair, at the risk of her neck, to reach the upper shelves ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac
... they hide their calves for a week or ten days in some retired situation, and go and suckle them two or three times a day. If any persons come near the calves they clap their heads close to the ground to hide themselves—a proof of their native wildness. The dams allow no one to touch their young without attacking with impetuous ferocity. When one of the herd happens to be wounded, or has grown weak and feeble through age or ...
— Cattle and Their Diseases • Robert Jennings
... things were worked up to this end; she would have liked to clap her applause, it was so well done. Mrs. Polkington and Violet were so admirable, they were already almost convinced of all they said; in two days they would believe it quite as much as Mr. Ponsonby did now. She did not in the least mind having to appear as the ungrateful daughter; it fitted ...
— The Good Comrade • Una L. Silberrad
... old chap." Jasper gave him a clap on the back. "Father is going to tell her himself. Come on, Polly and ...
— Five Little Peppers at School • Margaret Sidney
... scared, if I'm not," he said reproachfully. "The house is worth two hundred and fifty thousand, and there's only fifty on it now. If that fat, Dutch skinflint, Plank, shows his tusks, we can clap on another fifty." And as she made no sound or movement in reply: "As far as Plank goes, haven't I done enough for him to square it? What have we ever got out of him, except a thousand or two now and then ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... with our praise, Our shame to feel, our pride to show, Glad, angry—but indifferent, no! Whether it be thy lot to go, {660} For the good of us all, where the haters meet In the crowded city's horrible street; Or thou step alone through the morass Where never sound yet was Save the dry quick clap of the stork's bill, For the air is still, and the water still, When the blue breast of the dipping coot Dives under, and all is mute. So at the last shall come old age, Decrepit as befits that stage; {670} How else wouldst thou retire apart With the hoarded memories of ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson
... wan ray of the December sun penetrated the window of the attic and lay upon the ceiling in long threads of light and shade. All at once a heavily laden carrier's cart, which was passing along the boulevard, shook the frail bed, like a clap of thunder, and made it quiver from top ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... my hands with Messrs de Neufville and others, owners of two vessels hired by Gillon to carry the goods he had contracted to carry in his own ship. I had worried this friendly and generous Court with often repeated after-clap demands, occasioned by these unadvised, (as well as ill advised) and, therefore, unexpected drafts, and was ashamed to show my face to the Minister. In these circumstances, I knew not what answer to make you. I could not encourage you ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. VIII • Various
... we hear, Waking the world like trumpet shrill and clear. The hens all hang their heads, the chickens sadly peep; The boys look sober, and the girls all weep. Good-by, dear Cocky: sleep and rest, With grass and daisies on your faithful breast; And when you wake, brave bird, so good and true, Clap your white wings and ...
— The Louisa Alcott Reader - A Supplementary Reader for the Fourth Year of School • Louisa M. Alcott
... that some of the workmen at Tour-la-ville had been seduced from their duty by a glassmaker at La Fere-en-Tardenois, M. Deslandes called upon the Intendant at Soissons to clap them into prison. Turgot, the friend of Franklin, objected to this, but M. Deslandes gave him plainly to understand that 'a government which should tolerate such misconduct would ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert
... handing him back the conveyance, 'just clap in the words, "and Thimble," will you be so good; and I'll have the two mottoes painted up in the parlour instead ...
— The Battle of Life • Charles Dickens
... might have worn, crimson and tawny, and around his throat a golden chain. Far and near rushed into light, for in these lands and seas the dawn makes no tarrying. It is almost night, then with a great clap of light it ...
— 1492 • Mary Johnston
... lamb! and ketehin' her death a cold this blessed minnit. Set right down, my dear, and tuck your wet feet into the oven. I'll have a dish o' tea for you in less 'n no time; and while it's drawin' I'll clap Victory Adelaide ...
— Work: A Story of Experience • Louisa May Alcott
... his head in my lap, at the end of half-an-hour. But when there was a sound at last he almost screamed. I had to clap my hand over his mouth; whereat he promptly bit my finger, resentful because he knew then that I ...
— Jimgrim and Allah's Peace • Talbot Mundy
... of the failure of the Panorama-Dramatique had come like a thunder-clap. Coralie, taking alarm, made haste to sell her furniture (with the consent of her creditors) to little old Cardot, who installed Florentine in the rooms at once. The tradition of the house remained unbroken. Coralie paid her creditors and satisfied the landlord, proceeding with her "washing-day," ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... intention. It looked at you with a vengeful aspect. I got used to it afterwards; I did not see it any more; I had no time. I had to keep guessing at the channel; I had to discern, mostly by inspiration, the signs of hidden banks; I watched for sunken stones; I was learning to clap my teeth smartly before my heart flew out, when I shaved by a fluke some infernal sly old snag that would have ripped the life out of the tin-pot steamboat and drowned all the pilgrims; I had to keep a look-out for the signs of dead wood we could cut up in the night for next day's steaming. ...
— Heart of Darkness • Joseph Conrad
... enough," De Burg said with a smile, "and the moment you give me notice I will clap you into so firm a cage that I warrant you will not escape from it; but I trust the necessity will not arise. Now, Guy, take your friends to their chambers and see to their comfort. I will not tell the story of the battle until you ...
— Wulf the Saxon - A Story of the Norman Conquest • G. A. Henty
... could feel him watching her and she tried not to notice it. So absorbed was she in trying to appear unconcerned that she did not see the approach of the storm; in fact, there was a supercharge of restraint on all three of them, and it startlingly broke upon them in a clap of thunder that sounded as if it had smashed a ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... who were already unconscious on their luxurious couches. The cars drew up in a street—if street that could be called which was only a wide, cleared space, intersected by rails, with here and there a stump, and great piles of sawn logs bulking big in the moonlight, and a number of irregular clap-board, steep-roofed houses, many of them with open fronts, glaring with light and crowded with men. We had pulled up at the door of a rough Western hotel, with a partially open front, being a bar-room crowded with men drinking and ...
— A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains • Isabella L. Bird
... flash by in sudden white patches of phosphorescent foam, while all over head was black with the flying scud. The English second mate was stamping with vexation, and, with all his h's misplaced, storming at the men: ''An'somely the weather mainbrace—'an'somely, I tell you!—'Alf a dozen of you clap on to the main sheet here—down with 'im!—D'y'see 'ere's hall like a midshipman's bag—heverythink huppermost and nothing 'andy. 'Aul 'im in, Hi say!' But the sail wouldn't come, though. All the most forcible expressions of the Commination Service were liberally bestowed on ...
— The Continental Monthly, Volume V. Issue I • Various
... covered with skin. Uncivilized peoples crack their fingers, snap their thighs, or strike the ground with their feet to furnish music for impromptu dancing. In Tonga they crack their fingers; in Tahiti they pound the earth with the soles of their feet; here in Atuona they clap hands. The Marquesans have, too, bamboo drums, long sections of the hollow reed, slit, and beaten with sticks. For calling boats and for signaling they use the conch-shell, the same that sounded when "the Tritons blew their wreathed horn." They also have the jew's-harp, an instrument ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... miry rocks and stumps, squirming at all angles as if they had been tossed and twisted by earthquake shocks, and showing but little more relation to one another than may be observed among moraine boulders, Wrangell was a tranquil place. I never heard a noisy brawl in the streets, or a clap of thunder, and the waves seldom spoke much above a whisper along the beach. In summer the rain comes straight down, steamy and tepid. The clouds are usually united, filling the sky, not racing along in threatening ranks suggesting energy of an overbearing destructive kind, but forming ...
— Travels in Alaska • John Muir
... pleasure in life!" he exclaimed, springing up, "but you must all come and support me, and sing and clap your hands, and toe and heel it, too, every now and then. It will make my dancing go off better, and show the old boy that we wish to do our ...
— Ben Burton - Born and Bred at Sea • W. H. G. Kingston
... a barley-strae.' And, to do him justice, sir, he didna attempt to deny it, but said that ye wud do the same by me, if I would try ye, and offered to back ye against ony man in the twa kingdoms. Now, sir, I looked about all the day in the crowd, just to see if I could clap my een on ye, and to ask ye, in a friendly way, if ye would let me try what sort o' stuff ye are made o', but I couldna fall in wi' ye; and now I'm really glad that I hae met wi' ye—and as this is a gay level place here, and the ground is not very hard, ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume III • Various
... the heritage of which Spain would have deprived this people of this gathering of Americans to mark the epoch when the last Spanish soldier has been driven from the last foot of soil of that hemisphere discovered by Columbus. May we not justly exclaim with the psalmist of old: 'Oh, clap your hands, all ye people; shout unto God with the ...
— The Story of the Philippines and Our New Possessions, • Murat Halstead
... that he proposed to dispense with politicians, or that, when "the boys" presently counted him into their party team for campaign haranguing, he let them clap the harness upon him and splashed along in the mud with an intention ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... clapped his hands (suiting his actions to the words) he would have a pair of hands as well at the resurrection; and if he danced with his feet, he would rise complete. He hoped to rise like that, to sing, to clap his hands, dance, and jump too. The worst of jumping in this world, he said, was that he had to come down again, but even in heaven he supposed the higher he danced and jumped, the higher he would be; walking in heaven, to his mind, ...
— From Death into Life - or, twenty years of my ministry • William Haslam
... The bourgeois clap-trap about the family and education, about the hallowed co-relation of parent and child, becomes all the more disgusting, the more, by the action of Modern Industry, all family ties among the proletarians are torn asunder, and their ...
— The Communist Manifesto • Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels
... and set about the puddin'-thieves like a pair of windmills, giving them such a clip-clap clouting and a flip-flap flouting, that what with being punched and pounded, and clipped and clapped, they had only enough breath left to give two shrieks of despair while scrambling back into Watkin Wombat's Summer Residence, and banging the door behind them. The three friends had Puddin' ...
— The Magic Pudding • Norman Lindsay
... said it was all logs once, and that the roof was loose clap-boards, held down by logs that ran across them, like the roofs in the early times, before there were shingles or nails, or anything, in the country. But none of the oldest boys had ever seen it like that, and you had to take Jim Leonard's word for it if you ...
— The Flight of Pony Baker - A Boy's Town Story • W. D. Howells
... could come to look differently at things! Inger found no pleasure now in admiring a new calf; she did not clap her hands in surprise when Isak came down from the hills with a big basket of fish; no, she had lived for six years among greater things. And of late she had even ceased to be heavenly and sweet when ...
— Growth of the Soil • Knut Hamsun
... to call in the magic-lantern man, and to look out a big sheet and a candle end for him, as my poor mother used to do? I can still see her as she used to entrust her white sheet to him. 'Don't make a hole in it, at least,' she would say. How we used to clap our hands in the mysterious darkness! I can recall all those joys, my dear, but you know so many other things have happened since then. Other pleasures have ...
— Monsieur, Madame and Bebe, Complete • Gustave Droz
... close in with the land, he found it convenient to have this sail haul out and brail like a ship's spanker. As the gaff was now aloft, it was only necessary to let go the brails to loosen this broad sheet of canvas, and to clap on the out-hauler, to set it. This was probably the reason why the brig was so unceremoniously cast into the stream, without showing more of her cloth. The jib and flying-jibs, however, did at that moment drop beneath their booms, ...
— Jack Tier or The Florida Reef • James Fenimore Cooper
... rock or instrument of defence. It was, I think, the most imminent danger to which I have ever been exposed. I was calculating my capacity for dodging the creature when suddenly a sound like a small clap of thunder was heard. The rest of the herd, which seemed quite wild, seeing the approach of a stranger, had taken alarm and started off down the hillside on a full run, their rushing and trampling causing the earth to reverberate beneath their tread and produce the sound of which I have just ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar
... long in revealing to his grandmother and the devoted Agathe that Philippe, the cashier, the hero of heroes, was in love with Mariette, the celebrated ballet-dancer at the Porte-Saint-Martin. The news was a thunder-clap to the two widows; Agathe's religious principles taught her to think that all women on the stage were brands in the burning; moreover, she thought, and so did Madame Descoings, that women of that kind dined off gold, drank ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... rosy-cheeked, greener-than-grass probationary cop when fame came to him all in one clap and awoke a thunderous roll of laughter throughout ...
— Officer 666 • Barton W. Currie
... used principally in America, in lieu of slate or tiles in roofing. In very old times a planked vessel was termed a "shyngled or clap-boarded ship." ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... davit-ropes, And from a port a-square with lantern light, The little, leather trunks were passed, Ironbound and quaint; while down the vessel's side With voluble advice, bon voyage and au revoir, The chatting Frenchmen came— Click-clap of rapiers clipping on hard boots, Cocked ...
— Carolina Chansons - Legends of the Low Country • DuBose Heyward and Hervey Allen
... clap my hands upon it; but I could feel no substance; and it jumped out of the window again; but it immediately came in by the porch, though the ...
— The Witch of Salem - or Credulity Run Mad • John R. Musick
... the horse-whipping affair and the Westminster election, with the exception of a trifling after-clap or two, such as the High Bailiff sending me in a bill for my third share of the hustings, amounting to upwards of two hundred and fifty pounds (I think that was the sum). I refused the payment of it, and he commenced an action for the amount, and obtained a ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 3 • Henry Hunt |
