"Mess" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... me, viewing it all round, a wonderful good chance. An opening that isn't likely to come in one's way twice. Mr. Bates' son has bin and got himself into such a mess over a horse-racing transaction that he's had to make a bolt of it. I can't tell you the facts, because I don't rightly know them; but it's bad—something to do with checks that'll put him to hidin' for a long day, if he doesn't want to answer for ...
— The Devil's Garden • W. B. Maxwell
... thus supplying them so abundantly with wholesome food. The service being over, all the cooks, with many assistants, making up the greater part of the inhabitants, were busy in dressing the turtle, some making soup, others stews—indeed, of every mess there was far more than the men, albeit large eaters ...
— The Settlers - A Tale of Virginia • William H. G. Kingston
... provisions Lycurgus added another of remarkable character. No one was allowed to take his meals at home. Public tables were provided, at which all must eat, every citizen being forced to belong to some special public mess. Each had to supply his quota of food, such as barley, wine, cheese, and figs from his land, game obtained by hunting, or the meat of the animals killed for sacrifices. At these tables all shared alike. The kings and the humblest citizens were on an equality. No distinction ...
— Historic Tales, vol 10 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... "Jimmie," whose insides had been shot away in Gallipoli. He was the envy of the officers' mess, because his newly acquired digestive apparatus, composed principally of silver tubes, could assimilate more wine without producing ill results than any other five members of the mess. Jimmie was not a flying officer; by all the laws of nature ...
— Night Bombing with the Bedouins • Robert Henry Reece
... doctor from Hospital Earth as we are, and the sooner we get your position here straight, the better. We aren't going to have any ugly ducklings on this ship, and we aren't going to hide you in the hold every time we land on a planet. If we want to make anything but a mess of this cruise, we've got to work as a team, and that means everybody ...
— Star Surgeon • Alan Nourse
... from my Lord's lodgings, and giving Sarah some good advice, by my Lord's order, to be sober and look after the house, I walked home again with great pleasure, and there dined by my wife's bed-side with great content, having a mess ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... hard, I'm afraid I'm making a mess of it," she whispered to herself anxiously, as she hurried down-stairs to ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter
... ways of good Queen Bess, Who ruled as well as ever mortal can, sir, When she was stogg'd, and the country in a mess, She was wont to send for a Devon ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... saw th' state o' things, An' pitied ther distress, An' begg'd em not to be soa sour Abaat soa sweet a mess; ...
— Yorkshire Ditties, Second Series - To which is added The Cream of Wit and Humour - from his Popular Writings • John Hartley
... in the grilling heat of mid-July. The beautiful road stretching through the Post looked smooth as a white silk ribbon in the blazing sun. The row of tall hangars glistened with fresh white paint. On the screened porches of the officers' quarters, at the mess, and at the huts men in uniform talked and laughed as though their profession was the simplest and ...
— Battling the Clouds - or, For a Comrade's Honor • Captain Frank Cobb
... of the wet mess of hair and red and flesh was old Shep, stone-dead. And as Saunderson pulled the body out, his face was working; for no man can lose in a crack the friend of a dozen years, ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant
... was the galley, which was also the mess-room of the crew when she had any. Forward of this, and under the forward deck, was the forecastle, to which the inquirer descended. It was fitted up with bunks, and there was only one entrance to it, by a ladder from a ...
— Taken by the Enemy • Oliver Optic
... it must be so, Terence," O'Grady said resignedly, as he emptied his tumbler; "and besides, there is a sort of superstition in the service that an adjutant should be always able to walk straight to his tent, even after a warm night at mess. Now, although it seems to me that I have every other qualification, in that respect I should be a failure; and I imagine that, in a Portuguese regiment, the thing would be looked at more seriously than it is in an Irish one; where such a matter occurs, occasionally, among men ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty
... seem brave, but it is evident they are about despairing; I have heard it rumoured that the Arabs of Kwihara, if Tabora is taken, will start en masse for the coast, and give the country up to Mirambo. If such are their intentions, and they are really carried into effect, I shall be in a pretty mess. However, if they do leave me, Mirambo will not reap any benefit from my stores, nor from Livingstone's either, for I shall burn the whole ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... without a coach-and-six, To patch his broken fortunes, found A mistress worth five thousand pound; Swears he could get her in an hour, If gaffer Harry would endow her; And sell, to pacify his wrath, A birth-right for a mess of broth. Young Harry, as all Europe knows, Was long the quintessence of beaux; But, when espoused, he ran the fate That must attend the married state; From gold brocade and shining armour, Was metamorphosed ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... water. The kitchen is kept hot all the time, and the gusts of steam, laden with all sorts of good smells, seem like sighs issuing from its mouth-like doors. The smell of the preparation of all kinds of foods and sauces makes me smack my lips. And here, again, is a butcher's boy washing a mess of chitterlings as if it were an old loin-cloth. The cook is preparing every kind of food. Sweetmeats are being constructed, cakes are being baked. [To himself.] I wonder if I am to get a chance to wash my feet and an invitation to eat what I can hold. [He looks in another ...
— The Little Clay Cart - Mrcchakatika • (Attributed To) King Shudraka
... Walter's running away and the mess your father made of his business. It would help to show 'em you're holding up ...
— Alice Adams • Booth Tarkington
... He introduced his companions to Thompson, who told them Will Corwin was fit and well, and had become quite famous as a flyer. Thompson promised to dine at their mess that evening. He did so, and after dinner sat and chatted about flying in general, telling the Brighton boys many things strange to them about the development of the flying service since ...
— The Brighton Boys with the Flying Corps • James R. Driscoll
... looking death in the eye and refusing him any concession one naturally has a good opinion of one's self. I don't know if it was this feeling that in Thurston found expression in a stiffish attitude and folded arms; at the mess table one day, in his absence, another explanation was suggested by our quartermaster, an irreclaimable stammerer when the wine was in: "It's h—is w—ay of m-m-mastering a c-c-consti-t-tu-tional t-tendency to ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce
... have got life and some haven't got anything I can see, except paint. There was one I saw in New York, now. I thought at first it was a mess of spinach. I stood off and looked, and I walked up close and looked, and still I couldn't see anything but the same green mess. But—will you believe it, Nephew?—that thing was The Woods in Spring! Thinks I, They evidently ...
— The Purple Heights • Marie Conway Oemler
... foot o' his, I reckon. Pains him prob'ly. The mess he's left things.... He'd ought to have a fulldressuit of his own, 'stead o' ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... supposed until now; yet 'tis evident you would have us continue toiling for weeks against this foul current rather than strike one quick blow, and be free from the mess." ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... that you have no ill-feelings against the enemy, and may not even fear him, you destroy him as best you can. On the evening before our first battle we were sitting about the mess table—most of us officers of the line. None of us had ever killed a man. I said: 'Friends, when I meet the first Russian officer tomorrow my impulse will be to shake his hand.' My comrades agreed ...
— The New York Times Current History: the European War, February, 1915 • Various
... immediately granted, without any farther questions being put relative to his profession, or the manner in which he had been captured. The captain very civilly gave him to understand, that he might mess with the gun-room officers, if he could arrange with them, and that he expected to sail on the evening of the ensuing day. Newton immediately repaired on board of the frigate, to ascertain if the officers would receive him as ...
— Newton Forster - The Merchant Service • Captain Frederick Marryat
... know. But what is the use? You are a priest, I am a soldier. Yours is penance, mine is fighting; yours is praying, mine is singing,—every man to his own. And when you priests have got your pagans converted, we soldiers will clean up the mess with our muskets. And now, Father, good day, and may ...
— The Road to Frontenac • Samuel Merwin
... blackness, the startling brilliancy, and then—the monotonous grey. They seem too hard for me, at times. The clash between ideas and interests makes our inheritance a grim battlefield, and there are moments of mortification when one may feel tempted to sell it—not for a mess of pottage, but for the promise of a mess of pottage. Tempted, I said. There is always a course left, if you have the courage to face it. It may avail you; I cannot insure you even that. But if I were in ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... was her regular practice to spend the voyage in her cabin, which smelt good (such was the refinement of her art), and she had a secret peculiar to herself for keeping her port open without shipping seas. She hated what she called the mess of the ship and the idea, if she should go above, of meeting stewards with plates of supererogatory food. She professed to be content with her situation (we promised to lend each other books and I assured her familiarly that ...
— A London Life; The Patagonia; The Liar; Mrs. Temperly • Henry James
... less I stand in the position of a skilled and rich player who has tempted a less wealthy partner into a doubtful game. If my plans fail, I can look after myself; but I shouldn't like to get you in a mess. If I give you a hint, will ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie
... thy head for liking his father to a singing-man of Windsor, thou didst swear to me then, as I was washing thy wound, to marry me and make me my lady thy wife. Canst thou deny it? Did not goodwife Keech, the butcher's wife, come in then and call me gossip Quickly? coming in to borrow a mess of vinegar; telling us she had a good dish of prawns; whereby thou didst desire to eat some, whereby I told thee they were ill for a green wound? And didst thou not, when she was gone down stairs, desire me to be no more so familiarity with such poor ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... solar might itself! He was a wretched failure, the boy! And because he was her failure, she was annoyed with him, began to dislike him, grew to hate him. She looked on him as a painter might upon a picture, or a poet upon a poem, which he had only succeeded in getting into an irrecoverable mess. In the hearts of witches love and hate lie close together, and often tumble over each other. And whether it was that her failure with Photogen foiled also her plans in regard to Nycteris, or that her illness made her yet more of a devil's wife, certainly ...
— Harper's Young People, December 30, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... the bar, Senator. May I summon a Montana cocktail? You taught me the ingredients once—three dashes orange bitters; two dashes acid phosphate; half a jigger of whisky; half a jigger of Italian vermuth. You undermined the constitutions of half Montana with that mess." ...
— The Port of Missing Men • Meredith Nicholson
... replied Ted. "Show us how to do it successfully, and we'll go down and tackle the whole mess." ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor
... O cull, a section of my Pipkin's purple tress; Thou shalt find me drinking deeply with the Lords that rule the Mess; ...
— The Battle of the Bays • Owen Seaman
... are working in too near, Their carbines crackle louder every shot. I say! our chaps a-plodding in the rear Are getting it—and most uncommon hot! It's not much fun retreating in the night, Through all this mess of rain and reeking slime— It seems to me this boot's infernal tight! I must have hurt me when I slipped that time. Whew! that was close and there's a fellow gone! I know too well that heavy, sickening thud; It's bitter hard that we ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... banquets. People used to come to them, a few hundred years ago, for the sake of being jolly; they come now with an odd notion of pouring sober wisdom into their wine by way of wormwood-bitters, and thus make such a mess of it that the wine and wisdom reciprocally ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... on the money we common folk have, and she'll see!" exclaimed Mrs. Stixon. "Our kind don't want to learn fussin' and fixin' of puddens and pies and such like! Good for us if we can get a mess of biled potatoes and bacon. My gals'll get along athout ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas
... mess Eames will make of it if he marries that girl!" Such was Cradell's reflection as he betook himself to his own room. But of his own part in the night's transactions he was rather proud than otherwise, feeling that the married lady's regard for him had been ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... her so, when she must be very anxious to hear from home?' Now, you know, when mother says, 'Sadie, my dear child,' and looks at me from out those reproachful eyes of hers, there is nothing short of mixing a mess of bread that I would not do for her. So here I am—place, third story front; time, 11:30 P.M.; position, foot of the bed (Julia being soundly sleeping at the head), one gaiter off and one gaiter ...
— Ester Ried • Pansy (aka. Isabella M. Alden)
... he said, ruefully, 'what a mess I'm in? If they find out that I was in the Pav. at the time when the cups were bagged, how on earth am I to prove ...
— The Pothunters • P. G. Wodehouse
... themselves upon it, flat on the ground. Their faces were soaked in the fat, and the noise of their deglutition was mingled with the sobs of joy which they uttered. Through astonishment, doubtless, rather than pity, they were allowed to finish the mess. Then when they had risen Hamilcar with a sign commanded the man who bore the sword-belt to speak. Spendius ...
— Salammbo • Gustave Flaubert
... Admiral sent us up the coast to give help where we could. A coaster found us off Lagos with word that Lisbon had suffered worst of all. So we hammered at it, wind almost dead foul all the way . . . and here we are. Captain Hanmer brought me ashore in his gig. My word, but the place is in a mess!" ...
— Lady Good-for-Nothing • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... hole to which the general took me was the officers' mess— about as large as a suburban bathroom. At the end of the dining-table the captain was shaving himself, and laughed with embarrassment at our entry. But he gave me two fingers of a soapy hand and said "Enchante" with ...
— The Soul of the War • Philip Gibbs
... was obliged to get food at the public expense, there being none to be had in the market. You will imagine, that there must have been a service of plate, and great attendance, to wait on the illustrious stranger; but my fare was a mess of sorry pottage, brought me by a naked slave, who left me to deal with it as I thought proper: and even this I was in continual danger of having stolen from me by the children; who are as vigilant to seize opportunities, and as dexterous in snatching their food, as any starved ...
— An Essay on the History of Civil Society, Eighth Edition • Adam Ferguson, L.L.D.
... that wouldest have God take care of thy soul, as thou believest, so thou must do well; that is, do good to the poor, to thy neighbour, to all men, especially to the household of faith. Benjamin must have a Benjamin's mess; and all others, as thou art capable, must feel and find the fruit of thy godliness. Thou must thus serve the Lord with much humility of mind, though through many ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... colonel to pass the claret. Travers laughed for the first time. "That's a good idea," he said, in that carrying "bar-mess" voice of his; "an air-gun for cats, ha, ha! Make good bags, eh, Weatherhead?" I said that I did, very good bags, and felt I was getting ...
— Stories By English Authors: London • Various
... his rare ability were all the regiment's, and the regiment knew it; so he was studied as is the lot of few. His servant knew which shoes he would wear on a Thursday morning, and would have them ready; the mess-cook spiced the curry so exactly to his taste that more than one cook-book claimed it to be a species apart and labeled it with his name. If he frowned, the troopers knew somebody had tried to flatter him; if he smiled, the regiment ...
— Winds of the World • Talbot Mundy
... have to go to the colonel at once, and explain to him that I had nothing whatever to do with the matter," he thought, as he locked the drawer. Then an irresistible impulse seized him to go to the officer's mess, and, as an eye-witness, describe exactly what took place. The officers had already heard about the affair in the public gardens, and they hurried back to the brilliantly lighted mess-rooms to give vent ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... a soldier of the regiment of the king. Very well, this is weighty matter, of which the king must be advised! Monsieur's wife becomes expectant of a son and heir. 'Tis meet that Louis the Great should be advised of this! Mother of God! 'Tis a pretty mess enough back there on the St. Lawrence, where not a hen may cackle over its new-laid egg but the king must know it, and where not a family has meat enough for its children to eat nor clothes enough to cover them. My faith, in that poor medley of little lords and lazy vassals, how can you ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough
... awkward attempts at aerial navigation, and being caught by the crew. As it is known that a light will attract these delicate little sea-moths at night, sailors sometimes extend a bit of canvas on a pole from a forward port, in the shape of a scoop, and placing a lantern above it, gather quite a mess of them in a brief time. One morning the cook brought himself into special notice by giving us a fry of the self-immolated creatures. Large watersnakes appeared at the surface now and again, raising their slimy heads a couple of feet or more above ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou
... and we took a 'bus which passed by the street where Barber lived. All the way I continued to reproach him. It was not enough for him to play the fool on his own account, but he must get me into a mess, too. I might ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... being overhead. She was gone home long before he put out the store lights and turned out the last lingering idler, for Cap'n Abe preferred to cook for himself. He declared the Widow Gallup did not know how to make a decent chowder, anyway; and as for lobscouse, or the proper frying of a mess of "blood-ends," she was all at sea. He intimated that there were digestive reasons for her husband's death at the early age ...
— Cap'n Abe, Storekeeper • James A. Cooper
... half asleep in the sun, too lazy to work at all. When he had played truant, and returned late to the tent, and found nothing better left to eat than a dry crust of bread, or the cold remains of a mess of fish, he had frequently thought how pleasant it would be to have the best of everything for himself, and only his dog to eat up the rest. So this boy had often felt and thought; and so would many think and feel, perhaps, if there were many as forlorn and friendless ...
— The Settlers at Home • Harriet Martineau
... upon the necessity of procuring the means of existence in a co-operative organized manner. The social motives which to-day make man ambitious, hypocritical, stealthy, are ineffective. One need not sell his individuality for a mess of pottage, ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 1, March 1906 • Various
... controls industry you only put the whole mess off one step, the question then becomes, who controls the State? However, I'm not arguing political economy with you, sir. You didn't let me finish. I was going to say, I'm turning it over to the government to untangle, even while making use of the inventories ...
— Medal of Honor • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... 1866.—During the night it occurred to me that we should be in a mess if after exploration and information from the natives we could find no path, and when I mentioned this, Lieutenant Garforth suggested that we should proceed to Kilwa, so at 5 A.M. I went up to the ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume I (of 2), 1866-1868 • David Livingstone
... Tedham had come. "Now, remember what I've told you," she called after me, as I went to the door, "and be sure to tell me, when you come back, just how he takes it and every word he says. Oh, dear, I know you'll make the most dreadful mess of it!" ...
— A Pair of Patient Lovers • William Dean Howells
... Mallow. Craig touched his sleeve, but he threw off the hand roughly. He was one of the best rough and tumble fighters in the Straits Settlements. "You thieving beach-comber, I don't want to mess up the deck with you, but I'll cut your comb for you when ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... finished the dinner. Add to this two or three tallow-candles stuck on a cocoa tin, and the fact that none of the officers had shaved, or had had their clothes off for a week, and had walked some forty-five miles through rivers and mud, and you will have some idea of how the officers' mess of one of the smartest of Her Majesty's foot regiments do for themselves in time of war. Not a murmur or complaint ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... you," he said. "Don't move—nor nothin', or we'll blow holes through your figgers that'll cause a hell of a draught. We ain't yearning to make no sort o' mess in this yer caboose. But we're going to do it—'cep' you keep quite still, ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... have had to wait till they had caught you. But nobody conceived that to be possible. The President of a republic never runs away in his own person. There will be a cup of tea in the officers' mess-room at five o'clock. I will leave you till then, as you may wish to employ yourself." I went up immediately afterwards on deck, and looking back over the tafferel, could only just see the glittering spires of Gladstonopolis in ...
— The Fixed Period • Anthony Trollope
... saint that pretend t' acquiesce; From crossing of proverbs (let 'um hang that confess); From a sniveling cause, in a pontificall dress, And two lawyers, with the devil and his dam in a mess; From fools ...
— Cavalier Songs and Ballads of England from 1642 to 1684 • Charles Mackay
... of camp and mess, Left, as they lay, to die, In the battle's sorest stress, When the storm of fight swept by: They lay in the Wilderness,— Ah, where did they ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 96, October 1865 • Various
... was devoted to the further gathering of the throng and the "Grand Mess." At the first note of the "Magnificat" the reliques were brought forth from the upper chapel and the crowd from within and without broke into a thunderous "Vivent les Saintes Maries!" Then was sung the ...
— The Automobilist Abroad • M. F. (Milburg Francisco) Mansfield
... hardly consent to sell our birthright for so poor a mess of pottage as this petty jealousy offers. A teachable spirit in matters of which we are ignorant, is usually as profitable and respectable as abundant self-conceit, and rendering to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, quite as honest as to pocket the coin as our own, notwithstanding ...
— Farm drainage • Henry Flagg French
... glory-mongers slinking round to beg their bread at our back doors. Dammy, let 'em bellow now! Let 'em shout for war! I'll keep my mills busy and my agent walking the old rent-beat. If they can fill their bellies with a mess of glory I'll not grudge them what they can snatch; but I'll fill mine with food less spiced, and we'll see which of us thrives best—these sons of Mars or the old patroon who stays at home and dips his nose into nothing worse ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers
... home he mixed up in the trough a mess of barley-meal and wine for the pig, who, after gorging herself with it, became senselessly drunk. Tim, then, dressing her in a sarafan or woman's long night-gown, placed her on the petsch or stove in a corner, where ...
— The Story of Tim • Anonymous
... anything, and comes home all over mud, raving about fairy- land, and gold trees and blue ground; when she has just got into a bog in Belforest coppice-littering the whole place, too, with common wild flowers. If it had been Essie and Ellie, I should just have put them in the corner for making such a mess!" ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge
... outlandish, ungodly, or supernatural laziness were sacredly preserved from year to year, Caleb Kimball's indolence easily took the palm. His hay commonly went to seed in the field. His cow yielded her morning's milk about noon, and her evening "mess" was taken from her (when she was lucky) by the light of a lantern. He was a bachelor of forty-five, dwelt alone, had no visitors and made his living, such as it was, off the farm, with the help of a rack-o'-bones horse. He had fifty acres of timber-land, and when his easy-going methods of farming ...
— Ladies-In-Waiting • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... bail, as the lawyers have it; and if ever they catch me here again—[He goes towards the door, and returns in sudden alarm.] Oh dear! oh dear! here's mother Van Winkle coming back. I shall never get out of this mess. ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Rip van - Winkle • Charles Burke
... precise place at which to begin this narrative. There are, as it were, several points d'appui. One might describe the outward voyage, in a troopship packed to three or four times its normal peace-time capacity; where men slept on the floors, on mess-tables, and in hammocks so closely slung that once you were in it was literally impossible to get out until the whole row was ready to move; and where we were given food (!) cooked and served under conditions so revolting as to turn the stomach at the bare sight of it. ...
— With Our Army in Palestine • Antony Bluett
... head a very little forward and gently drew in her breath. The late Captain Dunbar had possessed in addition to the virtues of a dashing temperament, certain of its failings, and her cousin's demeanor decidedly reminded her of his conduct after particularly convivial evenings at the mess. But the test was reassuring. Her nose was keen, ...
— The Prodigal Father • J. Storer Clouston
... hungry that the Doctor would sneak downstairs with us into the palace basement, after all the cooks were safe in bed, and fry pancakes secretly over the dying embers of the fire. The Doctor himself was the finest cook that ever lived. But he used to make a terrible mess of the kitchen; and of course we had to be awfully careful that ...
— The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle • Hugh Lofting
... my hand, Major," the detective said, looking down at Desmond's proffered one, "for I'm in a filthy mess and no error. But won't you come in, sir?" he said to the Chief and led the way across the mosaic tile pathway to the ...
— Okewood of the Secret Service • Valentine Williams
... especially when he was in the watch off duty, was the foretop, whither he would climb up, blow high or blow low, and ensconce himself, sometimes for hours, until his services were required on deck, or else the rattling of pannikins and mess-kits warned him that something was "going on in the grub line below," when he would descend the rattlins, swiftly or leisurely as the case might be, and take his turn at either grub ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson
... orderly-room. Jenks said he would look in and see if "the skipper" were inside, and in a second or two came out with a red-faced, cheerful-looking man, whom he introduced as Captain Harold. With them was a tall young Scots officer in a kilt, whom Peter learned was Lieutenant Mackay of their mess. ...
— Simon Called Peter • Robert Keable
... this advanced post, was only a matter of a few weeks. But as the months passed by the camp began, in spite of the uncertainty, to assume an appearance of permanency. The officers built themselves huts and mess rooms. A good polo ground was discovered near Khar, and under careful management rapidly improved. A race-course was projected. Many officers who were married brought their wives and families to the camp among the mountains, ...
— The Story of the Malakand Field Force • Sir Winston S. Churchill
... twelve feet long by ten broad; seven feet high, and papered with palm leaves. The middle one is the hall of Audience and Justice— or injustice if you like—the Council Chamber, the House of Parliament, the mess-room, and the drawing-room. The one on the right with two windows, from which are magnificent views, is your Majesty's sleeping-room and boudoir; that on the left is the ditto of Prime Minister Dominick ...
— The Island Queen • R.M. Ballantyne
... picture limned against the black hills and the sweeping stretch of darkening prairie. Everything was animation; the bullwhackers unhitching and disposing of their teams, the herders staking out the cattle, and—not the least interesting—the mess cooks preparing the evening meal at the crackling camp-fires, with the huge, canvas-covered wagons encircling them like ghostly sentinels; the ponies and oxen blinking stupidly as the flames stampeded the shadows in which they were enveloped; and more weird than all, ...
— Last of the Great Scouts - The Life Story of William F. Cody ["Buffalo Bill"] • Helen Cody Wetmore
... obligation which accounts for hospitals, asylums and other charitable institutions. Hence also we endeavour to shelter those born deficient in mental or moral power. Dr Chapple seems to think that the result of all this is that we have made a pretty mess of society. He says, of these weaklings, that Nature has decreed that they should die. A most unscientific statement. Are these charitable efforts to be regarded as profane interference with the sacred decrees of Nature? Nature's decrees ...
— A Plea for the Criminal • James Leslie Allan Kayll
... had ever been to the Sandwich Islands. "The man started," he said, on returning, "as if he had been struck. He had evidently been there and committed some terrible crime, which my allusion recalled. I had made a frightful mess of it. B—— led me away to the door." This woful account was, of course, an imaginary and symbolical representation of the terrors which enforced conversation caused him; the good officer's surprise at the abrupt introduction of a new subject had supplied him with the ludicrous ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop
... and give it he," said the other, with a merry glance at Waymark. "But he mustn't make a mess ...
— The Unclassed • George Gissing
... your reverence, were not some throats so much wider than others. You will always see that one porker half empties the trough before others have moistened their snouts in the mess." ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope
... good a way as any other of wiling away the evening, and you are welcome to hear the rest of this one,' admitted Dunbar. He was a grand talker, according to his compatriots, and he chiefly loved the engineers' mess-room, where he could sit by a table covered in oil-cloth, and sip a little weak whisky and water, and revert to his broadest Doric in company with some engineers from the Clyde. 'The Rosana,' continued Dunbar, clearing his throat, 'only carried one boat on her last journey. I happen ...
— Peter and Jane - or The Missing Heir • S. (Sarah) Macnaughtan
... of retorts, kettles, tubes, siphons and tiny brass machinery. In the midst of the mess stood two old-fashioned armchairs—both sacred to Edison. One he sits in, and the other is for his feet, his books, pads ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 1 of 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Good Men and Great • Elbert Hubbard
... heavily from his exertions. "The rest have taken to the woods, which, I imagine, is quite a journey from here. You ought to see our friend—the one who couldn't make his eyes behave. They've eaten him full of holes. He's the most awful mess—sickening beast. He didn't have a bone in him—all crumpled up ...
— Under the Andes • Rex Stout
... have to cook some of it the best we can, although I expect we'll make a sorry mess of it without Chris. I guess broiling some of it will ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... Grace's new doublet; and your Grace can get it [from him]. Francisco Cachata owes [me] three pesos and Bartolo two—all to be used in saying masses for my brother. Juan de Palacios owes me four pesos, which he may spend in his mess; and my silver spoon and mirror. Will your Grace get them? and they are to be used in saying masses for my brother. Will your Grace tell him that if he shall bring any cloth, he must do his best for his soul. ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 • Various
... boy came into the mess. They said he was a French boy, but the first luff says he is the Capptain's ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... you'd make me. You have a good big bump of order, and I haven't any at all in little things. Tom Watterly was right. If I had tried to live here alone, things would have got into an awful mess. I feel ashamed of myself that I didn't clear up the yard before, but my whole mind's been on the ...
— He Fell in Love with His Wife • Edward P. Roe
... and when she was a little girl it was even worse, for instead of lemonade to drink, she was made to take a very bitter dose of herb tea, or a dreadful mess called composition which had every sort of nauseous thing in it you can think of. Little folks nowadays get off very easily, it ...
— A Dear Little Girl's Thanksgiving Holidays • Amy E. Blanchard
... you are always land-locked," returned Cap, laughing heartily; "but yonder is the Pathfinder, as they call him, with some smoking platters, inviting us to share in his mess; and I will confess that one gets no venison at sea. Master Western, civility to girls, at your time of life, comes as easy as taking in the slack of the ensign halyards; and if you will just keep an eye to her kid and can, while I join the mess of the Pathfinder ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... a bit," he explained; "and besides, didn't you hear Francois say that there were some dandy trout and grayling hanging about here at the foot of the rapids? Seems to me I'd like a mess for ...
— Boy Scouts on Hudson Bay - The Disappearing Fleet • G. Harvey Ralphson
... en garcon. We divide the work. I take all the hard and the scientific part, and make her do all the rest. When we have worked all day, and have said all we have to say to each other, we want relaxation. To that end we have formed a little "Mess" with fifteen friends at the table d'hote of the Hotel de la Ville, where we get a good dinner and a pint of the country wine made on the hillside for a florin and a half. By this plan we escape the bore of housekeeping, ...
— The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton Volume II • Isabel Lady Burton & W. H. Wilkins
... with you to the play. It will please her, whatever the bother to you. Besides, you will then be talked to. If you make a mess of it in trying to unravel the plot, she will essentially aid you in that direction. Nothing like a woman for a plot—especially if you desire to plunge head foremost ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 2, April 9, 1870 • Various
... also a box with a rat, or something, inside it that came by the evening post. Very likely it's the six-toed beast Terry was sending us to cross with the four-toed albino. I didn't look, because I didn't want to mess up my things, but I should gather from the way it's jumping ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Ghost Stories • Various
... fire. It started on the woodwork of the companion way, where there was a place for stationery; there was a mighty mess of water and smell of smoke and a panel or two burned, and no great damage done, as far as I can hear. I am surprised we don't go on fire every day with so many smokers chucking cigarette ends overboard. The wind-catchers sticking out of the ports of course catch these, and they ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... was there with a mouthful of toast.) "Take the mess limber and fetch 'em back if the Heavy Group Artillery will let you—they're in there ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, February 28, 1917 • Various
... Barney," I said piteously; "but you did, and Bob Hampton and Neb Dumlow came and laid down on the deck, and I saw it all, and heard it, and, oh dear, oh dear! what a terrible mess!" ...
— Sail Ho! - A Boy at Sea • George Manville Fenn
... Pedro; yet the sailors pray every minute, selfish fellows, that the miserable fowl may be brought to his end. They say the captain will never point the ship for the land so long as he has in anticipation a mess of fresh meat. This unhappy bird can alone furnish it; and when he is once devoured, the captain will come to his senses. I wish thee no harm, Pedro; but as thou art doomed, sooner or later, to meet the fate of all thy race; and if putting a period to thy existence is to be the signal for ...
— Typee - A Romance of the South Sea • Herman Melville
... that he understood what this meant, by a very unprofessional choice of words. "We are in a mess," he began, "and the sooner we are out ...
— The Evil Genius • Wilkie Collins
... the cask is too long to allow him to sit down. He must remain on his knees in a torturing position, and cannot bring his hands to his head. He relies on his friends to feed him, and if he has no friends he must starve. The jailers think it a good joke when a man loses the number of his mess ...
— Overland through Asia; Pictures of Siberian, Chinese, and Tartar - Life • Thomas Wallace Knox
... Mouth sat near him and poured out the tea, but ate or drank nothing herself. Tea-cups, spoons, plates, knives and forks, all of plain manufacture, were carefully arranged, the number corresponding with the guests. A fine mess of bass and white fish cut up and very palatably broiled filled a dish in the centre of the table, from which the host helped his guests. Birch bark salt cellars containing pepper and salt mixed allowed each one to season his fish with both or neither. A dish of blue berries picked on the shore ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens
... girls adjourned at a second summons of the bell, was as little appetizing as the breakfast had been. There was the nauseous soup, a morsel of veal, a salad dressed with rank oil, a mess of sweet curd, and a dish of stewed prunes. After the fiction of dining, Miss Foster took the two pupils for a walk by the river, where groups of soldiers under shade of the trees were practising the fife and the drum. Caen seemed to be full of soldiers, marching ...
— The Vicissitudes of Bessie Fairfax • Harriet Parr
... pretty mess they are like to make of it!—what with infidelity and blasphemy—I must say it—blasphemy!—Really you must do something, Mr. Bevis. Things have arrived at such a pass that, I give you my word, reflections not a few are made upon the rector for committing his flock to the care of ...
— Paul Faber, Surgeon • George MacDonald
... regrets the freedom which these graceful birds possess, although to grudge freedom to a pigeon is like grudging sunshine to a flower. But though the damage to the walls is really trifling, as they will stand for centuries to come, still the litter and mess which the birds naturally make is considerable and unsightly, and decidedly out of keeping in such a magnificent ruin. The pigeons exhibit what takes place when a species becomes dominant to the exclusion of other ...
— A Week's Tramp in Dickens-Land • William R. Hughes
... peculiar and solemn interest in the eyes of the young soldier. [Footnote: See Note 5.] It may be easily imagined that the officers, of a regiment commanded by so respectable a person composed a society more sedate and orderly than a military mess always exhibits; and that Waverley escaped some temptations to which he might otherwise ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... contain only a more or less complete store of honey. Others are hermetically sealed with an earthen lid. The contents of these latter vary greatly. Sometimes we find the larva of a Bee which has finished its mess or is on the point of finishing it; sometimes a larva, white like the first, but more corpulent and of a different shape; at other times honey with an egg floating on the surface. The honey is liquid and sticky, with a brownish colour and a very strong, repulsive smell. ...
— The Glow-Worm and Other Beetles • Jean Henri Fabre
... quarrelling with O'Hana. O'Moto was engaged with Kondo[u] Rokuro[u]bei. Kibei insisted on aiding Iemon; and Iemon did not dare to refuse his services in donning the haori. As he adjusted the awkward efforts of Kibei on one side, this amateur valet made a mess of it on the other. Besides, neither of them was any too steady on his feet. Then Kondo[u] and Iemon set out in ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... David," she had said, "and in spite of all the mess you have made of things, I believe in you; but even if I were fonder than fondest of you, I should despise myself ...
— IT and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... us,—though Jacob and Esau quarrelled already in the womb, yet, so long as the weaker and more politic brother can get the elder brother's portion, and simple Esau hunts his whales and pierces his untrodden forests, content with his mess of pottage,—honestly abiding by his bargain, though a little puzzled at its terms,—we think that fratricide, or the sincere thought of it, is very ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 10, August, 1858 • Various
... wide world could be fairer! She left him to extricate himself from a mess of his own making! It was more than fair, for she went out of her way to offer him an opening to jump through. And she paid him the compliment of suggesting be must be clever enough to take it, for she seemed ...
— King—of the Khyber Rifles • Talbot Mundy
... estimation, hard put to it for suitable companionship in Chicago. She was Eastern-bred-Boston—and familiar in an offhand way with the superior world of London, which she had visited several times. Chicago at its best was to her a sordid commercial mess. She preferred New York or Washington, but she had to live here. Thus she patronized nearly all of those with whom she condescended to associate, using an upward tilt of the head, a tired droop of the eyelids, and a fine upward ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... get out of the mess quite so easily as his father wished. Two questions arose about Major Tifto, outside the racing world, but within the domain of the world of sport and pleasure generally, as to one of which it was impossible that Silverbridge ...
— The Duke's Children • Anthony Trollope
... out of the war almost every mess had a negro cook, one of the mess furnishing the cook, the others paying a proportional share for hire; but as the stringency of the Subsistence Department began to grow oppressive, as the war wore on, many of these negroes were sent home. There was no provision made by the department for ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... made up my mind to drown myself. There is no mess about it, and men do not have to ...
— The Journal of Arthur Stirling - "The Valley of the Shadow" • Upton Sinclair
... indicates that during the day Henry had lost; during the night he had won. He put it down in his black book against the time when we should get to Paris, where money would buy things. For we ate at camps, slept in hospitals or in barns or in mess rooms of the ambulance men, and day by day and night after night we saw much misery and were "acquainted with grief." There are so many kinds of hospitals in France! The great streams of broken men that ...
— The Martial Adventures of Henry and Me • William Allen White
... the dry voice of Birch, "so am I. And all this is very apropos. It illustrates the general condition of affairs, especially that mess of trout you had on the moss a while ago. We're all trout, we and the shareholders. You, Wimperley, are that five pounder. We all rose to the fly of one R.F.C., and we were all landed in the back woods. There are more trout ...
— The Rapids • Alan Sullivan
... the huge bunk-house, a mess-house, an assay office, what seemed to be the superintendent's quarters, and a dozen smaller structures, all of logs, and began an abrupt descent. The top of the canyon was so high that they looked down on the roof of the big, silent stamp mill with ...
— The Plunderer • Roy Norton
... even temporarily? No! The manager of an institution like this has got to be young and husky and energetic and forceful and efficient and red-haired and sweet-tempered, like me. Of course I've been discontented,—anybody would be with things in such a mess,—but it's what you socialists call a holy discontent. And do you think that I am going to abandon all of the beautiful reforms I have so painstakingly started? No! I am not to be moved from this spot until you find a superintendent superior ...
— Dear Enemy • Jean Webster
... Mercury hidrargo. Mercy kompato—eco. Mere nura. Merely nure. Meridian meridiano. Merino merinolano. [Error in book: merinoslano] Merit merito. Merit meriti. Mermaid sireno. Merriment gajeco. Merry gaja. Mesh masxo. Mess kunmangxi. Message depesxo. Messenger sendito. Messiah Savonto, Mesio. Messmate kunmangxanto. Metal metalo. Metallic metala. Metallurgy metalurgio. Metaphor metaforo. Mete dividi, disdoni. Meteor meteoro. Meteorology meteorologio. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes |
