"Tinder" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... heat. You hastily gather handfuls of seemingly incombustible material and throw it on the fire, but the conflagration increases. Grass and green leaves hesitate for an instant and then flash up like tinder. The more you put on, the more your smudge rebels against its proper task of smudging. It makes a pleasant warmth, to encourage the black-flies; and bright light to attract and cheer the mosquitoes. Your effort ...
— Fisherman's Luck • Henry van Dyke
... it afterwards appears, did actually burst forth, with explosions more or less Vesuvian, in the inner man of Herr Diogenes; as indeed how could it fail? A nature, which, in his own figurative style, we might say, had now not a little carbonized tinder, of Irritability; with so much nitre of latent Passion, and sulphurous Humor enough; the whole lying in such hot neighborhood, close by "a reverberating furnace of Fantasy:" have we not here the components of driest Gunpowder, ready, on occasion of the smallest spark, ...
— Sartor Resartus - The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh • Thomas Carlyle
... dead. I'm too tinder-hearted to be burying anything but a dead bate, Dannie. That's a thousand years old, but laugh, like I knew you would, old Ramphirinkus! No, thank you, I don't go ...
— At the Foot of the Rainbow • Gene Stratton-Porter
... ets aine mama unn ain papa edam (wesen). unn (unt) diesa abn wais (twai) kinna (tinder) ghatf (dehappt). unn die kinna sint (dsint) in den walt tegang (gangen). unn-daben (habn) holz (olz) geh[o]l (ohlt). dann sint (dsint) sie an ain utsom-haendom (zuke-haeussn) zezan (gangn). unn (unt) habn (abn) ge ... (dessen). dann hatt die hetse (hekksee) dsa (tsakt). ...
— The Mind of the Child, Part II • W. Preyer
... snow it was impossible. With the first indications of night, I halted in a thick spruce grove near the river and drew together a fairly good supply of dead wood. On the under side of the branches of the fir trees was generally to be found a thick growth of hairy moss, and with a handful of this as tinder it did not take me long to get a good fire blazing. Close to the fire I threw a pile of spruce boughs that I broke from low branches and the smaller trees. I melted snow in my cup for water, and in this put a few lumps of mould from the flour bag, eating ...
— The Lure of the Labrador Wild • Dillon Wallace
... about a night alarm of fire at a military post that borders on the thrilling. In the days whereof we write the buildings were not the substantial creations of brick and stone to be seen to-day, and those of the scattered "camps" and stations in that arid, sun-scorched land of Arizona were tinder boxes of the ...
— An Apache Princess - A Tale of the Indian Frontier • Charles King
... smith's forge, his vice, and a wooden board or bench, which were also batted to a ledge of the rock, to the great joy of all, under a salute of three hearty cheers. From an oversight on the part of the smith, who had neglected to bring his tinder-box and matches from the vessel, the work was prevented from being continued for ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... a while. Then he opened a leather case that hung on his rifle sling and took from it a powder flask and flint and steel and some tinder. Pouring a little powder on the damp tinder, he struck the flint until at length a spark caught and fired the powder. The tinder caught also, though reluctantly, and while Rachel blew on it, he ...
— The Ghost Kings • H. Rider Haggard
... lesson of the smoking flax. Our glowing electric bulbs suffer no injury from blasts, and our lamps have like strength. The time was, when, wakened by the cry of the little sufferer, the ancient mother sprang up to strike the tinder and light the wick in the cup of oil. Only with difficulty was the tinder kindled. Then how precious the spark that one breath of air would put out! With what eagerness did the mother guard the smoking flax! And in setting forth the gentleness of God it is declared that, with eyes of love, ...
— The Investment of Influence - A Study of Social Sympathy and Service • Newell Dwight Hillis
... friction, poured through the slot at the side of the hearth, and accumulated in a little pile, that all at once began to smoke. In two seconds more it was a glowing coal of fire. Then Yim dropped his spindle, covered the coal with a bit of tinder previously made ready, and blew it into a flame, which he deftly transferred to the ...
— Under the Great Bear • Kirk Munroe
... inflammable heap, and when tired Mr. Sterling went home to snatch a bite of something to eat, and lazy Lem Wacker came strolling into the place, pipe in full blast, Bart had not hesitated to exercise his brief authority. A spark among that tinder pile would mean sure and swift destruction. Besides, light-fingered Lem Wacker was not to be trusted where things lay ...
— Bart Stirling's Road to Success - Or; The Young Express Agent • Allen Chapman
... United States by 1819. In 1824 Amesbury, Mass., had a water-power manufactory of flannel. The next year the practice of homoeopathy began in America, and matches of a rude sort were displacing the old tinder-box. The next year after this Hartford produced axes and other edged tools. Lithography, of which there had been specimens so early as 1818, was a Boston business in 1827. Pittsburgh manufactured damask table linen in 1828. The same year saw paper made from straw, ...
— History of the United States, Volume 3 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... murmured Mr Button to himself, as the form in his arms relaxed. Then he laid her gently down beside Dick. He shifted forward, moving like a crab. Then he put his hand to his pocket for his pipe and tobacco and tinder box. They were in his coat pocket, but Emmeline was in his coat. To search for them would ...
— The Blue Lagoon - A Romance • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... suburb, and observing the fragile-wheeled station-wagons, and the ice-wagons enormously labeled "DANGER" (perhaps by the gastric experts of the medical faculty), and the Colonial-style dwellings, and the "tinder" boarding-houses, and the towering boot-shine stands, and the roast-chestnut emporia, and the gasometers flanking a noble and beautiful river—I was observing all this when a number of young men and maids came out of a high-school ...
— Your United States - Impressions of a first visit • Arnold Bennett
... and light a fire in a stove, using not more than two matches, or light a gas range, top burner, oven and boiler, without having the gas blow or smoke. Lay and light a fire in the open, using no artificial tinder, such as paper or excelsior, and not ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... had given the moment, and wide circumstance had met it. Now the hand was in the glove, the statue in the niche, the bow upon the string, the spark in the tinder, the sea through the dike. Now what had reached ...
— Foes • Mary Johnston
... feared for neither man nor deevil. He got his tinder-box, an' lit a can'le, an' made three steps o't ower to Janet's door. It was on the hasp, an' he pushed it open, an' keekit bauldly in. It was a big room, as big as the minister's ain, an' plenished wi' grand, auld, solid gear, for he had ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 5 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... somewhat retarded by the general humidity of the soil and of the beds of leaves which cover it. But in long droughts the superficial layer of leaves and the dry fallen branches become as inflammable as tinder, and the fire spreads with fearful rapidity, until its further progress is arrested by want of material, or, more rarely, by heavy rains, sometimes caused, as many meteorologists suppose, ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... on its hinges, as they opened it. The coffins were borne in, and the whole party entered; the priest mumbling a short Latin prayer. In a short time, the priest alone returned; and looking cautiously around, and seeing no one, struck a light from a tinder box, and lighted his cigar. The other two men brought back the coffins, evidently relieved of their weight; and the priest—the boy—with the man who had last joined them, and who had also lit his cigar—entered the first caleche, after ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman
... tinder-box which he found on the mantel, he lighted a candle, and dressed himself in his old clothes, with a melancholy satisfaction. They exhaled the strong and aromatic odor of the plants and herbs of the surroundings through which Croustillac had so long walked in his ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... to kindle the fire was such a long time about it, owing to the damp tinder, that Dame Zudar impatiently snatched the flint and steel out of his hands, struck away at it till she had ignited the tinder, then thrust it with her own hand in the midst of the straw surrounding the faggots, fanned it with her apron till it burst into a vivid flame, and then ran across ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai
... a difficult matter to light the fire. They scraped off the inside of the bark until they accumulated a little heap of tinder. It was ignited with a few sparks of the flint and steel, and then the bark too caught fire. After that they had nothing to do but feed the flames which grew and grew, casting a luminous red glare in every corner of the old Council House. Then it ...
— The Border Watch - A Story of the Great Chief's Last Stand • Joseph A. Altsheler
... seemed to be most pertinacious in vengeance. I could have shot him in the back, or the neck, or where I liked, if I had only one cap. He was within three feet of the muzzle of my rifle; but what of that when I could not get the gun to go off? After a while I thought of making some tinder paper, and then trying to 'touch off' the piece with it, but a far better plan at that moment came into my head. While I was fumbling about my bullet-pouch to get at my flint and steel, of course my fingers came into contact with the ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid
... is no time to be scare at skeletons that slide down and disappear, for Mamselle Rosalin must have her camp and her place to sleep. Every man use to the bateaux have always his tinder-box, his knife, his tobacco, but I have more than that; I have leave Mackinac so quick I forget to take out the storekeeper's bacon that line the bottom of the sledge, and Mamselle Eosalin sit on it in the furs! We have plenty meat, and I sing like a voyageur while I build the ...
— The Skeleton On Round Island - From "Mackinac And Lake Stories", 1899 • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... alluded to the revealed will of God tinder the old dispensation, we will now hastily glance at the position occupied by Christ and his apostles in relation to this institution, and at their instructions and ...
— A Review of Uncle Tom's Cabin - or, An Essay on Slavery • A. Woodward
... thoughtfully put a tinder-box, flint and steel, and a couple of candles into the basket. After feeling his way on for some distance, he stopped and lighted one of ...
— From Powder Monkey to Admiral - A Story of Naval Adventure • W.H.G. Kingston
... instant passes without an explosion. Stones and timber and iron are flying high into the air, and falling to the earth with horrible crashes. The very trees are on fire. They are crackling, and their leaves and branches are like tinder. The buildings in the Place de la Concorde reflect the flames, and every stone in them is like bright gold. Montmartre is still outside the circle of the flames; but the little wind that is blowing carries the smoke up to it, and in the ...
— The Insurrection in Paris • An Englishman: Davy
... ounce of tobacco valued at sixpence, and three pence in coin, or, as it is quaintly worded, "in money and golde." Satirists of course made fun of the smoker's pocketful of apparatus. A pamphleteer of 1609 says: "I behelde pipes in his pocket; now he draweth forth his tinder-box and his touchwood, and falleth to his tacklings; sure his throat is on fire, the smoke flyeth so ...
— The Social History of Smoking • G. L. Apperson
... and tossed in logs through the door and windows, until presently that building, too, contained fuel enough to decompose the stone. And over the whole of it, here, there and everywhere, men were pouring cans and cans of kerosene, while other men were setting dry tinder in ...
— The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy
... my table a copy of the minutes of the Board of Education of January 9, 1895, in which is underscored a report on a primary school in the Bronx. "It is a wooden shanty," is the inspector's account, "heated by stoves, and is a regular tinder box; cellar wet, and under one classroom only. This building was erected in order, I believe, to determine whether or not there was a school population in the neighborhood to warrant the purchase of property to erect ...
— The Battle with the Slum • Jacob A. Riis
... closely examined their feet. They were cool, and showed no trace of scorching, nor were their anklets of dried tree-fern leaf burnt. This, Jonathan explained, is part of the miracle; for dried tree-fern is as combustible as tinder, and there were flames shooting out among the stones. Sceptics had affirmed that the skin of a Fijian's foot being a quarter of an inch thick, he would not feel a burn. Whether this be true or not of the ball and heel, the instep is covered ...
— Modern Mythology • Andrew Lang
... flames soon were eating at the stable. And once caught, it burned like tinder. The horses screamed as the fire licked at them, and all was confusion. To make matters worse, bullets ripped ...
— Kid Wolf of Texas - A Western Story • Ward M. Stevens
... broken; and out of the very extremity of fear we sometimes can draw its own antidote. Just as with flint and steel you may strike a spark, so danger, striking against our heart, brings out the flash that kindles the tinder. ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren
... telegraph operations. It was not long before we had a sufficient quantity of material gathered, and placing the dry wood in such a manner that it might be easily ignited, my companion produced his tinder apparatus, and was soon at work drilling the block of hard wood, and frantically endeavoring to coax a spark that might set ...
— Seven and Nine years Among the Camanches and Apaches - An Autobiography • Edwin Eastman
... galleries tumbling down, the thatch dry and combustible, and there was only one door. Suddenly, one day, there was a smell of fire: the old man rushed out. To his horror he saw that the thatch was aflame, the rotten pillars were catching fire one by one, and the rafters were burning like tinder. But, inside, the children went on amusing themselves quite happily. The distracted Father said: "I will run in and save my children. I will seize them in my strong arms, I will bear them harmless through the falling rafters and the blazing ...
— The Art of the Story-Teller • Marie L. Shedlock
... the neglect and carelessness of campers and tourists to put out their camp fires. A single match or a cigarette stub tossed from a passing automobile may start a costly fire. During the season from May to October, the western forests usually are as dry as tinder. Rains are rare during that period. A fire once started runs riot unless efficient control measures are used ...
— The School Book of Forestry • Charles Lathrop Pack
... making toadish hops and tortoise-like tips and amblings over the inequalities in the way. She looked after him, a new light shining from her eyes, a new passion stirring her bosom, where his words had fallen like a spark upon tinder. ...
— Claim Number One • George W. (George Washington) Ogden
... and like tinder, were wrapped in flames. Grief emerged from the kitchen, carrying a naked black child by the leg. Its ...
— A Son Of The Sun • Jack London
... as he could steady himself well enough, Benson bent and snatched up the burning candle from the tinder-like bed on ...
— The Submarine Boys for the Flag - Deeding Their Lives to Uncle Sam • Victor G. Durham
... of the lowland seemed filled with stifling clouds of smoke. Yet, from a dozen places along the foot of the hill, yellow flames were starting up, kindling higher, and devouring as fast as might be the leaves and tinder left from the ...
— Hiram The Young Farmer • Burbank L. Todd
... through his teeth stret over the best linen table-cloth, and fold it up tight, as innercent now as a baby, the dirrity baste! But the worrest of all was the copyin' he'd be doin' till ye'd be dishtracted. It's yersel' knows the tinder feet that's on me since ever I 've bin in this counthry. Well, owin' to that, I fell into a way o' slippin' me shoes off when I 'd be settin' down to pale the praities or the likes o' that, and, do ye mind! that haythin would do the same thing after ...
— The Universal Reciter - 81 Choice Pieces of Rare Poetical Gems • Various
... Pyrenees. Let me consider dates and reconstruct my formula. I take it that Charles II was more than a boy when Worcester was fought and when he drank that glass of ale at Hotighton, at the "George and Dragon" there, and crept along tinder the Downs to Bramber and so to Shoreham, where he took ship and was free. I take it, therefore, that when he came back in 1660 he must have been in the thirties, more or less, but how far in the thirties I dare ...
— Hills and the Sea • H. Belloc
... you see a great deal depended on the showing each locomotive made. Unluckily in the excitement a tinder box had been forgotten, and when it came time to start, the spark to light the fires had to be obtained from a reading glass borrowed from one of the spectators. This, of course, caused some delay. But once the fires were blazing and steam up, the ...
— Steve and the Steam Engine • Sara Ware Bassett
... closely together were like so much tinder wood. Those who had escaped drowning died in their prisons a more ...
— The Johnstown Horror • James Herbert Walker
... runs a dirty forefinger down the index. "Ob fas est aquam hostis venere," etc. "Tut, tut, it's not allowed. But here are some of the enemy in a barn? What about that?" "Ob fas est hostem incendio," etc. "Yes; he says we may. Quick, Ambrose, up with the straw and the tinder box." Warfare was no child's play about the time when Tilly sacked Magdeburg, and Cromwell turned his hand from the mash tub to the sword. It might not be much better now in a long campaign, when men were ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... crowd, we came unseen to a little side entrance that led to a stair, up which we passed. The stair ended in a passage; we turned down it till we found a door on the left hand. Charmion entered silently, and I followed her into a dark chamber. Being in, she barred the door and, kindling tinder to a flame, lit a hanging lamp. As the light grew strong I gazed around. The chamber was not large, and had but one casement, closely shuttered. For the rest, it was simply furnished, having white walls, some chests for garments, an ancient chair, what I took to be a tiring ...
— Cleopatra • H. Rider Haggard
... h.t. Facult. Phil. Decano, solenniter defendet die[17] mens. Septemb. Christophorus Guentzer, Argentorat. Argentorati, Typis Friderici Spoor, 1657" ("Second Part of a Dissertation, on certain Passages of Milton; which, with God's favour, and tinder the presidency of James Schaller, Doctor of Divinity and Professor of Practical Philosophy, acting as Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy for the occasion, Christopher Guentzer of Strasburg will solemnly defend on the 17th of September. Strasburg, Printed by ...
— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson
... quarter Is. Whenever such price shall be under 60s., and not under 59s., the duty shall be for every quarter L. 2s. And in respect of each integral shilling, or any part of each integral shilling, by which such price shall be tinder 59s., such duty shall be increased by 2s." Mr. Canning moved resolutions similar to the above on barley, oats, rye, peas, beans, wheat-meal, and flour, oatmeal, maize, &c. If the produce of, and imported from any British possession in North America, or elsewhere ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... on me and gave me a couple of biscuits and a swig of water. He was more or less talkative, besides, and from him I learned that Daggs planned to start about midnight for your side of the island, carrying buckets of pitch and tinder, so as to ...
— The Black Buccaneer • Stephen W. Meader
... plenty of blaze, too," added Tom. "See the flames eating away! This stuff is as dry as tinder for there hasn't been any rain ...
— Tom Swift and his Wizard Camera - or, Thrilling Adventures while taking Moving Pictures • Victor Appleton
... dark and rainy evening, and as the entrances to the catacombs were not guarded in those days, it was not difficult for me to make my way unseen into their interior. I had brought with me a tinder-box and several rushlights, and as soon as I felt secure from observation from the outside I struck a light and began my operations. Then, according to a plan I had previously made, I slowly walked along the solemn passageway which ...
— The Vizier of the Two-Horned Alexander • Frank R. Stockton
... a very lofty tree with leaves like those of our apple trees, and fruit resembling medlars, but not eatable, the whole stem and branches being thickly covered with thorns. The bark is as susceptible of fire as tinder, and when one of these trees is cut down it never springs up again. There is another sort of a yellowish colour, which is reckoned valuable. The best manna is produced in this country. Among the fish of this river is one equally voracious with the crocodile, from which ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VI - Early English Voyages Of Discovery To America • Robert Kerr
... a little startled, and half angry, answered with the low, ironical laugh not uncommon to him, "Pish! you ladies are apt to think us men much greater fools than we are. A briefless lawyer is not very inflammable tinder. Yes, a cousin's love,—quite enough. Poor little Helen! time enough to put other notions into her head; and then—she will have a sweetheart, ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... one moment, during the searches, it is true, hopes were excited on the perception of a faint brimstone odour issuing from an antiquated iron box found among some rubbish; but instead of any vellum or parchment, there were only the unused remains of some bundles of veteran matches, with their tinder-box accomplice, which had been thrown aside and forgotten, ever since the time when the functions of those old hardened incendiaries, flint and steel, were extinguished by the lucifers. All further search, it is feared, will be in vain; and the deed is now believed to be as irrecoverably ...
— The True Legend of St. Dunstan and the Devil • Edward G. Flight
... stock, on the crook of his arm, and not yet slung over his shoulder, was a soiled buckskin pouch, which went always with the rifle—the "possible sack" of the wilderness hunter of that time. It contained his bullets, bullet-molds, flints, a bar or two of lead, some tinder for ...
— The Magnificent Adventure - Being the Story of the World's Greatest Exploration and - the Romance of a Very Gallant Gentleman • Emerson Hough
... behind the other, on the path. The man in front has a leaf-mat drawn like a hood over his head and back in order that the ghost may not touch him from behind unawares. In his hand he holds a glowing coal and some tinder, and as he puts the one to the other he calls to the ghost, "Come, take, take, take; come, take, take, take," and so on. Meantime his mates behind him are reckoning up the names of all the men near and far who are suspected of sorcery, ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer
... the honest creature in her little attentions. I told her I would certainly take a nap in the morning, as I had slept so little for the last three nights, and was besides so fatigued. "Musha to be sure, and why not, agra! afther the hard bout you had in that blessed Island! betoken that you're tinder and too soft rared to bear it like them that the work hardens; sleep!—to be sure you'll sleep your fill—you want it, in coorse; and now go to bed, and you'll appear quite another man in the mornin', ...
— The Station; The Party Fight And Funeral; The Lough Derg Pilgrim • William Carleton
... adjoining house. This Doubleday allowed, posting himself as watchmen at the door. No sooner was Fawkes alone than he took the opportunity to rid himself of the chief evidences against him, by flinging the match and tinder out of his window, which overlooked the river. In another minute Sir Thomas Knevet and his men entered ...
— It Might Have Been - The Story of the Gunpowder Plot • Emily Sarah Holt
... it might be our fate to be lost in the wilderness, which I did not much relish. We were all at this time "hungry as hunters," and beginning to feel very miserable from being wet through. What little ammunition I had left I fired off as signals, or made tinder of to get up a fire, but the wood would not burn. In this hapless condition the black boys began murmuring, wishing to go on, pretending, though both held opposite views, that each knew the way; for they thought ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... candle a day," said a guard as he blew out the one he carried, laying it, with a tinder-box, on a shelf in the wall of rock beside me. Then they filed out, and the narrow door shut with a loud bang. We peered through at the fading flicker of the candles. They threw wavering, ghostly shadows on every wall of the dark passage, ...
— D'Ri and I • Irving Bacheller
... few moments after the cry of "fire" added to the terrors of the storm. A barn belonging to a neighbor who lived a mile distant from us, had been struck by that flash, and was soon wrapped in flames. It was a large building, with timbers and boards like tinder, and was filled with hay, and it was well-nigh consumed before assistance could reach the spot, and it was with much difficulty that the flames could be kept from the other buildings on the premises, indeed several of the neighbours were obliged to remain on the spot most of ...
— Walter Harland - Or, Memories of the Past • Harriet S. Caswell
... light it?" one of them exclaimed in a tone of consternation. "I don't suppose we have got flint and steel or tinder box among us." ...
— Colonel Thorndyke's Secret • G. A. Henty
... was going on the fire died out, having been flooded by the water. The Prince would not waken his brothers, although he had no tinder-box of his own to rekindle the flame, but resolved to search around a little in the wilderness in hope of stumbling upon some one who could ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various
... seem to them desirable, after consultation with the Board of Education, to supply or aid the supply of education other than elementary, and to promote the general co-ordination of all forms of education." Tinder the powers so granted much has been done throughout England during the past few years to extend and make efficient the means of higher education; to erect schools which shall provide training for the future services required by the community and the State of the more highly gifted of its ...
— The Children: Some Educational Problems • Alexander Darroch
... assurance that the little, low, yellow bush was "Mexican saddle blanket" or "Tinder bush," this last because it burns like tinder in ...
— Vignettes of San Francisco • Almira Bailey
... war such an aerial ship might be, from which two men could blow up fortress after fortress and city after city when and where they chose. Armies could be annihilated, granite and steel would be as tinder before a bomb or torpedo of picric acid dropped ...
— Lorraine - A romance • Robert W. Chambers
... could get, Viz. Ten days Provision, Rice, Flesh, Fish, Pepper, Salt, a Bason to boil our Victuals in, two Calabasses to fetch Water, two great Tallipats for Tents, big enough to sleep under if it should rain, Jaggory and Sweet-meats, which we brought from home with us, Tobacco also and Betel, Tinder-Boxes two or three for sailing, and a Deers Skin to make us Shooes, to prevent any Thorns running into our feet as we travelled through the Woods; for our greatest Trust under God was to our feet. Our Weapons were, each man a small Axe fastned to a long Staff in our hands, and ...
— An Historical Relation Of The Island Ceylon In The East Indies • Robert Knox
... running all the way, was soon on the scene. Anyone and everyone volunteered to help carry goods to a place of safety, and hot work it was, I can tell you, for being mostly of wood, and maybe redwood, they (the houses) burnt like tinder. From running to so many fires and falling down in my haste I got my shins bruised and bleeding, and my trousers, of course, torn. I was showing my children these scars only lately, they being still much ...
— Some Reminiscences of old Victoria • Edgar Fawcett
... guard soon replaced his blunderbuss in his arm-chest, and, having looked to the rest of its contents, and having looked to the supplementary pistols that he wore in his belt, looked to a smaller chest beneath his seat, in which there were a few smith's tools, a couple of torches, and a tinder-box. For he was furnished with that completeness that if the coach-lamps had been blown and stormed out, which did occasionally happen, he had only to shut himself up inside, keep the flint and steel sparks well off the straw, and get a light with tolerable safety ...
— A Tale of Two Cities - A Story of the French Revolution • Charles Dickens
... associates, and by a large part of the inhabitants of Salt Lake City itself. It was estimated by the army officers at the time that 25,000 of a total population of 45,000 in the Territory, took part in this movement. When they abandoned their houses they left them tinder boxes which only needed the word of command, when the troops advanced, to begin a general conflagration. By June 1 the refugees were collected on the western shore of Utah Lake, fifty miles south of Salt Lake City. What a picture ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... I had but mony, Or any friend to bring me from this bondage, I would Thresh, set up a Cobler's shop, keep Hogs, And feed with 'em, sell Tinder-boxes, And Knights of Ginger-bread, Thatch for three Half pence a day, and think it Lordly, From this base Stallion trade: why does he eye ...
— Beaumont & Fletcher's Works (1 of 10) - The Custom of the Country • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... out his tinder box, and after a little effort, for the snow made the tinder damp, he ...
— The Hero of Ticonderoga - or Ethan Allen and his Green Mountain Boys • John de Morgan
... put it, it did seem to him distinctly foolish, not to say careless, not to say out and out incendiary, for any girl to go blushing her way like a fire-brand through a world so palpably populated by young men whose heads were tow, and hearts indisputably tinder, ...
— The White Linen Nurse • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... table, shot by chance From fair Eliza's graceful form, Assail'd and took my heart by storm? And mark'd you not, with earnest zeal, I ask'd her, if she'd have some veal? And how, when conversation's charms Fresh vigour gave to love's alarms, My heart was scorch'd, and burnt to tinder, When talking to her at the winder? These facts premised, you can't but guess The cause of my uneasiness, For you have heard, as well as I, That she'll be married speedily; And then—my grief more plain to tell— Soft cares, ...
— English Satires • Various
... the same in cities, for, after all, cities depend upon the country and its productiveness. The owners of woodland should be taught the folly of cutting everything before them, and of leaving the refuse brush to become like tinder. The smaller growth should be left to mature, and the brush piled and burned in a way that would not involve the destruction of every sprout and sapling over wide areas. As it is, we are at the mercy of every careless boy, and such vagrants as Lumley ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... second journey to France, where he should be able to discover other more material circumstances; and the duke of Queensberry procured a pass for him to go to Holland from the earl of Nottingham, though it was expedited tinder a borrowed name. The duke had communicated his discovery to the queen without disclosing his name, which he desired might be concealed: her majesty believed the particulars, which were confirmed ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... a flint, a small one, And a little piece of tinder, Strike a light as quick as may be, Light the pine-chip in the holder, 140 Then go out to clear the cowshed, And the cattle do thou fodder, For the mother's cow is lowing, And the father's horse is ...
— Kalevala, Volume I (of 2) - The Land of the Heroes • Anonymous
... "Era," publisher's offer, first copy of books sold, wonderful success. praise from Longfellow, Whittier, Garrison, and Higginson, threatening letters, Eastman's, Mrs., rejoinder to, reception in England, "Times," on, political effect of, book tinder interdict in South, "Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin," Jenny Lind's praise of, attack upon, Sampson Low upon its success abroad, first London publisher, number of editions sold in Great Britain and abroad, dramatized in U. S. and London, European edition, ...
— The Life of Harriet Beecher Stowe • Charles Edward Stowe
... into the cabin to strike a light, which he obtained by a piece of iron and flint, with some fine dry moss for tinder. While he was so employed, my eyes were fixed on the vessel, wondering what it could be. It moved through the water, turned this way and that. "It must be alive," thought I; "is it a fish or a bird?" As I watched the vessel, the sun was going down and there was not more ...
— The Little Savage • Captain Marryat
... made to secure whatever could be saved from the wreck. Bales of cloth, cases of wine, a few boxes of cheese, some hams, the carcass of a milch cow that had been washed on shore, buckets, tubs, butts, a seaman's chest, (containing a tinder-box and needles and thread,) with a number of elegant mahogany turned bed-posts, and part of an investment for the India market, were got on shore. The rain poured down in torrents—all hands were busily at work to procure shelter from the weather; and with the bed-posts and broad-cloths, and part ...
— Thrilling Stories Of The Ocean • Marmaduke Park
... other ways, William, although, in most of them, tinder is necessary. The savages can produce fire by rubbing a soft piece of wood against a hard one. But we have gunpowder; and we have two ways of igniting gunpowder - one is by a flint and steel, and the other is by collecting the sun's rays into one focus ...
— Masterman Ready • Captain Marryat
... logs are dry as tinder and they crackle with the heat, And the sparks, like merry children, come a-dancing round my feet, In the cold, long nights of autumn I can sit before the blaze And watch a panorama born of all my yesterdays. I can leave the present burdens ...
— When Day is Done • Edgar A. Guest
... from the field, some night—dear sport for the lads!—takes place the burning of the "hempherds," thus returning their elements to the soil. To kindle a handful of tow and fling it as a firebrand into one of those masses of tinder; to see the flames spread and the sparks rush like swarms of red bees skyward through the smoke into the awful abysses of the night; to run from gray heap to gray heap, igniting the long line of signal fires, until the whole earth seems a conflagration ...
— The Reign of Law - A Tale of the Kentucky Hemp Fields • James Lane Allen
... the hard nut to crack. Fire is the forest's worst enemy. In a dry season like this Penetier would burn like tinder blown by a bellows. Fire would race through here faster 'n a man could run. I'll need special fire rangers, an' all other rangers must be trained to fight fire, an' then any men living in or near the forest will be paid to help. The thing ...
— The Young Forester • Zane Grey
... her, Jack!" cried one; "she'll be overboard double quick if she fouls agin them blessed bulwarks. It's as rotten as tinder." ...
— Jack Harkaway and his son's Escape From the Brigand's of Greece • Bracebridge Hemyng
... safe? Are we not then in her Husband's Power? For a Husband hath the absolute Power over all a Wife's Secrets but her own. If the Girl had the Discretion of a Court-Lady, who can have a Dozen young Fellows at her Ear without complying with one, I should not matter it; but Polly is Tinder, and a Spark will at once set her on a Flame. Married! If the Wench does not know her own Profit, sure she knows her own Pleasure better than to make herself a Property! My Daughter to me should be, like a Court-Lady to a Minister of State, a Key to the whole Gang. Married! If the Affair ...
— The Beggar's Opera - to which is prefixed the Musick to each Song • John Gay
... with the whole web of your goodness, nature has interwoven into the fine fabric of her form a thread of my evil—not in the grosser sense,—no, no; still, look after her; the breath of passion must be stirring in her, and at her years most maids are tinder to love's dropping sparks. Remember, there never yet was a nun but once had tender thoughts. Love comes unto all that live, and with not less certainty than death's advances —nay, even the cold, ...
— The Advocate • Charles Heavysege
... he took a small silver case containing flint, steel and tinder. Then we went into my rooms, where he stripped me, rubbed me down, and disposed of my garments as he had of his. My wallet he took pains to hide in the bottom of a chest, after emptying it and putting the contents about so that each article was hidden in a different ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White
... was dry like tinder. Ned had nothing to do but to set the torch. In an instant the leaves leaped into a roaring flame. The blaze ran higher, took hold of the trees and ran from bough to bough. It sprang to other trees, and, in an incredibly brief ...
— The Texan Star - The Story of a Great Fight for Liberty • Joseph A. Altsheler
... or German tinder, readily inflame from flint and steel, or from the sudden condensation ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, - Issue 479, March 5, 1831 • Various
... a beautiful chalcedony or agate, which has been formed in cavities in the volcanic rocks which occur so abundantly in north-eastern Asia, and which probably are also found here and there as pebbles in the beds of the tundra rivers. As tinder, are used partly the woolly hair of various animals, partly dry fragments of different kinds of plants. The steel and a large number of pieces of flint are kept in a skin pouch suspended from the neck. Within this pouch there is a smaller one, containing the tinder. It is ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold
... English comedy," said Flemming laughing, "in which a scholar is described, as a creature, that can strike fire in the morning at his tinder-box,—put on a pair of lined slippers,—sit ruminating till dinner, and then go to his meat when the bell rings;—one that hath a peculiar gift in a cough, and a license to spit;—or, if you will have him defined by negatives, he is one that cannot make ...
— Hyperion • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... every one else, was occupied in gathering and discussing news about it, and in visiting the Stone-pits. The rain had washed away all possibility of distinguishing foot-marks, but a close investigation of the spot had disclosed, in the direction opposite to the village, a tinder-box, with a flint and steel, half sunk in the mud. It was not Silas's tinder-box, for the only one he had ever had was still standing on his shelf; and the inference generally accepted was, that the tinder-box ...
— Silas Marner - The Weaver of Raveloe • George Eliot
... observed the prospector. "I was down to my last match." And, gathering some mesquit brush for fuel, and rubbing a dead branch into tinder, he drew out a knife and, rapidly and repeatedly striking the back of its blade with the flint, produced a stream of sparks, which fell on the tinder. Blowing the while, he started a flame. When the fire was ready the man shook his ...
— The Round-up - A Romance of Arizona novelized from Edmund Day's melodrama • John Murray and Marion Mills Miller
... they must inevitably perish, they determined to search for the hut, and to winter there, if so fortunate as to find it. Himkof, with three others, were selected to make the search. They were provided with a musket, twelve charges of powder, a dozen balls, an axe, a small kettle, a knife, a tinder-box and tinder, a wooden pipe for each, some tobacco, and a bag with twenty pounds of flour. This was as much as they could carry with safety, as they had to make their way for two miles over loose ridges of ice, which would ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 433 - Volume 17, New Series, April 17, 1852 • Various
... cindhers at th' rollin' mills. Some iv thim took pinsions because they needed thim; but divvle th' wan iv thim ye'll see paradin' up an' down Ar-rchey Road with a blue coat on, wantin' to fight th' war over with Schwartzmeister's bar-tinder that niver heerd iv but wan war, an' that th' rites iv sivinty-sivin. Sare a wan. No, faith. They'd as lave decorate a confeatherate's grave as a thrue pathrite's. All they want is a chanst to go out to th' cimitry; an', faith, who doesn't ...
— Mr. Dooley: In the Hearts of His Countrymen • Finley Peter Dunne
... a giddy fool as I was, I needs must give them a startler—the whoop of an owl, done so exactly, as John Fry had taught me, and echoed by the roof so fearfully, that one of them dropped the tinder box; and the other caught up his gun and cocked it, at least as I judged by the sounds they made. And then, too late, I knew my madness, for if either of them had fired, no doubt but what all the village would have risen and rushed upon me. However, as the luck of the matter went, it proved for my ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... Fuel. — N. fuel, firing, combustible. [solid fuels] coal, wallsend[obs3], anthracite, culm[obs3], coke, carbon, charcoal, bituminous coal, tar shale; turf, peat, firewood, bobbing, faggot, log; cinder &c. (products of combustion) 384; ingle, tinder, touchwood; sulphur, brimstone; incense; port-fire; fire-barrel, fireball, brand; amadou[obs3], bavin[obs3]; blind coal, glance coal; German tinder, pyrotechnic sponge, punk, smudge [U. S.]; solid fueled rocket. [fuels for candles and lamps] wax, paraffin wax, paraffin oil; lamp oil, whale ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... crept in, very timid and quiet, and dropped a little bag upon the things for my journey. And in the little bag, I knew, were the flint and steel and the well-dried tinder for the fires my soul must build. And the blankets were chosen which were to be wrapped around me. Also were the slaves selected that were to be killed that my soul might have company. There were seven of these slaves, for my father was rich and powerful, and ...
— Children of the Frost • Jack London
... coulee bank, I found several flints, hard and white. Then I tore out a bit of my coat lining and moistened it a trifle, and saturated it with powder from my flask, rubbed in until it all was dry. This niter-soaked fabric I thought might serve as tinder for the spark. So then I struck flint and steel, and got the strange spark, hidden in the cold stone ages and ages there on the Plains; and presently the spark was a little flame, and then a good fire, and ...
— The Way of a Man • Emerson Hough
... great domed building that burned up last night after the illuminations. It was madness to cover public buildings with open oil lamps and leave them to be looked after by natives—this huge Taj hotel, dry as tinder outside, a complexity of dry wooden jalousies and balconies, was covered with these lights and floating flags—how it didn't go off like a squib was a miracle. I saw one flag gently float into a lamp, burn up and fall in flaming shreds and no one ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... sufficing to sever a limb, while recovery from its stab is almost hopeless. Attached to the girdle also are a powder-flask, a small metallic box containing fat to anoint the rifle-balls, a purse of skin for carrying flints, tinder, and steel, and not unfrequently a hatchet, or knife in a sheath. The sabre is silver-hilted, without a guard; and its scabbard, richly embroidered, is composed of several pieces of morocco of different colors. The pistols also are mounted with silver; the poniard ...
— Life of Schamyl - And Narrative of the Circassian War of Independence Against Russia • John Milton Mackie
... deum. Shake off thy sleep, get up betimes, Go to the church and pray, And, never fear, God will thee hear, And keep thee all the day. Good counsel, boys; observe it, mark it well; This early rising, this diluculo Is good both for your bodies and your minds: 'Tis not yet day; give me my tinder-box; Meantime, unloose your satchels and your books: Draw, draw, and take ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various
... girl is the subject. Of course that was ever so long ago, when there were no lucifer matches, and steel and tinder were used to light fires; when soda and saleratus had never been heard of, but people made their pearl ash by soaking burnt crackers in water; when the dressmaker and the tailor and the shoemaker went from house ...
— Dotty Dimple Out West • Sophie May
... wood, they are all ablaze. Up three flights of stairs and no exit! I gave myself up for lost. Half unconscious I hurried back to the window. I heard the cries from the street, "A man! a man! This way with the ladder!" A ladder was set up. In an instant it began to smoke and to burn like tinder. It was dragged away. Then streams of water from all the engines hissed in the flames beneath me. Distinctly I could hear each separate stream striking the glowing wall. A fresh ladder was put up; below there was deathly silence and you can imagine that I, ...
— The German Classics Of The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries, Volume 12 • Various
... compared in importance to the heart. The heart is said to be the lord of the body, which it rules as a master rules his house. Shall the lord, who is the heart, be ailing and his sickness be neglected, while his servants, who are the members only, are cared for? If the knee be lacerated, apply tinder to stop the bleeding; if the moxa should suppurate, spread a plaster; if a cold be caught, prepare medicine and garlic and gruel, and ginger wine! For a trifle, you will doctor and care for your bodies, and yet for your hearts you will take no care. Although you are born of mankind, ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... ancient cave homelike and familiar. There was less litter within than she had found without and what there was was mostly an accumulation of dust. Beside the doorway was the niche in which wood and tinder were kept, but there remained nothing now other than mere dust. She had however saved a little pile of twigs from the debris on the porch. In a short time she had made a light by firing a bundle ...
— Tarzan the Terrible • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... living north of the Pueblos, say that at one time all the nations, Navajos, Pueblos, Coyoteros, and white people, lived together tinder ground, in the heart of a mountain, near the river San Juan. Their food was meat, which they had in abundance, for all kinds of game were closed up with them in their cave; but their light was dim, and only endured for a ...
— Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel • Ignatius Donnelly
... presence of his sister, and destroyed by a cannon placed six paces off, but only loaded with powder, in order to prolong the agony; now, a Christian accused of having tried to blow up Janina by introducing mice with tinder fastened to their tails into the powder magazine, who was shut up in the cage of Ali's favourite tiger ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - ALI PACHA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... you got away, which you couldn't do, they would come back and capture the depot. We have got to fight for it, that's evident; and the boats of a fleet could hardly make their way in here. We had best get the three craft moored with their broadsides to the entrance. We will blow the boats to tinder if they try to come in, and then we can load up with all the most valuable goods and slip out at night-time. That is ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty
... thought he stopped, and the cursing tongue was silent. Five minutes later he left the place, closing the door carefully behind him; but before that time a red jet of flame, like the ravenous tongue of a famished beast, was lapping at a hastily assembled pile of tinder-dry furniture in one ...
— Ben Blair - The Story of a Plainsman • Will Lillibridge
... operating there for nearly a week. The Oahu had been detached from the Atlantic Fleet only a few days ago, to combat the possible threat. Maybe the ships were only acting as stake-outs for the politicians, the Captain thought slowly. The tinder waiting for the spark. And it wouldn't ...
— Decision • Frank M. Robinson
... for making a new petticoat or nightgown, makes it alone in her room on the Thursday night lights a fire (not to destroy it; two of her fellow-servants are prying outside her door, and she knows better than to make a smell of burning, and to have a lot of tinder to get rid of)—lights a fire, I say, to dry and iron the substitute dress after wringing it out, keeps the stained dress hidden (probably ON her), and is at this moment occupied in making away with it, in ...
— The Moonstone • Wilkie Collins
... the works of the earliest great Venetian master must have acted on the public like a spark on tinder. They certainly found a sudden and assured popularity, for they play a more and more important part in the pictures executed for the Schools, many of the subjects of which were readily turned into studies of ordinary ...
— The Venetian Painters of the Renaissance - Third Edition • Bernhard Berenson
... carnal desire, Thou tempting, consuming and treacherous fire, That catches like tinder and scorches like flame, Consigning the victim to sorrow and shame, Thy honeyest potion is wormwood and gall; ...
— Hymns and Hymnwriters of Denmark • Jens Christian Aaberg
... and gave them names accordingly; wherefore the serpent, Adam knew, was subtil, therefore Satan useth him, thereby to catch this goodly creature. Hereby the devil least appeared; and least appearing, the temptation soonest took the tinder.[7] ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... letter, sir,' he said; 'it wasn't written under dictation, and she wasn't bribed to write it. There's heart in it, sir, if I may be allowed the expression: there's a woman's heart in that letter: and when a woman's heart is once allowed scope, a woman's brains shrivel up like so much tinder. I put this letter to that speech in the corridor at the Reindeer, Mr. Austin; and out of those two twos I verily believe I can make the queerest four that was ever reckoned up ...
— Henry Dunbar - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... your smocks, Look well to your locks, And your tinder box, Your wheels and your rocks, Your hens and your cocks, Your cows and your ox, And beware of the fox. When the bellman knocks, Put out your fire and candle-light, So they shall not you affright: May you ...
— The Sources and Analogues of 'A Midsummer-night's Dream' • Compiled by Frank Sidgwick
... fire is a natural transition. How to get a blaze just when you want it puzzles the will sometimes hugely. Every traveller should provide himself with a good handy steel, proper flint, and unfailing tinder, because lucifers are liable to many accidents. Pliny recommended the wood of mulberry, bay-laurel, and ivy, as good material to be rubbed together in order to procure a fire; but Pliny is behind the times, and must not be trusted to make rules for General ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 50, December, 1861 • Various
... which heretofore were us'd by the most famous artists, especially the curious pieces of Raphael, Durer, and Holbin, and before that of canvass, and much more lasting: To these add the galls, misletoe, polypod, agaric (us'd in antidotes) uvae, fungus's to make tinder, and many other useful excrescencies, to the number of above twenty, which doubtless discover the variety of transudations, percolations and contextures of this admirable tree; but of the several fruits, and animals generated of them, and other trees, ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn
... Israel, and it remains true to-day and for ever. Do we see it fulfilled? One looks round upon our congregations, and into one's own heart, and we behold the parable of Gideon's fleece acted over again—some places soaked with the refreshing moisture, and some as hard as a rock and as dry as tinder and ready to catch fire from any spark from the devil's forge and be consumed in the everlasting burnings some day. It will do us good to ask ourselves why it is that, with a promise like this for every Christian soul to ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... some draught, went out, and we were in darkness. Amante proposed that we should carry the letters back to my salon, collecting them as well as we could in the dark, and returning all but the expected one for me; but I begged her to return to my room, where I kept tinder and flint, and to strike a fresh light; and I remained alone in the room, of which I could only just distinguish the size, and the principal articles of furniture: a large table, with a deep, overhanging cloth, in the middle, ...
— Curious, if True - Strange Tales • Elizabeth Gaskell
... dress of a revolutionary soldier, carrying on his shoulder a musket that was a fire-lock, and slung at his side was a powder-horn, while in his tinder-box were flint and steel. How many battles this old Continental had been in, what victories he had won, and what hardships he had endured! He was not slow to tell of ...
— The Knights of the White Shield - Up-the-Ladder Club Series, Round One Play • Edward A. Rand
... shouted back to duck, and they passed tinder a low roof where water dripped on them, and the rock underfoot was the bed of a shallow stream. After that the track began to rise, and the grade grew so steep that even Ismail, the furious, had to ...
— King—of the Khyber Rifles • Talbot Mundy
... cold, do not forget to throw a rug or horse-blanket over your pump; a frozen pump is a comfortless preparation for a winter's breakfast. Never allow ashes to be taken up in wood, or put into wood. Always have your tinder-box and lantern ready for use, in case of sudden alarm. Have important papers all together, where you can lay your hand on them at once, ...
— The American Frugal Housewife • Lydia M. Child
... wild outburst of drums and groans he sprang towards the King-God elect and anointed his breast and shoulders with a pungent compound, and leaped away into another dance, while Mungongo plied the two fire sticks. When the spark was blown upon the dry tinder and the first flame flickered Bakahenzie dropped flat before the gate as from the wizards ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... was ever his master, and to- day the King's health had been a fair excuse. He did not spy me, but the roar of his ballad had startled the two men outside, and so, while he was stumbling over chairs, and groping for a tinder-box, I slipp'd out in the darkness, and ...
— The Splendid Spur • Arthur T. Quiller Couch
... The primitive mind is slow to resent an affront, and while the chief deputy had couched his last remarks in well-chosen language, his intimation that I was a fugitive from justice, and an outlaw in resisting arrest, was tinder to stubble. Knowing the metal of my outfit, I curbed the tempest within me, and relying on a brother whom I would gladly follow to death if need be, I waved hands off to my boys. "Now, men," said Bob to the deputies, "the easiest way out of this matter ...
— The Outlet • Andy Adams
... fire,—but such a fire as they Upon the moment could contrive with such Materials as were cast up round the bay,— Some broken planks, and oars, that to the touch Were nearly tinder, since so long they lay A mast was almost crumbled to a crutch; But, by God's grace, here wrecks were in such plenty, That there was fuel ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... not to unsaddle him, but, cutting the surcingle with my knife, left him to shake the saddle off; then with the bridle I hammered on the door, shouting to my wife to open. I heard her fumbling for the tinder-box. 'For the love of Heaven, woman, strike no light,' I cried. 'Santa Barbara bendita! have you seen a ghost?' she exclaimed, opening to me. 'Yes,' I replied, rushing in and bolting the door, 'and had you struck a light you would now ...
— The Purple Land • W. H. Hudson
... was the spark to tinder, the lead at last. "Everything, Harry, everything." A halt for composure. "I suppose if I were to pick out one single thing, though, that was worse than another, it's my writing. I think, I know, ...
— The Dominant Dollar • Will Lillibridge
... clamor on behalf of proletaries, who write works against the Jesuits, who busy themselves about the amelioration of no matter what,—the communists, the humanitarians, the philanthropists, you understand,—all these people are our advanced guard. While we are storing gunpowder, they are making the tinder which the spark of a single ...
— Unconscious Comedians • Honore de Balzac
... tense moment he seemed to hear his father's voice saying to him, "Why, boy, you're built like an ox!" The memory was like a match to tinder. He flung his hard young legs about the man's ankles, bringing him down like a dead weight upon his own body. With the wind half crushed out of him, he struggled and rolled to protect his revolver. A dozen times the man snatched, ...
— The Shagganappi • E. Pauline Johnson
... their cooking arrangements were very primitive. In the first place, they were compelled to make a fire by the method in use among the savages, of rubbing two sticks smartly together, and catching the flame in a little prepared tinder. The fish were baked over the fire thus kindled. Though the outside was smoked, the inside was sweet and palatable, and neither was disposed to be fastidious. The preparation of the meal took considerable time, but they had abundance of that, and occupation prevented ...
— Brave and Bold • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... house laughing, but indignant. "Says your hay's in danger o' heatin', Moses! As if you hadn't cured it till it was dry as tinder 'fore you mowed it up. Well, 'twon't do no harm, an' will keep him out of mischief. He's a reg'lar poke-noser, Deacon Meakin is. But he's routed them hens so there won't be no more egg-layin' in high places, breakin' a body's neck to hunt 'em. But, my suz! I wish you could ha' seen that ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond
... used as tinder, derived from Polyporus fomentarius, a fungus belonging to the group Basidiomycetes and somewhat resembling a mushroom in manner of growth. It grows upon old trees, especially the oak, ash, fir and cherry. The fungus is cut into slices and then steeped in a solution of nitre. ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... twilight settled deeper over the room. There was only a flicker on the brass andirons, a blur of pale blossoms where the potted azalea stood. The rain drummed steadily, and as steadily came the gentle modulations of Kirk's voice, as the tale of "The Tinder-Box" progressed. ...
— The Happy Venture • Edith Ballinger Price
... him near an hour ago, sir, he stopped on his way up to light his cigar at the tinder lamp on ...
— The Empire Annual for Girls, 1911 • Various
... spark in my tinder grew dull and went out. For a long while I lay there, thinking, awed by the ways of God—so certain, so inscrutable. And understood how at the last all things must be revealed—even the momentary and lightest impulse, and every ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... is desirable; but in arteriosclerosis, or when the blood pressure is high and the heart labors tinder the disadvantage of contracting against an abnormal circulatory resistance, alcohol may act perfectly to relieve this kind of circulatory disturbance. In this condition the alcohol should not be given concentrated, and ...
— DISTURBANCES OF THE HEART • OLIVER T. OSBORNE, A.M., M.D.
... She was living in the two-family house on Ash Street, with the dressmaker and her three children and feeble-minded father, in the lower flat. There was the desired back yard for Jacky, where a thicket of golden glow lounged against the fence, and where, tinder stretching clothes lines, a tiny garden overflowed with color and perfume. Every day little Lily would leave her own work (which was heavy, for she had several "mealers") and run downstairs to help Mrs. Hayes wash and dress ...
— The Vehement Flame • Margaret Wade Campbell Deland
... the dam all round. "This is our best friend of all," said she. "Without this the sun would turn us all to tinder,—crops, flowers, ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade
... room. Maria had not returned from Madame de Ruth's apartment. She kindled a light from her steel tinder-casket and set a waxen taper aglow. Then she began ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay
... of a drought, when the tall dead grass was like tinder for hundreds of miles and a carelessly-dropped match would set the whole country on fire, Swampy would strike a hard-faced squatter, manager or overseer with a cold eye, and the conversation would ...
— Children of the Bush • Henry Lawson
... followers. But remarkable as that delusion was, it is almost forgotten now, so many extravagancies tread upon one another's heels, and hustle each its predecessor off the stage. Spirit-rapping is the last, and is spreading like wildfire throughout the land: some characters have so much tinder in their composition, that they catch in a moment. But it will soon go out—'tis like the crackling of thorns under the pot—a quick blaze for a moment, and then ...
— Holidays at the Grange or A Week's Delight - Games and Stories for Parlor and Fireside • Emily Mayer Higgins |
