"Alert" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... morning's work the sleepy deacon and the alert constable contended over the possession of ...
— The Light in the Clearing • Irving Bacheller
... her: he was on guard in the nave with his regiment. I wanted to make some sign to her, but I had been told that everybody would be looking at me. When I was crowned, "everybody" had meant Krak, and I had feared no other eye. I was more self-conscious now. I was particularly alert that my mother should observe nothing. But the Countess and I exchanged a glance; she nodded cautiously; almost immediately afterward I saw her wipe her eyes. I should have liked to talk to her, tell her that I liked being a king rather better, ...
— The King's Mirror • Anthony Hope
... refused me a dollar to begin again, so we were soon reduced to the greatest misery. True it is, that I now and then shear a mule, and my wife tells the bahi (fortune) to the servant-girls, but these things stand us in little stead: the people are now very much on the alert, and my wife, with all her knowledge, has been unable to perform any grand trick which would set us up at once. She wished to come to see you, brother, this night, but was ashamed, as she has no more clothes than myself. Last summer ...
— The Zincali - An Account of the Gypsies of Spain • George Borrow
... their saddles, with reins tight drawn, and heels ready to drive home the spur—with glances bent greedily at the gleaming lights, and ears keenly alert to catch every sound—the hearts of some trembling with fear, others throbbing with hope, still others thrilling with the thought of vengeance—they wait for the crack that is to be the signal— wait and listen, with difficulty ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid
... and look at it; and presently you become conscious of a difference between it and all the other houses. They are all alert, busy, noisy, crowded with life in every storey, oozing vitality from every window; but of all the narrow vertical strips that make up the houses of the street, this strip numbered thirty-seven is empty, ...
— Christopher Columbus, Complete • Filson Young
... white from too much sentry-go and too little sleep. There is little distinction between sailors and Legation people, for we are all in the same dilemma. On this eventful 20th of June, instead of being resolute and alert, everybody is merely tired and weakened by a couple of weeks' watchfulness against Boxers during an unofficial semi-siege, a state of affairs which has quite unfitted us for fresh strains. Yet beyond our barricades of upturned carts and stolen building-bricks all was quiet and peaceful, ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale
... came to me," he continued in his low, pained voice. "It happens that I have known Mr. Marcy here for years; we were friends in college, though we had lost track of one another till his business brought him here. A few small circumstances—my suspicion was already on the alert—made me guess that Mr. Marcy was about to give Doctor West a bribe for having awarded the filter contract to his company. I got Mr. Marcy alone—taxed him with his ...
— Counsel for the Defense • Leroy Scott
... because their schooling had been largely inferior and their work therefore chiefly unskilled. Nevertheless, the Army staff concluded, all races were equally endowed for war and most of the less mentally alert could fight if properly led.[2-40] ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.
... slightest trace of family resemblance between them, and yet the man was hardly of a type that she would choose for so intimate a friend as her presence here with him suggested. She did not talk much, but seemed rather to be on the alert to protect him as from some unseen danger which appeared to hang over him. She followed his eyes wherever they wandered, and clearly took but little pleasure ...
— The Seventh Noon • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... and as quitting time approached, he became more tense—more alert. Five minutes before the whistle, he faded back into the building and hurried to the lavatory. He went into the booth furthest from the entrance and locked the door. Now there was nothing to do but wait. Another of the ...
— The Stowaway • Alvin Heiner
... was when, at the next morning's durbar, Nur Mahomed appeared before him fresh, alert, and smiling as usual. He was determined, however, to try once more, and bidding the young man come into his presence that evening, gave orders that he was to carry a secret despatch to the governor of a distant province. 'Make your preparations at once,' added he, 'and be ready to start in the ...
— The Brown Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... gone to bed!" exclaimed Blaize, "I had just taken a couple of rufuses, and was about to put on my nightcap, when, hearing a noise without, and being ever on the alert to defend my master's property, even at the hazard of my life, I stepped forth ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... time Janet's eyes and ears were on the alert in a double sense of which the Major knew nothing. He was busy with a description of the last spring flower show, and how the Duke of Cheltenham's auriculas were by no means equal to those of Major Strickland, when Janet gave a little start as ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 5, May, 1891 • Various
... he heard a series of little chirps, faint but unmistakable. He was alert in an instant. Yes, that was the snowbirds, and they were coming. He wondered if Fat heard them and was ready. Where was Fat, anyway? How strange he felt, now he was almost afraid, for he was sure something was watching ...
— Buffalo Roost • F. H. Cheley
... is for the most part a lonely place. Men pass through the melancholy iron-gates by which that quadrangle is entered on three sides—from Broad street, from the Ratcliff, and from New College-Lane—when necessity leads them that way, with alert step and silently. No nursemaids or children play about it. Nobody lives in it. Only when the examinations are going on you may see a few hooded figures who walk as though conscious of the powers of academic life and death which they wield, and ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... Jesuit, an active Royalist, and a staunch worker for the Church party. I don't know much about French politics—that is Vellacott's department. But I know that if he were here, and knew of the Vicomte's presence in England, he would be very much on the alert." ...
— The Slave Of The Lamp • Henry Seton Merriman
... Nature. The British Army was, to a great extent, stale and veld-sick. It was informed that the war would soon be over, and it had become slack and careless. Convoys were sent afield with insufficient escorts to run the gauntlet of ever watchful and alert Boer commandants; Intelligence news qualified by the reports of untrustworthy native spies was transmitted circumferentially from column to column, with the result that the leader to whom it was of the most importance was sometimes the last to ...
— A Handbook of the Boer War • Gale and Polden, Limited
... he stood with clenched fists and heaving breast; then, with grim eagerness, with every sense supernaturally alert, with nerves tense, quick eyes and ready muscles, he ...
— The Eyes of the World • Harold Bell Wright
... Norgate droop or mope; she was alive to every advantage, alert to improve every opportunity. Frankly she praised the house at Ashpound, which she had formerly known at the distance of common acquaintanceship, but now knew in the nearness of home, from garret to cellar. "What a well-seasoned, ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... interrupted Patricia, suddenly alert again, "I don't believe I'll ever amount to a row of pins as an artist? I always forget the work and think only of the people and the fun. I wonder if I can't brace up and do something worth while. I'll start ...
— Miss Pat at School • Pemberton Ginther
... songs come from imagination," said Joe McCarthy. "A song-writer's mind is ever alert for something new. What might pass as a casual remark to an outsider, might be a great idea to a writer. For instance, a very dear young lady friend might have said, 'You made me love you—I didn't want to do it.' Of course no young lady friend ...
— Writing for Vaudeville • Brett Page
... in what he was saying; his small eyes glistened and he took a step forward. "Your lordship remembers the 'Frisco Pet? Your lordship remembers him?" he repeated, thrusting an alert face closer. ...
— Half A Chance • Frederic S. Isham
... the judge pronounced the sentence of death. Again the dark figure was by the prisoner's side, alert, erect, every faculty of mind and body at its highest tension, her cheeks aflame with defiance, her eyes gleaming with ...
— The One Woman • Thomas Dixon
... tries To purchase happiness that age denies; Obtains the shadow, but the substance goes, And hugs the thorn, but cannot keep the rose; For Dead Sea fruits bids prodigally, eats, And then, with tardy reformation—cheats. Alert his faculties as three score years And four score vices will permit, he nears— Dicing with Death—the finish of the game, And curses still his candle's wasting flame, The narrow circle of whose feeble glow Dims and ...
— Black Beetles in Amber • Ambrose Bierce
... thrilling series of mystery stories for girls. Nancy Drew, ingenious, alert, is the daughter of a famous criminal lawyer and she herself is deeply interested in his mystery cases. Her interest involves her often in some very ...
— The Corner House Girls at School • Grace Brooks Hill
... walking along the path before me with his eyes on the ground—walking so slowly, and with his lean frame so bent that I might have supposed him ill if I had not remarked the steady movement of his head from right to left, and the alert touch with which he now and again displaced a clod of earth or a cluster of leaves. By-and-by he rose stiffly, and looked round him suspiciously; but by that time I had slipped behind a trunk, and was not to be seen; and after a brief interval ...
— Under the Red Robe • Stanley Weyman
... from early morning till late afternoon, aboard on the sea, trolling, watching, waiting, eternally on the alert, I had kept at the game. My emotional temperament made this game a particularly trying one. And every possible unlucky, unforeseen, and sickening thing that could happen to a fisherman had happened. I grew morbid, hopeless. I could no longer ...
— Tales of Fishes • Zane Grey
... rue Mandar, when Lucien de Rubempre was presented to him. Vernou was a caustic critic on the side of the oppositon. The uncongeniality of his domestic life embittered his character and his genius. He was a finished specimen of the envious man, and pursued Lucien de Rubempre with an alert and malicious jealousy. [A Bachelor's Establishment. Lost Illusions. A Distinguished Provincial at Paris. Scenes from a Courtesan's Life.] In 1834, Blondet recommended him to Nathan as a "Handy Andy" for a newspaper. [A Daughter ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe
... swaggered along the streets and laughed loudly and talked with an audacious freedom that was often the cause of his expulsion from respectable company. A glass or two of wine seemed quite to turn his brain; he was alert then for any frivolity, and he was not always content with so restricted a libation, when the consequences were even more ...
— Art in England - Notes and Studies • Dutton Cook
... the detective, who seemed to have fallen into a kind of anxious dream. Would it do to interrupt him with questions? Would he obtain a straight answer if he did? The old man moved heavily but the now fully alert Curator could not fail to see that it was with the heaviness of absorbed thought. Dare he disturb that thought? They had both reached the broad corridor separating the two galleries at the western end before he ...
— The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow • Anna Katharine Green
... to which man's inner life is open, is alert every moment, not occasional. It is gentle and not tyrannical, constantly respecting man's freedom and reason, otherwise losing him as a human being. It has set this and other laws for itself which it pursues undeviatingly. The larger part of the book is an exposition of these laws in the conviction ...
— Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence • Emanuel Swedenborg
... glad of the opportunity to sit for a moment also; for 'my part, I was quite alert. Alas! my dear Susan, 'tis my mind that is so weak, and so open to disorder;- my body, I really find, when it is an independent person, very strong, and capable of much exertion without ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... in tense whispers, and the listening was now of the same tenseness. Two khaki-clad Sammies stood on the alert in the muddy ditch, dignified by the title, "trench," and tried to pierce the darkness that was like a pall of black ...
— The Khaki Boys Over the Top - Doing and Daring for Uncle Sam • Gordon Bates
... empirical, especially in medicine. Denial may be given to this statement, nevertheless it is true, and I have had practical exemplification of it in my own experience. Observation is perhaps more powerful an organon than either experiment or empiricism. If the eye is always watching, and the mind on the alert, ...
— The Story of My Heart • Richard Jefferies
... especially for the first fifty years. They built and burnt innumerable stockades for and against; built wooden Forts which are now stone Towns. They fought much and prevalently; galloped desperately to and fro, ever on the alert. In peaceabler ulterior times, they fenced in the Nogat and the Weichsel with dams, whereby unlimited quagmire might become grassy meadow,—as it continues to this day. Marienburg (MARY'S Burg), still a town of importance in that same grassy region, ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol, II. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Of Brandenburg And The Hohenzollerns—928-1417 • Thomas Carlyle
... the first of Charlemagne's peers and the darling of the emperor's heart, was left to guard the rear of the retiring hosts; and the heathen, silently, and by thousands and tens of thousands, were massing together,—watchful, alert. ...
— With Spurs of Gold - Heroes of Chivalry and their Deeds • Frances Nimmo Greene
... that moment Sir Seymour felt positive that a struggle was going on in Arabian in which the drink he had taken was playing a part. The intensely suspicious nature of the enemy of society, always on the alert, because always liable to be in danger, was at odds with the demon that steals away the wits of men, unchains their recklessness, unlocks their tongues, uncovers often their most secret inclinations. Arabian was hesitating. ...
— December Love • Robert Hichens
... erect figure—gazed at her with surprise, then thrust his head from the window and bowed with smiling, if somewhat exaggerated, politeness. The next moment carriage and traveler vanished down the road in a cloud of dust, but an alert observer might have noticed an eye at the rear port-hole, as though the person within was supplementing his brief observation from the side with a longer, ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... enforces in the most appealing terms the fundamental teaching of all the work of his mature years. First of all, we have the boyhood of the two friends who are afterwards to grow apart in their sympathies; the one alert of mind, imaginative, open to every intellectual influence, also impetuous and hot-blooded; the other shy and intellectually stolid, but good to the very core, and moved by the strongest of altruistic impulses. In accordance ...
— Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson • William Morton Payne
... coming, and when at last he did enter the room, he advanced two or three steps and paused as though he meant presently to go out again. After his usual quiet good-morning with his sober smile, he gave his alert listeners the clue ...
— A Cathedral Singer • James Lane Allen
... over the side for the phosphorescence of the water, and watching the smoke of the funnel lose itself overhead. The silent stars and sparkling waves would have set Phoebe's dutiful science on the alert, or transported Honor's inward ear by the chant of creation, but to her they were of moderate interest, and her imagination fell a prey to the memory of the eyes averted, and hand withdrawn. 'I'll be exemplary when this is over,' ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... enjoy up to the present. Now I am going to count three, and when I say 'Three', you will open your eyes and come out of the passive state in which you are now. You will come out of it quite naturally, without feeling in the least drowsy or tired, on the contrary, you will feel strong, vigorous, alert, active, full of life; further still, you will feel very cheerful and fit in every way. 'ONE—TWO—THREE—' At the word 'three' the subject opens his eyes, always with a smile and an expression of well-being ...
— Self Mastery Through Conscious Autosuggestion • Emile Coue
... they sat, trying to make talk, and each pretended to himself and to the other that he was not worrying. But Tom, who had a scout's ear, started and his heart beat faster at every trifling stir outside. Then, as they realized that darkness must have fallen, they became more alert for sounds and a little apprehensive. They knew Florette would come quietly, but Tom believed he ...
— Tom Slade with the Boys Over There • Percy K. Fitzhugh
... himself up. He plucked at Robert's sleeve. A change had come over him in the last minutes. His sunken brown eyes had dried and become rather terribly alert. Something too fine—too exquisitely balanced in him had been disturbed and ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... although profound for three or four hours, was subsequently restless. The mind, when agitated, watches for the body, and wakes it at the time when it should be on the alert. Newton woke up: it was not yet daylight, and all was hushed. He turned round, intending to get up immediately; yet, yielding to the impulse of wearied nature, he again slumbered. Once he thought that he ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... scavenger is the peccary, a species of wild hog, whose home ranges from Texas to the Pampas of South America. He is a devourer of creatures more obnoxious than himself. He moves with great rapidity, is always on the alert, and stops at nothing from mountains to a flowing river. When he attacks an enemy he makes short work ...
— The Human Side of Animals • Royal Dixon
... to is the invasion of Rome by the Gauls in 390 B.C. They captured the whole of the city, except the Capitol, which was successfully defended by Manlius, who had been put on the alert by the cackling ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil
... of the district were on the alert, and several suspicious-looking men found lurking about, were taken up. A hat which fitted one of them was picked up in Mr. Hewson's grove; the gravel under the end window bore many signs of trampling feet; and there were marks on the wall as if guns had rested against it. ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... must not excite yourself. These deceptions are very usual in war; the eye, in the moment of alert, is hardly to be trusted, and when the smoke blows away you see the man you fired at, taking aim, it may be, at yourself. You should observe, too, that you were in the dark night, and somewhat dazzled by the lamps, and that the sudden stopping of the mail had jolted you. ...
— Lay Morals • Robert Louis Stevenson
... most of which he made on his back premises, changed Ould Michael and the whole company! From being solemn, silent, alert and generally good-natured, they became wildly vociferous, reckless, boastful and quarrelsome. That Sunday, as always happens in the Mountains, where there are plenty of whisky and a crowd of men, was utterly horrible. The men went wild in all sorts of ...
— Michael McGrath, Postmaster • Ralph Connor
... was now ruined, for fevers, sleeplessness, gout, and eyestrain kept him in constant pain, and at times made even that strong mind of his a little queer and wobbly. But on one point at least it remained alert and lucid,—he still could think out his course clearly. With a view to avoiding the treacherous winds and coastwise currents that had previously wrought such havoc with his ships, he set his rudders due east on leaving Veragua; his idea being to sail first ...
— Christopher Columbus • Mildred Stapley
... childhood to different kinds of danger, he suspected some treachery. He was also surprised to see Danveld, while talking with him, approach him closer and closer; the others began to ride to his sides, as if to surround him. Consequently he was upon the alert, especially as he did not have any weapons; he had not brought ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... topped the rise and the town burst suddenly into view, the little animal pricked up its ears and quickened its pace, only to feel the reins suddenly tighten and to hear the rider's voice gruffly discouraging haste. Therefore, the pony pranced gingerly, alert, champing the bit impatiently, picking its way over the lumpy hills of stone and cactus, but holding closely to ...
— The Two-Gun Man • Charles Alden Seltzer
... alert wore us to shadows; rockets from the goulet, the tocsin, the warning boom of a gun from the castle, found us spurring our jaded horses through ice and snow to scour the landward banlieue and purge it of a dreaded revolt. The names of Marx, of Flourens, of Buckhurst, were constantly ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... who was "taking his trick" all alert, instead of lounging over the spokes as he had been doing previously, listening to ...
— The White Squall - A Story of the Sargasso Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... most original pieces is the dog-vivisection poem, called The Heart in the Jar. There is a tumultuous passion in it almost overpowering; and no one but a true poet could ever have thought of or have employed such symbolism. Mr. Mackaye's mind is so alert, so inquisitive, so volcanic, that he seems to me always just about to produce something that shall surpass his previous efforts. I have certainly not lost faith in ...
— The Advance of English Poetry in the Twentieth Century • William Lyon Phelps
... seventy archers of the Persian guard, picked men, ascended the dark passage at dead of night, occupied the tower, and when morning broke displayed from it a scarlet flag, as a sign to their countrymen that a portion of the wall was taken. The Persians were upon the alert, and an instant assault was made. But the garrison, by extraordinary efforts, succeeded in recapturing the tower before any support reached its occupants; and then, directing their artillery and missiles against the assailing columns, inflicted on them tremendous losses, ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 7. (of 7): The Sassanian or New Persian Empire • George Rawlinson
... be very true; but the affair of Andre has made us on the alert. When treason reaches the grade of general officers, Captain Wharton, it behooves the friends ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... guests would mingle with the rest, lending with their silken gowns and silken manners a touch of picturesqueness to the scene. I can well remember seeing the famous Wu Ting Fang, whose alert manner made him a general favourite. He prided himself upon it—and rightly. "How old do you think I am?" he asked his host one day. "Perhaps forty-five," was the reply. "Forty-five! What a guess! Sixty-five would have been nearer—and I mean to ...
— Sir Robert Hart - The Romance of a Great Career, 2nd Edition • Juliet Bredon
... Kate were waiting for us by the roadside and, after a joyous greeting, climbed into the wagon; we then drove on to take up Willis, whom we found equally on the alert. Each made contributions to the common stock of ...
— When Life Was Young - At the Old Farm in Maine • C. A. Stephens
... stopped, and listened for some sound, and the natives, usually so alert to recognize ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Adventures on Strange Islands • Roger Thompson Finlay
... the elaborate device adopted by Campos, and by Weyler after him, to check the Cuban movements. We need only say here that, despite its cost and the number of men it tied up on guard duty, the trocha failed to restrain the alert islanders. Gomez had crossed it in his movement westward, and Maceo now followed with equal readiness. He made a feint of an attack in force on one part of the line, and when the Spaniards had concentrated to defend this ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume III • Charles Morris
... though his mind seemed heavy enough, his body was on the alert; and he appeared before Mr. Bounderby came in. 'I didn't mean to be cross, Loo,' he said, giving her his hand, and kissing her. 'I know you are fond of me, and you know I am ...
— Hard Times • Charles Dickens*
... was waiting, feverishly alert, for the pause that should allow her to begin her own detailed ...
— The Incomplete Amorist • E. Nesbit
... laboring men, should also think seriously as to what such a movement as this portends. The judges who have shown themselves able and willing effectively to check the dishonest activity of the very rich man who works iniquity by the mismanagement of corporations, who have shown themselves alert to do justice to the wageworker, and sympathetic with the needs of the mass of our people, so that the dweller in the tenement houses, the man who practices a dangerous trade, the man who is crushed by excessive ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... when he hailed Billy, and there was instant response in language of a violent character from the young disciple of Christian Science. As the two stood in a ring of boys, each watching the other and alert to catch some advantage of beginning, Billy was certainly the most unconcerned, and he appeared to advantage. He was occupied throughout every nerve and vein of his being, first in "holding the thought" he had fixed ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VI. (of X.) • Various
... became alert, as the Master had been, listening to the song of the water-carrier, now becoming ...
— Virgilia - or, Out of the Lion's Mouth • Felicia Buttz Clark
... soon reached the opposite bank. The boat bearing her car came alongside almost at the same moment. The oxen ascended the flying bridge, and in a few minutes were yoked by the alert servants who had been landed ...
— The Works of Theophile Gautier, Volume 5 - The Romance of a Mummy and Egypt • Theophile Gautier
... nothing to find from it, even if we could translate it. It's intended as a plant; either for us or for the Marquis; but I fancy, for us—so with your permission we will waste no time on it further than to keep alert for its purpose. When were you to ...
— The Cab of the Sleeping Horse • John Reed Scott
... hit a large stretch of clear water, and at such times the jingle-bell would sound in the engine-room and the Quinn would shoot forward at a rate that fairly lifted the rowboat out of the water, while Dan, kneeling astern, oar in hand, muscles tense, and mind alert, was ready to do anything that lay in his skill ...
— Dan Merrithew • Lawrence Perry
... his usefulness. Promptly at his post in the Hall of Representatives stood the veteran sentinel, watching vigilantly over the interests of his country. With an eye undimmed by age, a quick ear, a ready hand, an intellect unimpaired, he guarded the citadel of liberty, ever on the alert to detect, and mighty to repel, the approach of the foe, however covert or however open his attacks. Never did the Union, never did freedom, the world, more need his services than now. A large territory, of sufficient extent to form several States, had been blighted by slavery, and ...
— Life and Public Services of John Quincy Adams - Sixth President of the Unied States • William H. Seward
... John Tosswill's second wife, and, though over forty, a still young and alert looking woman, more Irish than Scotch in appearance, with her dark hair and blue eyes. But she came of good Highland stock and was proud ...
— What Timmy Did • Marie Adelaide Belloc Lowndes
... are doing in the cool kitchen. Trees are inquisitive and often excited; but they do not count, one has nothing to say to them, they are irresponsible, they obey the wind, which has no principles.... But what is that? I hear steps!... Up, ears open; nose on the alert!... It is the baker coming up to the rails, while the postman is opening a little gate in the hedge of lime-trees. They are friends; it is well; they bring something: you can greet them and wag your tail discreetly twice or thrice, ...
— Our Friend the Dog • Maurice Maeterlinck
... Johnson seemed to be more uniformly social, cheerful, and alert, than I had almost ever seen him. He was prompt on great occasions and on small. Taylor, who praised every thing of his own to excess; in short, 'whose geese were all swans,' as the proverb says, expatiated on the excellence of his bull-dog, ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... while the rest lay down with their arms by their side, ready to fall in at a moment's notice. A dropping fire was kept up on both sides, but this was rather for the purpose of showing that they were on the alert than with any idea of ...
— A Girl of the Commune • George Alfred Henty
... agreed with the lad, and henceforth they entered no houses save to buy bread and mead. Of meat they had plenty, for as they passed through the forests Wolf was always upon the alert, and several times found a wild boar in his lair, and kept him at bay until Edmund and Egbert ran up and with spears and swords slew him. This supplied them amply with meat, and gave them indeed far more than they could eat, but ...
— The Dragon and the Raven - or, The Days of King Alfred • G. A. Henty
... Church must be jealous and alert. Sometimes the responsibility for the presence of the wrong man in the pulpit rests with her rather than with the man himself. It is open to question whether the Church always regards with quite sufficient seriousness this business of putting names "upon the plan." We have known cases ...
— The Message and the Man: - Some Essentials of Effective Preaching • J. Dodd Jackson
... their military spirit. They were kept in a state of universal and thorough organization to protect themselves from Indian hostilities, or to respond, on any occasion, at a moment's warning, to the call of the country. The sentinel at the watch-house was ever on the alert. Authority was early obtained from the General Court to form a foot company. All adults of every description, including men much beyond middle life,—every one, in fact, who could carry a musket, belonged ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham
... with his beautiful lady, and her father and mother, Lord and Lady Palmerston. Lord Palmerston is of middle height, with a keen dark eye and black hair streaked with gray. There is something peculiarly alert and vivacious about all his movements; in short, his appearance perfectly answers to what we know of him from his public life. One has a strange, mythological feeling about the existence of people of ...
— The Life of Harriet Beecher Stowe • Charles Edward Stowe
... her lip between her teeth, and looked at David with frightened eyes. The child was instantly alert. ...
— The Awakening of Helena Richie • Margaret Deland
... vociferously invoked carita. They accompanied this demand by the corrupted cry of "nix munjay"—nothing to eat,—which they enforced by most expressive gestures, extending their mouths, and exhibiting rows of ravenous-looking teeth. The caleche drivers, too, were on the alert, and respectfully taking off their turbans, proffered their services to convey the Signore to Floriana. Delme declined their offers, and, passing a draw-bridge which divides Valletta from the country, ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman
... an intaking of breath inaudible even to themselves but clear to the ears of Joan. She was on her feet, with bright, wild eyes glancing here and there. There was no suggestion of childishness in her, but a certain willingness to flee from a great danger or attack a weaker force. She stood alert, rather than frightened, with her head back as if she scented the wind to learn what approached. The ball of gray fur straightened into the sharp ears and the flashing teeth of a coyote puppy. Buck Daniels' ...
— The Seventh Man • Max Brand
... ceased. Lester had all he could do to handle the tiller and shape his course, and Fred had to be on the alert in his management of the sheet, which strained and tugged under the force of the wind. It was a time for action rather than speech, and Bill and Teddy, who just then could do nothing but serve as ballast, looked on in silence as the Ariel tore ...
— The Rushton Boys at Treasure Cove - Or, The Missing Chest of Gold • Spencer Davenport
... to encamp in a dense cane-brake, where no foe could approach without giving warning. In the night, some thought they heard approaching footsteps. But La Salle made it manifest that they were all on the alert, and the foe, if there were ...
— The Adventures of the Chevalier De La Salle and His Companions, in Their Explorations of the Prairies, Forests, Lakes, and Rivers, of the New World, and Their Interviews with the Savage Tribes, Two Hu • John S. C. Abbott
... was only the interlude foreshadowing the tragedy of the dawn. Grant did not intend to surprise the Confederates by rushing madly and headlong at a given point, without warning or notice. He put them on the alert all along the entire line, but they were unaware where he intended to strike in deadly earnest. At dawn earnest charges, in double column, were made at different points on the line, but without success. Still the continuous roar was kept up from fort ...
— Lee's Last Campaign • John C. Gorman
... relieved him at the throttle, and running slightly slower, to make sure they would not pass over Georgetown in the darkness, Tom began to hum softly to himself as he kept a sharp lookout upon his instruments. John settled back in the seat behind, as alert for any sudden peril as his mate had ...
— Around the World in Ten Days • Chelsea Curtis Fraser
... told herself that she had to do everything alone. It was she who must save the situation. The arrogant grasp of this fact made a great impression upon her mind and her character. Henceforward she no longer dreamed about men, but was alert in her intention to make everything her tool, and everybody. From a young girl she had been converted into an unscrupulous taker from all. The death of her father was a blow which had suddenly drawn together ...
— Coquette • Frank Swinnerton
... the door until the company are seated: he places himself on the left, behind his master, who is to distribute the soup; where soup and fish are served together, his place will be at his mistress's left hand; but he must be on the alert to see that whoever is assisting him, whether male or female, are at their posts. If any of the guests has brought his own servant with him, his place is behind his master's chair, rendering such assistance to others as he can, while attending to his master's wants throughout the dinner, so that ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... truth with a friendly indirectness, and banters us out of our folly with a foreign instance. Plutarch or Montaigne is not more happy in historical parallels, for personal reflection and sober application to actual duty. Never was fancy more alert in the service of piety. His imagination is as luminous as Sir Thomas Browne's, and, if less peculiar and original in its combinations, rises into identity with more child-like and lofty worship. Ever ready to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 74, December, 1863 • Various
... of old song Drowsed at the last, and floods his corpse did whelm; But thou hast ever been alert as strong, Pilot who never slumbered at the helm. Impetuous youth aspires to rear a realm, And the State-bark to steer In other fashion. Is it faith or fear Fills the old Pilot's spirit as he moves Slow from the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, March 29, 1890 • Various
... twelve by the lower road. Jack wasted no time and we sped along the empty driveways of the estate at a furious pace. The cool damp air of the lowlands refreshed and stimulated us and we were now keenly alert and thinking hard. The lodge gates were kept open now and we went roaring through them and out into the country roads where the going was not so good. Neither of us had dared to repeat our former questions which were still uppermost in our minds. The topic was prohibitive and until we knew something ...
— Paradise Garden - The Satirical Narrative of a Great Experiment • George Gibbs
... I recall the gay transformation in my shop-mates when the whistle blew on Saturday night. The dullest and most morose showed intelligence then. The prospect of rest, be it ever so remote—even in the hereafter—roused them from their lethargy. How alert and cheerful we were on holidays, even the prolonged holiday of a strike brought its pinched joys. Quite a number of my ancient comrades of industry looked forward to the Poor House with a hopefulness born of thwarted toil. The luckiest ones out of the thousands whom ...
— An Anarchist Woman • Hutchins Hapgood
... alert, and although the next ball pitched was a bit low, he swung for it, sending it down toward ...
— The Rover Boys in the Land of Luck - Stirring Adventures in the Oil Fields • Edward Stratemeyer
... town. Here arms were distributed and orders given by their leader, named Roche. Silently and quickly they reached the town they hoped to surprise. But the regular troops, of which the garrison was chiefly composed, were on the alert, though their preparations were made full as silently. When the peasantry emerged from Tullow Street, into an exposed space, a deadly fire was opened upon them from the houses on all sides. The regulars, in perfect ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... bulk of the people, but also with the Parliament. Already were the presidents and councillors of the law-courts discussing the charges to be brought against the fallen minister in order to justify his dismissal; while the foreign ambassadors were equally alert in writing to acquaint their several courts with the overthrow of Richelieu and the supremacy ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... Blue Bonnet more than the unexpected news that she was to remain in Woodford another three months had done. She was unusually keen and alert, intuitive to a degree, and while Aunt Lucinda's manner was all that could be desired, she felt that she had been a disappointment in some way. She rose a little wearily and going to the piano ran her fingers over ...
— Blue Bonnet in Boston - or, Boarding-School Days at Miss North's • Caroline E. Jacobs
... of eye and ear are in the will. As the will bends those hinges move of themselves. Eye and ear and mind open. The lower the will bends, the more fully and habitually, the more will eyes and ears open, the keener and more alert will be the mental processes, the more intelligent the understanding. And there comes to be a continual mutual shifting. With better understanding can come stronger more intelligent yielding of will, ...
— Quiet Talks on John's Gospel • S. D. Gordon
... for each took his position behind the tree barricade with all senses alert for any indications of ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... among the noiseless steeps And hollows of the Erymanthian woods, Roused her from sleep. With listening head, Snatched bow, and quiver lightly slung, she stands, And peers across that dim and motionless glade, Beckoning about her heels the wakeful dogs; Yet Dian, thus alert, is but a dream, Making more real this brooding quietness. How strong and wonderful is night! Mankind Has yielded all to one sweet helplessness: Thought, labour, strife and all activities Have ebbed like fever. The smooth tide of sleep, Rolling across the fields of Attica, Hath ...
— Among the Millet and Other Poems • Archibald Lampman
... ought to offer a prize for the finest toad. When Polly comes to sit in the shade near my strawberry-beds, to shell peas, Calvin is always lying near in apparent obliviousness; but not the slightest unusual sound can be made in the bushes, that he is not alert, and prepared to investigate the cause of it. It is this habit of observation, so cultivated, which has given him such a trained mind, and made him so philosophical. It is within the capacity of even the humblest of us ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... reach, ostensibly for the use of her patient should he revive sufficiently to swallow a few drops—was yet too drowsy from the fatigues of the day, sundry cups of Christmas egg-nogg, and the obesity of age, to maintain alert vigil over one she, in common with her fellow-servitors, scorned as an aggravated specimen of the always and ever-to-be despicable genus, "poor white folks." There was next to nothing for her to do ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... favor her sex is wont to deny, and he said to himself that seldom had he seen a more flower-like face. Her lovely lips were already puckered in a rosy pout, her hands raised ready to rest on his shoulders as he should encircle her with his arms, when he noted with a start that her eyes, snapping, alert, and eager, were bent not upon his face, but upon his upper left hand vest pocket, where bulged the one thousand dollars ...
— The Strange Adventures of Mr. Middleton • Wardon Allan Curtis
... proportion to the apparent unimportance of the incident. Then they had gone gayly in to supper, had sat about two stainless tables close by the open windows, and had been waited upon by both Sue and Tim in such alert fashion that their plates arrived almost before ...
— A Court of Inquiry • Grace S. Richmond
... way through a noisy bit of "jazz," Caleb Patten, with one of his host's cigars lighted, was leaning a little forward in his chair, alert to seize the first opportunity of ...
— The Bells of San Juan • Jackson Gregory
... shall see fit, on the morrow. For the Meissen north road forks off there, in those two directions: straight northward is for Grossenhayn, right hand is for Badeburg. Most interesting to Lacy, which of these forks, what is quite optional, Friedrich will take! Lacy is an alert man; looks well to himself; warns Daun; and will not be caught if he can help it. Daun himself is encamped at Reichenberg, within two miles of him, inexpugnably intrenched as usual; and the danger surely is not great: nevertheless both these Generals, wise by experience, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... evident that intelligence of unusual greatness seethed in the cauldron wherein fermented Mr. Evans' brew of news. His rook-like eye sparkled, his movements, even that walk for whose disabilities it may be remembered that the pantry boy had thanked his God, were alert ...
— Mount Music • E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross
... read to Mrs. Barry, or translated from the French and Italian, in which many of them were written, did not fail to keep the old lady in a perpetual fury against her charge: and so I had my watch-dog, as I called her, always on the alert. In translating these languages, young Quin was of great service to me; for I had a smattering of French—and High Dutch, when I was in the army, of course, I knew well—but Italian I knew nothing of, and was glad of the services of so faithful and ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... seeing Mamma, and had decided to kiss her at all costs, even with the certainty of being in disgrace with her for long afterwards, when she herself came up to bed. The tranquillity which followed my anguish made me extremely alert, no less than my sense of expectation, my thirst for ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... easy manner, and wondered how it was possible for them to do it. But destiny, my special destiny, was at work. I was standing near, talking with affected gaiety to several young ladies, who, however, must have remarked my preoccupation; for my second sense of hearing was alert to what was being said by the group of which the girl in white was the center, when I heard her say: "I think his playing of Chopin is exquisite." And one of my friends in the group replied: "You haven't met ...
— The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man • James Weldon Johnson |
