"Ferret" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... tone and of the conversation many times before he left London next evening. He was rather an adept at the discovery of small mysteries; he liked to draw conclusions from a series of small events, and to ferret out other people's secrets. He thought that he was now upon the track of some design of Vivian's, and he became exceedingly curious about it. If it had been possible to open the box without disturbing ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... bodies of Catholic horse, which they greeted with cheers. That was in the Rue des Poulies; and at the corner where it abutted on the quay before the Hotel de Bourbon, a ferret-faced man ran blindly into them. Gaspard caught him and drew him to his horse's side, for he recognised the landlord of the tavern where he ...
— The Path of the King • John Buchan
... temple (not being a man of the world) to examine his Podurellae. Whereon (as was to be expected) the roof caved in bodily, smashing the idols, and sending the priests flying out of doors and windows, like rabbits out of a burrow when a ferret goes in. ...
— The Water-Babies - A Fairy Tale for a Land-Baby • Charles Kingsley
... was furious with her, notwithstanding his love for her, and indeed because of it. It was outrageous that a woman whom he adored should seek to ferret out facts which might send him to State's Prison. It was abominable that she would not cease to care for that stupid officer after he had been so carefully put out of her way. Coronado felt that he ...
— Overland • John William De Forest
... get it out of them before long. As to the fellows having tumbled into the torrent, I do not believe it. They are not likely to have gone off without our people knowing something about it. They are either in hiding somewhere near Roaring Water,—and if so, I shall soon ferret them out,—or else they have gone away to take squaws from among the Indians, and set up ...
— In the Rocky Mountains - A Tale of Adventure • W. H. G. Kingston
... was all very useless. Probably no matter what he contrived, the police would ferret her out. There was just one chance though which, properly taken, might save ...
— The Paliser case • Edgar Saltus
... ships of the station; hence there were many Christians, and these evening gatherings were blessed by God, and made profitable to all. We had on board one whose destination was the prison at Bermuda, not to become a prisoner, by the way, but a warder. This man, at 4 a.m. every morning, would ferret out all the boys in the ship, sending them to the upper deck to undergo a salt water bath, which to us all, at that untimely hour, was a ...
— From Lower Deck to Pulpit • Henry Cowling
... the end of the explanation. Now he gave a brief order, and a negro stepped forward with a long, dull-coloured sword in his hand. The dragoman squealed like a rabbit who sees a ferret, and threw himself frantically down upon ...
— A Desert Drama - Being The Tragedy Of The "Korosko" • A. Conan Doyle
... dangerous enemy to the cause of freedom was not to be found in the field, but among neighbors who were lurking at midnight around the scenes of home. The districts of Albany and Schoharie was infested by Tories, and young Schoolcraft was ever on the qui vive to ferret out this most insidious and cruel of the enemy's power. On one occasion he detected a Tory, who had returned from Canada with a lieutenant's commission in his pocket. He immediately clapped spurs to his horse, and reported him to Gov. George Clinton, the Chairman of the Committee ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... very fine Jaffa oranges," he said hurriedly, pointing to a corner where they were stored, behind a high rampart of biscuit tins. There was evidently more in the remark than met the ear. The boy flew at the oranges with the enthusiasm of a ferret finding a rabbit family at home after a long day of fruitless subterranean research. Almost at the same moment the bearded stranger stalked into the shop, and flung an order for a pound of dates and a tin of the best Smyrna halva across the counter. The most adventurous housewife ...
— The Toys of Peace • Saki
... nothing unusual in the method of hiring. The big corporations were immensely jealous of their research discoveries and went to great lengths to keep them secret—at the same time resorting to any means to ferret out their business rivals' secrets. There might still be a chance ...
— The Velvet Glove • Harry Harrison
... Kenmuir, and trot off to the village school with Maggie Moore. And soon the lad came to look on Kenmuir as his true home, and James and Elizabeth Moore as his real parents. His greatest happiness was to be away from the Grange. And the ferret-eyed little man there noted the fact, bitterly resented it, and vented ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant
... invisible cordon that Foyle had drawn about Grell's house in Grosvenor Gardens, Dutch Fred loitered, his keen, ferret eyes wandering alertly over passers-by. Misgivings had assailed him during a vigil that had lasted several hours. It was all very well to be "in with" the police; but suppose their plans miscarried? Suppose Red Ike and his unknown ...
— The Grell Mystery • Frank Froest
... more prey? With ferret quickness eyes swept the range of vision. Out of an orchard into the stubble of a wheat-field broke a panicky mass; a score or more of men who had lost their officer and their heads presumably. They were the nail under the hammer, ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer
... outlasted a thousand speculations. Has hate been necessary, and is it still necessary, and will it always be necessary? Is all life a war forever? The rabbit is nimble, lives keenly, is prevented from degenerating into a diseased crawling eater of herbs by the incessant ferret. Without the ferret of war, what would life become?... War is murder truly, but is not ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... logical harmony with their scientific conceptions. A man may remain a good orthodox Christian long after he has adopted scientific opinions irreconcilable with Eastern Orthodoxy, or, indeed, with dogmatic Christianity of any kind. In the confessional the priest never seeks to ferret out heretical opinions; and I can recall no instance in Russian history of a man being burnt at the stake on the demand of the ecclesiastical authorities, as so often happened in the Roman Catholic world, ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... was going to the openin' of a bazaar this afternoon—openin' by royalty; but I got my orders this morning to fill up the tank and come along at once, 'cos she was going out into the country. 'Ow's that ferret of mine going on?" ...
— Sally Bishop - A Romance • E. Temple Thurston
... and dare the angry foe. He said, and this opinion pleased around: 305 Jove turn'd aside, and on his daughter frown'd, Unmark'd by Hermes, who, with strange surprise, Fretted and foam'd, and roll'd his ferret eyes, And but with great reluctance could refrain From dashing at a blow all off the plain. 310 Then he resolved to interweave deceits, — To carry on the war by tricks and cheats. Instant he call'd an Archer from ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Oliver Goldsmith • Oliver Goldsmith
... wrong time: You'd come upon his scrutinizing hat Making a peaked shade blacker than itself Against the single window spared some house Intact yet with its mouldered Moorish work— Or else surprise the ferret of his stick 20 Trying the mortar's temper 'tween the chinks Of some new shop a-building, French and fine. He stood and watched the cobbler at his trade, The man who slices lemons into drink, The coffee-roaster's brazier, and the boys That volunteer to help him turn its winch. ...
— Men and Women • Robert Browning
... they undoubtedly show signs of increased sexual activity at some times more than at others, are not known to have anything of the nature of a regularly recurrent rutting season. Nothing of the kind is known in the Dog, nor, so far as we are aware, in the males of the domestic Cat, or the Ferret, all of which seem to be capable of copulation at any time of the year. On the other hand, the males of Seals appear to have a rutting season at the same time as the sexual season of the female." (Marshall and Jolly, "Contributions ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... a "legal trance"—Hedrick was bubbling with good spirits, and when he left his office for politics he could get out in his shirt-sleeves at a primary and peddle tickets, or nose up and down the street like a fat ferret looking for votes. So when Abner Handy announced that he desired to go to the State Senate, to fill an unexpired term for two years, he had Hedrick behind him to give strength and respectability to his candidacy. Between ...
— In Our Town • William Allen White
... kicked him with all the pleasure in life. His awful guardedness made me feel as if I were an inquisitive little journalist trying to ferret out some unsavoury scandal. And he had been the first person to point the general suspicion a few minutes earlier, by his inquiry about the motor. I decided to turn the tables on him, ...
— The Jervaise Comedy • J. D. Beresford
... one of them but would have sentenced his own father had there been so much as a suspicion that he leaned to Presbyterianism or to Whiggery. Just under the Judge was a broad table, covered with green cloth and strewn with papers. On the right hand of this were a long array of Crown lawyers, grim, ferret-faced men, each with a sheaf of papers in his hands, which they sniffed through again and again, as though they were so many bloodhounds picking up the trail along which they were to hunt us down. On the other side of the table sat a single fresh-faced young man, in silk gown ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Kent from the Fourth Reader. He was shaking with suppressed laughter, that turned into astonishment at Old Tilly's calm rejoinder. If it didn't take Old Till to ferret things out! ...
— Three Young Knights • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... St. John, but Mr. St. Aubyn, son of Sir John St. Aubyn. Polidori knows him, and introduced him to me. He is of Oxford, and has got my parcel. The Doctor will ferret him out, or ought. The parcel contains many letters, some of Madame de Stael's, and other people's, besides MSS., &c. By ——, if I find the gentleman, and he don't find the parcel, I will say something he ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. IV - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... Fenside, and let him turn farmer if he likes, and I'll help him; or it may be that David will hear of something more to his advantage, or perhaps find out some of his other relatives. David is as keen as a ferret, and he'll not let a chance pass of serving the lad." John's patience was seriously tried. He saw seafaring men of various grades pass in and out, corroborating the account of the flourishing business of Paul Kelson, Fluke and Company, and he concluded, while Simon Fluke was ...
— Owen Hartley; or, Ups and Downs - A Tale of Land and Sea • William H. G. Kingston
... during which the little doctor looked with a ferret-like curiosity from one man to the other. Sir Chetwynd Lyle rose ponderously up from ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... was by no means a youthful Apollo. To speak more plainly, he was no beauty. A tow head and freckled face often belong to a prepossessing boy of popular manners, but in Andrew's case they were joined to insignificant features, small ferret eyes, a retreating chin and thin lips, set ...
— Robert Coverdale's Struggle - Or, On The Wave Of Success • Horatio, Jr. Alger
... safety of a wise rabbit, but soon or late is a sure death-trap to a fool. A young rabbit always thinks of it first, an old rabbit never tries it till all others fail. It means escape from a man or dog, a fox or a bird of prey, but it means sudden death if the foe is a ferret, ...
— Wild Animals I Have Known • Ernest Thompson Seton
... on a Friday at three, at the same hour at which Christ died for all men. The Crusaders forgot the teaching of the hour; remembered only their wounds, losses, and sufferings, and put to death without mercy all who came in their way and all they could ferret out. ...
— Peter the Hermit - A Tale of Enthusiasm • Daniel A. Goodsell
... stepping along leisurely before him. For a second he stopped, and then he was back round the corner, and had swung himself up to a patch of shadow on the crag-side. He looked down and saw his enemy clearly in the moonlight; a long, ferret-faced fellow, with a rifle hung on his back and an ugly crooked knife in his hand. The man looked round, sniffing the air like a stag, and then, satisfied that there was nothing to fear, turned and went on. Lewis, who had been ...
— The Half-Hearted • John Buchan
... got to do with Jerry-Jo McAlpin?" Mrs. McAdam asked sharply, fixing her little ferret eyes ...
— The Place Beyond the Winds • Harriet T. Comstock
... I unmasked a battery. I looked straight into her little faded grey eyes, which straggle away from each other as if ashamed of their mutual ferret experiences,—for you know one looks out so, and one turns always up,—and I answered, that my brother had been exceedingly fortunate, as, notwithstanding the numerous matrimonial nets adroitly spread for him, he had escaped, like the Psalmist, 'as a bird out of the ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... pole-cat. It may be seen swimming about the lakes, preferring generally the still waters in autumn to the more rapidly-flowing currents of spring. It somewhat resembles the otter, and differs in shape slightly from the marten or ferret. Its teeth, however, are more like those of the pole-cat than the otter; while its tail does not possess the muscular ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... House to expect any luck in the way of information from the gentleman behind the counter. However, when a man has devoted his life to ferreting out information, the habit of ferreting is apt to be very strong upon him; so I pass the time of day to my fancy-stationer, and then begins to ferret. 'Madame Durski, at Hilton House yonder, is an uncommonly handsome woman,' I throw out, by way of an opening. 'Uncommonly,' replies my fancy-stationer, by which I perceive he knows her. 'A customer of yours, perhaps?' I throw out, promiscuous. 'Yes,' ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... wonderfully conceited in his opinion of himself, as well as mean and underhand, to look at. According to his own account, he leaves his old trade and joins ours of his own free will and preference. You will no more believe that than I do. My notion is, that he has managed to ferret out some private information in connection with the affairs of one of his master's clients, which makes him rather an awkward customer to keep in the office for the future, and which, at the same time, ...
— The Queen of Hearts • Wilkie Collins
... I looked at each other. We knew what we did call him, and were afraid Minora would in time ferret it out and enter it in her note-book. The Man of Wrath looked none too well pleased to be alluded to under his very nose by our ...
— Elizabeth and her German Garden • "Elizabeth", AKA Marie Annette Beauchamp
... A clever man. I may say, an invaluable man." Colonel Mansfield was looking hard at the Major's ferret-like face as he made reply. "No one likes the fellow. He is suspected of being a leper. But he is clever. He is undoubtedly clever. I remember his absence. It was at the time of that mission to Khanmulla, the mission I wanted ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... proceeds to ferret into this yere myst'ry, we finds thar's a sharp come up from Dallas who claims that Cimmaron's got to pay him what Glidden owes. This yere Dallas party puts said indebtednesses ...
— Wolfville • Alfred Henry Lewis
... re-opened with musket balls and grape-shot. The Cherokee and Creek scouts, fighting on their side, tried to ferret out the hiding places. Alas, the cloud proved to be only a little shower, and then vanished. The Great Spirit had ...
— Boys' Book of Indian Warriors - and Heroic Indian Women • Edwin L. Sabin
... get nearer to young Linnet, with whom she wished to be on intimate terms, broke suddenly off, and the poor young lady was precipitated to the ground and sadly hurt. Her cries brought to her assistance her younger brother Tom, who, as soon as he had helped her home, ran for young Ferret, who had lately begun practice as a physician. When the good young doctor came, he found Miss Weasel lying on the sofa, looking very pale and very interesting. He felt her pulse, looked at her tongue, and soon discovered that the lady was more frightened than ...
— The Comical Creatures from Wurtemberg - Second Edition • Unknown
... of small words which from the frequency of their use have, like pronouns, lost their primitive character, and are now preserved only as adjectives. Let us examine a few of them by endeavoring to ferret out their true meaning and application in the expression of ideas. We will begin with the old articles, a, an, and the, by testing the truth and propriety of the duty commonly assigned to them ...
— Lectures on Language - As Particularly Connected with English Grammar. • William S. Balch
... legs, to the faint squeaking of the rats below. Desperately bold at last, the persecuted animals bolted above-ground—the terrier accounted for one, the keeper for another; Rawdon, from flurry and excitement, missed his rat, but on the other hand he half-murdered a ferret. ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... night, his head was burning, and he shivered and his knees trembled. Perhaps, though he was by no means sensitive, he felt the influence of the horrors that surrounded him, and which seemed more sinister than ever in the bleak light of morning. He began to ferret in the cupboards, and at last succeeded in discovering—oh, marvelous fortune!—a bottle of brandy, three parts full. He hesitated for an instant, then he poured out a glass, and drained it at ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau
... you catchum someting, smellum pretty big," said Hoang, his ferret glance twinkling ...
— Moran of the Lady Letty • Frank Norris
... which these people go about their curious tasks invariably suggests a crime to Rupert Grant, Basil's amateur detective brother, whereupon Basil has to intervene to put matters right. The author does not appear to have been struck by the inconsistency of setting Basil to work to ferret out the doings of his fellow club-members. The book is, in fact, full of joyous inconsistencies. The Agent for Arboreal Villas is clearly unqualified for the membership of the Club. Professor Chadd ...
— G. K. Chesterton, A Critical Study • Julius West
... the room with a roast hare; and have heard in return that he does not care about brill, but worships John Dory, we slide into a gluttonous silence, and abide in it. Barbara's man of God is in a wholly different pattern to mine. He is a macerated little saint, with the eyes of a ferret and the heart of a mouse. As the courses pass by, in savory order, I, myself unemployed, watch my sister gradually reassuring, comforting, heartening him, as is her way with all weakly, maimed, and unhandsome creatures. She has succeeded in thawing him into a thin trickle ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... night we travelled on in the close, stuffy wagon-lit by way of Mons to Paris arriving with some three hours and a half to spare, which we idled in one of the all-night cafes near the station, having been met by a little ferret-eyed Frenchman, named Jappe, who had been one of Fremy's subordinates when he was ...
— The Sign of Silence • William Le Queux
... for a hare; at present, in me you have but a ferret [7], for my fare is in the way of ...
— The Captiva and The Mostellaria • Plautus
... those obscure passages. Cousin Benedict believed that he was going to lose sight of it. But, to his great surprise, the passage was at least two feet high, and the mole-hill formed a gallery where his long, thin body could enter. Besides, he put the ardor of a ferret into his pursuit, and did not even perceive that in "earthing" himself thus, he ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... young sir. If you should take the field, you will find that your comfort greatly depends upon it. A sharp, active knave, who will ferret out good quarters for you, turn you out a good meal from anything he can get hold of, bring your horse up well groomed in the morning, and your armour brightly polished; who will not lie to you overmuch, or rob you overmuch, and who ...
— Saint Bartholomew's Eve - A Tale of the Huguenot WarS • G. A. Henty
... scolded Dukovski, going out of the house. "It is clear she knows something, and is concealing it! And the chambermaid has a queer expression too! Wait, you wretches! We'll ferret ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne
... instantaneously that she was in the power of a very dangerous man. How he was endeavouring to ferret out admissions and denials which would afterwards stand him in good stead! How came he, too, to know so much about her friends? Had he been questioning Lord Marnell? Margery's breath came short and fast, and she trembled exceedingly. ...
— Mistress Margery • Emily Sarah Holt
... bloodshot eyes, and mouth foaming with a species of fury, he mounted his horse, went at full speed to the court-house, made inquiries of everybody who had seen his brother, asked with whom he had last been seen, and left no stone unturned to ferret out ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... good mind to trick her!" soliloquised he; alluding, it must be owned, to that revered mother. "She wouldn't let me go out to Bill Hook's to-night; though I telled her as it wasn't for no nonsense I wanted to see him, but about that there gray ferret. I will, too! I'll go back the field way, and cut down there. She'll ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood
... longed for some excuse for opening a communication with her, but could not find one. At length, however, fortune opened the desired avenue; and, after much hesitation and trembling, she summoned up the courage to avail herself of the offered opportunity. Phillips, in his determination to ferret out the outrage which had been committed on him and his companions, and of the author of which he still entertained no doubt, had, immediately after the trial, commenced a series of rapid journeys to all the nearest villages or ...
— Gaut Gurley • D. P. Thompson
... a public not now reading them, but there seems little or no understanding of the fact that there lies an uncultivated field of tremendous promise to the publisher who will strike out on a new line and market his books, so that the public will not have to ferret out a book-store or wind through the maze of a department store. The American reading public is not the book-reading public that it should be or could be made to be; but the habit must be made easy for it to acquire. Books must be placed ...
— The Americanization of Edward Bok - The Autobiography of a Dutch Boy Fifty Years After • Edward William Bok
... as though a lamb had butted me; such daring at the hands of such a dastard implied unchangeable resolve, a great pressure of necessity, and powerful means. I thought of the unknown Carthew, and it sickened me to see this ferret on ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the girls in the afternoon," said Eric. "I do hope that big ferret isn't making his way out. He is a stunner, sir; why, he killed—Ermie, keep your legs away—he has teeth like razors, sir, and once he catches on, he never lets go. He'll suck you to death as likely ...
— The Children of Wilton Chase • Mrs. L. T. Meade
... lay these menacing forms? What has been done to ferret out this crime? Who is suspected? Has the body of Alice Webster been discovered? Possibly the strange disappearances have ceased to excite comment. Even Sir Donald Randolph and Esther may remember these only ...
— Oswald Langdon - or, Pierre and Paul Lanier. A Romance of 1894-1898 • Carson Jay Lee
... I'll just take the liberty of hunting about, and seeing if I cannot ferret out some food or other," exclaimed Pat. "If these bastes of bears haven't broken into the pantry, maybe there will be a scrap of something or other to stay ...
— Snow Shoes and Canoes - The Early Days of a Fur-Trader in the Hudson Bay Territory • William H. G. Kingston
... arrive at a mass of material, a wealth of information concerning the past experiential, emotional, mental and moral life of the individual whose dream we were at the moment analyzing. In fact, one could ferret out the full life history in great detail, thus obtaining a complete autobiography leading far down into the depths of the dreamer's mental life and into the inner world of his own. With the material so obtained one could truly reconstruct the complete ...
— The Journal of Abnormal Psychology - Volume 10
... Jim was the reverse. He was a little fellow, with a face like a ferret; he had sharp-peaked features, a pale skin with many freckles, very small, keen blue eyes, rather closely set together, red hair, which he wore short and stuck up straight all over his small head. His face was clean-shaven, and he had a very alert look. ...
— Good Luck • L. T. Meade
... panic, gave over their attempts to retrieve the tubes. They dove for various hiding places—under benches, behind retorts, anywhere to get away from the terror running amuck in their midst. And after them sprang Dex, mad with his sudden miraculous success, to ferret them out one by one and blow them into hell with their ...
— The Red Hell of Jupiter • Paul Ernst
... ferret out and discuss all the psychological problems that are concealed behind these bland tables. Their general parallelism is obvious. Indeed we might say that to-day the English and German forms resemble each other more than does either set the West Germanic ...
— Language - An Introduction to the Study of Speech • Edward Sapir
... you remember," continued Sylvia, "that Fan was with us on the very, very day when darling auntie told us about the packet—the day when you came out of her room with your eyes as red as a ferret's; and don't you remember how you couldn't help howling that day, and how far off we had to go for fear darlingest auntie would hear you? And can't you recall that Fan crept after us, just like the horrid ...
— Betty Vivian - A Story of Haddo Court School • L. T. Meade
... mid-afternoon, a slack hour for Pedro's kind of trade, and the shanty was empty of customers when the impromptu vigilance committee entered. Pedro himself was half dozing in the faro dealer's chair. His small, ferret eyes flashed a spark at the visitors as he rose, ...
— Over the Pass • Frederick Palmer
... sailors who were good for anything were indignant with our captain, this fellow, to curry favour—pah! And to think of his being here! Oh, if he'd a notion I was within twenty miles of him, he'd ferret me out to pay off old grudges. I'd rather anybody had the hundred pounds they think I am worth than that rascal. What a pity poor old Dixon could not be persuaded to give me up, and make a provision for ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... you can guess, but very little to his credit, and quite enough to justify any father in refusing him his daughter's hand; but in this case it is evident to me that De Mussidan is yielding to a secret pressure. We must ferret out some hidden crime in De Croisenois' past which will force him ...
— The Champdoce Mystery • Emile Gaboriau
... him, certainly not; but Blee 's a ferret when a thing 's hid. A detective mind theer is to Billy. How would it do to tell un right away an' put un 'pon his honour ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts
... fortnight ago, arrested me. He is still young, tall, broad-shouldered, and his constabulary uniform seems almost too tight for him. His face, square and massive, is pitted with smallpox, his moustache small and fair, and his eyes sharp and ferret-like. The third, who is in mufti, is Mr. N——, the procurer to the Chamber of Judgments.[2] Tall, stout, with an insignificant face, brown eyes, and a brown beard shaved on the chin, he is still ...
— The Idler Magazine, Volume III, June 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... save a considerable corner. Dedisham, in its hollow, is an ancient agricultural settlement: a farm and feudatory cottages in perfect completeness, an isolated self-sufficing community, lacking nothing—not even the yellow ferret in the cage. The footpath beyond the homestead crosses a field where we find the Arun once again—here a stream winding between steep banks, sure home of kingfisher ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... the other hand," added Jack, "if animals sometimes attach themselves to us, we attach ourselves to them. We are told that Crassus wore mourning for a dead ferret, the death of which grieved him as much as if it had been his own daughter.[E] Augustus crucified one of his slaves, who had roasted and eaten a quail, that had fought and conquered in the circus.[F] Antonia, daughter-in-law of Tiberius, ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien
... a record of them by drawing a stroke with chalk for every rat on the red brick wall of the stable, near his ferret-hutch. He only used a few traps—one was set not at a hole, but at a sharp curve of the brook—and the whole of these rats were taken in a part of the brook about 250 or 300 yards in length, just where it ran through a single field. The great majority were water-rats, but ...
— Round About a Great Estate • Richard Jefferies
... explained, it is probable, by the fact, stated by Neal in his "History of New England," that there was an organized association of private individuals, a committee of vigilance, in Salem, during the continuance of the delusion, who had undertaken to ferret out and prosecute all suspected persons. He says that many were arrested and thrown into prison by their influence and interference. It is hardly to be doubted, that the persons who busied themselves to prevent the reprieve ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham
... and ferret-eyed the younger, Black his scapular denoting A lay brother; his companion ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. II. (of II.), Jewish Poems: Translations • Emma Lazarus
... her, please, that you have confided what has happened to me and that I will do my best to ferret ...
— The Camp Fire Girls in the Outside World • Margaret Vandercook
... practically the corner stone of this affair. It was he who met Freistner in Amsterdam and started these negotiations, and I'm damned if I like Fenn, or trust him. Did you see the way he looked at Stenson out of the corners of his eyes, like a little ferret? Stenson was at his best, too. I never admired the ...
— The Devil's Paw • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... only a fortnight after the reopening of the school, when I happened to be playing one morning with two new boys; I remember their names, Rastonaix and Servoin, now, and I can see the big fat cheeks of Rastonaix and the ferret-like face of Servoin. Although we were day pupils, we were allowed a quarter of an hour's recreation at school, between the Latin and English lessons. The two boys had engaged me on the previous day for a game of ninepins, and when it was over, they came close ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne
... going to play some trick on Angela to take her down, as she calls it; that's what you think, isn't it? And that's what I think. Oh, Anna, I wish I could ferret out the mischief and stop it. It will be something hateful and mortifying to poor Angela, I know. If I could only get some clew to what it is, so as ...
— A Flock of Girls and Boys • Nora Perry
... that he was not hanged on a high forked tree for having hung on her "low forks" (*). But this anger and resentment did not last long, for as I heard afterwards on good authority, peace was concluded between them, and the youth had the right to ferret in the coney burrow whenever he ...
— One Hundred Merrie And Delightsome Stories - Les Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles • Various
... the death of Coolidge, yet no better suggestion occurred to him and he felt that he must do something. His conversation with Sexton had greatly strengthened his conviction that this was a murder, and he had determined to ferret out the truth if possible. Yet, thus far there was nothing to build upon, no clue, no motive, no suspicion as to who had perpetrated the deed. He simply faced a blank wall, in which no entrance was apparent, yet there must be one, if he was only fortunate enough ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish
... would remain quiet, Jolly Roger took off his shoes. After that he made no more sound than a ferret as he crept to the door. An inch at a time he raised himself, until he was standing up, with his ear half an inch from the crack that ran lengthwise of the frame. Holding his breath, he listened. For an interminable time, it seemed to him, there ...
— The Country Beyond - A Romance of the Wilderness • James Oliver Curwood
... or sorry to see your good Mr. Palmer; for while you hold out your hand, you turn away your face from me.—Dear, dear! what a burning hand, and how the pulse goes and flutters! What does Dr. Wheeler say to this? I am a bit of a physician myself—let me look at you. What's this? eyes as red as ferret's—begging your eyes' pardon, young lady—What's this about? Come," said he, drawing a chair and sitting down close beside her, "no mysteries—no mysteries—I hate mysteries—besides, we have not time for them. Consider, I go to-morrow, and have all my shirts to pack up: ay, smile, ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth
... not they be very fine gentlemen here, to be so liberal? Signs by I shall, please God, one of these days, visit that old, grand mountain with the white head; and if there be a hare's form in his rough sides or his curly beard, I will ferret it out, and soon have pussy by ...
— The Cross and the Shamrock • Hugh Quigley
... in evening clothes, seeming a very elegant young gentleman indeed, but his two companions were of grosser type, as far as appearances went: one, Dacey, thin and wiry, with a ferret face; the other, Chicago Red, a brawny ruffian, whose stolid features nevertheless exhibited something of half-sullen ...
— Within the Law - From the Play of Bayard Veiller • Marvin Dana
... town and city she was called upon for an interview before she had time to brush off the dust of travel. One of the New York papers detailed a reporter to follow her from point to point, catch every word she uttered, ferret out all she said to her friends and in some way extort what was wanted. She often remarked that "in this case men proved themselves the champion ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... without you're going to do something. I know; we'll go back and make Magg lend us his ferret, and then we'll try ...
— Burr Junior • G. Manville Fenn
... the personal charms of Mrs Nicholas Forster at the time of their union, she had, at the period of our narrative, but few to boast of, being a thin, sharp-nosed, ferret-eyed, little woman, teeming with suspicion, jealousy, and bad humours of every description: her whole employment (we may say, her whole delight) was in finding fault: her shrill voice was to be heard from the other side of the ...
— Newton Forster - The Merchant Service • Captain Frederick Marryat
... are so absurd, the bias of the court so palpable, that it is not worth while to discuss them. The parallel proceedings in the military trial and execution of Francisco Ferret in Barcelona in 1909 caused worldwide indignation, and the illegality of almost every step, according to Spanish law, was shown in numerous articles in the European and American press. Rizal's case was even more brazenly unfair, but Manila was too remote ...
— Lineage, Life, and Labors of Jose Rizal, Philippine Patriot • Austin Craig
... midnight I had a deed duly drawn up, signed and sealed, selling me the steamer for fifty cents. I still see the look in his eyes as he gave me fifty cents change from a dollar. He was a self-made man, had acquired considerable money, and was keen as a ferret at business. The deed was to me a confession that he was in the plot for barratry, to murder ...
— A Labrador Doctor - The Autobiography of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... Sullivan's, lived a remarkable man of this class, named Darby Skinadre. In appearance he was lank and sallow, with a long, thin, parched looking face, and a miserable crop of yellow beard, which no one could pronounce as anything else than "a dead failure;" added to this were two piercing ferret eyes, always sore and with a tear standing in each, or trickling down his fleshless cheeks; so that, to persons disposed to judge only by appearances, he looked very like a man in a state of perpetual repentance for his ...
— The Black Prophet: A Tale Of Irish Famine • William Carleton
... the ferret-faced man who had been with Much at the tourney. Both insisted on paying over to Stuteley the amount of the wager lost ...
— Robin Hood • Paul Creswick
... Red Ferret once more!" said he. "I knew him of old in France, where he has done us more harm than a company of men-at-arms. He speaks English as he speaks French, and he is of such daring and cunning that nothing is secret from him. In all France there is no more dangerous man, for though he ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... and small, lean as with fasting or with a wasting hunger not of this world, and his hands were as small and slender as a woman's. But his eyes! They were cunning and trustless, narrow- slitted and heavy-lidded, at one and the same time as sharp as a ferret's and as ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... animals which have been observed within the limits of the ancient Media are the lion, the tiger, the leopard, the bear, the beaver, the jackal, the wolf, the wild ass, the ibex or wild goat, the wild sheep, the stag, the antelope, the wild boar, the fox, the hare, the rabbit, the ferret, the rat, the jerboa, the porcupine, the mole, and the marmot. The lion and tiger are exceedingly rare; they seem to be found only in Azerbijan, and we may perhaps best account for their presence there by considering that a few of these animals ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 3. (of 7): Media • George Rawlinson
... 1," whispered Max to his friend. "We've got the better of Mr. Ferret so far, but I fear we shall have trouble in getting many live shells away from under the noses ...
— Two Daring Young Patriots - or, Outwitting the Huns • W. P. Shervill
... husband and remain a member of that vigilant court. It was all or nothing. If a married woman were clever enough to take a lover undetected and merely furnish interesting surmise, there was no attempt to ferret out and punish her; for no ...
— Sleeping Fires • Gertrude Atherton
... "What is it, sir?" asks Madge. "Anything in rings? What kind?" "Oh, just plain rings," says the man with a great show of indifference, while his eyes ferret among the trinkets on the counter. And then, very calmly: "Oh, these will do, I guess." Two wedding rings, and he spent twenty cents. Madge follows him with her eyes. "That's it," she whispers, "usually the men buy two. One for themselves and one for the girl. Or if it's the girl ...
— A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago • Ben Hecht
... in the throng, stood blinking at me with his red eyelids, his bald head shining from its top to the thin fringe of reddish hair above his big flaring ears, his small wizened face all screwed up into a knot, his thin lips pursed, his little ferret eyes, close-set against his mean, miserly nose, peering at me under their blinking ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White
... felt equal to cursing down any cabman within the four-mile radius. That second volley finished him. He turned to his reins again and was borne away defeated; the red eyes of his lamps peering back at me like an angry ferret's. ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... would have been unpleasant, without being of any use. When a disagreeable duty is to be done, the quicker it is done the better. Captain Kane took 'em down to Castle Island last night; but it won't do for them to stay there. The Abolitionists will ferret 'em out, and be down there with their devilish habeas corpus. I want you to go on board 'The King Cotton,' take the captain aside, and tell him, from me, to remove them forthwith from Castle Island, keep them under strong guard, and skulk round with them ...
— A Romance of the Republic • Lydia Maria Francis Child
... detested and persecuted; in the Bluff region the natural enemy of the rabbit is honored, and his person is sacred. The rabbit's natural enemy in England is the poacher, in Bluff its natural enemy is the stoat, the weasel, the ferret, the cat, and the mongoose. In England any person below the Heir who is caught with a rabbit in his possession must satisfactorily explain how it got there, or he will suffer fine and imprisonment, together with extinction of his peerage; in Bluff, the cat found with a rabbit ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... clean-shaven, square-jawed, with light, steely, secretive gray eyes, and a look of intelligence and assurance that did not harmonize with his motley garb. His companion was a foreigner, small of stature, with eyes like a ferret and deep pits in his ...
— The Desert of Wheat • Zane Grey
... her veil in the burying-ground or on her way thither, but it was a flimsy mass of black lace—richly wrought, yet insufficient to hide the paleness of the upper part of her visage. Mr. Aylett watched and wondered, with but one definite idea in his brain beyond the resolve to ferret out the entire mystery in his stealthy, taciturn fashion. Herbert Dorrance had been, in some manner, compromised by his association with this Chilton, had reason to dread exposure from him, and his sister was the confidante of his ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... thousand cases, however, Shakespeare cannot have rejected words through fear lest he should repeat them. It has taken three centuries for the world to ferret out his apa? ?e?? mue?a: can we believe that he knew them all himself? Unless he were the Providence which numbers all hairs of the head, he had not got the start of the majestic world so far as that, however myriad-minded we may consider him. An ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XXVI., December, 1880. • Various
... York himself. You will go halfway and sleep on the road tonight. It is very good of him, as in that way no one will suspect that you are any but a pair of ordinary travelers. Keep up your spirits, my boy. We have sent to London for a detective from Bow Street to try and ferret out something of this mysterious business; and even if we do not succeed, I have every faith that it will come right in the end. And now goodby, my boy, I shall see you in a fortnight, for of course I shall come over to York to the trial to give evidence ...
— Through the Fray - A Tale of the Luddite Riots • G. A. Henty
... [transitive: object is a topic] ask about, inquire about. scratch the head, slap the forehead. look into every hole and corner, peer into every hole and corner, pry into every hole and corner; nose; trace up; search out, hunt down, hunt out, fish out, ferret out; unearth; leave no stone unturned. seek a clue, seek a clew; hunt, track, trail, mouse, dodge, trace; follow the trail, follow the scent; pursue &c. 662; beat up one's quarters; fish for; feel for &c. (experiment) 463. investigate; take up an inquiry, institute an inquiry, pursue an inquiry, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... powerful but subdued excitement pervaded the building. Watchers of the strikers had noted the increasing number of officers in civilian dress long after the usual business hours, and Elmendorf, quick to take the alarm, had hastened thither to ferret out the cause. Vain his effort to communicate with his one victim. He was at his desk, and a vigilant ex-sergeant-major of cavalry scowled at the would-be intruder and told him visitors could not enter the clerks' rooms. Vain his effort ...
— A Tame Surrender, A Story of The Chicago Strike • Charles King
... husband's head were off, might not the Abbe reap his share of the gathered harvest? The stakes were high, but the game was worth the playing, and Rosselot played it with spirit and energy unto the last card. His appearance in court is ever memorable, and as his ferret eyes glinted through glass at the President, he seemed the villain of some Middle Age Romance. His head, poised upon a lean, bony frame, was embellished with a nose thin and sharp as the blade of a knife; his tightly compressed lips were ...
— A Book of Scoundrels • Charles Whibley
... high and the consumer's money ready, there are a hundred tricks to which shooters and dealers willingly resort to ship and receive unlawful game without detection. It takes the very best kind of game wardens,—genuine detectives, in fact,—to ferret out these cunning illegal practices, and catch lawbreakers "with the goods on them," so that they can be punished. Mind you, convictions can not be secured at both ends of the line save by the most extraordinary good fortune, and usually the shooter and shipper escape, even ...
— Our Vanishing Wild Life - Its Extermination and Preservation • William T. Hornaday
... person so destitute of all talent (excepting that of low intrigue), as was Cardinal Dubois, being thus fortunate. His intellect was of the most ordinary kind; his knowledge the most common-place; his capacity nil; his exterior that of a ferret, of a pedant; his conversation disagreeable, broken, always uncertain; his falsehood written upon his forehead; his habits too measureless to be hidden; his fits of impetuosity resembling fits of ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... a big enough reward, I'll find out who the feller is," said Anderson. "Course, you understand it ain't my duty as marshal to ferret out matrimonial mysteries. I'd have to tackle it in my capacity as a private detective. An' you couldn't hardly expect me to do all this extry work without ...
— Anderson Crow, Detective • George Barr McCutcheon
... as he says of himself, born an observer. "Je suis ne de maniere que tout me devient une matiere de reflexion; c'est comme une philosophie de temperament que j'ai recue, et que le moindre objet met en exercice."[35] With his keen eyes constantly on the watch and his subtle mind ever ready to ferret out the eccentricities, defects, or hidden motives which some glance or gesture in his neighbor has revealed to him, and which a less delicate mind would have failed to grasp, going so far sometimes as to impute finesse where he has seen but the reflection ...
— A Selection from the Comedies of Marivaux • Pierre Carlet de Chamblain de Marivaux
... brought with her might better, in Lena's estimation, be dispensed with than that the all-absorbing reading and research should be interrupted. Finally Kate called one night to find Lena gone. She had taken her trunk and oil-stove and the overworked gas-lamp and had stolen away. To ferret her out ...
— The Precipice • Elia Wilkinson Peattie
... in a faded silk gown of dead-leaf hue. But if she represented the dignity and fair fame of the establishment in its intercourse with clients, the soul of the place, the ever-busy manipulator, was her husband, Monsieur Broquette, a little man with a pointed nose, quick eyes, and the agility of a ferret. Charged with the police duties of the office, the supervision and training of the nurses, he received them, made them clean themselves, taught them to smile and put on pleasant ways, besides penning them in their various rooms and preventing ...
— Fruitfulness - Fecondite • Emile Zola
... officer, when he arrives, will soon ferret out the truth, however, depend on that," observed Mr Ludlow, as he and Stephen mounted their horses to ride back. But neither the captain nor Charley were inclined to wait till the said detective should arrive to win back what they valued so much. Charley thought ...
— Washed Ashore - The Tower of Stormount Bay • W.H.G. Kingston
... answered Spargo, stolidly. "I feel it. Instinct, perhaps. I'm going to ferret out the truth. And ...
— The Middle Temple Murder • J.S. Fletcher
... attempted to dog the young lawyer's steps, hoping thus to ferret out Edith's hiding place; but nothing satisfactory resulted, for Roy, after his hard and somewhat disappointing day, simply repaired to his club, where, after partaking of his dinner and smoking a cigar to soothe his nerves, he ...
— The Masked Bridal • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... seeking laws, seeking statements that will fit into infinite, incessantly interweaving complexities, and be true of them all! There is I perceive a valiant and magnificent stupidity about the human mind, a disregard of disproportion and insufficiency—like the ferret which will turn from the leveret it has seized to attack even man if he should interfere. By these desperate feats of thinking it is that our species has achieved its victories. By them it survives. By them it must stand the test of ultimate ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells
... bhistie, the other servants remaining behind, much to their delight, to take charge of spare baggage, &c. left in the bungalow. One of the Maharajah's army also accompanied us, a rough-and-ready-looking sepoy irregular, whose duty it was to ferret out supplies and coolies, &c. during our march, and at the same time, perhaps, to keep a watch over our own movements and desperate designs. Passed the night under gauze fortifications, the disappointed mosquitoes buzzing about ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight
... their disposal was increased by the fact; that when I reached the Arsenal I found the Louvre vacant, the queen, who lay at Fontainebleau, having summoned the King thither. Ferret, his secretary, however, awaited me with a letter, in which Henry, after expressing his desire to see we, bade me nevertheless stay in Paris a day to transact some business. "Then," he continued, "come to me, my friend, ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman
... lad. However, to make it short I may come to the pint at once. Isaac got engaged himself and mentioned my name to Mr Rudyerd, who took the trouble to ferret me out in the docks and—and in fact engaged me for the work, which ...
— The Story of the Rock • R.M. Ballantyne
... linguists. We will go to-morrow to the headquarters of the Bow Street runners. They are the detectives, you know, and if they cannot at once put their hands upon such a man as we want, they will be able to ferret out half a dozen in twenty-four hours. One of these fellows you must engage to go down to Canterbury and take lodgings there. They are almost always in destitute circumstances, and would be content with very moderate pay, which would ...
— Through Russian Snows - A Story of Napoleon's Retreat from Moscow • G. A Henty
... only heaviness. To the other contest between them he brought an amazing sureness, a suppleness, power, and audacity beyond praise. He directed his battle, and at his elbow Tom Mocket, sandy-haired and ferret-eyed, did ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... ago. The daughters had been reared here; but, even as enmity had arisen on the tilled slips of garden outside Eden, so there had always been strife between the daughters of the lonely manse—on the one side rebellion and the resentment of restraint, on the other tale-bearing and ferret-eyed spying. ...
— Bog-Myrtle and Peat - Tales Chiefly Of Galloway Gathered From The Years 1889 To 1895 • S.R. Crockett
... deepens the hot silence. The hills open To show a slope of poppies, Ardent, noble, heroic, A flare, a great flame of orange; Giving sleepy, brittle scent That stings the lungs. A creeping wind slips through them like a ferret; they bow and dance, answering ...
— Young Adventure - A Book of Poems • Stephen Vincent Benet
... proverbially tricky memory for names. He introduced me as Jones once, and I lost the opportunity of handling the case because the party in question couldn't believe that anybody named Jones would be likely to ferret ...
— Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces • Thomas W. Hanshew
... family Mustelidae which includes mink, otter, weasels, skunks, and ferrets, and with its brown body, deep yellow throat, and long tail is really very handsome. Polecats inhabit the Northern Hemisphere and are closely allied to the ferret which so often is domesticated and used in hunting rats and rabbits. We found them to be abundant in the low valleys along the Burma border and often saw them during the day running across a jungle path or on the lower branches of a tree. The polecat is a blood-thirsty ...
— Camps and Trails in China - A Narrative of Exploration, Adventure, and Sport in Little-Known China • Roy Chapman Andrews and Yvette Borup Andrews
... the class, though he had never known anything nearer it than city beggars. He pictured them as philosophic vagabonds, full of quaint turns of speech, unconscious Borrovians. With these samples his disillusionment was speedy. The party was made up of a ferret-faced man with a red nose, a draggle-tailed woman, and a child in a crazy perambulator. Their conversation was one-sided, for it immediately resolved itself into a whining chronicle of misfortunes and petitions ...
— Huntingtower • John Buchan
... known, when the town grew inquisitive, and the critics were compelled to ferret out his antecedents, that the new actor had already attained middle age,—that he had been vegetating for years in that obscurest and most miserable of all dramatic positions, the low comedian of a country-theatre,—that he had ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 • Various
... and exquisite beauty[4]. The other creature, found in no other country, is called by the Dutch the Stinkbungsen, or Stinking-Badger. This is of the size of an ordinary dog, but is shaped like a ferret. When pursued by man or beast, it retreats but slowly, and when its enemy draws near, discharges backwards a so intolerably fetid wind, that dogs tear up the ground and hide their noses in it, to avoid the smell. When killed, it stinks so abominably that there is no approaching the ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... mourning—he cannot have been dead very long, for the girl is unable to speak of him without tears," muttered Mrs. Montague, thoughtfully, a heavy frown settling on her brow. "There is some mystery about her which I am bound to ferret out; she is exceedingly reticent about herself—I wonder if my suspicions can be correct?" she continued, her face settling into hard, revengeful lines. "She certainly looks enough like that girl to be ...
— Mona • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... appears, however, to have been unacquainted with some previously noticed by Hevelius. Lacaille brought back with him from the Cape a list of forty-two—the first-fruits of observation in Southern skies—arranged in three numerically equal classes;[44] and Messier (nicknamed by Louis XV. the "ferret of comets"), finding such objects a source of extreme perplexity in the pursuit of his chosen game, attempted to eliminate by methodising them, and drew up a catalogue comprising, ...
— A Popular History of Astronomy During the Nineteenth Century - Fourth Edition • Agnes M. (Agnes Mary) Clerke
... that, Mr. Mason. I was only a lad at the time, and could not have managed it at all. But they didn't ferret about enough. Mr. Mason, there's a deal better evidence than any that is given by word of mouth. A clever counsel can turn a witness pretty nearly any way he likes, but he can't do that with little facts. He hasn't the time, you see, to get round them. Your lawyers, sir, ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope
... hand down, and it was given a vicious bite by a white, pink-eyed ferret Paul was carrying there. I yelled with pain and surprise. I pulled my hand up in the air, the ferret hanging to a finger. The ferret dropped to the ground. Paul stooped and picked it up, guffawing. It didn't bite him. It knew and feared him. That was his idea of a joke, the ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... was not listening. He stood bent somewhat forward, leaning over the table, and fixed me with his ferret-like eyes. ...
— The Man in Lower Ten • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... "let us look at this matter calmly and dispassionately. You have employed us to ferret out the thieves, and to recover, if possible, the money of which you have been robbed. We have therefore but one duty to perform, and that is to find the men. I have looked into this case carefully; I have noted every point thus far attained; I have weighed every ...
— The Burglar's Fate And The Detectives • Allan Pinkerton
... replied, but each made a secret resolution to ferret out Miriam's suspected treachery if it were the last ...
— Grace Harlowe's Plebe Year at High School - The Merry Doings of the Oakdale Freshmen Girls • Jessie Graham Flower
... them evermore. He said, and falsely sware, yet him assured. Then Dolon, instant, o'er his shoulder slung His bow elastic, wrapp'd himself around With a grey wolf-skin, to his head a casque 395 Adjusted, coated o'er with ferret's felt, And seizing his sharp javelin, from the host Turn'd right toward the fleet, but was ordain'd To disappoint his sender, and to bring No tidings thence. The throng of Trojan steeds 400 And warriors left, with brisker pace he moved, When brave Ulysses his ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer
... wonder that so many marriages are passably successful, and so few come to open failure, the more so as I fail to understand the principle on which people regulate their choice. I see women marrying indiscriminately with staring burgesses and ferret-faced, white-eyed boys, and men dwell in contentment with noisy scullions, or taking into their lives acidulous vestals. It is a common answer to say the good people marry because they fall in love; and of course you may use and misuse a word as much as you please, if you have the world ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... effect, for the lad rose from his knees, stepped to the hole, and picked up something which Tom saw at once to be a long, reddish, writhing ferret. This snaky animal the lad thrust into his breast, stuffed the little piece of net into his pocket, picked up three more scraps from the mouths of other holes, and finally took the rabbit from the ground to pack inside ...
— The Vast Abyss - The Story of Tom Blount, his Uncles and his Cousin Sam • George Manville Fenn
... settled everything in her own mind for taking Maud back that very evening, but after all, one day was as good as another, and if Jim should once begin on the subject of Maud, who could tell what he might ferret out? He might even insist on himself taking Maud back to her supposed mother and baby sister, and then what would happen? And it would be of no use to keep back her sister's address from him, for there was ...
— The Girls of St. Olave's • Mabel Mackintosh
... slowly, like an old ferret who feels at home. She remained more than a quarter of an hour in the kitchen, then returned, spread out her linen, took the broom, and brushed away some blades of straw on the floor. At last she raised her head, and turned her little green eyes in every ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne
... As you approach their domiciles, the cocks, which are always on the alert, evidently give the alarm to their sitting mates, which thereupon slip surreptitiously from the nest; and in that case how are you going to ferret out their domestic secrets? ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser
... had knocked him down he lay where he fell, dazed by the blow, and blinking up at me with his small ferret eyes. I knew him to be one Edward Sharpless, and I knew no good of him. He had been a lawyer in England. He lay on the very brink of the stream, with one arm touching the water. Flesh and blood could not resist it, so, assisted by the toe of my boot, he took a cold bath to cool ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... Cannas ego Varnam clade notavi; Discite mortales non temerare fidem: Me nisi Pontifices jussissent rumpere foedus Non ferret Scythicum Pannonis ora jugum." ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... relies upon the taking advantage of a fellow-man, which leads to the degradation of a woman or to the unhappiness of a child. Everything which is opposed to the idea of human brotherhood. That which produces scrofulous kings, and lying priests, and greasy millionaires, and powdered prostitutes, and ferret-faced thieves. That which makes the honest man a pauper and a beggar, and sets the clever swindler in parliament. That which makes you what you are at 24, a man without a home, with hardly a future. That which tries to condemn those ...
— The Workingman's Paradise - An Australian Labour Novel • John Miller
... any ground whatever with hedges or ditches, or walls without a special permit.[1355] In case of a permit being given he must leave a wide, open and continuous space in order to let the huntsmen easily pass through. He is not allowed to keep any ferret, any fire-arm, any instrument adapted to the chase, nor to be followed by any dog even if not adapted to it, except the dog be held by a leash or clog fastened around its neck. And better still. He is forbidden to reap his meadow or his Lucerne before St. John's day, to enter his own field between ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... his finger a massy ring. A little ferret-eyed monk, a transcriber of saints' legends and Saxon chronicles, was immediately called. He pronounced the writing heathenish, and of the Runic form. A sort of free translation may be given ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... the first time, Beryl perceived that he held a slip of yellow paper from which he looked now and then to her face. His features were coarse and heavy, but his eyes were keen as a ferret's; and without answering his question, she turned away and looked across the water which teemed with craft of every description, laden with freight animate and inanimate, passing to and from the vast city, whose spires, domes and forest ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... apron; one only saw the ends of his trousers and his head; and the head was one of the strangest ever seen, for there was not a hair upon it; he was bald as an egg, and his head was the shape of an egg, and the colour of an Easter egg, a pretty pink all over. The eyes were like a ferret's, small and restless and watery, a long nose and a straight drooping chin, and a thick provincial ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore
... Rev. Scatchard Vialls came in at the last moment with perspiring brow, excusing himself on the ground of professional duties. He was thin, yet flabby, had a stoop in the shoulders, and walked without noticeably bending his knees. The crown of his head went to a peak; he had eyes like a ferret's; his speech was in a high, nasal note. For some years he had been a widower, a fact which perhaps accounted for his insinuating manner when ...
— Denzil Quarrier • George Gissing
... own country, and it will be interesting to them at some future day, to be known to you. This is, perhaps, the only moment of your life in which you can acquire that knowledge. And to do it most effectually, you must be absolutely incognito, you must ferret the people out of their hovels as I have done, look into their kettles, eat their bread, loll on their beds under pretence of resting yourself, but in fact, to find if they are soft. You will feel a sublime pleasure in the ...
— The Writings of Thomas Jefferson - Library Edition - Vol. 6 (of 20) • Thomas Jefferson |
