"Pick" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... greyhound and all other hounds and dogs is, that it can pick up its game while running at full speed, a feat that no other dog can do. The foxhound, or farm dog, will run over a fox or a rabbit many tunes without being ...
— The Writings of John Burroughs • John Burroughs
... direction of our line. Near a junction of by-roads I heard some funny remarks passed by ration parties trying to find the way to their sections. To pick one's way in the dark over strange ground littered with debris is not an easy task. The exact language I heard would hardly ...
— How I Filmed the War - A Record of the Extraordinary Experiences of the Man Who - Filmed the Great Somme Battles, etc. • Lieut. Geoffrey H. Malins
... see the advantage, I have examined the financial question, and propose to add two hundred dollars to the six hundred in my letter of October 30th, to enable you to execute it. I would suggest that you stop a day in Washington on your way to Charleston, to pick up the topographical and geographical information which you desire, and to have all matters of a formal kind arranged to suit your convenience and wishes, which, I am sure, will all be promotive of the objects in view from your visit to Florida. ...
— Louis Agassiz: His Life and Correspondence • Louis Agassiz
... moment she heard his gun go off. Then Potts seized his fowling-piece; and going down to the dining-room door, where he could hear the burglars at work, he cocked the gun, aimed it, pushed the door open with the muzzle and fired. Instantly Mrs. Potts sprang the rattle, and before Potts could pick up the lacerated hired girl the front door was burst open by two policemen, who came into ...
— Elbow-Room - A Novel Without a Plot • Charles Heber Clark (AKA Max Adeler)
... pencil or a piece of chalk through the prism, in the same way. When you think you know where it is, try to pick it up. ...
— Common Science • Carleton W. Washburne
... fellow? What is your name? Ain't you afraid of being in the woods by yourself?' On satisfying his inquiries, I invited the traveler to partake of my duck, which he did, without leaving me a bone to pick, his appetite was so keen, though he should have been welcome to all the game I could have killed, when I afterward became acquainted with his noble and gallant soul." After satisfying his questions, he inquired of the stranger ...
— Life & Times of Col. Daniel Boone • Cecil B. Harley
... of cranberries. Wash and quarter the quinces, removing the seeds; pick over and wash the cranberries and put them in the preserving kettle with the quinces; add cold water to nearly cover fruit; cook slowly until soft. Allow juice to drip through a jelly bag. Boil twenty-five minutes and add an equal quantity of heated ...
— Stevenson Memorial Cook Book • Various
... all she said was: "I'm not going to give up my freedom for the first man who lifts his little finger, I can tell you. I haven't such a great opinion of the menfolk. Conceited creatures, the most of them. I mean to pick and choose. And I mean Ishmael ...
— Secret Bread • F. Tennyson Jesse
... he shall hear of your approach, If that young Arthur be not gone already, Even at that news he dies; and then the hearts Of all his people shall revolt from him, And kiss the lips of unacquainted change; And pick strong matter of revolt and wrath Out of the bloody fingers' ends of john. Methinks I see this hurly all on foot: And, O, what better matter breeds for you Than I have nam'd!—The bastard Falconbridge Is now in ...
— King John • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... greatly excited. He paced the room in a nervous tremor. It was arranged that a small steamer, which had stood a short distance offshore since yesterday to relay the wireless message and make it doubly sure, should pick the Duke up as soon as Lapas signaled by a triple dip of the flag that the fortress had been destroyed. The steamer was then to rush the Grand Duke around the cape to Puntal, bringing him in as though he had come from Spain. Those conspirators who were in the capital, strengthened by those who ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... amongst them, but those who were there were intelligent and energetic. These workmen were what might be termed the "pick of the crowd." ...
— The History of a Crime - The Testimony of an Eye-Witness • Victor Hugo
... kinds of people, is responsible for the existence of this little work. There are one or two well-written textbooks on foreign exchange, but never yet has the author come across a book which covered this subject in such a way that the man who knew little or nothing about it could pick up the book and within a few hours get a clear idea of how foreign exchange works,—the causes which bear upon its movement, its influence on the ...
— Elements of Foreign Exchange - A Foreign Exchange Primer • Franklin Escher
... our young literature. He found that a work of merit, written by an American who had not established a commanding name in the market, met very cavalier treatment from our publishers, who frankly said that they need not trouble themselves about native works, when they could pick up every day successful books from the British press, for which they had to pay no copyright. Irving's advocacy of the proposed law was entirely unselfish, for his own market ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... about the door, the "craw, craw," of some neighboring chickens, which have stepped around to consider the dinner baskets, and pick up the crumbs of the noon's repast. For a marvel, the busy school is still, because, in truth, it is too warm to stir. You will find nothing to disturb your meditation on character, for you cannot hear the beat ...
— The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... indignant eyes on him. "Fancy YOUR saying that! Fancy your having the impertinence to offer me so absurd a sophistry! At what Calcutta dinner-table did you pick it up?" she cried derisively. "Well, it shows that one can't trust one's best friend ...
— The Path of a Star • Mrs. Everard Cotes (AKA Sara Jeannette Duncan)
... the situation. The word had gone out. Baron Malcolm Haer was due for a defeat. You weren't going to pick up any lush bonuses signing up with him, and you definitely weren't going to jump a caste. In short, no matter what Haer's past record, choose what was going to be the winning side—Continental Hovercraft. Continental Hovercraft and old Stonewall Cogswell who had lost ...
— Mercenary • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... pick out his own lamb among a hundred, doctor, and I am sure they are alike as so many peas. Surely ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... [contemptuously.] She did not. She hit himself with a worn pick, and the rusted poison did corrode his blood the way he never overed it, and died after. That was a sneaky kind of murder did win small glory with the boys itself. [She crosses ...
— The Playboy of the Western World • J. M. Synge
... upon her quarter. She continued all black hull and white sail, not a soul to be seen on deck, except a dark object which we took for the man at the helm. "What schooner is that?" No answer. "Heave to, or I'll sink you." Still all silent. "Serjeant Armstrong, do you think you can pick off that chap at the wheel?" The mariner jumped on the forecastle, and levelled his piece, when a musket-shot from the schooner crushed through his skull, and he fell dead. The old skipper's blood was up. "Forecastle there! Mr. ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous
... officer, "it seems to me I had better get you sent back to your old station, where you can quietly pick up the threads again. Would the trooper you mentioned be fit to keep an eye on ...
— Winston of the Prairie • Harold Bindloss
... he cried. "Why didn't you say so before? I could have easily explained. We are not coming by the same route; but we'll pick up their trail sometime today, even if ...
— The Son of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... this, because, while Keppel must be approved for attacking in partial disorder, Byron must be blamed for attacking in utter disorder. Keppel had to snatch opportunity from an unwilling foe. Having himself the lee-gage, he could not pick and choose, nor yet manoeuvre; yet he brought his fleet into action, giving mutual support throughout nearly, if not quite, the whole line. What Byron did has been set forth; the sting is that his bungling tactics ...
— The Major Operations of the Navies in the War of American Independence • A. T. Mahan
... favorable circumstances. In both the French and English service a great deal of weeding among the officers was necessary. Those were the palmy days of court and political influence; and, moreover, it is not possible, after a long peace, at once to pick out from among the fairest-seeming the men who will best stand the tests of time and exposure to the responsibilities of war. There was in both nations a tendency to depend upon officers who had been in their prime a generation before, and the ...
— The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 • A. T. Mahan
... the ordinary admission tickets come. As I told you this afternoon, we are having no trouble with our reserved seats. There have been no duplicates there. But there is a duplication in the fifty cent seats, where one may take his pick as to where he ...
— Joe Strong The Boy Fire-Eater - The Most Dangerous Performance on Record • Vance Barnum
... was quite ravishing, and dignified as beautiful. Some said (but really people say such things) that there was a talk (I never believe anything I hear) that had not the Bird of Paradise flown in (these foreigners pick up everything), Mrs. Montfort would have been the Duchess of St. James. How this may be I know not; certain, however, this superb and stately donna did not openly evince any spleen at her more fortunate rival. Although she found herself a guest at the Alhambra ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 4 • Charles Dudley Warner
... Something made her pick the letter swiftly up and read it through a second time. So wild was the desire to go that she began to whimper, kissing the letter again and again, holding it softly to her cold cheek. Keith! What did it matter? What did anything matter but her love? Was she ...
— Nocturne • Frank Swinnerton
... "Children pick up such notions, ma'am," said she at last, apologetically, to Ruth, who stood, white and still, with a new idea ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... had et them i rew the people up river and when they wood see a cardinel flower they wood holler to me and i wood row the boat up to the place where the cardinel flower was and they wood pick it and holler over it and then we wood go on. the river was kind of low and the banks were steep and slipery where the cardinel flowers grew and Charlie Lane, the feller whitch was in the boat, had on sum white ...
— Brite and Fair • Henry A. Shute
... writing, it was a pleasure to pick out the phases of his history—a history that even then seemed to be so very modern, and to a boy, with an unspoiled imagination, so very real. It seemed only natural that he should be converted by a blast of illumination from God. It is not hard for young people to accept miracles. ...
— Confessions of a Book-Lover • Maurice Francis Egan
... even a denser shadow in the moonless dark. Framtree joined them, and they waited expectantly for Jaffier's index of light to pick up the mystery. Ten minutes passed before the gunboat, following doggedly, and whipping her light over sea, suddenly uncovered the dark from a big tramp steamer, aimed at the Inlet. For an instant it was lost again, but the ...
— Fate Knocks at the Door - A Novel • Will Levington Comfort
... had thought to pick up the lamp. I should like to have found out what was the cause of ...
— Three Men on the Bummel • Jerome K. Jerome
... it more difficult to exercise control and to allocate responsibilities, and thus make irresponsibility, favouritism, dishonesty, and the evasion of punishment more easy and more frequent? Is a larger number of voters likely to pick out abler administrators than a small one? Does not the elective system, according to the Socialists themselves, cause the scum to rise to the top, and result in the election of plausible windbags?[1264] Are the ...
— British Socialism - An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical Proposals • J. Ellis Barker
... awaken his regard For's private friends: his answer to me was, He could not stay to pick them in a pile Of noisome musty chaff: he said 'twas folly, For one poor grain or two, to leave unburnt And still to nose ...
— The Tragedy of Coriolanus • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... it wouldn't be safe for me to go out—as it was a raining at the time—but I thought I'd risk it any how. So I went out, pick'd up a few chunks of stove-wood, and was a coming up the steps into the house, when my feet slipp'd from under me, and I fell down as sudden as if I'd been shot. Some of the wood lit upon my face, broke down the bridge of my nose, cut my upper lip, and knocked out three of my front ...
— The Canadian Elocutionist • Anna Kelsey Howard
... the name on the card, a disagreeable sort of feeling came over me; and as I desired the porter to show the gentleman into my father's private room, and followed him there, I mentally resolved to pick a quarrel with this individual, and to give him an opportunity of blowing my brains out—about the best thing that could happen to me, as I thought, at ...
— Ellen Middleton—A Tale • Georgiana Fullerton
... captain of the ship; so Stukely, taking the lead as usual, explained in a few brief words the particulars of their mishap, thanked the unknown for his kindness in taking the trouble to pick them up, and concluded by expressing the hope that the individual to whom he was speaking would have the great goodness to stand inshore and land them on the nearest point ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... identification, used even as ably as Dr. Rydberg uses it, will not pick every mythologic lock, though it undoubtedly has opened many hitherto closed. The truth is that man is a finite animal; that he has a limited number of types of legend; that these legends, as long as they live and exist, are excessively prehensile; ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... some weeks before that I might have the pick of her geese for a Christmas present, and I knew that she was always as good as her word. I would take my goose now, and in it I would carry my stone to Kilburn. There was a little shed in the yard, and behind this I drove one of the birds—a fine big one, ...
— The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... a little amused, by her hesitation, and more airily a man-of-the-world than ever, his tone one of high detachment, to spare her any possible feeling of personal obligation, and to place his performance in the light of a matter of course,—as if indeed he had done nothing more than pick up and return, say, a handkerchief she might have dropped. "You were right," he owned to his thought of Lady Blanchemain; "she is beautiful." Here, at close quarters with her, one's perception of her beauty became acute,—here, ...
— My Friend Prospero • Henry Harland
... arranged their meals and labours, And threaten'd quarrels with the whip, That, living in sweet cousinship, They edified their wondering neighbours. At last, some dainty plate to lick, Or profitable bone to pick, Bestow'd by some partiality, Broke up the smooth equality. The side neglected were indignant At such a slight malignant. From words to blows the altercation Soon grew a perfect conflagration. In hall and kitchen, dog and cat Took sides with zeal for this ...
— A Hundred Fables of La Fontaine • Jean de La Fontaine
... respect. There had been an occasion, it seemed, long ago in her childhood, when she, having lost from her neck a locket which held her dead father's portrait, had found it, all search for it having ceased, on the carnation-bed where she had stooped to pick a flower. On the day that the news reached them that Hugh, her brother, had won the hurdle race at Cambridge (one of the chief triumphs, it appeared, of her eventless life) she had just finished arranging a vase of pink carnations for ...
— A Sheaf of Corn • Mary E. Mann
... evening the two friends, with a pick-axe, a hoe, and a shovel, directed their way towards the palace. They approached the cellar by a small door, and then began to dig in the ground at the foot of the cellar wall. After a few hours of steady work, they succeeded in making an ...
— Filipino Popular Tales • Dean S. Fansler
... him, his legs straddled, his hat on one side, his mouth open. The Vision began to pick its way down the ...
— The Claim Jumpers • Stewart Edward White
... genteel' than the rest of the company. Why, 'tis Crofton Croker, or, as he is familiarly called amongst his friends, 'The honourable member for fairy-land.' There you are, Crofty, my boy! with your note-book in your hand; and maybe you won't pick up a trifle in such good company." It may be added, that Mr. Croker was for many years one of the registrars of the Royal Literary Fund. And now, in drawing this slight sketch of Mr. Croker's life to a close, the writer hopes that it may not be ...
— A Walk from London to Fulham • Thomas Crofton Croker
... been touched by shovel or pick for more than three years, and I don't believe that Col. Gid Ward and his crowd ever intend to hire another day's work on it. Colonel Gid says every operator and sport from Clew to Erie goes across there, and if there's any ro'd-repairin' all hands ...
— The Rainy Day Railroad War • Holman Day
... sea-song sang, About a Chimpanzee Who went abroad, In a drinking gourd, To the coast of Barberee. Where he heard one night, When the moon shone bright, A school of mermaids pick Chromatic scales From off their tails, And did it ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various
... advantages. Holding it to be the inevitable doom of fallen man to inherit some frailty or failing, it would be difficult, had he a Pandora's box-ful to pick and choose among, to find one less dangerous or offensive. As the judicious physician informs the patient suffering under some cutaneous or other external torture, that the poison lay deep in his constitution—that it must have worked in some ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... one might have put a ton or two on it—it would not have bent under the load; under the bed was a solid chest; in a corner stood a little table of the same strong kind, and near the table a three-legged stool, so solid and squat that Gerasim himself would sometimes pick it up and drop it again with a smile of delight. The garret was locked up by means of a padlock that looked like a kalatch or basket-shaped loaf, only black; the key of this padlock Gerasim always carried about ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Russian • Various
... nook under a sloping piece of bark, to which she would retire at times, and sitting down on the bottom of her cage in the shadow, looked like a little grey mouse. When appetite brought her out again, she would go to her tree-larder and pick out the choice hidden morsels, as if they were the insects which would have been her food if her lot had been cast amongst tree-branches ...
— Wild Nature Won By Kindness • Elizabeth Brightwen
... But she is too sure of her husband. Too certain that he will go on worshipping her no matter what she does or how she treats him; and, after all, I suppose even love can die for want of sustenance. It seems to me she gives all she has to give to the baby, and her husband is left to pick up the crumbs that ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi
... new commander as he passed down the line rode Daniel Morgan, big, strong, masterful, handsome, the very pick and choice of leaders for his rough and ready riflemen. Like most of his men, he scorned to wear a uniform, appearing on parade, as in the field, in a neat-fitting hunting-shirt of Indian-tanned buckskin with fringings of the same—a costume that set off his gigantic figure as no tailor-fine ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... sentinel, I let my pipe fall and stopped to pick up the bits. There I met the officer on duty; but as he was reading a letter he did not pay attention to me. The soldiers at the guard-house appeared surprised at my dress, and a drummer turned around several times to look at me. I placed ...
— Hortense, Makers of History Series • John S. C. Abbott
... moment her mamma felt no interest in the mouth of the oracle; and so they all walked down together to the carriage. And, though the way was steep, Mrs. Thompson managed to pick her steps without the assistance of an arm; nor did M. Lacordaire presume to ...
— The Chateau of Prince Polignac • Anthony Trollope
... the shopping to the last, because Lady Monica told us it was to be done first," said Pilar sagely; so we wandered through the shabby aisles of Rag Fair, Pilar hoping against hope to unearth a treasure; because, did not a man once pick up, for a song, a Greco worth a fortune, and did not one always find something at least amusing in the Rag Fair of Madrid? Thence we went on to the Moorish mosque, which the Visigoths began, and so to San Juan de los Reyes, which, Pilar said, I must like better than ...
— The Car of Destiny • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... regret a violation of the laws of war by the General of the Shatterham Wanderers army. In the heat of the combat with the Notts Strollers brigade he ignored the whistled appeal for an armistice to pick up the wounded. Proceeding steadily he fired a deadly shot into the enemy's fortifications. A neutral officer, under the protection of the Red Cross, courageously protested against this infamy. In an excess of military fury the General smote the neutral officer to the earth. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, September 16, 1914 • Various
... very low energies. No one exactly knowns why. At low energies, protons, alpha particles, or other charged particles do not interact with nuclei because they cannot penetrate the electrostatic energy barriers. For example, slow positive particles pick up electrons, become neutral, and lose their ability to cause nuclear transformations. Slow neutrons, on the other hand, can enter nearly all atomic nuclei and induce fission of certain of the heavier ones. It is, in fact, these properties of the neutron which ...
— A Brief History of Element Discovery, Synthesis, and Analysis • Glen W. Watson
... returned Madame de l'Estorade. "The paper can't have turned of itself; besides, in recalling the circumstances, I have a dim recollection that at the moment when I started to run to Rene I felt something drop,—fate willed that I should not stop to pick ...
— The Deputy of Arcis • Honore de Balzac
... don't pick the easy ones, do you? You certainly go right after what you want, Bets. But why ...
— Captain Pott's Minister • Francis L. Cooper
... 'ere after theatres once or twice. Remarkable fancy they was. You gentlemen on the top floor does very much as you likes, but it do seem to me, sir, droppin' a walkin'-stick down five flights o' stairs an' then goin' down four abreast to pick it up again at half-past two in the mornin', singin,' "Bring back the whiskey, Willie darlin,'"—not once or twice, but scores o' times,—isn't charity to the other tenants. What I say is, "Do as you would be done by." That's ...
— The Light That Failed • Rudyard Kipling
... turn over to you in a succinct form all information that may be relevant, for without such sorting you would be overwhelmed." "And I," said Deepwaters, "will order the commanders of our vessels to give you a farewell salute at starting, and to pick you up in case you fail. When you have demonstrated the suitability of apergy," he continued, "and the habitability of Jupiter and Saturn—,which, with their five and eight moons, respectively, and rings thrown ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds • J. J. Astor
... none. 'Tis melancholy work facing and footing it to one of your own sort, and no clipsing and colling at all. Now, pick and choose." ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... with confident intimacy over the old lady's shoulder, and they read the burglary column together, Rachel interrupting herself for an instant to pick up Mrs. Maldon's ball of black wool which had slipped to the floor. The Signal reporter had omitted none of the classic cliches proper to the subject, and such words and phrases as "jemmy," "effected an entrance," "the servant, now thoroughly alarmed," "stealthy footsteps," "escaped with ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... population. Rapidly increasing integration with Western Europe - Finland was one of the 12 countries joining the European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) - will dominate the economic picture over the next several years. Growth in 2003 was held back by the global slowdown but will pick up in 2004 provided the world economy suffers no ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... looking longingly at Clifford Heath's cottage, as he passes the gate, and the little lawyer begins to pick his way across the muddy street, not caring to go on ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch
... hand easily enough. Next he finds a bride who cannot enter the church because she is very tall and wears a high comb. The difficulty is settled as in the former story. After a while he comes to a woman who is spinning and drops her spindle. She calls out to the pig, whose name is Tony, to pick it up for her. The pig does nothing but grunt, and the woman in anger cries, "Well, you won't pick it up? May your mother die!" The traveller, who had overheard all this, takes a piece of paper, which he folds up like a letter, and then knocks at the door. "Who is there?" ...
— The Book of Noodles - Stories Of Simpletons; Or, Fools And Their Follies • W. A. Clouston
... baker, just starting upon his farinaceous career, would dare to dream of—may be invested; and the old rich bakers who can dower their daughters with many honey-pots know that in the matter of sons-in-law they have but to pick and choose. ...
— A Romance Of Tompkins Square - 1891 • Thomas A. Janvier
... these moments that he saw how it might be done. "He would let fruit drop to the ground and rot if no other man wanted it," he analyzed keenly, "but if another man tried to pick it up, he would ...
— The Trumpeter Swan • Temple Bailey
... books were now one of the comforts of his life. "When I feel blind," he said—"and we don't always feel blind, you know, when we are in the right company among people who know how to treat us as if we were not children, and as if we were not deaf—I pick up a book, and, if I stick to it and concentrate, I begin to lose remembrance and to live in the story I am reading and among the people of the tale. And—it is more like seeing the world ...
— Over the Fireside with Silent Friends • Richard King
... had chosen to assist him in supporting the weight of government. But the very night after he returned to his palace, he saw the old man the third time in a dream, who said to him, "The time of your prosperity is come, brave Zeyn: to-morrow morning, as soon as you are up, take a little pick-axe, and dig in the late sultan's closet; you will there find a ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... nevertheless, flattered himself that it would enable him to achieve great deeds in battle and deal death among the Peruvians. Ten months afterwards I met this hero on a march among the mountains of Peru. He had, girded on, a light little sword, like a tooth pick or a bodkin compared with the formidable weapon he had discarded, and which a sturdy negro was carrying behind him. I could not refrain from asking the officer whether the trusty broad-sword had not done good service ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi
... Norsemen's ships would have been lost, But Harald all his vessels saves, Throwing his booty on the waves. The Jutlanders saw, as he threw, Their own goods floating in their view; His lighten'd ships fly o'er the main While they pick up their own again." ...
— Heimskringla - The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway • Snorri Sturluson
... utterances are registered and reported with more or less exactitude. But I think he has no other listener who comports himself as Hinze does—who, figuratively speaking, carries about a small spoon ready to pick up any dusty crumb of opinion that the eloquent man may have let drop. Tulpian, with reverence be it said, has some rather absurd notions, such as a mind of large discourse often finds room for: they slip about among ...
— Impressions of Theophrastus Such • George Eliot
... student (if such a term could be applied to Mr. Lincoln) one who did not know him might have called him indolent. He would pick up a book and run rapidly over the pages, pausing here and there. At the end of an hour—never, as I remember, more than two or three hours—he would close the book, stretch himself out on the office lounge, and with hands under his head and eyes shut he would digest the mental ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... I mean not here, Decency of behaviour; as how one man should salute another, or how a man should wash his mouth, or pick his teeth before company, and such other points of the Small Morals; But those qualities of man-kind, that concern their living together in Peace, and Unity. To which end we are to consider, that the Felicity of this life, consisteth not in ...
— Leviathan • Thomas Hobbes
... it caught Delamater's eye. He leaned down to pick up three pellets of metal, like small shot, ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science January 1931 • Various
... what shall it be? Shall we drift about here until morning, when some vessel will pick us up? I have no doubt this fire has drawn a half-dozen ...
— Adrift in the Wilds - or, The Adventures of Two Shipwrecked Boys • Edward S. Ellis
... to Buttons, pick up this chicken from the table, toss my card on to the empty plate, and addressing Buttons as a species of Prussian pig, march out with the ...
— The King In Yellow • Robert W. Chambers
... Accounts of the Loss sustained in this Action; but it is generally believed, there were upwards of one hundred Men killed, and near two hundred wounded, thirty of whom were taken Prisoners, Numbers of Arms, Colours, Drums, Woolpacks, Grenadoes, Pick-axes, Shovels, Scaling Ladders, &c. were left behind in the Retreat, which the Enemy arrogantly diverted themselves withal, for some Time, on the Top of the Hill, taking Care to ...
— An Account of the expedition to Carthagena, with explanatory notes and observations • Sir Charles Knowles
... miles when we had our first serious mishap since leaving the Indian village. Patricia had insisted she be allowed to take the lead where the blazed trees made the trace easy to follow. I humored her, for she kept within a rod of me. We struck into a bottom and had to pick our way through a stretch ...
— A Virginia Scout • Hugh Pendexter
... was the joy of the few, and the bedazement of "the Board," crumbles beneath the pick, as did the north side of St. Mark's, and history is wiped from ...
— The Gentle Art of Making Enemies • James McNeill Whistler
... declared the lawyer. "You're too old to go. Besides, we are informed that you are keeping the lawful pupils from properly attending to their studies. You must pick up your ...
— A Busy Year at the Old Squire's • Charles Asbury Stephens
... up in cages as though they were Teuton enemies. They encircled them with barbed wire. They kept many of them hungry and thirsty, deprived them of life's necessaries for days, and in some cases reduced the discontented—and who in their place would not be discontented?—to pick their food in dustbins among garbage and refuse. I have seen officers and men in France who had shed their blood joyfully for the Entente cause gradually converted to Bolshevism by the misdeeds of the Allied authorities. In whose ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... man down the trail, and maybe he can pick up the missing one," said San Pedro, and while the other natives were quieting the restless mules, one tall black man hastened in the ...
— Tom Swift in Captivity • Victor Appleton
... search of the Great Carbuncle because we shall need its light in the long winter evenings and it will be such a pretty thing to show the neighbors when they visit us! It will shine through the house, so that we may pick up a pin in any corner, and will set all the windows a-glowing as if there were a great fire of pine-knots in the chimney. And then how pleasant, when we awake in the night, to be able ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... is we can't carry the heavy car with us," replied Tom. "It's too big to pick up and take ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Runabout - or, The Speediest Car on the Road • Victor Appleton
... make known my pretensions to being something more than a servant, I sat down, and entered into conversation with the priest, who, from what I could pick from him, was a dependent upon the mollah. He, in his turn, endeavoured to discover what my business could be; but he did not so well succeed, although the strange and mysterious questions which he ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier
... the said stake larger at the end of it, where, having pierced it, they fit into it a small narrow bit of iron about one palmo long. Then seated in the passages or works, as the veins prove, they pick out and remove the ore, which having been crushed by a stout rock in certain large receptacles fixed firmly in the ground, and with other smaller stones by hand, and having reduced the ore to powder, they carry it to the washing-places. For that purpose they have some small streamlets ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XX, 1621-1624 • Various
... and more of power and might, If he be disposed to revenge his cause, Woll soon pick a quarrel, be it wrong or right, To the inferior and weaker for a couple of straws, And woll against him so extremely lay the laws, That he woll put him to the worse, either by false injury, Or by some craft and subtlety, or else by ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Robert Dodsley
... our orgies. It will thus be seen that the Count's timid exclusiveness shut out from these family orgies my dear and esteemed friend and master MacCallum More. However, in a certain sense, it was an advantage, as we had at least the pick of the young ones, in my two sisters and Ellen, who wanted very little persuasion to join our Lyon's Inn orgies. And our excellent friend had some of his own set, both male and female, to meet us either with one, two ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... Twisty Barlow hysterically. "Why, man, with that pile me an' you could sail back into San Diego like kings! Now that dago will pick you clean ...
— Daughter of the Sun - A Tale of Adventure • Jackson Gregory
... in the huge army of the unskilled and the semi-skilled, outside of those trades, so as to cover the fruit-pickers in the fields and the packers in the canneries, the paper-box-makers, the sorters of nuts and the knotters of feathers, those who pick the cotton from the plant, as well as those who make the cotten into cloth. Another group yet to be enrolled are the hundreds of thousands of girls in stores, engaged in selling what the girls in factories have made, and still other large groups of girls in mercantile offices who are indirectly ...
— The Trade Union Woman • Alice Henry
... wretches who attend meetings, sighing and looking demure; in the meantime their pals pick the pockets of those persons who may be in the same pew with them. They also rob the congregation of their watches, as they are coming out of church; exchange their hats for good ones jocosely called hat making; ...
— Sinks of London Laid Open • Unknown
... many compliments, trusting that our visit had produced a favourable impression. I was very anxious to know what was thought of the present,—the largest we have yet given, much larger than what was received by either Hateetah or Wataitee. I sent two of my servants about to pick up the news in town. I was not disappointed; I hoped to please his highness, and succeeded. He was greatly delighted; and, moreover, displayed immense generosity for an African. Immediately we had retired he called together ...
— Narrative of a Mission to Central Africa Performed in the Years 1850-51, Volume 1 • James Richardson
... Leo stopped too, and they stood for a moment staring at each other. Lady Holme, who was still by the open window, did not move. There was complete silence in the room. Then Leo dropped the latch-key. It fell on the thick carpet without a noise. He made a hasty, lumbering movement to pick it up, but Lord Holme was too quick for him. When Lady Holme saw the key in her husband's hand she moved at last and came forward into the middle of ...
— The Woman With The Fan • Robert Hichens
... tell you—it's really very funny. Just as everyone was rushing to get into the London express I heard a coin drop on the platform, and I saw it rolling. It was half-a-sovereign. I couldn't be sure who dropped it, but I think it was a lady. Anyhow, no one claimed it. I was just going to pick it up when that chap came by. He saw it, and he put his foot on it as quick as lightning, and stood still. He didn't notice that I was after it too. So I drew back. I thought I'd wait and ...
— The Matador of the Five Towns and Other Stories • Arnold Bennett
... fresh devices for torturing the nerves. The telephone set ringing by a ghostly hand, the aeroplane with a phantom pilot, will replace the Gothic machinery of ruined abbeys and wandering lights. The possibilities of terror are manifold, and it is impracticable here to do more than pick up a few threads in the tangled skein. Terror becomes inextricably interwoven with other motives according to the bent of the author. It is allied with psychology in James' sinister Turn of the Screw, with scientific phantasy in Wells' Invisible Man. It may enhance ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... by sons of Eblis,' said Butros. 'I never gave up my arms. I have some pieces now, that, although they are not as fine as those of the English prince, could pick a son of Eblis off behind a rock, whether ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli
... what I'm going to do about it," said Fulkerson. "I've been round all day, trying to pick up the pieces—row began right after breakfast this morning—and one time I thought I'd got the thing all put together again. I got the old man to say that he had spoken to March a little too authoritatively about Lindau; that, in fact, he ought to have communicated ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... Reynolds, and the rest; but what he had overheard had reference solely to Keegan; for when they began to speak of Ussher, everything had been said in so low a voice, that he had been unable to comprehend a word. He had contrived, however, to pick up something, in which Ballycloran, rents, Keegan, and a bog-hole were introduced in marvellous close connection, and he was not slow in coming to the determination that he had been wrong when he fancied that Ussher was the object against whom plots were being formed, ...
— The Macdermots of Ballycloran • Anthony Trollope
... at cards, I suppose, in England. A dash at loo for about an hour, and half-a-dozen cuts at blind hookey,—that's about my form. I know I drop more than I pick up. If I knew what I was about I should never touch ...
— The Duke's Children • Anthony Trollope
... in the fiery stillness. She had broken her fan. Two thin pieces of ivory fell, one after another, without a sound, on the thick carpet, and instinctively he stooped to pick them up. While he groped at her feet it occurred to him that the woman there had in her hands an indispensable gift which nothing else on earth could give; and when he stood up he was penetrated by an irresistible belief in an enigma, by the conviction that within his reach and passing away from ...
— Tales of Unrest • Joseph Conrad
... a wall about it, He ought to reap the fruits. And He does all that for His inheritance. God's honour is concerned in His portion not being waste. It is not to be a 'garden of the sluggard,' by which people who pass can see the thorns growing there. So He will till it, He will plough it, He will pick out the weeds, and all the disciplines of life will come to us, and the ploughshare will be driven deep into the heart, that 'the peaceable fruit of righteousness' may spring up. He will fence His vineyard. Round about His inheritance His hand will be cast, within ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... on highmost stead, heart, ears and sight * Your wone's my heart; mine all's your dwelling-site: Sweeter than honey is your name a-lip, * Running, as 'neath my ribs runs vital sprite: For Love hath made me as a tooth-pick[FN368] lean * And drowned in tears of sorrow and despight: Let me but see you in my sleep, belike * Shall clear my cheeks of tears ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 8 • Richard F. Burton
... can come up when he's lying unconscious, pick the locks, and get out what I want, I can lock the mail pouches again, and he won't know he's been robbed for some hours. That will give me that much more time to get away. Yes, that's my best plan," and as Ryan rode along he examined several keys which he took from a pocket. ...
— Jack of the Pony Express • Frank V. Webster
... How can you wear them abominable things!" exclaimed the distressed woman, stooping to pick up the purple ...
— Maggie Miller • Mary J. Holmes
... Baynes of our parish."—Ah, ah, Miss Charlworth, the one Our Tom fought for a young lady? Come, now we've got into the fun! - "I shouldered him: he primed his pistol, and I trailed my musket, prepared." Why, that's a fine pick-a-back for ye, to make twenty Russians look scared! "They came—never mind how many: we couldn't have run very well, We fought back to back: 'face to face, our last time!' ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... 'What a plague! nobody there? What the devil, and rot me, John, for a lazy dog as you are!' I knew no way to cure him but by writing down all he said one morning as he was dressing, and laying it before him on the toilet when he came to pick his teeth. The last recital I gave him of what he said for half an hour before was, 'What, the devil! where is the washball? call the chairmen! d—n them, I warrant they are at the alehouse already! zounds! and confound them!' When he came to the glass he takes up my note—'Ha! this ...
— Isaac Bickerstaff • Richard Steele
... that he had heard, not even so much as a lifted glance. But as she drew the door shut behind her she heard him pick up the ...
— Once to Every Man • Larry Evans |
