"Trap" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... for almost certain, that the party whom we have driven from fastness to fastness during the night, has at length sprung to the top of yonder battlements from the place where we now stand. Finding the turret is guarded below, the place he has chosen for his security will prove a rat-trap, from ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott
... now stepped forward, and said, "Ye'll just let me carry the laddie to the village, doctor. I'll start the noo, and I'll carry him easier like than any kind o' trap, ye ken." ...
— Little Folks (Septemeber 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... power of fire had left its monuments amid those of the power of water. The sedimentary rock of sandstone, shales, and marl, not only showed veins of ignitible lignite, but it was pierced by the trap which had been shot up from earth's flaming recesses. Dikes of this volcanic stone crossed each other or ran in long parallels, presenting forms of fortifications, walls of buildings, ruined lines of aqueducts. The sandstone and marl had been ...
— Overland • John William De Forest
... the woman for catching me in the trap! Before Dale came in I was on the point of putting an airy construction on my indiscreet speech. I had no desire to discuss my longevity with any one. I want to keep my miserable secret to myself. It was exasperating ...
— Simon the Jester • William J. Locke
... go?" Mr. Burton queried, instantly anxious. "You hardly know what you are going to get into. It may be a trap of some sort. Suppose, as a matter of revenge, there were a bomb under ...
— Christopher and the Clockmakers • Sara Ware Bassett
... objection to Knight's plan for luring the journalist into his "trap," which was a harmless one. According to his prophecy, Mr. Milton Savage of the Torquay Weekly Messenger accepted the invitation from his correspondent, and came to luncheon on the day when the public were free to view ...
— The Second Latchkey • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... mind which enabled him to talk interestingly of many things and many places. On this particular evening he was anything but the man of iron she had known—until she ventured to speak of Ed. Then he closed up like a trap. He was almost gruff in his refusal to say a word ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach
... a "kraal," composed of stakes driven down in the form of a V, leaving the broad end open for the whales to enter. This was done in a shallow place, with the point of the kraal towards shore; and if by chance one or more whales should enter the trap at high water, the fishermen were to occupy the entrance with their boats, and keep up a tremendous splashing and noise till the tide receded, when the frightened whales would find themselves nearly "high and dry," or with too little water to enable them to swim, and their capture would ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... slug into what could be a trap like that with one gang. If it was a trap, they were sacrifices. You hope the opposition will now relax its precautions. Sometimes it does—and a day or so later you're back for the real raid. That works occasionally. Anyway it was the plan in ...
— Legacy • James H Schmitz
... and while I lay striving, poor little fellow, to dispel my alarm by fixing my thoughts resolutely on a rabbit-trap I had set under some running hemlock out on the side hill, that there rose the noise of a horse being ridden swiftly down the frosty highway outside. The hoofbeats came pounding up close to our gate. A moment later there was a great hammering on the oak door, as with a cudgel ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... not all gloom and disaster on his side. Captain Bland, who had been sent by Bacon with a considerable force to capture Berkeley, was led into a trap and captured by Captain Larramore. Shortly after, the governor returned to Jamestown with a large number of longshoremen and loafers, great enough in quantity, but ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick
... of my arm, unless you have a mind to fall through a trap-door, or bring down a forest on your head; you will pull down a palace, or carry off a cottage, if you are not careful," said Etienne.—"Is Florine in her dressing-room, my pet?" he added, addressing an actress who stood waiting ...
— A Distinguished Provincial at Paris • Honore de Balzac
... bigger fool than I ever thought you were, Lester," he had told his nephew. "Why in thunder didn't you tell your folks and me all about this just as soon as it happened? We could have set a trap for those rascals and caught ...
— The Rover Boys at Big Horn Ranch - The Cowboys' Double Round-Up • Edward Stratemeyer
... they sat in council, At length the Mayor broke silence: 'For a guilder I'd my ermine gown sell; I wish I were a mile hence! It's easy to bid one rack one's brain— I'm sure my poor head aches again, I've scratched it so, and all in vain. Oh for a trap, a trap, a trap!' Just as he said this, what should hap At the chamber door, but a gentle tap? 'Bless us,' cried the Mayor, 'what's that? Anything like the sound of a rat ...
— The Children's Garland from the Best Poets • Various
... inscrutable smile of hers, and the disturbing green rays shot from her eyes. A thrill of interest stirred his pulses while something held him there against his will and his better judgment, as if he were caught fast in the steel spring of a trap. ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... it as the day for the custom. Tomorrow will be Christmas Day, and I have come out twenty miles this evening to hold a service of that kind with the semi-annual communion as it happens. It will be a cold, cheerless room in a clay-built cabin down in the corner of a bare valley in a trap and basalt district with sparse vegetation and a bare aspect. A cold spot with a handful of Christians, bearing their testimony alone out on the margin of our field of work. I hope to see 40 or 50 patients up to sundown, and then have worship with them at night. That will be my Christmas. This ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... and up an alley, and over a wall, and through a garden, and under an arch, and over a court-yard, and through a gate, and down another street, and up another alley, and through a house, and up a long staircase, and out upon a roof, and over several abutments, and down a trap-door, and down another pair of stairs, and through another house, into another garden, and over another wall, and down a long road, and over a field, clear out ...
— Ting-a-ling • Frank Richard Stockton
... got sick of the big blood-rusted traps and the stretching-rings and the blood-smeared cutting-boards and the smell of pelts being cured. For every pelt, I began to see, meant pain and death. In one trap Francois found only the foot of a young red fox: it had gnawed its leg off to gain freedom from those vicious iron jaws that had bitten so suddenly into its flesh and bone and sinew. He also told me of finding a young bear which had broken the anchor-chain of ...
— The Prairie Mother • Arthur Stringer
... very wise, and she had taught her babies to run and hide when they saw the old cat coming. She had also taught them not to go near a trap. The little mice obeyed their mother, and they were happy in their home in the ...
— The Child's World - Third Reader • Hetty Browne, Sarah Withers, W.K. Tate
... to the theatre so much that at the jour de l'an my father included a toy-theatre among my presents. It had a real curtain of green baize, that would roll up and down, and beautiful coloured scenery that you could shift, and footlights, and a trap-door in the middle of the stage; and indeed it would have been altogether perfect, except for the Company. I have since learned that this is not infrequently the case with theatres. My company consisted of pasteboard men and women who, as artists, struck ...
— Grey Roses • Henry Harland
... building. There, while Joe held the door partly open and I held the lantern so as to throw a light into the kitchen, my father knelt upon the floor waiting for the bear to give him another chance. But Big Reuben was much too clever to do anything of the sort; he was not going to put himself into any such trap as that; and presently my mother from up-stairs called out that she could see him ...
— The Boys of Crawford's Basin - The Story of a Mountain Ranch in the Early Days of Colorado • Sidford F. Hamp
... Certainly the theory of a just and vigilant Providence, of a future paradise where all these sufferings of the world would receive compensation, had long seemed necessary to the wretchedness of mankind; but what a trap lay in it, what a pretext for the tyrannical grinding down of nations; and how far more virile it would be to undeceive the nations, however brutally, and give them courage to live the real life, even if it were in tears. If they were already turning aside from Christianity was ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... arrived at Aldeire, and you thought yourself free from danger, to rid yourself of my company and avoid giving me my half of the treasure, after it was found. In truth, you are not the clever man you imagine yourself to be, but only a simpleton deserving of pity, who have deliberately walked into a trap from which there is no escape, in telling me where this great treasure is to be found, and telling me at the same time that you know my history, and that if I were to accompany you to Spain you would there be absolute master of my life. And what need, then, have I of ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Spanish • Various
... turn he saw that the aisle merely circled the stairway, coming out into the depot again on the other side. It was a trap. He glanced quickly ...
— Monkey On His Back • Charles V. De Vet
... importunate with this nobleman to press his title to the crown, as the legal representative of his great-grandmother Mary, youngest daughter to king Henry the Seventh. But the earl, fearing, as it is said, that this was only a trap to ensnare him, gave information against Hesket to the government, in consequence of which he was apprehended, tried and executed. Hesket had threatened the earl that, if he did not comply with his suggestion, ...
— Lives of the Necromancers • William Godwin
... have that privilege. Innocence belongs to childhood and girlhood, but under present conditions, it is as dangerous and foolish as level and unguarded railway crossings, or open and unguarded trap doors. It is no pleasant task to have to tell a joyous, sunny-hearted girl of fourteen or fifteen about the evils that are in the world, but if you love her, you will do it! I would like to see this work done by trained motherly and tactful women, ...
— In Times Like These • Nellie L. McClung
... "And it's darned good luck for us. The boys ran across a valley full of wild horses over here about twenty miles. Dad, I believe I can trap several ...
— Valley of Wild Horses • Zane Grey
... an individual of a different type. He was a young man with heavy brows and a large mouth devoid of lips, set tight as a snapped man-trap. He had keen, restless, watchful eyes. His hair was sandy, thrust forward over his brow, and hanging low behind. On the opposite side of the hearth crouched a boy, a timid, delicately formed lad with a large head ...
— The Broom-Squire • S. (Sabine) Baring-Gould
... difficulty in following the prompter, whose duty it is to dictate to the performer the words which the latter afterwards repeats. Seated in a stage trap before the leader of the orchestra, he is conveniently within hearing of the actors, who upon the evening of representation never desert him if they can possibly help it. But I, who have studied my part after the manner of English actors, could easily dispense with the Cuban prompter's ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman
... fairly into this trap, he sent a force to close up the entrance of the valley. The Romans suddenly found that they had been entrapped into a cul-de-sac, with impassable hills in front and on each side, and a strong body of AEquians guarding the entrance to the ravine. There was neither grass ...
— Historic Tales, Volume 11 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... an English deserter who had gone over with the traitor Stanley; and in order to see if his suspicions were correct, pretended that he was dissatisfied with his position and would far rather be fighting on the other side. The man at once fell into the trap, acknowledged that he was an Englishman, and said that if Grimeston and Redhead would but follow his advice they would soon become rich men, for that if they could arrange to give up one of the forts to Parma they would be ...
— By England's Aid • G. A. Henty
... first time I felt a creep of undefinable horror. Not so my servant. "Why, they don't think to trap us, sir; I could break that trumpery door with ...
— The Haunters & The Haunted - Ghost Stories And Tales Of The Supernatural • Various
... cried Mr. Sagittarius, dropping the knife and fork which he had just picked up for the dissection of a lobster croquette. "I said this was a trap. I said it was a rat-trap from ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens
... trying to devise some plan of escaping it, angrily wishing he had never been born. Was there no way out of the world but this? When he thought of the millions of lonely creatures rotting away under ground, life seemed nothing but a trap that caught people for one horrible end. There had never been a man so strong or so good that he had escaped. And yet he sometimes felt sure that he, Claude Wheeler, would escape; that he would actually invent some clever shift to save ...
— One of Ours • Willa Cather
... war only when the United States is willing to go to war with the Soviet Union to free Berlin from the trap it is in. If we won't defend our own vital interests against the aggressive and arrogant actions of communists 90 miles from our shores, what would prompt us to cross the ocean and defend ...
— The Invisible Government • Dan Smoot
... tumbling pell-mell over each other. They were being rapidly dragged down a steep declivity. Day dawned and revealed a terrible scene. The form of the mountains changed in an instant. Cones were cut off. Tottering peaks disappeared as if some trap had opened at their base. Owing to a peculiar phenomenon of the Cordilleras, an enormous mass, many miles in extent, had been displaced entirely, and was speeding ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne
... lion could both see and be seen: probably the top was entirely covered with boards, and upon these was raised a sort of low hut or sentry-box, just large enough to contain a man, who, when the proper moment arrived, peeped forth from his concealment and cautiously raised the front of the trap, which was a kind of drop-door working in a groove. [PLATE CXIX., Fig. 2.] The trap being thus opened, the lion stole out, looking somewhat ashamed of his confinement, but doubtless anxious to vent his spleen on the first convenient object. The king, prepared for his ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 2. (of 7): Assyria • George Rawlinson
... married; he lived alone; he never went to church; he never voted; he refused to pay a tax to the State: he ate no flesh, he drank no wine, he never knew the use of tobacco; and, though a naturalist, he used neither trap nor gun. He chose, wisely, no doubt, for himself, to be the bachelor of thought and Nature. He had no talent for wealth, and knew how to be poor without the least hint of squalor or inelegance. Perhaps he fell into ...
— Excursions • Henry D. Thoreau
... experience of the world failed to forewarn him of what was coming. Phoebe, it is needless to say, instantly fell into the trap. ...
— The Fallen Leaves • Wilkie Collins
... can't get used to do without sleep," said Forsyth, stepping down through the trap-door, "so I'll bid ye ...
— The Lighthouse • R.M. Ballantyne
... winding construction, which communicated with the back yard of the palace, and the openings of which, high above the ground, were protected by iron gratings. The stone stairs leading down into the vaults could be closed at will by a heavy trap-door in the back hall, which we found open. The Baron himself led the way down the stairs. We remarked that it might be awkward if that trap-door fell down and closed the opening behind us. The Baron smiled at the idea. "Don't be alarmed, gentlemen," ...
— The Haunted Hotel - A Mystery of Modern Venice • Wilkie Collins
... we've got the traitors as tight as a squirrel in a box-trap. Some of 'em jumped off and were killed, but we've got the most of 'em, and Pedro is ...
— Jack North's Treasure Hunt - Daring Adventures in South America • Roy Rockwood
... Beak, as he called the major. But Strong resolved to seek an explanation of these words otherwise than from Colonel Altamont, and did not choose to recall them to the other's memory. "No," he said then, "you didn't split as you call it, colonel; it was only a trap of mine to see if I could make you speak; but you didn't say a word that any body could comprehend—you were too ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... that there was a back door to Rushton's office; in this door was a small sliding panel or trap-door with a little shelf at the bottom. The men stood in the road on the pavement outside the closed door, their money being passed out to them through the sliding panel. As there was no shelter, when it rained they occasionally ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell
... perfume!" Mrs. Jasher gasped and saw in a moment how the late conversation had led her to fall into a trap. ...
— The Green Mummy • Fergus Hume
... expression may raise a smile on some of my readers' lips—the tract of country best worth seeing in the neighbourhood of Sydney, is Illawarra, commonly called the Garden of New South Wales. By a change in the formation from sandstone to trap, a soil this here produced capable of supporting a vegetation equal in luxuriance to any within the tropics. In the deep valleys that intersect the country, the tree-fern attains a great stature, and throwing out its rich spreading fronds on all ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes
... where we get out of this trap, Elinor Wream. If such a big lightning like that can get in, we can get out," ...
— A Master's Degree • Margaret Hill McCarter
... to meet the Marchesino there. Yet she was going to ask them to meet each other. She had told the Marchesino so. Should she tell Emile? Perhaps, if she did, he would refuse to come. But she could never lay even the smallest trap for a friend. So she wrote on, asking Emile to let her know the night he would come as she had promised to invite the ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... glassy deep, But oft retarded; once with a hidden net, Though with great windows, (for when need first taught These tricks to catch food, then they were not wrought As now, with curious greediness, to let None 'scape, but few and fit for use to get,) As in this trap a ravenous pike was ta'en, Who, though himself distress'd, would fain have slain This wretch; so hardly are ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... us to warn. I won't pretend to think that things are all right, when I know they are not all right. That would be mean. What is called making the best of it, would testify all the wrong way. My life, instead of being a warning, would be a sort of a trap. Let me at least play the humble role of scarecrow. I am in excellent condition for it," she ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... his mind again. He abandoned the goal of outer walls and chances of escape. He wrenched violently at that trap door. It was bolted but the bolt was an ancient one and gave at his furious exertions, letting him down into a ...
— The Fortieth Door • Mary Hastings Bradley
... displayed such clever ingenuity and forethought in laying a trap for the inquisitive, is it not more than likely that there may be other traps baited ...
— The House of Whispers • William Le Queux
... one of these retreats by an interval of silence, Stefan was as likely as not to find an auto at the gate and hear exclamatory voices proceeding from the nursery, when he would fade into the woods again like a wild thing fearful of the trap. ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
... holiday excursion; then came a sudden reverse, that, for a time, seemed to make certain the loss of the entire fleet. At Alexandria the Red-river bottom is full of great rocks that make it impassable except at the highest water. When Porter's gunboats arrived, they found themselves caught in a trap from which there seemed to be no hope of escape. The army was encamped along the banks of the river, and the soldiers began again their jokes upon Porter's habit of taking gunboats for an overland journey. The army generals began to get impatient, and advised Porter to blow up ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... not venture the experiment. "Perhaps," said he, "she may be less shocked at this proposal from one man than from another. And if she should take me at my word, where am I then? caught, in my own trap, and undone for ever." "No;" answered Nightingale, "not if I can give you an expedient by which you may at any time get out of the trap."——"What expedient can that be?" replied Jones. "This," answered Nightingale. "The young fellow I mentioned, who is one of the most intimate acquaintances ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... humane person had himself tasted the tender mercies of 'paternal' government; he knew the nature of a dungeon better even than his prisoner. 'For four years,' we are told, 'he had seen no human face; his scanty food had been lowered to him through a trap-door; neither chair nor table were allowed him, his cell was never swept, his beard and nails were left to grow, the humblest conveniences of civilised humanity were denied him!'[67] On this man affliction had produced its softening, ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... Bianca's sake," I implored him. "I am assured that here is nothing but a trap baited for you. Do not gorge their bait as your valour urges you. Defeat them, my lord, by circumspection. Do you not see that if you resist the Holy Office, they can issue a ban against you, and that against such a ban not even the Emperor can ...
— The Strolling Saint • Raphael Sabatini
... pattern and one or two horizontal bands across the face of the picture. (Fig. 7). It can sometimes be reduced or eliminated by the insertion of a filter trap at ...
— Zenith Television Receiver Operating Manual • Zenith Radio Corporation
... in that last question, and when he asked it I knew it was he or some one acting for him who had attempted to mislead me about the time of the vessel's departure. I saw a chance to trap him, ...
— The Devil's Admiral • Frederick Ferdinand Moore
... during this happy period that she was standing, one day, by the garden gate, when Colonel French passed by in his fine new trap, driving a spirited horse; and it was with perfect candour that she waved her hand ...
— The Colonel's Dream • Charles W. Chesnutt
... has often been my Case Tom. When I get into that Train of thinking, and consider the present Situation of our Country, it makes me as uneasy in my Coffin as a Rat shut up in a Trap. I remember an old She[1] Fool, that was fonder of scribling than reigning, used to say, that the Dead have that melancholy Advantage over the Living of first forgetting them; but 'tis as false as ten thousand other Truths, that your Philosophers and Politicians above ...
— A Dialogue Between Dean Swift and Tho. Prior, Esq. • Anonymous
... he cast his eyes upward, and again an involuntary exclamation broke from him. "Did you see that trap-door?" he asked. ...
— Winsome Winnie and other New Nonsense Novels • Stephen Leacock
... position of defence and possessing a wide outlook over the Campanian plain, had only one narrow passage in its rocky rim to serve as entrance or outlet. Followed hither by the Roman forces and caught like rats in a trap, Spartacus and his men were doomed either to be reduced by starvation, or else to run the gauntlet of the sole narrow exit, which the Senate's commander, Clodius Glabrus, was already guarding. The story of Spartacus' escape from ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... occasionally," he said. "For instance, instead of shooting the rabbit for supper, I'm going to try a figure-four trap." ...
— The Heart of the Desert - Kut-Le of the Desert • Honore Willsie Morrow
... exchange of glances from the others, but Mother Corey chuckled. "Heart like a steel trap, cobber," he said, almost approvingly. "Well, you'll be earning your keep here—yours and that granddaughter's, too. Here—you'll need directions for ...
— Police Your Planet • Lester del Rey
... talking rapidly, apologizing for keeping them waiting, and explaining that for the children's sake she always went down into the cellar when the shelling commenced, wishing them, as they gathered up their parcels and left, "bonne chance," and making for the trap-door and the ladder ...
— Action Front • Boyd Cable (Ernest Andrew Ewart)
... thro which they passed is Similar to what we See from Camp. one Beaver & a foot of Beaver caught in trap Cought this morning at Sunset Mr. Fairfong and a pt. of Otteau & Missourie Nation Came to Camp, among those Indians 6 were Chiefs, the principal Chiefs Capt. Lewis & myself met those Indians & informed ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al
... That was a sure sign. In the back seat, John Gordon and the Pretender, as everyone now called Charles Stuart, were silently but busily whittling away, constructing part of a wonderful new kind of ground-hog trap. Elizabeth had filled one side of her slate with an elaborate picture of a castle on a hill, a stream, a lake, a ship, and an endless vista of town and road and church-spire stretching away into the distance. She had never heard of that school of artists ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith
... the party were breathlessly climbing three steep iron staircases, the last of which ended at a trap-door, giving admittance to the clock-room, where the keeper generally sits; from here another ladder-like staircase leads up into the lantern. Arrived at the top, the Baron screamed with delight at ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various
... is a way they have," the thane said. "'Come in here!' said the rat in the trap to the rat outside, 'one is safe from ...
— King Olaf's Kinsman - A Story of the Last Saxon Struggle against the Danes in - the Days of Ironside and Cnut • Charles Whistler
... slept with their guns at hand that night. They knew the pride and might and treachery of Pontiac, and they feared him. They felt as if they were in a trap, with the raging sea before them and the forest alive with ...
— Four American Indians - King Philip, Pontiac, Tecumseh, Osceola • Edson L. Whitney
... long before there was a clash between Dave and his party on one side and Merwell and his followers on the other. Link Merwell, as usual, did all in his power to injure Dave, and make the outing for the others a failure, but he was caught in his own trap, and it was proved that he had, to a certain extent, aided some horse-thieves in their nefarious work. Mr. Merwell had to pay Mr. Endicott for the animals that were missing, and, in order to hush the matter up, he agreed to sell his ...
— Dave Porter and His Rivals - or, The Chums and Foes of Oak Hall • Edward Stratemeyer
... had met the slum doctor's eye with a shock of recognition; she looked at once away. She felt like one who has walked singing into a malicious trap. Why, oh, why, need the man have been ambushed here, of all places under the sun, obtruding his undesired presence and marplot countenance once again on ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... home.' At half-past three she ordered a hansom to be summoned, instead of her own carriage, and, having dressed with nervous rapidity, she ran downstairs and entered the vehicle. 'Drive to the British Museum,' she spoke up to the cabman through the trap. ...
— Thyrza • George Gissing
... one of the cottages to hear the afternoon church service performed by Mr. Watson, and Captain Waldegrave describes it as a most striking scene. The place chosen was the bedroom of one of the double cottages, or one with an upper story. The ascent was by a broad ladder from the lower room through a trap-door. The clergyman took his station between two beds, with a lamp burning close behind him. In the bed on his right were three infants sound asleep; at the foot of that on his left were three men sitting. On each side and in front were the men, some wearing only ...
— The Eventful History Of The Mutiny And Piratical Seizure - Of H.M.S. Bounty: Its Cause And Consequences • Sir John Barrow
... exclaimed—"It would be easy enough to take the island if our generals were MEN. If I were General, I would do it at once!" This burst of the tanner made the assembly laugh. He was saluted with cries of "Why don't you go, then?" and Nicias, thinking probably to catch his opponent in his own trap, seconded the voice of the assembly by offering to place at his disposal whatever force he might deem necessary for the enterprise. Cleon at first endeavoured to avoid the dangerous honour thus thrust upon him. But the more he drew back the louder were the assembly in calling upon him to accept ...
— A Smaller History of Greece • William Smith
... 202). Covers may also be made by stretching mosquito netting over arcs of barrel hoops or bent wires. If by some such means the plants are kept insect-free till they outgrow the protection, they will usually escape serious damage from insects thereafter. It is well to plant trap or decoy hills of cucumbers, squashes, or melons in advance of the regular planting, on which the ...
— Manual of Gardening (Second Edition) • L. H. Bailey
... inhabitants, whoever they might be, had not thought fit to put in an appearance, so I was left to my own devices. My first attempt to "rush" Pornic up the steep sand-banks showed me that I had fallen into a trap exactly on the same model as that which the ant-lion sets for its prey. At each step the shifting sand poured down from above in tons, and rattled on the drip-boards of the holes like small shot. ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... the increasing state of excitement of the young sailor prince, who drank more and more champagne, stopped old Mrs. Schwellenberg's remonstrances by giving the old lady a kiss, and telling her to hold her potato-trap, and who did not "keep sober for Mary". Mary had to find another partner that night, for the royal William Henry could not ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... to the 15th cent. In the interior a broad triforium with heavily-canopied window-openings surrounds the church. The vaulting shafts expand in a curious way over the roof. In the chapel of the south transept is a statue of Mary by Coysvox. At the foot of the pier in this transept a trap-door opens into the crypt, 10th cent. At the south side of the Palais des Arts is St. Pierre, amodern edifice, with a beautiful portal of the 11th cent., all that remains ...
— The South of France—East Half • Charles Bertram Black
... him abruptly on the shoulder. "Tell me your own opinion of a hot-headed, meddling young fool who not only got into mischief himself at a most critical moment, but led half-a-score of valuable men into what was practically a death-trap, for the sake of, I suppose he would call it, an hour's sport. On my soul, Derrick," he ended, with a species of quiet vigour that carried considerable weight behind it, "if you weren't such a skeleton ...
— Rosa Mundi and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... an attack on Paducah, Kentucky, on the banks of the Ohio. While he was able to enter the city he failed to capture the forts or any part of the garrison. On the first intelligence of Forrest's raid I telegraphed Sherman to send all his cavalry against him, and not to let him get out of the trap he had put himself into. Sherman had anticipated me by sending troops against him before he ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... women, with the possible exception of children, make the most remarkable witnesses to be found in the courts. They are almost invariably quick and positive in their answers, keenly alive to the dramatic possibilities of the situation, and with an unerring instinct for a trap ...
— Courts and Criminals • Arthur Train
... a deep breath, and looked uneasily out of the window. This was dangerous news, indeed! What, little Miss Butterfly, has the boy with the gauze net caught sight of you already? Will he trap you and imprison you so soon in his little gilded matrimonial cage, enticing you thereinto with soft words and, sugared compliments to suit your dainty, delicate palate? and must I, who have meant to chase you for the chief ornament of my own ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... Edwards mysteriously swallowed up, like a stage ghost down a trap-door. And do you know, reader, I am very near leaving him so for good and all, and suspending these sketches indefinitely,—yea, even to the time of the Mississippi dividends, or any other period ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... ruler of Pal-ul-don. He licked his thin lips as he sought the window through which Tarzan had entered and now Lu-don's only avenue of escape. Cautiously he made his way across the floor, feeling before him with his hands, and when they discovered that the trap was set for him an ugly snarl broke from the priest's lips. "The she-devil!" he muttered; "but she shall pay, she shall pay—ah, Jad-ben-Otho; how she shall pay for the trick she ...
— Tarzan the Terrible • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... to attend that of the three inspectors, which followed at once. She was called as a witness and inquired of Judge Hunt: "I should like to know if the testimony of a person convicted of a crime can be taken?" "They call you as a witness, madam," was his brusque reply. Later, thinking to trap her, he asked, "You presented yourself as a female, claiming that you had a right to vote?" Quick as a flash came her answer: "I presented myself not as a female, sir, but as a citizen of the United States. I was called to the ballot-box ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... peculiar fashion; and after having acquainted myself with the fashions of the second and third periods, I was now peculiarly interested in the acquaintance which I was enabled to commence with that of the first and earliest also. I found, too, in a bed of trap beside the Edinburgh road, scarce half a mile to the east of the town, numerous pieces of carbonized lignite, which still retained the woody structure—probably the broken remains of some forest of the Carboniferous period, enveloped ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller
... volcanic-torn country whose mountains piled up in utter confusion like the waves of the stormy Atlantic; and further on we would come out upon a plain once more scattered with gigantic bowlders of porphyry and trap, out of which the monoliths of ancient Thebes might have ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 1157, March 5, 1898 • Various
... oh, my fine shiny Quaker gent," sez I, an' I flings the door wide open an' there I stan's in the doorway, "it's her you wants, is it?" sez I. "And pray what does my fine shiny Quaker gent want wi' my darter?" "Your darter?" sez 'e, an opens 'is mouth like this, and shets it agin like a rat-trap. "Yis, my darter," sez I. "I s'pose," sez I, "you think she ain't 'ansom enough to be my darter. No more she ain't," sez I; "but she takes arter her father, an' werry sorry she is for it," sez I. "I want to put her in the way of 'arnin' some money," sez 'e. "Oh, ...
— Aylwin • Theodore Watts-Dunton
... went up with the tide frequently found themselves stranded on the way down, for the water passed freely between the palm-tree trunks without affording them right of way, and the rude weir often stopped for ever belated bream, mullet, and barramundi. This simple trap, though it does not appear to be put into use on the coast generally, seems almost to indicate an instinctive knowledge of a studied design described to me by an observant friend who has travelled into many an odd nook and corner of Queensland. ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... did not know. But, down the passage and down the stairway was the only exit to the rest of the palace and the air. She threw open her press so that the hinges cracked. She caught her cloak and she caught her hood. She had nowhither to run—but there she was at the end of a large trap. Their footsteps as they receded echoed and whispered ...
— The Fifth Queen • Ford Madox Ford
... perfectly aware that her goings and comings had become a matter of no little concern to the austere gentleman who dwelt on the other side of the wall. That he watched her she knew, for she had been feminine enough to trap him into changing his position that he might ...
— The Wall Between • Sara Ware Bassett
... towards the east, and the second went to the west, both making fun of poor Dummling, who was obliged to stay where his feather had fallen. Then Dummling, sitting down and feeling rather miserable after his brothers had gone, looked about him, and noticed that near to where his feather lay was a trap-door. On lifting this up he perceived a flight of steps, down which he went. At the bottom was another door, so he knocked upon it, and then heard a ...
— Grimm's Fairy Stories • Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm
... I care! I care because it's a dirty, low-lived piece of work! These Injuns need every bit of fur they can trap to buy grub and clothes with. When they get hooch, they pay a big price—and they pay it in grub and clothes that their women and ...
— Connie Morgan in the Fur Country • James B. Hendryx
... readiness to persist in their iniquitous deeds. And do not look for any help from your comrades yonder; they triumphed temporarily, achieving a victory by sheer force of numbers, but since you and they parted company they have fallen into a trap—and now those who still live are prisoners. Will you join them; or will you go the way of those others who have to-night laid down their lives at the behest of a man who knows not the meaning of mercy? Let those among you who are willing to surrender throw ...
— The Cruise of the Thetis - A Tale of the Cuban Insurrection • Harry Collingwood
... over a great part of the space that I have mentioned, furry animals abound; and different fur companies send those in their employ to boat up the river, to sail through the lakes, to hunt wild animals, to trap beavers, and to trade with the various Indian tribes which are scattered throughout ...
— History, Manners, and Customs of the North American Indians • George Mogridge
... coincidence, if not as a reward for an act of straightforwardness, in which I saw no merit, at least as proof that the upper powers had not altogether forgotten me. I found both the editor and his periodical, as I should have wished them, temperate and sunny—somewhat clap-trap and sentimental, perhaps, and afraid of speaking out, as all parties are, but still willing to allow my fancy free range in light fictions, descriptions of foreign countries, scraps of showy rose-pink morality and such like; which, though they had no more ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al
... off at the desired diameter, or else given a rounded end like a test-tube and a hole the proper size blown in the center of it. A suitable thick-walled bulb is to be blown on the small tube, as in the case described above. This method is also used in making the Kjeldahl trap (a, Fig. 13), the small tube to be inserted being first drawn, the thick bulb blown at its point of union with the main tube, and then the small tube bent and cut. The large bulb is best made with rather heavy wall, being either blown in the middle of a tube, and one piece of the tube drawn ...
— Laboratory Manual of Glass-Blowing • Francis C. Frary
... with a small circus then in Vermont. But Dan'l's beloved vagabond hadn't a sou, and before he could tramp there, the show would be far on its southern way. Naturally, the Deacon refused a loan—I can just see the way his mouth would snap shut like a trap, but Dan'l, what with egg money and his tiny garden, and errand money from summer boarders, had gathered together twenty slow dollars, and he came lavishly forward. The rover blithely promised to pay him back in two monthly payments. He's never sent a penny. ...
— Jane Journeys On • Ruth Comfort Mitchell
... I remember is being placed on the seat of a trap beside the local R.M. (Resident Magistrate), and thus going out, escorted by a party of ...
— The Reminiscences of an Irish Land Agent • S.M. Hussey
... his appetite. His mouth was almost huge, and reached way around to the sides of his head under his eyes. It opened up more like the mouth of a frog or a toad than like that of most birds. When he hunted he kept it yawning wide open, so that it made a trap for many an unlucky insect that flew straight in, without ever knowing what happened to it when it disappeared down the great hollow throat, into a stomach so enormous that it hardly seems possible that a bird less than twice the size of ...
— Bird Stories • Edith M. Patch
... as this, that I cannot be thankful enough for having finished "Atherton," for I am sure I could not write it now. There is some chance of my getting better in the summer, if I can be got into the air, and that must be by being let down in a chair through a trap-door, like so much railway luggage, for there is not the slightest power of helping myself left in me,—nothing, indeed, but the good spirits which Shakespeare gave to Horatio, and Hamlet envied ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields
... the monks who dwelt therein, wishing to ascertain something of the hereafter of those whose bodies lay all undecayed in the cemetery, visited it alone in the dead of night for the purpose of prosecuting his inquiries on that fearful subject. As he opened the trap-door of the vault a light burst from below; but deeming it to be only the lamp of the sacristan, the monk drew back and awaited his departure concealed behind the high altar. The sacristan emerged not, however, from the opening; and the monk, tired of waiting, approached, ...
— Folk-lore and Legends: German • Anonymous
... one account that I have received, I have no doubt that this is often the case; but a gentleman informs me that he lately saw eight or ten worms leave their burrows and crawl about the grass on some boggy land on which two men had just trampled while setting a trap; and this occurred in a part of Ireland where there were no moles. I have been assured by a Volunteer that he has often seen many large earth-worms crawling quickly about the grass, a few minutes after ...
— The Formation of Vegetable Mould through the action of worms with • Charles Darwin
... officer was starting off, I remarked to Bismarck that Napoleon himself would likely be one of the prizes, but the Count, incredulous, replied, "Oh no; the old fox is too cunning to be caught in such a trap; he has doubtless slipped off to Paris"—a belief which I found to ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... a Barbican or Sally-port beyond. The pit is 12 feet deep and measures 27 feet x 10 feet across. It may possibly have served the double purpose of defence and of water supply—there being no other apparent source. In the footbridge across the pit may have been a trap-door, or other means for suddenly breaking communication in case of need. Overhead probably lay the roadway for horsemen with a proper drawbridge. The thickness of the walls indicates their having been built to a considerable height, sufficient ...
— The Hawarden Visitors' Hand-Book - Revised Edition, 1890 • William Henry Gladstone
... our own picture of what's going on. We ask for it, we get it. It builds up and up—and finally we're like mice in a trap built of our own ideas. ...
— Sjambak • John Holbrook Vance
... overheard; and there is no place so safe for a confidential conference as in a hansom driving through the streets of London. Drive slowly towards the Evening Graphite office," she said to the cabman, pushing up the trap-door in the roof of the vehicle. Mr. Stoneham took his place beside her, and the cabman turned his horse ...
— Jennie Baxter, Journalist • Robert Barr
... couldn't think of any way of letting her know she was getting it. It's no use writin' to those scoundrels of lawyers of hers and telling them. She'd only think it was a trap; or she'd think I'd caved in, and be so cockahoop we should never get any forrader. Then I got the idea. It looks a bit roundabout, but I believe it'll work, I do really. But it'll take a lot of working, and I'm wondering whether that ...
— Happy Pollyooly - The Rich Little Poor Girl • Edgar Jepson
... remembered that in the chair behind his had been a young girl, and he felt a pity for her that choked him like a hand at his throat. Then as they went down he instinctively but vainly tried to shake off the hold, which was as that of a trap. It was like being in the actual grip ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates
... man, with a grey military moustache and a filthy black frock coat, limped out and sat down beside the trap, removed his boot—his sock was blood-stained—shook out a pebble, and hobbled on again; and then a little girl of eight or nine, all alone, threw herself under the hedge close by ...
— The War of the Worlds • H. G. Wells
... wheels and a hysterical whistle—anyhow each sweaty hour brings St. Louis and Nancy nearer. St. Nancy, St. Nancy, St. Nancy, says the sleepless racket of the wheels, but the peevish electric fan at the end of the corridor keeps buzzing to itself like a fly caught in a trap. "And then I got married you see—and then I got married you see—and when you get married you aren't a free lance—you aren't ...
— Young People's Pride • Stephen Vincent Benet
... learnt that their estimate of heat was so different, that the only safety was in keeping the room like an oven. The folding doors into the back drawing-room had a trick of opening of their own accord; and the trouble given her by this draught-trap, as Arthur called it, can hardly be estimated, especially one windy week in March, when ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge
... introduced by Lord Suffield, which abolished the practice of setting spring-guns and other engines of destruction for the preservation of game. This bill, which passed into a law, declared it to be a misdemeanour in any person to set a spring-gun, man-trap, or other engine calculated to kill, or inflict grievous injury, with the intent that it should destroy life, or occasion bodily harm to any trespasser or other person who might come into contact with it. An exception was made in favour of gins ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan |
