"Tussle" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... their best man, one Jack Armstrong, to "throw Abe." Jack Armstrong was, according to the testimony of all who remember him, a "powerful twister," "square built and strong as an ox," "the best-made man that ever lived;" and everybody knew the contest would be close. Lincoln did not like to "tussle and scuffle," he objected to "woolling and pulling;" but Offutt had gone so far that it became necessary to yield. The match was held on the ground near the grocery. Clary's Grove and New Salem turned out generally to witness the bout, and betting on the result ran high, the community as ...
— McClure's Magazine, January, 1896, Vol. VI. No. 2 • Various
... she knew how it came about, she had a gold apple in her hand. Then she was so bitterly sorry, she burst into tears, and wanted to throw it away; but the Bull said, she must keep it safe and watch it well, and comforted her as well as he could; but he thought it would be a hard tussle, and he doubted ...
— Popular Tales from the Norse • Sir George Webbe Dasent
... days past. The wind has veered about! It now comes boisterously from the northwest, and, taking hold of the aged framework of the Seven Gables, gives it a shake, like a wrestler that would try strength with his antagonist. Another and another sturdy tussle with the blast! The old house creaks again, and makes a vociferous but somewhat unintelligible bellowing in its sooty throat (the big flue, we mean, of its wide chimney), partly in complaint at the rude ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IX (of X) - America - I • Various
... your leave," the prisoner said, suiting the action to the word. "This aneurism of mine makes me easily tired, and the tussle we had half an hour ago has not mended matters. I'm on the brink of the grave, and I am not likely to lie to you. Every word I say is the absolute truth, and how you use it is a matter of no ...
— A Study In Scarlet • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Then he had another tussle of wills with Miss Cushman, the white nurse from across the seas. It came about in this way. Women who are Mohammedans keep their faces veiled, but the Armenian Christian nurses had ...
— The Book of Missionary Heroes • Basil Mathews
... answer, I will tell you the circumstance I alluded to, which was this: Last night, as I was crossing about town drumming up friends to attend the meeting tomorrow, seeing we are expecting a hard tussle, I met a man that I could have sworn was John Peters, if I had not known the fellow was close in Northampton jail; and as it was, I could swear it was his exact shape and appearance. Well, knowing it could ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... everybody knows Kiah. Poor old chap, he'll be breaking his heart over his young master, as he calls him, for I doubt 'twas him was drowned off the Mermaid in the tussle the other day.' ...
— Two Maiden Aunts • Mary H. Debenham
... received from the two or three officers whom he has questioned, and the papers themselves, he has immediate need of seeing the ex-quartermaster sergeant, Rix. But he cannot go when there is a chance for a fight right here. Stuart may dash in westward, and have just one lively tussle with them to cover the crossing of his valuable plunder and prisoners below. Of course they have not men enough to think of confronting him. Just in the midst of all the excitement there comes an orderly ...
— A War-Time Wooing - A Story • Charles King
... the fact that he had not been able to secure the schooling which geniuses need in these days. He was unfitted for the work geniuses do. All he was to be was a rural teacher, accidentally elected by a stupid school board, and with a hard tussle before him to stay on the job for the term of his contract. He could have accepted positions quite as good years ago, save for the fact that they would have taken him away from his mother, their cheap little home, their garden and their ...
— The Brown Mouse • Herbert Quick
... sacrifice their soul's interests in the idolatry of wealth. There was a time when you saw the folly of trying with, money to satisfy the longing of your soul. You said, when you saw men going down into the dust and tussle of life, "Whatever god I worship, it won't be a golden calf." You saw men plunge into the life of a spendthrift, or go down into the life of a miser, like one of old smothered to death in his own money-chest, and you thought, "I shall be very careful never to be caught in these traps in which ...
— Around The Tea-Table • T. De Witt Talmage
... knew,—no one better,—that this oyster becomes harder and harder in the opening as the man who has to open it becomes older. It is an oyster that will close to again with a snap, after you have got your knife well into it, if you withdraw your point but for a moment. He had had a rough tussle with the oyster already, and had reached the fish within the shell. Nevertheless, the oyster which he had got was not the oyster which he wanted. So he told himself now, and here had come to him the chance of ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... some paces away. The man relaxed his hold on her, but, instead of running as her hold-up man had done, he turned to meet the oncoming champion. Alexander grappled with him and there was a stout tussle. It seemed ages to Antoinette, who was watching the struggle with tense, strained eyes, before Alexander proved his redoubtability by throwing her insulter over ...
— The Mermaid of Druid Lake and Other Stories • Charles Weathers Bump
... there wasn't a thing that could bite or scratch For which Tom Johnson wasn't a match, Excepting his wife, and she was the better Half by all odds—he'd often get her In a tight place, and give her a strapping. But somehow or other 'twould always happen, In every tussle and every bout, In every 'scrimmage' and every rout, She'd come out ahead of the cross-grained old wizzard, And by hook or crook manage to 'give him a blizzard.' Sometimes from a brawl of which Tom was the hero, ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... to trust your judgment, Dick. Besides, I've got other fish to fry. I'm going east to-night to have one more tussle with the steel mills. We must have quicker deliveries and more of them. When I get back, we'll organize the track-layers and begin to make us ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde
... tussle lasted, Thomas Bodza stood upon the table with the pose of a capitoline statue, whence he exclaimed ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai
... Nipe enough time to complete his work on his communicator." He looked at Stanton and chuckled, but there was no humor in his short laugh. "We would not wish our friend, the Nipe, to bring his relatives into this little tussle, ...
— Anything You Can Do ... • Gordon Randall Garrett
... preachers thet hang on ter this docterin thet ther yerth moves insted uv ther sun." "Hoosay Mandy. Why don't yer tak proper! Hoosay!" "Well, he jes oughter be named Hussy, fur he is er hussy. When ole sat'n meets them two at the cross-road thars er goin ter be er tussle now I tell yer." "Well now yer know thet ther scripter says cussed be Canyon, least wise thets the way Brother Melvin splained hit tother night, cussed be Canyon means cussed be Niggers." "Now Teck Pervis, wher is yer proof thet the scripter ...
— Hanover; Or The Persecution of the Lowly - A Story of the Wilmington Massacre. • David Bryant Fulton
... road was "woodsy and wild and lonesome." On the right hand, scrub firs, their spirits quite unbroken by long years of tussle with the gulf winds, grew thickly. On the left were the steep red sandstone cliffs, so near the track in places that a mare of less steadiness than the sorrel might have tried the nerves of the people behind her. ...
— Anne Of Green Gables • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... Brokenhearted Bride," also received a nod, and returned it apathetically. Pete Hamilton, however, got a flabby handshake, a wheezy laugh, and the announcement that he was down from Shoshone for a good, gamy tussle with that four-pounder he had lost ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower
... as if Miss Bengough had forgotten their tussle about the first Romilly. She frowned, turned half away, ...
— Widdershins • Oliver Onions
... Hallijohn just then. She did not faint as she had done once before that day, but she looked as if she should die. One sharp cry, instantly suppressed, for Afy did retain some presence of mind, and remembered that she was in the public road—one sharp tussle for liberty, over as soon, and she resigned ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... army. When Perkins had been in the town three years, the anecdotes illustrating his shiftlessness multiplied, and his name was a synonym for that trait of character known in the vernacular as "no-'count." In the third spring, after a winter's tussle with rheumatism, Perkins died. His funeral was of so little importance that none of the corpulent old ladies in black alpaca, holding their handkerchiefs carefully folded in their hands, came panting across ...
— The Court of Boyville • William Allen White
... its forewheels perilously near the ditch. Near by was a lady, standing with arms stiff and hands clenched, stamping her foot as she addressed, in no measured terms, two men who were rolling over one another in a desperate tussle a few yards away on the heath. As Desmond drew nearer he perceived that a second and younger lady stood at the horses' heads, grasping the bridles firmly with ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang
... and agree on equal terms. We must reach some solution, some shadow of consent; for without that, eager talk becomes a torture. But we do not wish to reach it cheaply, or quickly, or without the tussle and effort ...
— Memories and Portraits • Robert Louis Stevenson
... incident, then, of a political nature, in which the victors of the tussle on Fernando Noronha were publicly concerned, was the outcome of a message cabled by Dom Corria while the smoke of Russo's cannon still clung ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... if so, we han't so much to fear as from t' other 'uns. They arn't so hard up, I should say; or even if they be, there arn't so many o' 'em to bully us. There were only five or six o' them. I should be good for any three o' that lot myself; an' I reckon you an' Will'm here could stan' a tussle wi' the others. Ah! I wish it war them. But it arn't likely: they had a good boat an' a compass in it; and if they've made any use o' their oars, they ought to be far from here long afore this. You've got the best ears, ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... retorted the captain bravely. "But we would not have been unprepared, and you would have had a tussle to get on board, instead of things being made ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson
... freedom or the struggle for the land. Catholic emancipation is a leading case: obstinacy against obstinacy, the No! of England against the Yes! of Ireland, and the former sprawling in the ditch at the end of the tussle. "The Law," ran the dictum of an eighteenth-century Lord Chancellor, "does not suppose any such person to exist as an Irish Roman Catholic." At this moment a Catholic holds the seals and purse of the Chancellorship. Never ...
— The Open Secret of Ireland • T. M. Kettle
... sometimes foolish, very very foolish, in what she said! She, Anna Bauer, had often noticed it. Still, averse as she was from the thought, the old German woman was ruefully aware that she would have to accept Mr. Hegner's invitation. When it came to a tussle of will between the two, herself and her mistress, Mrs. Otway generally won, partly because she was, after all, Anna's employer, and also because she always knew exactly what it was she wanted Anna to do. Anna was emotional, easily touched, ...
— Good Old Anna • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... days that followed did Maui amuse himself with the big kite. As he grew more familiar with its handling the impetuous demi-god would ask Laamaomao for winds from Ipunui and glory in the tussle his kite gave him when buffeted by these stronger blasts—even though wise old Laamaomao was ...
— Legends of Wailuku • Charlotte Hapai
... strikingly good, are probably rejected or attacked with the good-humoured ridicule and withering scorn distinctive of true friendship and cordial intimacy. Then is each fully and formally debated, every tussle advancing it a stage, and none finally accepted until all the others have fallen in the battledore-and-shuttlecock process to which they have been subjected. Then, when the subject is settled, comes the consideration ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann
... day and the next, the bulldog in the master's eye was a terror to evil-doers. At the close of school on the second day Bud was heard to give it as his opinion that "the master wouldn't be much in a tussle, but he had a heap of thunder and lightning ...
— The Hoosier Schoolmaster - A Story of Backwoods Life in Indiana • Edward Eggleston
... space of time, Karl had concocted two cups of steaming coffee. Helen was then all aglow. Her strength was restored. The boisterous wind had crimsoned her cheeks beneath the tan. She had never looked such a picture of radiant womanhood as after this tussle with the storm. Luckily her clothing was not wet, since the travelers reached the cabane at the very instant the elements became really aggressive. It was a quite composed and reinvigorated Helen who summoned Bower from his ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... considering not so much its black-ness, which was intense, the eaves nearly meeting overhead, as the small chance I had of distinguishing between attackers and attacked. But Simon and the men overtaking me, and the sounds of a sharp tussle still continuing, I decided to venture, and plunged into the alley, my left arm well advanced, with the skirt of my cloak thrown over it, and my sword drawn back. I shouted as I ran, thinking that the knaves might desist on hearing me; and this was what happened, for as I arrived on the scene ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman
... valiant young gentlemen. They fought stoutly by my side during our long tussle with the Spaniards, and more than once saved my life by ridding me of foes who would have taken me at a disadvantage. Once, indeed, when I was down from a blow on the pate from a Spanish axe, they rushed forward and kept my assailants at bay until ...
— By England's Aid or The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) • G.A. Henty
... to go cold into a battle that needs warmth, out into the muddle that you have made yourself; and your mother and all your friends will despise you, oh, my darling, and rightly, if it is ever right to despise. George still dark, all the tussle and the misery without a word from him. Am I justified?" Into his own eyes tears came. "Yes, for we fight for more than Love or Pleasure; there is Truth. Truth counts, ...
— A Room With A View • E. M. Forster
... in his pocket. "I shall stay on board; we have a moonlight night, and if we had not, I could find my way out in a yellow fog. Please to get your boats all ready, manned and armed, for there may be a sharp tussle." ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... The man that rode this horse seemed to have selected me as his mark. He rode straight at me from the first. He was a fine, manly-looking fellow, and our swords were about the last that were crossed in the struggle. We had a sharp tussle for a while. I think he must have been struck by a chance shot. At least he was unseated just about the time my own horse was shot under me. Looking around amid the confusion I saw this horse without ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... I saw the bundle of bank-notes in his hands, the sweep! I would have let him kill me sooner.... Oh, we had a sharp tussle, I ...
— The Confessions of Arsene Lupin • Maurice Leblanc
... in the tussle his overcoat had rolled up under his arms, the pistol pocket was clear, and a blue black automatic flashed dully in ...
— Men of Affairs • Roland Pertwee
... and arrows from under cover wrought slight scathe; so one last charge the Bastard commanded, and led himself, and a sore tussle there was that time on the wall-crest, one or two of our men leaping into the fort, whence they came ...
— A Monk of Fife • Andrew Lang
... I was a better swimmer than I am; I would go off and help him. But old Grim cost me a good tussle, and I don't feel quite as if I could ...
— Sunshine Bill • W H G Kingston
... exposed to it already to spread the disease all over the city. Three more cases to-night. Mrs. Smelts' symptoms are very suspicious. Dr. Adair is coming himself at nine o'clock to give instructions. It's going to be a tussle all right!" ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice
... was superb. He had hands of steel and velvet, and fear was an unknown quantity to him. Ann watched the ensuing tussle between man and beast with unequivocal admiration. The mare, a big raking bay, with black points and a white blaze, sulkily obeyed her rider's curbing hands upon the bridle whilst they rode through the lanes, but when they emerged upon the wide, swelling sweep of the ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler
... been a little shrewder as readers of human character, or if they had known why old William Bacon was there, they would have kept quiet; but it was not long before they began to push again, and at last one of them gave a squeak, and a tussle took place. The preacher was in the ...
— Other Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... reinforcements being late in arriving to render assistance. They were so badly mauled and cut up that it was necessary to withdraw them from the line to refit, and infantry from an "Old Contemptible" Division took their place. Bourlon Wood became so saturated with gas that, after a great tussle, neither side was able to tenant it any longer, and so withdrew, leaving a screen of outposts to ...
— Three years in France with the Guns: - Being Episodes in the life of a Field Battery • C. A. Rose
... my lord," said he, hardly raising his head from the floor, "I am here but for a witness beliken. I am breeding of no broil, save an' my gossip o' yesternight drew me into a tussle with ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... BLENNERDALE, running into the lagoon for repair, had been cut off with all hands. In similar fashion had the crew of the GASKET, a sandalwood trader, perished. There was a big French bark, the TOULON, becalmed off the atoll, which the islanders boarded after a sharp tussle and wrecked in the Lipau Passage, the captain and a handful of sailors escaping in the longboat. Then there were the Spanish pieces, which told of the loss of one of the early explorers. All this, of the vessels named, is ...
— South Sea Tales • Jack London
... has always held honor, and often, more than fair ability. The preponderance of ministers in every generation may, also, still gladden the heart of the argumentative ancestor whose dearest pleasure was a protracted tussle with the five points, and their infinitely ramifying branches, aided and encouraged by the good wine and generous cheer he set, with special relish, before all who could meet ...
— Anne Bradstreet and Her Time • Helen Campbell
... commune, set apart for the practice of athletic sports, chief of which is the favourite khoosthee or wrestling. There is generally some wary old veteran, who has won his spurs, or laurels, or belt, or whatever you choose to call it, in many a hard fought and well contested tussle for the championship of his little world; he is 'up to every dodge,' and knows every feint and guard, every wile and tactic of the wrestling ground. It is generally in some shady grove, secluded and cool; ...
— Sport and Work on the Nepaul Frontier - Twelve Years Sporting Reminiscences of an Indigo Planter • James Inglis
... still. The relief he felt was exquisite. If once he could have a chance of seeing the man who was in the room with him, and who he could not doubt was the person who had thrown him in, Max felt he should be all right. In a tussle with another man he knew that he could hold his own, and a sight of the ruffian would enable him to judge whether bribery or force would be the ...
— The Wharf by the Docks - A Novel • Florence Warden
... the mill, listenin' ter the letter, could sca'cely git thar consent ter wait fur old man Bates ter git through his talk ter Loralindy, that he kin talk ter every day in the year! But arter awhile he settled his spectacles agin, an' tuk another tussle with the spellin,' an' then he rips out the main p'int o' the letter. "This stranger-man he 'lowed he war bold enough ter ax another favior. The cuss tried ter be funny. 'One good turn desarves another,' he said. 'An' ez ye hev done me one good turn, I want ye ...
— A Chilhowee Lily - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... day was only 7 miles 400 yds. We are blaming our sledge-meter for the slow rate of progress. It is extraordinary that on the days when we consider we are making good speed we do no more than on days when we have a tussle." ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... of them cough as a human being does behind his hand. The lantern threw dancing reflections on the snow. Tyke grovelled and rolled in the light drift, barking loudly. He bit at his own tail. Kit set down the lantern, and fell upon him for a tussle. The two of them had rolled one another into a snowdrift in exactly ten seconds, from which they rose glowing with heat—the heat of young things when the blood runs fast. Tyke, being excited, scoured away wildly, and circled ...
— Bog-Myrtle and Peat - Tales Chiefly Of Galloway Gathered From The Years 1889 To 1895 • S.R. Crockett
... said the policeman, not caring to have a single-handed tussle with the human savage, whose strength and desperate ...
— Cast Adrift • T. S. Arthur
... 'ov them thar chaps Thet in this life of tussle An' rough-an'-tumble, sort ov set A mighty store on muscle; B'liev'd in hustlin' in the crop, An' prayin' on the last ...
— Old Spookses' Pass • Isabella Valancy Crawford
... that," said the owner of the deep, boyish voice, and sounds of scuffling feet, the creaking of the bed, and bursts of laughter proclaimed a tussle. ...
— Judy of York Hill • Ethel Hume Patterson Bennett
... a few days later, the caravan had a genuine tussle with the Comanches. It was a bright moonlight night, and about two hundred of the mounted savages attacked them. It was a rare thing for Indians to begin a raid after dark, but they swept down on the unsuspecting teamsters, yelling like a host of demons. They were armed with bows ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman
... his foot. "Take tent o' yoursel'!" he cried threateningly. "When I was tracking Stroke I fell in with one of his men, and we had a tussle. He pinked me in the hand, but 'tis only a scratch, bah! He was carrying treasure, and I ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie
... duck him in Neptune—the college fountain. There was a tussle, and his hand was cut by a bit of broken piping. You perhaps don't know that he made a speech last week, attacking several of us in a very offensive way. The men in college got hold of it last night. A man who does that ...
— Lady Connie • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... and massacres, I cannot tell. The alliance, however, was a fact. Defeated in his attempt to check our advance from the sea, he retreated with his usual swiftness, and preparing for another hard and hazardous tussle, began by sending his wife with the little girl across the Pequena range of mountains, ...
— A Set of Six • Joseph Conrad
... raised again, Vaughan rushed forward and caught it. He twisted the plaited hide round his wrist and hung on. Sax joined him immediately, but they tried in vain to wrench the handle out of the infuriated man's hand. The unequal tussle was soon over. Mick was a big heavy man, and the lads were light and were not used to matching their strength against the endurance of a man. First one and then the other was thrown back. They came on again, however, till, with a sudden jerk, Mick flung the whip away from him, ...
— In the Musgrave Ranges • Jim Bushman
... still with Egstrom & Blake, and we met in what they called "our parlour" opening out of the store. He had that moment come in from boarding a ship, and confronted me head down, ready for a tussle. "What have you got to say for yourself?" I began as soon as we had shaken hands. "What I wrote you—nothing more," he said stubbornly. "Did the fellow blab—or what?" I asked. He looked up at me with a troubled smile. "Oh, no! He didn't. He made it a kind of confidential business between us. He ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... I never saw the people in better spirit," answered the second lieutenant. "They are like a bull-dog with a captured bone. They are not inclined to yield it without a desperate tussle." ...
— Marmaduke Merry - A Tale of Naval Adventures in Bygone Days • William H. G. Kingston
... friends immediately volunteered, but he sat quietly watching the fun while one after another of the boys fell victim to the pony's powers. Finally, when the little animal's triumph seemed complete, Grant stepped into the ring and sprang upon his back. A tremendous tussle for the mastery immediately ensued, but though he reared and shied and kicked, the tricky little beast was utterly unable to throw its fearless young rider, and amid the shouts of the audience the clown at last stopped the contest and paid Ulysses ...
— On the Trail of Grant and Lee • Frederick Trevor Hill
... screamed, kicking his heels angrily against the rock,—"the tails is made out of nassy old string!" And, I am sorry to say, Peter made a snatch at both chocolate mice and knocked them out of Rudolf's hand. This, of course, made it necessary for Rudolf to box Peter's ears, and a tussle quickly followed, in the middle of which something dreadful happened. The large flat rock they were sitting on gave several queer shakes and heaves and then suddenly rose right up under the three children and threw them head over heels into the air. They were not a ...
— The Wonderful Bed • Gertrude Knevels
... through Denver to Cheyenne, marched thence to the Black Hills to cut the trails from the great reservations of Red Cloud and Spotted Tail to the disputed ground of the Northwest; and here we had our own little personal tussle with the Cheyennes, and induced them to postpone their further progress toward Sitting Bull and to lead us back to the reservation. It was here, too, we heard how Crazy Horse had pounced on Crook's columns on the bluffs of the Rosebud that ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, November 1885 • Various
... landlord, good all round. I can scarcely believe it yet. A burglar, of course. I suppose he entered the house for the purpose of robbery, when your father awoke and jumped out of bed, there was a tussle, and the scoundrel killed him; at least, that is what I gather from the story that the ...
— Colonel Thorndyke's Secret • G. A. Henty
... slave gives tongue like a hound on the scent. "Baila!" and, a stick being handed him, he performs the gymnastics of his country, a sort of war-dance without accompaniment. "El can!" and, giving him a broom, they loose the dog upon him. A curious tussle then ensues,—the dog attacking furiously, and the blind man, guided by his barking, defending himself lustily. The Chino laughs, the master laughs, but the visitor feels more inclined to cry, having been bred in those Northern habits which respect infirmity. A real ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... was plenty of fun to be got out of the experience. "The doors of the old coaches were narrow, and many a tussle to get inside occurred. One lady in particular who was very stout and a regular passenger on a certain train, always had to be assisted both in and out—the stationmaster pulling and the guard pushing, while the fireman was enjoying ...
— The Story of the Cambrian - A Biography of a Railway • C. P. Gasquoine
... him. In a very few minutes Ganew was lying in the bottom of his own ox-cart, with his hands securely tied behind him with a bit of his own rope and the Elder was sitting calmly down on a big boulder, wiping his forehead and recovering his breath; it had been an ugly tussle, and the ...
— Saxe Holm's Stories • Helen Hunt Jackson
... which among primitives was less strong than is ordinarily supposed, but which in early boyhood reaches forth its hands, industriously, if not always wisely, after concrete, tactual knowledge and proprietorship. So also with the impulse to tussle and to revel in the excitement of a contest; inhibited, it explodes; neglected, it degenerates; but directed it goes far toward the making of a man. Evidence of this intensity, zest, and pressure of young life is never wanting. Disorder "rough-house," and ...
— The Minister and the Boy • Allan Hoben
... his tussle with the tangled underbrush, his old clothes had some fresh tears, and his hands ...
— Tom Slade with the Colors • Percy K. Fitzhugh
... Rondeau likes. Nevertheless old Duncan floored him. While he's been away somebody taught him the hammer-lock and the crotch-hold and a few more fancy ones, and he got to work on Rondeau in a hurry. In fact, he had to, for if the tussle had gone over five minutes, Rondeau's youth would have decided ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne
... aren't you? Got to keep us all straight, and develop all our characters. Poor girl, you'll have a hard tussle!" ...
— The Second Violin • Grace S. Richmond
... serene and lovely mornings that sometimes succeed a storm. The birds sung loud and cheerily, the yellow corn uplifted itself in the broad fields, and waved proudly after its sharp tussle with the tempest, which had done its best to beat down the heavy ears with cruel wind and driving rain half the night through. The vine-leaves clustering round Robert's window fluttered with a joyous rustling, shaking the rain-drops in diamond showers from ...
— Lady Audley's Secret • Mary Elizabeth Braddon
... right; and the chase now lay over Sheeplow Water meadows, and so on to Bolsover brick-fields, when the pack again changed from hunting to racing, and the pace for a time was severe. His lordship having got his second horse at the turn, was ready for the tussle, and plied away vigorously, riding, as usual, with all his heart, with all his mind, with all his soul, and with all his strength; while Jack, still on the grey, came plodding diligently along in the rear, saving his horse as much as he could. His lordship charged a stiff flight ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... names in the regimental list of conduct, minimizing their chances of promotion when the list would reach the eyes of the commanding general and, finally, those of the Kaiser and of his military cabinet. At best it meant a tussle with the pater. But golden youth does not long indulge in such gloomy reflections. That is its privilege. Thus, then, after exchanging melancholy views, the younger swarm broke and fled into the garden ...
— A Little Garrison - A Realistic Novel of German Army Life of To-day • Fritz von der Kyrburg
... feast we had shared in overnight, or only a quaint dream? Was Heru real or only a lovely fancy? And those hairy ruffians of whom a horrible vision danced before my waking eyes, were they fancy too? No, my wrists still ached with the strain of the tussle, the quaint, sad wine taste was still on my lips—it was all real enough, I decided, starting up in bed; and if it was real where was the little princess? What had they done with her? Surely they had not given her to the ape-men—cowards ...
— Gulliver of Mars • Edwin L. Arnold
... some hand-to-hand tussle meanwhile, Mrs. Pedders had; but she'd stuck it out noble. At the start about nine out of ten of her neighbors and kind friends was dead sure she knew where that bunch of securities was stowed, and some of 'em didn't make any bones of sayin' she ought to be in jail along with Pedders. So of ...
— Shorty McCabe on the Job • Sewell Ford
... it is only natural that you should entertain the wish; in fact you have injured him seriously, and we must do all in our power to alleviate his pain. I will go in the morning and see Dr. Green. I shall, of course, tell him that the boy was hurt in a tussle with you, and that you are very sorry about it. The fact that he is some two years older, as you say, and ever so much stronger and bigger, is in itself a proof that you were not likely to have wantonly provoked a fight with him. I shall ask the doctor if there is ...
— Through the Fray - A Tale of the Luddite Riots • G. A. Henty
... patient study. True, I foresaw, from the Spider's organization, a single sting in the centre of the thorax; but that did not explain the victory of the Wasp, emerging safe and sound from her tussle with such a quarry. I had to see what occurred. The chief difficulty was the scarcity of the Calicurgus. It is easy for me to obtain the Tarantula at the desired moment: the part of the plateau in my neighbourhood left untilled by the vine-growers provides me ...
— More Hunting Wasps • J. Henri Fabre
... fight or a tussle with her in securing the key to No. 5 the night of the murder, and in the scoffling he had scratched her. That, at least, would be Perry's story and Lucy's. Braceway had been certain of that also before ...
— The Winning Clue • James Hay, Jr.
... as to the issue of the coming tussle, I could not help admiring that brig. She was a truly beautiful craft; distinctly a bigger vessel than the Shark, longer, more beamy, with sides as round as an apple, and with the most perfectly moulded ...
— A Middy in Command - A Tale of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood
... old heart. If you don't, you'll not need to go to old Lagonda's pool. By the holy saints, I'll take you there myself and plunge you in just to rid the world of such a fool. You hear me! Now, go on! And remember in your tussle that that big S cut over the old Sunrise door out there stands for Service. That's what will make your name ...
— A Master's Degree • Margaret Hill McCarter
... gentle old priest, who looked from his peaceful haven with dreamy eyes upon the sweat and tussle of the world's battle. Had he instead been in the thick of the fight, it might have been harder for him to believe that his enemies ever had ...
— Men of Iron • Ernie Howard Pyle
... better," said the doctor. "He is coming to himself, and his memory—his power of recalling the past—is improving. He is stronger too, though not much, as yet. With his loss of memory his accident has had less to do, than the life he had been living before it. He has had a hard tussle, but he is a strong man naturally, and he may escape this time. From the worst effects of his accident he can never recover. As far as I can judge from present symptoms, he will never walk a step again—never. But he may live for years. He may even recover so as to be able to attend ...
— Allison Bain - By a Way she knew not • Margaret Murray Robertson
... Valdes, and in the fight that followed put a bullet in his leg," replied the sheriff. "It was in the tussle that Jan got his ankle sprained, but your guide landed his man. Sometimes Jan may seem slow, but in a rumpus he's a terror for speed, decision, and grit. We were heading up the White Trail, hoping to head you off, when we ran ...
— The Meadow-Brook Girls in the Hills - The Missing Pilot of the White Mountains • Janet Aldridge
... another, and at last he came back, wet and dripping from his tussle with the river, and cursing the very ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge
... older birds. It is when the young go out of the nest on their first foraging that the parents, full of a crass and simple pride, make their indescribable chucklings of gobbling, gluttonous delight. The little ones would be amusing as they tug and tussle, if one could forget what it is they ...
— The Land Of Little Rain • Mary Hunter Austin
... girls who were finally picked for the deciding tussle, five wore the dark green uniforms that had identified them the previous year as the official freshman team. They were Judith, Jane, Adrienne, Christine Ellis and Marian Seaton. Among the other five contestants, Barbara Temple and Olive Hurst, both of last year's practice team, had ...
— Jane Allen: Right Guard • Edith Bancroft
... agricultural community of "old-world virtues" for young and old, "and ancient and homely methods." One of his great aims was the promoting of home industries. As regards Newman's reference to politics at the end of letter No. 2 in 1888, Gladstone's Government was but just breathing after the sharp tussle they had been through with the Home Rule party, with Parnell at their head. In 1886 Gladstone had brought in the measure which was to give Ireland a "statutory parliament." This was practically the signal for a disastrous rent which tore his party in two, and was the precursor ...
— Memoir and Letters of Francis W. Newman • Giberne Sieveking
... fell to me to have a tussle with Honest Tom when he was Minister for Defence in the Federal Government. About ...
— The Chronicles of a Gay Gordon • Jose Maria Gordon
... Phillips and Carolyn were clinging to Cope, who had rushed out in undershirt and trousers, Peter had a short tussle on the porch with the intruder. He came in showing a scratch or two on his face, and he reported the pantry ...
— Bertram Cope's Year • Henry Blake Fuller
... his task was an unpleasant one. A fight, a tussle, a battle fair and square wouldn't have troubled him in the least, but when his work demanded the witnessing of prisoners being shot or flogged, he often felt, although he knew they deserved it, ...
— Under the Rebel's Reign • Charles Neufeld
... the first time the announcement had been made from the ring. Mr. Sparling had given his consent, even though he had not seen the act. He had, however, observed Teddy engaged in a tussle with the beast that afternoon, and could readily understand that what Teddy told him about January's contrariness ...
— The Circus Boys On the Mississippi • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... have housed the fore topgallant mast and main topmast, and I would have attempted it had we had a decently willing crew; but I doubted whether the Dagoes would have undertaken the job, except under compulsion; and I was unwilling to engage in a tussle with a crowd of insubordinates with a hurricane threatening to burst ...
— The Strange Adventures of Eric Blackburn • Harry Collingwood
... up," he said, "and Taylor is pushing their left smartly. They will make one more tussle to recover their line of retreat; but we shall smash them from end to end and ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various
... resent it; she could resent nothing Hallam ever did save that morbid talk of his. She had been fighting with this spirit ever since she could remember, and their brief "tussle" over, she crept closer to him along the ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond
... was probably correct. At all events the boys did not scruple to make a blazing fire in the stove, and very pleasant the warmth felt after their long tussle with the storm. ...
— Canoe Boys and Campfires - Adventures on Winding Waters • William Murray Graydon
... either," returned Lester. "I was so worked up over that tussle with the shark that I didn't have time to think of anything else. But now I'm hungry ...
— The Rushton Boys at Treasure Cove - Or, The Missing Chest of Gold • Spencer Davenport
... tussle, but she did want him at the top. She had not told Madame Beattie about the manuscript growing and growing on Jeff's table every night. It was his secret, his and hers, she reasoned; she hugged ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... he said cheerily, as I held up my head; 'you will do now. I had a sharp tussle to get you here, but it is all right. We are setting inshore fast. Pull yourself together, for we shall have a rough time of it in the surf. Anyhow, we will ...
— The Tiger of Mysore - A Story of the War with Tippoo Saib • G. A. Henty
... It was a sharp tussle for a few moments, and then two of the men caught hold of hanging branches as the boat swung within reach. The next minute a rope was passed round a branch, and ...
— Rob Harlow's Adventures - A Story of the Grand Chaco • George Manville Fenn
... ordeal. He was a born fighter. Strength, endurance, courage were expressed in every line of his body. Indeed, as was seen in the matter of the rows between the Garrison and the National boys, he thought a good lively tussle to be fine fun, and never missed a chance ...
— Bert Lloyd's Boyhood - A Story from Nova Scotia • J. McDonald Oxley
... few minutes there was a tussle. The bottle struck the floor and broke, and I desisted and rose. We stood panting and threatening each other. In the end I planted myself between him and the food, and told him of my determination to ...
— The War of the Worlds • H. G. Wells
... reckoned, would put him high enough in the water to scramble on to the ledge, and then it would have to be a tussle of physical strength, if necessary, for he meant to save Mary somehow, whether she would ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant
... painter, or something, and he's got into a fight with the wolves," continued Dan, as he strained his ears to catch the sounds of the encounter. "They are having a lively tussle, aren't they?" ...
— For the Liberty of Texas • Edward Stratemeyer
... hard tussle that morning with an ill-tempered horse he was breaking, and he felt tired out. He had no idea of compelling a horse with a whip. Sir Shawn had bought this horse at a fair a short time before. He ...
— Love of Brothers • Katharine Tynan
... her head thrown back a little as the beautiful bay reefed and plunged forward, enjoying the speed as much as his rider. Jim was a length or so behind on Monarch, whose one ambition at that moment was, in Murty's words, "to get away on him." It was plain that the boy was exulting in the tussle. The sunlight gleamed on the black horse's splendid side as they dashed up ...
— Mates at Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce |
