"Brittle" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... completely covered with bouquets, garlands, and wreaths of withered flowers. The leaves had fallen from most of them, and were now lying scattered about the floor. Leaves that had once been green had turned brown; the grasses and mosses were in shreds, the twigs were dry and brittle. Many of the bouquets had had ribbons attached to them; these, once red or blue, were now faded. Others had been bound with gold tinsel; this had rusted. The slanting rays of the sun fell on others, ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... seemed almost the quick result of the working of some machine; and those closest to the grave's brink crouched down, and, intent as they were upon the progress of events, heeded not the damp earth that fell upon them, nor the frail brittle and humid remains of humanity that occasionally ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... 'Brittle, the member for Stoney-Muckford, was in the next carriage to me yesterday; and he's a slow coach, too,' I threw in. 'It does look as if the division was nearer than ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... proposed To an Earthen Pot a journey. The latter was opposed, Expressing the concern he Had felt about the danger Of going out a ranger. He thought the kitchen hearth The safest place on earth For one so very brittle. "For thee, who art a kettle, And hast a tougher skin, There's nought to keep thee in." "I'll be thy bodyguard," Replied the Iron Pot; "If anything that's hard Should threaten thee a jot, Between you ...
— The Talking Beasts • Various
... of the wilful Pat rather as evidences of Oriental, half-effeminate devilry than as passports to decent society. Oxford had veneered him, but scratch the veneer and one found the sandal-wood of the East, perfumed, seductive, appealing, but something to be shunned as brittle and untrustworthy. ...
— Tales of Chinatown • Sax Rohmer
... All the pianists I have heard with a beautiful tone—Thalberg, Henselt, Liszt, Tausig, Heller—yes, Stephen of the pretty studies—Rubinstein, Joseffy, Paderewski, Pachmann and Essipoff, sat low before the keyboard. When you sit high and the wrists dip downward your tone will be dry, brittle, hard. Doubtless a few pianists with abnormal muscles have escaped this, for there was a time when octaves were played with stiff wrists and rapid tempo. Both things are an abomination, and the exception here does not prove the rule. Pianists ...
— Old Fogy - His Musical Opinions and Grotesques • James Huneker
... be used as an ingredient of tooth-powder, it makes the teeth brittle. Camphor certainly has the effect of making the teeth, for a time, look very white; but it is ...
— Advice to a Mother on the Management of her Children • Pye Henry Chavasse
... from a scrub oak a handful of leaves. They were very brittle and crumbled in his hand. A match flared out. His palm cupped it for a moment to steady the blaze before he touched it to the crisp foliage. Into a nest of twigs he thrust the small flame. The twigs, dry as powder from a four-months' drought, crackled like miniature fireworks. The grass ...
— Gunsight Pass - How Oil Came to the Cattle Country and Brought a New West • William MacLeod Raine
... these trivial occurrences? Not, Heaven knows, from the interest I can now attach to them; but because, like a drowning man who catches at a brittle twig, I seize every apology for delaying the subsequent and dreadful part of my narrative. But it must be communicated: I must have the sympathy of at least one friend ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... accounted a great wonder; and everyone said, if the Devil had not assisted him, it was impossible the thing could have been done; for, in general, these ropes are so brittle, being made of green hay, that they will scarcely bear to be bound over the rick. And, the more to horrify the good people of this neighbourhood, the driver said, when he first came in view, he could almost give his oath that he saw two people busily ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg
... jar your ideal to see them worn against such a stormy day dress. To me they are the perfection of summer. No color could be more intense than this spotless whiteness. There!' Fastening them, the brittle stems snapped, and the flowers fell at her feet. 'No flowers for me to-day, of your choosing at least. Practically, lilies have such an uncomfortable way of breaking ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 6, No 5, November 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... is the most fragile of the genus. It grows in dense tufts in the clefts of storm-beaten rocks, high up on the mountain-side on the very edge of the fern line. It is a handsome little fern about four or five inches high, has pale-green pinnate fronds, and shining bronze-colored stalks about as brittle as glass. Its companions on the lower part of its range are Cryptogramma acrostichoides and Phegopteris alpestris, the latter with soft, delicate fronds, not in the least like those of Rock fern, though ...
— The Yosemite • John Muir
... sword to find it brittle, Surprised at the surprise that was your plan, Who shaking and breaking barriers not a little Find never more the death-door ...
— Poems • G.K. Chesterton
... banks of the rivers. The middle one scattered white milk on the wooded hills and the stony mountains. The youngest showered blue milk in the valleys and by the gray seashore. And, on the morrow, where 5 the red milk had been sprinkled, red and brittle ore of iron flecked the ground; where the white milk had been scattered, powdery ore of a yellow hue abounded; and where the blue milk had been showered, flaky masses of crude iron, tough and dark, lay hidden beneath the ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell
... many exceptions, that it may be doubted in whether it is in any sense true. Most of the cedars are slow of growth; but while the timber of some of them is firm and durable, that of others is light, brittle, and perishable. The hemlock-spruce is slower of growth than the pines, but its wood is of very little value. The pasture oak and beech show a breadth of grain—and, of course, an annual increment—twice as great as trees of the same species grown in the woods; and the American ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... papers between, and a box full of stones for a presser. We used a common soap-box, and put in stones to the weight of about thirty-five pounds. The handles were made of rope. I have found this a splendid way to press flowers, as it absorbs the moisture from the flower and does not leave it at all brittle. ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, July 1878, No. 9 • Various
... across the steam steerin' wheel, was Captain Freeman, unconscious. His face was so blistered that his eyes were nearly shut. His hair was singed right down to the skull. His hands were raw an' bleedin'. His clothes were scorched into something that was black an' brittle. The harbor-master lifted him, an' laid him ...
— Plotting in Pirate Seas • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... abandoned hole. About her comfort he seems shamefully unconcerned. Intent only on his own, he drills a perfectly round hole, usually on the underside of a limb where neither snow nor wind can harm him, and digs out a horizontal tunnel in the dry, brittle wood in the very heart of the tree, before turning downward into the deep, pear-shaped chamber, where he lives in selfish solitude. But when the nesting season comes, how devoted he is temporarily to the mate he has neglected and even abused through the winter! Will she ...
— Bird Neighbors • Neltje Blanchan
... in mid-June, Skippy, having finished the last bar of peanut brittle and made sure that no vestige remained of the box of assorted chocolates which had preceded it down the Great Hungry Way, assembled three comic weeklies and four magazines, gave the porter a quarter for his ostentatious devotions and descended at the station, with exactly ...
— Skippy Bedelle - His Sentimental Progress From the Urchin to the Complete - Man of the World • Owen Johnson
... developed to harden relentlessly only over unyielding surfaces of horn such as the termites' deadliest enemy, the ants, wear for armor, will never be known. But in a matter of moments it became apparent that it was going to prove too brittle to continue clamping flesh as elastic as that ...
— The Raid on the Termites • Paul Ernst
... trees, of the utility of which such sanguine hopes had been entertained, were found to be unfit for large masts or yards, being shakey or rotten at thirty or forty feet from the butt; the wood was so brittle that it would not make a good oar, and so porous that the water soaked through the planks of a boat which had been built of it. Mr. King also lamented their ignorance of the proper mode of preparing the flax plant, which rendered it useless to them. A single pod of cotton had been found on the ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 1 • David Collins
... of the mountain which buried Goldau was composed of a hard but brittle conglomerate, called nagelflue, resting on unctuous clay, and inclining rapidly towards the village. Much earth remained upon the rock, in irregular masses, but the woods had been felled, and the water had free access to the ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... glows; Sinking sudden from its pride Into death—the Lethe tide. Ask'st thou whence thy beauties rise? Boastest thou those radiant eyes?— Or that cheek in roses dyed? All their beauty (thought of sorrow!) From the brittle mould they borrow. Heavy interest in the tomb For the brief loan of the bloom, For the beauty of the day, Death the usurer, thou must pay, In the ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... sugar, and butter into a thick sauce-pan or kettle and stir until the sugar is dissolved. Boil until the mixture becomes brittle when tried in cold water. Stir constantly at the last to prevent burning. Add vinegar and soda just before removing from the fire. Pour into a well-greased pan and let it stand until cool enough to handle. Then pull until light ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Household Science in Rural Schools • Ministry of Education Ontario
... developed commercially, it is an interesting ancestor of the modern tape recorder, which it resembles somewhat in design. How practical it was or just why it was built we do not know. The tape is now brittle, the heavy paper reels warped, and the reproducing head missing. Otherwise, with some reconditioning, it could be ...
— Development of the Phonograph at Alexander Graham Bell's Volta Laboratory • Leslie J. Newville
... regard charcoal as a brittle, readily combustible substance, but we have before us specimens in which these qualities are conspicuously absent. Here is a piece of carbonized cotton sheeting, which may be rolled or folded over without breaking, and, as you see, when placed in ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 601, July 9, 1887 • Various
... have not the hard, brittle surface of the other Echinoderms; on the contrary, their envelope is tough and leathery, capable of great contraction and dilatation. No idea can be formed of the beauty of these animals either from dried specimens or from those preserved in alcohol. Of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... walked slowly, treading under foot the dry frosty leaves, he reflected how the monotonous crackling of this foliage, once so full of life, now withered and rendered brittle by the frost, seemed to represent his own deterioration of feeling. It was a sad and suitable accompaniment of his own ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... blunt and true, and sturdily said he— 'Abide, my lord, and rule your own, and take this rede from me, That woman's faith's a brittle trust. Seven twelve- months didst thou say? I'll pledge me for no lady's truth beyond the seventh day.'" ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... particularly shone in, were Sir Martin Marrall, Gomez in the Spanish Friar, Sir Nicolas Cully in Love in a Tub, Barnaby Brittle in the Wanton Wife, Sir Davy Dunce in the Soldier's Fortune, Sosia in Amphytrion, &c. &c. To tell you how he acted them, is beyond the reach of criticism: but to tell you what effect his action had upon the spectator, is ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various
... same as, or somewhat greater than, that of coal. The principal seat of the manufacture in Great Britain is in South Wales, where the dust and smalls resulting from the handling of the best steam coals (which are very brittle) are obtainable in large quantities and find no other use. Some varieties of lignite, when crushed and pressed at a steam heat, soften sufficiently to furnish compact briquettes without requiring any cementing material. Briquettes ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various
... the battle, he left his father's sword behind and caught up his charioteer Metiscus' weapon; and that served him long, while Teucrian stragglers turned their backs; when it met the divine Vulcanian armour, the mortal blade like brittle ice snapped in the stroke; the shards lie glittering upon the yellow sand. So in distracted flight Turnus darts afar over the plain, and now this way and now that crosses in wavering circles; for on all hands the Teucrians locked ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil • Virgil
... a few feet from the debris of outcrop, and finally affixed his "Notice." Then, with a conscientiousness born possibly of his new religious convictions, he dislodged with his pickaxe enough of the brittle outcrop to constitute that presumption of "actual work" upon the claim which was legally required for its maintenance, and returned to his horse. In replacing his things in his saddle-bags he came upon ...
— In a Hollow of the Hills • Bret Harte
... become hard and stiff. If it is impossible to procure a good shoe dressing[15], neat's-foot oil or tallow are the best substitutes; either will soften the leather and preserve its pliability. Leather requires oil to preserve its pliability, and if not supplied will become brittle, crack, and break easily under strain. Inferior dressings are always harmful, and no dressing should be used which contains acid or varnish. Acid burns the leather as it would the skin, and polish containing varnish forms ...
— Manual of Military Training - Second, Revised Edition • James A. Moss
... Crack! my brittle wing," Is all I ever sing, Tho' I've almost always said, When I've struck my little head, That I'm angry, with ...
— The Cheerful Cricket and Others • Jeannette Marks
... danger is the greater by how much the more his heart has become callous, under the hardening influence of a wicked life; and every day that danger increases. God's patience may be exhausted. The brittle thread of life may be sundered at any moment, and the impenitent and unprepared soul be summoned to the bar of God. With great propriety, therefore, may the parent feel anxious in regard ...
— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various
... considerably stronger than the crisp, brittle crust which Aunt Bettie brings to our table," replied ...
— Grandfather's Love Pie • Miriam Gaines
... to take and tear up that paper you were surreptitiously scribbling at, when Pye ordered you to go up and hand it in?" demanded Gaunt, of George Brittle. "It was that which put him out with us ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... afternoon because they struck such a peculiarly difficult surface that the sledges were constantly being brought up. Then on foot they made better progress, though no advance could be made without the most strenuous labour. The brittle crust would hold for a pace or two, and then let them down with a bump, while now and again a leg went down a crack in the hard ice underneath. So [Page 361] far, since arriving among the disturbances, which increased rapidly towards the end of the march, they had not encountered ...
— The Voyages of Captain Scott - Retold from 'The Voyage of the "Discovery"' and 'Scott's - Last Expedition' • Charles Turley
... galloping, Joris and I, Past Looz and past Tongres, no cloud in the sky; The broad sun above laughed a pitiless laugh; 'Neath our feet broke the brittle bright stubble like chaff; Till over by Delhem a dome spire sprung white, And "Gallop," gasped Joris, "for Aix is ...
— O May I Join the Choir Invisible! - and Other Favorite Poems • George Eliot
... Elnora, doubling down on the floor and spreading out her skirt, "set the bucket here, mother. These points are brittle, and should be put in one at a time. If they are chipped I can't sell them. Well sir! I've had a time! You know I just had to have books. I tried three stores, and they wouldn't trust me, not even three days, ...
— A Girl Of The Limberlost • Gene Stratton Porter
... deal of the inside of the tooth, the hard, shiny surface is left just like a thin shell; and one day you happen to bite down upon a piece of bone in your food, or try to crack a nut with your teeth, and "crack" goes this brittle shell ...
— The Child's Day • Woods Hutchinson
... animal which "humps" itself. In the same way a scrofulous patient must not eat turkey, as that bird seems to have a scrofulous eruption on its head, while ball players must abstain from eating frogs, because the bones of that animal are brittle and easily broken. ...
— The Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees • James Mooney
... was stifled by that wind. The inhabitants of Ormus eat no flesh, or bread made of corn; but live upon dates, salt fish, and onions. The ships of this country are not very stout, as they do not fasten them with iron nails, because the timber is too brittle, and would split in driving these home; but they are fastened with wooden pins, and sewed with twine made from the husks of certain Indian nuts, prepared in a peculiar manner; this twine or thread is very strong, and is able ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... abbott of Aberbrothok," cut the bell from its buoy only to be lost himself on the reef a year later. The abbey was founded by William the Lion in 1178, but war, fire and fanaticism have left it sadly fragmentary. Now it is the charge of the town, but the elements continue to war upon it and the brittle red sandstone of which it is built shows deeply the wear of ...
— British Highways And Byways From A Motor Car - Being A Record Of A Five Thousand Mile Tour In England, - Wales And Scotland • Thomas D. Murphy
... distinctly wrought That one might almost say, her body thought; She, she thus richly and largely hous'd is gone And chides us, slow-paced snails who crawl upon Our prison's prison earth, nor think us well Longer than whilst we bear our brittle shell." ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury
... lie outdoors on a very cold night; the frost would make it brittle, so that the steel might shiver on the first knot you ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... not conceal the booty; when he could neither be dignified by the possession of it, nor if cut in pieces be served by its use? For we are told that when hot, they quenched it in vinegar, to make it brittle and unmalleable, and consequently unfit for any other service. In the next place, he excluded unprofitable and superfluous arts: indeed, if he had not done this, most of them would have fallen of themselves, when the new money took place, ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various
... "Right you are," said the cabman, and the trap slammed, and the lash lay along the glistening side of the horse. The cab swayed, and the Anarchist, half-standing under the trap, put the hand containing the little glass tube upon the apron to preserve his balance. He felt the brittle thing crack, and the broken half of it rang upon the floor of the cab. He fell back into the seat with a curse, and stared dismally at the two or three drops ...
— The Stolen Bacillus and Other Incidents • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... plant which cannot be intelligibly described to those who have never seen it. The stem consists of a tough pithy substance, round which the leaves are formed. These, long and tapering like the rush, are four-sided, and extremely brittle; the base from which they shoot is broad and flat, about the size of a thumb-nail, and very resinous in substance. As the leaves decay annually, others are put forth above the bases of the old ones, which are thus pressed down by the new shoots, and a fresh ...
— The Bushman - Life in a New Country • Edward Wilson Landor
... structure of the bark will show how it comes to be so well adapted for this purpose. The bark seldom grows more than half an inch thick, and is covered with a skin or epidermis; when fresh, it cuts somewhat similar to a soft sandstone, but when dry, it is very brittle and flint like, and often difficult to break. On examination of a section under the microscope, all the cells of the different layers are seen to be more or less silicated, the silex forming in the cells when the bark is still very young. ...
— Scientific American, Volume 40, No. 13, March 29, 1879 • Various
... to keep the patterns in condition during the process of casting, and it was well that he did so, because the extreme cold had frozen the plaster casts before they were dry, rendering them so brittle that many of them were broken in handling, and the head itself was crumbled into a hundred pieces and ...
— Final Report of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission • Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission
... sphere. I found that metal pushed through the sphere will conduct an electrical current, which is pretty definite proof that the metal isn't within the sphere at all. Glass can be forced through it without breaking. Not flexible glass, but rods of plain old brittle glass. It turns without breaking, and it also loses some of its length. Water can be forced through a tube inserted in the sphere, but only when terrific pressure is applied. What that proves I can't even begin ...
— Empire • Clifford Donald Simak
... amorphous state, while presence of the former metal gives rise to the formation of graphite, and, consequently, causes a partial separation of carbon. Iron suffers on casting loss of graphite, assumes a finely-grained texture, becomes hard and brittle, and is changed from gray to white. In view of the fact that samples of cast iron with equal percentage of silicium and carbon yield on casting a different product, it has become necessary to institute experiments as to the cause of this behavior. Samples of ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 483, April 4, 1885 • Various
... Palace was the most splendid in the world, all made of priceless porcelain, but so brittle and delicate that you had to take great care how you touched it. In the garden were the most beautiful flowers, and on the loveliest of them were tied silver bells which tinkled, so that if you passed you could ...
— The Yellow Fairy Book • Leonora Blanche Alleyne Lang
... of the tree it had stripped first, ready for him to begin again—so quick is the process of vegetation in these countries. There is a saying among the Indians, that when the wind blows the sloth begins to travel. In calm weather he remains tranquil, probably not liking to cling to the brittle extremities of the branches, lest they should break with him in passing from one tree to another; but as soon as the wind arises, and the branches of the neighbouring trees become interwoven, the sloth then seizes hold of them and travels at such a good round pace, ...
— The Illustrated London Reading Book • Various
... wine red, or the violet, belong to many that are eatable; whilst the pale or sulphur yellow, bright or blood-red, and the greenish belong to few but the poisonous. The safe kinds have most frequently a compact, brittle texture; the flesh is white; they grow more readily in open places, such as dry pastures and waste lands, than in places humid or shaded by wood. In general, those should be suspected which grow in caverns and subterranean passages, on animal matter undergoing putrefaction, as well as those whose ...
— Enquire Within Upon Everything - The Great Victorian Domestic Standby • Anonymous
... smooth and have plenty of yolk, the skin pliable and light pink in color. When the coat loses its lustre and gloss and the skin becomes hard, rigid, thickened and dirty, it indicates a lack of nutrition and an unhealthy condition of the body. In sheep, during sickness, the wool may become dry and brittle and the skin pale and rigid. When affected with external parasites, the hair or wool becomes dirty and rough, a part of the skin may be denuded of hair, and it appears thickened, leathery and scabby, or shows ...
— Common Diseases of Farm Animals • R. A. Craig, D. V. M.
... and another, were common enough, but each of them was defective in some quality indispensable for success. Neither glass nor porcelain is flexible, and therefore to lay a continuous line of one or the other was out of the question. Resin and pitch were even more faulty, because extremely brittle and friable. What of such fibres as hemp or silk, if saturated with tar or some other good non-conductor? For very short distances under still water they served fairly well, but any exposure to a rocky beach with its chafing action, any rub by a passing ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: - Invention and Discovery • Various
... when it begins to thicken, dip the handle of a spoon in it, and put that into a pint bason of water. Squeeze the sugar from the spoon into it, and so on till all the sugar is extracted. Take a bit out of the water, and if it snaps and is brittle when cold, it is done enough. But let it be only three parts cold, then pour the water from the sugar, and having a copper form oiled well, run the sugar on it, in the manner of a maze, and when cold it may be ...
— The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, • Mary Eaton
... a way of going to the public library on Saturday afternoons (with a bag of very sticky peanut candy in her pocket, the little sensualist!) and there, huddled in a chair, dreamily and almost automatically munching peanut brittle, her cheeks growing redder and redder in the close air of the ill-ventilated room, she would read, and read, and read. There was no one to censor her reading, so she read promiscuously, wading gloriously through trash and classic and historical ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber
... rock to the ship. And there about the fins, already frozen into brittle spikes was a tangle of plants—the rich result ...
— Plague Ship • Andre Norton
... to be judg'd how far th' engage; And, where the sense by custom's checkt, Are found void, and of none effect. For no man takes or keeps a vow 75 But just as he sees others do; Nor are th' oblig'd to be so brittle, As not to yield and bow a little: For as best-temper'd blades are found, Before they break, to bend quite round, 80 So truest oaths are still most tough, And though they bow, are breaking proof. Then wherefore ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... an ejaculation of joy. The brittle rock had revealed its secret to him. Unexpected treasures, incalculable fortunes, lay ...
— The Son of Monte-Cristo, Volume II (of 2) • Alexandre Dumas pere
... mache and various plastic cement materials are used for modeling mouths, of which papier mache is probably the best; plaster paris is often used in an emergency but is brittle and heavy. For modeling use finely ground paper pulp mixed with glue and plaster or whiting. Only practice and experiment will determine just ...
— Home Taxidermy for Pleasure and Profit • Albert B. Farnham
... place that is it is scarcely possible to describe. Wide and dreary levels of sand, some four or five feet lower than the town, and flooded by high tides; the only vegetation a scanty, dingy gray, brittle, crackling growth,—bitter sandworts and the like; over and through which the abominable tawny sand-crabs are constantly executing diabolic waltzes on the tips of their eight legs, vanishing into the ground like imps as you approach; ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 5, March, 1858 • Various
... trembling with falling drops—but quietly trembling—not troubled into ridgy wave or foam—the rocks themselves, ideal rock, as hard as iron—no—not quite that, but so hard that after breaking some of it, breaking solid white quartz seemed like smashing brittle loaf sugar, in comparison—and cloven into the most noble masses; not grotesque, but majestic and full of harmony with the larger mountain mass of which they formed a part. Fancy what a place! for a hot afternoon after five, with no wind—and absolute solitude; no creature—except ...
— The Life of John Ruskin • W. G. Collingwood
... the power of breaking off their rays, and, like the crab and lobster, can grow new ones to take their place. They have many beautiful relations in the star-fish family, one of the loveliest being the Brittle-star, so called because it will break in pieces when touched. Another relative is the Sun-star, which has twelve or fifteen rays, and often grows to a very large size. Its color is sometimes purple, sometimes red, with white rays tipped with red; truly a gorgeous creature, and no doubt ...
— How Sammy Went to Coral-Land • Emily Paret Atwater
... exploded. We should have said that previous to use, all gut should be soaked, and the longer the better. It is a good plan to let it soak over night, and make up your cast in the morning. When gut is thus thoroughly wet, it is wonderful how easy it is of manipulation. On the other hand, dry gut is very brittle, and will break on the slightest provocation. Fix the cast and silk-and-hair line together, having previously made a single knot on the end of the latter, ...
— Scotch Loch-Fishing • AKA Black Palmer, William Senior
... (bractea?), and if the cotton is gathered early in the morning, whilst the dew is on the plant, this leaf is tough and does not break, and the cotton is gathered clean; but if it is picked after the dew has evaporated, this leaf is brittle, and gets mixed with the cotton in the picking. But he says that no persuasion can induce the ryots to keep that which is picked in the morning from that which is gathered in the heat of the day. He also ...
— Essays in Natural History and Agriculture • Thomas Garnett
... droop of a hair on the wet beard of the drowned man as he tumbled in the swirl of the lagoon where the Brenta meets the tide, a dozen voices corrected us, and we were warned to be careful. A reputation so sudden and tremendous is, at its beginning, somewhat brittle. ...
— Bog-Myrtle and Peat - Tales Chiefly Of Galloway Gathered From The Years 1889 To 1895 • S.R. Crockett
... incarnation of the Logos, and purified from any connection with Greek mythology and gross polytheism.[4] A motley multitude of primitive Christian ideas and hopes, derived from both Testaments, and too brittle to be completely recast, as yet enclosed the kernel. But the majority of these were successfully manipulated by theological art, and the traditional rule of faith was transformed into a system of doctrine, in which, to some extent, the old articles ...
— History of Dogma, Volume 2 (of 7) • Adolph Harnack
... size and matter made, Were swiftly down a rolling stream convey'd. The larger vessel, form'd of solid brass, Did boldly o'er the rapid water pass; While that whose substance was but brittle clay, Would, for his safety, give the stronger way. Him the Brass Pot invited to draw near, And said, "His frailty need not cause his fear; For he, with just precaution would prevent The danger of their jostling as they went." The Earthen ...
— Favourite Fables in Prose and Verse • Various
... cometh out of the heavens in a cradle of flowers, drawing forth upon the stage, in a blue twist of silk, from his left hand, Vain Hope, Brittle Joy: and with a carnation twist of silk from his right hand, Fair ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various
... Verekers and Norrises; at the Flemings, old Mrs. Fleming, and Louie and Emmeline and Edith, and the disgraceful Maurice, all five of them useless pensioners on his brother's bounty; Maurice a thing of battered, sodden flesh hanging loose on brittle bone, a rickety prop for the irreproachable summer suit bought with Anthony's money. He scowled at the tables covered with fine white linen, and at the costly silver and old china, at the sandwiches and cakes and ices, and ...
— The Tree of Heaven • May Sinclair
... other birds are so completely housed from the elements, or protected from their natural enemies, the jays, hawks, and owls. A tree with a natural cavity is never selected, but one which has been dead just long enough to have become soft and brittle throughout. The bird goes in horizontally for a few inches, making a hole perfectly round and smooth and adapted to his size, then turns downward, gradually enlarging the hole, as he proceeds to the softness ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... will be of no avail unless it be plucked from his beard while he is alive, and twitched out with wooden tweezers. While he lives he will not suffer this to be done to him, and the leash will be of no use should he be dead, because it will be brittle." ...
— The Mabinogion • Lady Charlotte Guest
... a little, Though cities flame! Messenger of night, though my words are brittle, Though I know not your name, Though your steed paw sparkles and your pinions quiver With colors like the sea, Tell me if you saw her, if you saw my love ever! She is ...
— Perpetual Light • William Rose Benet
... shepherdess had lost her head as well as her crook, and the pink coat of the shepherd had an unseemly rent in it,—but I only laughed at the disaster, and would not scold her for her awkwardness. China had a knack of slipping through Jill's fingers; she had a loose uncertain grasp of things that were brittle and delicate; she had not learned to control her muscles or restrain her strength. She had a way of lifting me up when I teased her that turns me giddy to remember: I was quite a child in her hands. She was always ashamed of herself when she had done it, and begged my pardon, and ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... a curious, brittle hissing. The ends of the rods began to dissolve into dazzling, diamond rain, atomically minute, that passing through the egg-shaped lights poured upon the periphery of the pedestal. Rapidly the bars melted. Heat there must be in these lights, ...
— The Metal Monster • A. Merritt
... a'n't sorry; it's as bad as reading the 'Diary of a Physician.' The boy will be all right now, and the lesson won't hurt him, though it has been a rough one. But no more metaphysics for him, Ned Blount! And, boys, let this be a warning to you. He's too brittle a toy to be handled in your ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 6, No. 33, July, 1860 • Various
... observed, "It takes the average apprentice about one year to discover, that he does not know how to drive a nail with the skill of an expert;" one who drives it through hard woods without bending and brittle, without splitting. This skill is however always more quickly acquired, when a rule like the following is given the apprentice at the beginning of his training. "Gripping the hammer near the end of the handle and setting the nail slightly slanting ...
— The Choctaw Freedmen - and The Story of Oak Hill Industrial Academy • Robert Elliott Flickinger
... attempter, such attempts, and such snares, as I see will be laid for her. And, after all, I see not when men are so frail without importunity, that so much should be expected from women, daughters of the same fathers and mothers, and made up of the same brittle compounds, (education all the difference,) nor where the triumph is ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... latches[13] of himself. And thus it falleth,' quod the friar, 'by folk here on earth, The water is lik'ned to the world, that waneth and waxeth, The goods of this world are likened to the great waves That as winds and weathers, walken about, The boat is liken'd to our body, that brittle is of kind, That through the flesh, and the fraile world Sinneth the sadde man, a day seven times, And deadly sin doeth he not, for Dowell him keepeth, And that is Charity the champion, chief help against sin, For he strengtheth man to stand, and stirreth man's soul, And though thy body bow, as boate ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... of Douglas's hands and jerked him forward. A scream burst from Douglas as George's hands closed around his neck. Muscles sprang into writhing life in the humanoid's huge forearms. There was a soft, brittle crack, and Douglas sagged limp in the iron grip ...
— The Lani People • J. F. Bone
... sections of the country that have been longest exposed to the leeching and washing of the rains, are poorest in those substances that go to the making of the osseous framework of man and of the animals. Wheat does not grow well there, and the men born and reared there are apt to have brittle bones. An important part of those men went downstream ages before they were born. The water of such sections is now soft and free from mineral substances, but not ...
— The Writings of John Burroughs • John Burroughs
... of the New Year (January 1, 1915) was cloudy, with a gentle northerly breeze and occasional snow-squalls. The condition of the pack improved in the evening, and after 8 p.m. we forged ahead rapidly through brittle young ice, easily broken by the ship. A few hours later a moderate gale came up from the east, with continuous snow. After 4 a.m. on the 2nd we got into thick old pack-ice, showing signs of heavy pressure. It was much hummocked, but large areas of open water and ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... hesitate to consider both to be the same species. The first Southern specimen which I examined presented the following characters: on the prosoma there was a central longitudinal band, formed of a thin, brittle, brown-coloured calcified layer, which became irregularly rather narrow towards the thorax; on each side it sent out six or seven irregular rectangular plates, which surrounded and supported the bases ...
— A Monograph on the Sub-class Cirripedia (Volume 1 of 2) - The Lepadidae; or, Pedunculated Cirripedes • Charles Darwin
... liver pass'd The ruthless point, and, falling, he expired. Forth sprang Eurypylus to seize the spoil; 695 Whom soon as godlike Alexander saw Despoiling Apisaon of his arms, Drawing incontinent his bow, he sent A shaft to his right thigh; the brittle reed Snapp'd, and the rankling barb stuck fast within. 700 Terrified at the stroke, the wounded Chief To his own band retired, but, as he went, With echoing voice call'd on the Danai— Friends! Counsellors, and leaders of the Greeks! Turn ye and stand, ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer
... a wallet which bore the signs of long wear, and, opening it, deliberately drew out a folded sheet of note paper, grown yellow with age and brittle with much handling. Then, adjusting his spectacles, he added: "Here's something I'd like to read to you, Albert. It's written ...
— Five Hundred Dollars - or, Jacob Marlowe's Secret • Horatio Alger
... gave her a job in the weavin' room of his mill. Do you know what that's like, Henry?" Henry shook his head. He had never been inside a linen-mill. "The linen has to be woven in a moist atmosphere, or else it'd become brittle an' so it wouldn't be fine," Mr. Quinn went on; "an' the atmosphere is kept moist by lettin' steam escape from pipes into the room where the linen is bein' woven—a damp, muggy, steamy atmosphere, Henry ... an' Lizzie McCamley left this village ... left ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... promised Roger to take care of her," Mr. Farraday gasped, and without so much as a glance at Miss Hawtry, both men departed with all the rapidity possible. There must be some reason that all bonds without-the-law are so brittle, and those of friendship and honor and love so ...
— Blue-grass and Broadway • Maria Thompson Daviess
... now like a polished skeleton—very clean, but very brittle: a little breeze, and whole houses would tumble to bits. I started painting, one day, a little picture from the hall of the College for Young Ladies. When I went the next day I found my point of view had been raised several feet: the top walls had come down. But (p. 038) ...
— An Onlooker in France 1917-1919 • William Orpen
... woods have different qualities," replied Forester. "Some are light and soft, which are good qualities for certain purposes. Some are hard. Some are stiff, and some flexible. Some are brittle, and others tough. For a cane, now, do we want a hard wood ...
— Forests of Maine - Marco Paul's Adventures in Pursuit of Knowledge • Jacob S. Abbott
... elements that come in contact with it. Hence it was that the feet of these animals was made to bear on the hard ground, and to be wet naturally every time the horse drank. Drought and heat will contract and make hard and brittle the substance of which the feet is composed; while on the other hand cooling and moisture will expand it, and render it pliable and soft. Nature has provided everything necessary to preserve and protect this foot, while the animal ...
— The Mule - A Treatise On The Breeding, Training, - And Uses To Which He May Be Put • Harvey Riley
... are besides A very brittle glass; And Time, in his unresting tides, Makes all things change and pass; Turns riches to a beggar's dole; Sets glory's race an ...
— Adela Cathcart - Volume II • George MacDonald
... wheel or a shot hare, while his rider went ahead independently like a bird, and alighted— anyhow! Such accidents, however, seldom resulted in much damage, red skin being probably tougher than white, and savage bones less brittle than civilised. At all events, nothing very serious occurred until the plain was pretty well strewn with ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne
... from the butternut-tree made me suspect an owl, and that the bird whose cry I heard was in his talons. I was out of my cot and up to the nest in a moment, but the tragedy was over; the birds were all gone, and the night was silent. In the morning I found that a piece of the brittle birch limb had been torn away, enlarging the entrance to the cavity so that the murderous talons of the owl could reach in and seize the young birds. I had been aroused in time to hear the marauder on the roof ...
— Under the Maples • John Burroughs
... this appears: "The Theatre of this Town was opened by Mr. McGrath's Company of Comedians, with the celebrated comedy The Miser. This Company is by far the best that ever visited this town." Then on August 12 there was "The Beggars Opera and A Comedy of two acts, Barnaby Brittle or a Wife at her Wits End. Also in August Mr. McGrath's Company of Comedians gave The Tragedy of Douglas and Garrick's Comedy of Two ...
— A Portrait of Old George Town • Grace Dunlop Ecker
... is a compound of one or more of the metals with sulphur; it is usually brittle, often crystalline, and of a dull somewhat greasy lustre. It is essential that the slag, when solid, shall be so much more brittle than the regulus, that it shall be easy to crumble, and remove it without breaking the latter; and it must not be basic. The ...
— A Textbook of Assaying: For the Use of Those Connected with Mines. • Cornelius Beringer and John Jacob Beringer
... particular authors may be compared to a certain sagacious bird, which, in building its nest is sure to pull to pieces the nests of all the birds in its neighborhood. This unhappy propensity tends grievously to impede the progress of sound knowledge. Theories are at best but brittle productions, and when once committed to the stream, they should take care that, like the notable pots which were fellow-voyagers, they ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... at Jana. Then he screamed furiously and, shooting out his trunk, snatched the Ivory Child from her hands, whirled it round as he had whirled Simba, and at last dashed it to the stone pavement as he had dashed Simba, so that its substance, grown brittle on the passage of the ages, ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard
... insect does not remove, being unable to get at them, and polished on the inside surface, which is within the worm's reach. What can be the nature of that singular lid whereof the Cerambyx furnishes me with the first specimen? It is as hard and brittle as a flake of lime-stone. It can be dissolved cold in nitric acid, discharging little gaseous bubbles. The process of solution is a slow one, requiring several hours for a tiny fragment. Everything is dissolved, except a few yellowish flocks, which appear ...
— The Wonders of Instinct • J. H. Fabre
... fragments of extraneous rock are not unfrequently found embedded in the midst of masses of scoriae. Lieutenant Evans, to whose kindness I am indebted for much information, gave me several specimens, and I found others myself. They nearly all have a granitic structure, are brittle, harsh to the touch, and apparently ...
— Volcanic Islands • Charles Darwin
... behold. He bellowed, he stormed; he broke everything he touched; rosewood was as brittle as glass. ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... and a wisp of brittle grass in her hands crackled in a double grasp. She glanced up at him swiftly, as she felt his touch, and this time there was a nearing of the white frock to the suit of blue. "Well,—if—if—you've got t'," ...
— The Biography of a Prairie Girl • Eleanor Gates
... and disappointment, and suffering were to pass Miss Danton by. You were so good, and so far up in the clouds, nothing low or base could reach you. Well, it was not to be. You were only clay, after all—the porcelain of human clay, perhaps, but very brittle stuff withal. Trouble did come; the man you had made a sort of idol of, to whom you had given your whole heart, with a love so intense as to be sinful—this man abandons you. The sister you have trusted and been fond of, deceives you, and you find that trouble is something more ...
— Kate Danton, or, Captain Danton's Daughters - A Novel • May Agnes Fleming
... Unceasingly roll'd, It riseth and falleth ever; It ringeth like glass! How brittle, alas! 'Tis hollow, and resteth never. How bright the sphere, Still brighter here! Now living am I! Dear son, beware! Nor venture there! Thou too must die! It is of clay; 'Twill ...
— Faust Part 1 • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... useful as a mordant in itself, but as a modifying agent with other mordants. It must always be used with great care, as it tends to harden the wool, making it harsh and brittle. Its general effect is to give brighter, clearer and faster colours than the other mordants. When used as a mordant before dyeing, the wool is entered into the cold mordant bath, containing 4 per cent of stannous chloride and 2 per cent oxalic acid; the temperature is ...
— Vegetable Dyes - Being a Book of Recipes and Other Information Useful to the Dyer • Ethel M. Mairet
... that fell in January, 1686, is described as "a mass of black leaves, having the appearance of burnt paper, but harder, and cohering, and brittle." ...
— The Book of the Damned • Charles Fort
... a great number of cousins, some of them common enough along our shores. One of the strangest is the Brittle Star. On first seeing one of these animals I tried to capture it by holding its long, wriggling arms. At once the arms broke off. Then I tried to scoop the creature out of its watery home. But it began to break its "rays" ...
— On the Seashore • R. Cadwallader Smith
... (Spatangus purpureus), clothed in pale lilac horny spines, and other Echinoderms, for which you must consult Forbes's "British Star-fishes:" but perhaps the species among them which will interest you most, will be the common brittle-star (Ophiocoma rosula), of which a hundred or so, I can promise, shall come up at a single haul of the dredge, entwining their long spine- clad arms in a seemingly inextricable confusion of "kaleidoscope" ...
— Glaucus; or The Wonders of the Shore • Charles Kingsley
... and Romans had no substitute for the papyrus, which was so brittle that it could not be folded or creased. It could not be bound up in books, nor could it be rolled up unsupported. It was secure only when it had been wound around a wooden or ...
— Forty Centuries of Ink • David N. Carvalho
... And your bones are very brittle; If you would grow great and stately, You must try ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various
... own hearing very thin and brittle. The girl turned her gaze upon him swiftly, the soft smile deepening, the dream-light in her eyes burning brighter and more steady. She bent forward, placing over his wasted hand a hand firm and warm, strong yet ...
— The Bronze Bell • Louis Joseph Vance
... a model for Miss Bullock to imitate. Miss B. knows how to regulate her feelings better than this poor little creature. Miss B. would never have committed herself as that imprudent Amelia had done; pledged her love irretrievably; confessed her heart away, and got back nothing—only a brittle promise which was snapt and worthless in a moment. A long engagement is a partnership which one party is free to keep or to break, but which involves all the ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Cobalt, a brittle metal, of a reddish-gray color and weak metallic lustre, used in coloring glass. It is not easily melted nor ...
— A Treatise on Domestic Economy - For the Use of Young Ladies at Home and at School • Catherine Esther Beecher
... appearance, and colors the soil a reddish hue in its immediate vicinity. Wherever this rock abounds, the soil is durable and the crops are usually heavy. It is sometimes met with having a fine grain, and so very hard as to be almost brittle, though generally very difficult to break, and when broken strongly resembling cast-iron, and will sometimes ring, on being struck, almost as clearly. It was used very much formerly for making journals to run mill-gudgeons upon. When found ...
— History and Comprehensive Description of Loudoun County, Virginia • James W. Head
... view. On both sides of the wood of Tarfa trees extends a range of low hills of a substance called by the Arabs Tafal [Arabic], which I believe to be principally a detritus of the feldspar of granite, but which, at first sight, has all the appearance of pipe-clay; it is brittle, crumbles easily between the fingers, and leaves upon them its colour, which is a pale yellow. The Arabs sell it at Cairo, where it is in request for taking stains out of cloth, and where it serves the poor instead ...
— Travels in Syria and the Holy Land • John Burckhardt
... himself;—he "must" come off. Again, if you wish to kill a snake, it is no use hitting and trying to crush his head. The bones of the head are composed of the densest material, affording effectual protection to the brain underneath: a wise provision for the animal's preservation; for were his skull brittle, his habit of crawling on the ground would render it very liable to be fractured. The spinal cord runs down the entire length of the body; this being wounded, the animal is disabled or killed instanter. Strike therefore his tail, and not his head; for at his tail the spinal cord is but thinly covered ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... If you were living inside that box you would think it very secure. You would note the thickness of the walls and the hardness of the stone, and you would dream away in a peaceful green dusk. But all the time it would be held up by trifles—brittle trifles." ...
— Huntingtower • John Buchan
... forces of stability and freedom. Slowly but surely, the free world gathers strength. Meanwhile, from behind the iron curtain, there are signs that tyranny is in trouble and reminders that its structure is as brittle as ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... an image of the Enemy of Man—made of some sort of brittle paste—which had been placed at the foot of one of the masts. This they broke in pieces and scattered, and the oldest men among the spectators, rising from their places, picked up the fragments which they handed to the skeletons—an action supposed to signify that ...
— The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ - The Original Text of Nicolas Notovitch's 1887 Discovery • Nicolas Notovitch |
