"Firefly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... You have no idea what a coward I am at heart; but somehow you girls have taken a notion I should do things and I can't bear to disappoint you. I must admit this is fascinating. I like it better even than golf, and will also give up my canter on Firefly this afternoon ...
— Jane Allen: Junior • Edith Bancroft
... perfectly understood. 'And what did he tell you to do?' said I. 'He told me,' says Jim, 'to bring the colt along and finish up close by where he would be standing at the end of the track.' I thought it rather odd to send Firefly such a stiff gallop as all that, but Jim was certain that he had heard right. And off they went, beginning the other side of Southwick Hill. I saw the Gaffer with his arms in the air, and don't know now what he said. Jim will tell you. He did give it you, didn't he, you old Woolgatherer?" ...
— Esther Waters • George Moore
... Elfie a little carelessly, 'I have always heard that the more horses you have the less work you get out of them. Where do you want to go, Cousin James? Can't you take Firefly in ...
— The Carved Cupboard • Amy Le Feuvre
... that season the Firefly, and many misinterpreted her illy suppressed excitement and the scrutiny of those lambent eyes sending out their flame signals in search of answering lights. Even her secretary did not know that the dark shadows which ringed ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... get away at first, and back they trooped. A second trial was a failure. But at the third they were off in a line as straight as a chalk-mark. There were Essex and Firefly, Queen Bess and Mosquito, galloping away side by side, and Black Boy a neck ahead. Patsy knew the family reputation of his horse for endurance as well as fire, and began riding the race from the first. Black Boy came of blood ...
— The Strength of Gideon and Other Stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... down at her in a half-puzzled way, looked as if he was suddenly reassured that she was only a little girl, after all—not a provoking firefly, but a wistful, unconscious child who only wanted to do her ...
— The Wishing-Ring Man • Margaret Widdemer
... over that uplifted region. Above, near the summit of the mountain, flashed the red eye of a charcoal burner's fire; beneath only the plateau sloped to a ragged edge easterly, for the lake was hidden under the shoulder of the hills. No firefly danced upon this height; but music there was, for a nightingale bubbled his liquid notes in a great myrtle not ten yards from ...
— The Red Redmaynes • Eden Phillpotts
... Bone men opposite must rely on their ears alone hereafter, for they could not see through this darkness. McKay was visible enough to his own party, but not to the enemy. The blond man in the hammock watched the somber figure of his comrade, followed the flight of a big firefly whose light floated near, thought of the two bushmen out in the dark, and looked again at the still ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
... chain lightning, fork lightning, sheet lightning, summer lightning; ball lightning, kugelblitz [German]; [chemical substances giving off light without burning] phosphorus, yellow phosphorus; scintillator, phosphor; firefly luminescence. ignis fatuus[Lat]; Jack o'lantern, Friar's lantern; will-o'-the-wisp, firedrake[obs3], Fata Morgana[Lat]; Saint Elmo's fire. [luminous insects] glowworm, firefly, June bug, lightning bug. [luminous fish] anglerfish. [Artificial light] gas; gas light, lime light, lantern, lanthorn[obs3]; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... become a dream, and through the little opening of your eyelids I shall slip into the depths of your sleep; and when you wake up and look round startled, like a twinkling firefly I shall flit out ...
— The Crescent Moon • Rabindranath Tagore (trans.)
... they are building their fire already; it glimmers for a moment, and dies again like the light of a firefly. ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper
... them, looking in the direction of the big gate, saw a light shining apparently on one of its posts. He called the attention of the rest to it. They wondered what it could mean. It could not be a firefly. It was not the light of a lantern in the hands of some one walking; the light was too steady. The Judge said to George: "My son, run down the lane, and see what that light means." George needed no urging, but at once went with swift pace to the gate. There ...
— The Kentucky Ranger • Edward T. Curnick
... has faded from the elms, And in the denser darkness of the boughs From time to time the firefly's tiny lamp Sparkles. How often in still summer dusks He paused to note that transient phantom spark Flash on the ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... earth—of the fruitful life of seasons and of crops—produced in a solitary observer a quiet that was not untouched by awe. Where nature was suggestive of the long repose of ages, the brief passions of a single generation became as the flicker of a candle or the glow of a firefly in the night. ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... more natural place; and these eyes, when the insect is touched, shoot forth two strong streams of greenish light, something like that produced by an electric dynamo, while, at the same time, the entire body of the "firefly," or beetle, becomes as incandescent ...
— The White Squall - A Story of the Sargasso Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... but Roquebrune and my garden are world enough for me. Is breakfast ready, Mademoiselle Luciola? Thanks; we will begin as soon as you have brought things to lay another place. Is that not a good name for the wee body—Firefly? Oh, but you should see our fireflies here in May, when the Riviera is supposed to be wiped off the map, not existent till winter. And the glow-worms. I have three in my garden. No garden is complete without at least one glow-worm. I had to beg ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... made the first co'tce. After coming up the qadjinai, or magic reed, he was very dirty; his skin was discolored and he had a foul smell like a coyote. He washed with water, but that did not cleanse him. Then Qastcej[)i]ni sent the firefly to instruct him concerning the co'tce and how to rotate a spindle of wood in a notched stick. As First-man revolved the spindle, or drill, between his hands, Firefly ignited the dust at its point with a spark of fire which Qastcej[)i]ni had given it for that purpose. There is another myth ...
— Navaho Houses, pages 469-518 • Cosmos Mindeleff
... of energy that lights the lamps of the firefly and the glow-worm, and it must be some sort or degree of energy that keeps consciousness going. The brain of a Newton, or of a Plato, must make a larger draft on the solar energy latent in food-stuffs than the brain of a day laborer, and his body less. The same amount of food-consumption, ...
— The Breath of Life • John Burroughs
... beyond the river deepened. A firefly or so flickered brightly above the fields of clover. In the soft clear twilight, fragrant with the smell of clover and water lily and rimmed now by the rising moon, Philip found his resolution of the afternoon difficult to utter. The pool at his feet was a motionless mirror of summer ...
— Diane of the Green Van • Leona Dalrymple
... all countries many refer to insects, birds, animals, persons, actions, trades, food or children. In Chinese rhymes we have the cricket, cicada, spider, snail, firefly, ladybug and butterfly and others. Among fowls we have the bat, crow, magpie, cock, hen, duck and goose. Of animals, the dog, cow, horse, mule, donkey, camel, and mouse, are the favorites. There are also rhymes on the snake and frog, ...
— The Chinese Boy and Girl • Isaac Taylor Headland
... deep and dark, Waiting for the firefly's spark; If you wish to see him now, Follow me, and make ...
— Lulu, Alice and Jimmie Wibblewobble • Howard R. Garis
... occasion Yoosoof conceived that the captain of the 'Firefly' might be obliged to take this course to get rid of the negroes already on board, who were of course consuming his provisions, besides being an extremely disagreeable cargo, many of them being diseased and covered with sores, owing to their cruel ...
— Black Ivory • R.M. Ballantyne
... having told Dawson, who was escorting Clara, that Hanmer was looking for him to make out the list of "the eleven," I was very sorry indeed when the sound of a gun announced that the Hon. H. Chouser's Firefly had won the cup, and that the other two yachts might be expected in the course of half-an-hour. Nobody waited for them, of course. The herring boats, after a considerable deal of what I concluded from the emphasis ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843 • Various
... narrate the all-important narration of his constant indisposition,—to assure us that his ill health more than once threatened the mighty task he had in hand. These, to be sure, are most important revelations. But Khalid here misses his cue. Inspiration does not seem to come to him in firefly-fashion. ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... have deceived me," he answered quietly. "I have deceived myself. I thought I was following a great God-sent light. It was nothing more than a firefly glittering through my darkness. You are ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie
... coffee plantations, and indeed throughout the rural portions of the country, there is a curious little insect called a cocuyo, answering in its general characteristics and nature to our firefly, though it is quadruple its size, and far the most brilliant insect of its kind known to naturalists. They float in phosphorescent clouds over the vegetation, emitting a lurid halo, like fairy torch-bearers to elfin crews. One at first sight is apt to ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou
... larva of one of these, which is the glow-worm beside the path. You may get a very faint real illumination from him, lighting perhaps the space of your fingernail as he crawls along. He, too, merely serves to make the darkness visible. The firefly of the tropics is more spectacular. He blazes forth like a meteor, setting all the thicket aglow for a moment. The lights of our fireflies are more like a frosting of the darkness, as when the moon shines in winter and the light glints from ice crystals hung on the frozen ...
— Old Plymouth Trails • Winthrop Packard
... all the lamps," said Martin, and put it out. He sat on his bunk and the gleam of his cigarette came and went. It was like a big firefly in the half dark cabin. "To-morrow," he said to himself, with a tingle running through his ...
— Who Cares? • Cosmo Hamilton
... whirls in circles overhead; When the cow-bells melt and mingle In a softened, silver jingle, And the old hen calls the chickens in to bed; When the marshy meadows glimmer With a misty, purple shimmer, And the twilight flush is changing into shade; When the firefly lamps are burning And the dusk to dark is turning,— Then the bullfrogs ...
— Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse • Joseph C. Lincoln
... Malanus flows. Flows, flows, flows onward. Si (Mr.) On-na-i and Na-to-tan dig obi (taro) with their hands. Dig, dig, dig with the hands. The firefly in the woods opens his eyes. Opens, opens, opens his eyes. The bank caves into the river. Caves, caves, caves in. Here, your arm pretty bamboo (?) Bamboo, bamboo, pretty bamboo. Do not disturb the rest of the kabibinan (a bird). Disturb, disturb, do not disturb. Help the kolat ...
— The Tinguian - Social, Religious, and Economic Life of a Philippine Tribe • Fay-Cooper Cole
... for the position of leader by the veteran A.C. Gregory, and on the 14th of August he left Brisbane in the Firefly, having on board a party of volunteer assistants who had been stirred by the widespread sympathy with the missing men to take an active part in the relief expedition. Unfortunately, those under Landsborough were, with one exception, unacquainted ...
— The Explorers of Australia and their Life-work • Ernest Favenc
... seen why they did not invite us," said one old Firefly. "They did not need us because the moon ...
— Sandman's Goodnight Stories • Abbie Phillips Walker
... deceives them. We catch a glimpse of the old fellow's white throat as he trots about in a zigzag course, poking his tan muzzle into every clump of tall grass and giving tongue occasionally as he sniffs the cold trail. Presently a long, quavering cry comes from old Firefly; again and again Blucher opens more and more eagerly; another and another dog takes it up, and the trot quickens into a lope. The trail grows warmer as they follow the line of fence, and just as we settle ourselves in ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - February, 1876, Vol. XVII, No. 98. • Various
... dim light showed on a slope gentler than the rest, leading down to the lake. It was a spark so faint and vague that it might have passed to the ordinary eye as a firefly, but rangers and Mohawks knew well that it came from some portion of St. Luc's camp and that the enemy was close at hand. Then the band stopped and the three leaders talked together again for ...
— The Rulers of the Lakes - A Story of George and Champlain • Joseph A. Altsheler
... through the wood, the fugitives emerged, after some hard riding, upon the bare hillside. Below them, and some distance ahead, could be seen the twinkling lights of the village Jack had noticed the night before, while on their right hands gleamed the firefly-like ...
— The Border Boys Across the Frontier • Fremont B. Deering
... "she is a firefly," are phrases often used to describe that vivacious individual whose adeptness at repartee puts the rest of the crowd in the background. These people are always largely or purely Thoracic. They never belong ...
— How to Analyze People on Sight - Through the Science of Human Analysis: The Five Human Types • Elsie Lincoln Benedict and Ralph Paine Benedict
... the river as we rode, And rode till midnight when the college lights Began to glitter firefly-like in copse And linden alley: then we past an arch, Whereon a woman-statue rose with wings From four winged horses dark against the stars; And some inscription ran along the front, But deep in shadow: further on we gained A little street half garden and half house; But ...
— The Princess • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... Ape and the Firefly" (JAFL 20 : 314) shows the firefly making use of the same ruse the dragon-flies employ to get the monkeys to slay one another. The first part of this variant is connected with our No. 60. The "killing fly on head" incident we ...
— Filipino Popular Tales • Dean S. Fansler
... mocking bird, a songster gay, Would soothe their souls, with multifarious song, Singing his farewell-hymns to dying Day, As fade his smiles the darkening glades along; And when the frowns of night more thickly throng, The amorous firefly led them at that hour, O'er wooded hills, and marshes deep and long, To their sweet rest, which sank, with grateful power, Along their wearied nerves, in their wild, ...
— Lays of Ancient Virginia, and Other Poems • James Avis Bartley
... deserted highway that followed the horseshoe curve of the Belleport shore. They had evolved a code whereby, with much labor it must be admitted, they were able to spell out messages that flickered their way through the night with the beauty of a firefly's revel; but when Jack had taken up work with the coast guard, this old-time substitute for speech had been abandoned, giving place to the briefer method of three nightly flashes. Neither toil nor illness, ...
— Flood Tide • Sara Ware Bassett
... nobility enshrined in a "small" act; he marked how, set in the scales of the eternal balances of scope and eternity, a copper penny set against a million dollars were as two feathers; they rode light, and there was little choice between them. He had known that firefly cluster of lights above to be the majestic processional of worlds. He saw himself as small; the universe as big. And the knowledge did not crush; it elevated. Throughout the whole of creation ran the fine ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory
... a matter of fact; but I have a small pension, and I earn a little by writing titbits of scientific gossip for 'The Firefly.' Herr von Eulenberg helps. He translates interesting paragraphs from the foreign technical papers, and I jot them down, and by that means I pick up sufficient to buy an extra hat or wrap, and go to ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... approaching evening; inside, the long shadows, gathering heavily in the aisles and richly sculptured hollows of the side-chapels, brought night before its time. The last votive candle at the Virgin's shrine flickered down and disappeared like a firefly in dense blackness,—the last echo of the bell died in a tremulous vibration up among the high-springing roof-arches, and away into the solemn corners where the nameless dead reposed,— the last impression of life and feeling vanished with the retreating figure of the ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... of an earth robbed of its winter clothing a cluster of moving figures stood out in faint relief, and presently a light flashed out like the infinitesimal blaze of a firefly in the night. It passed, and then it came again. Again it passed. And again it came. This time it lived and grew. A fire had lit, and the group of figures were crouching over it as though to protect it against the dark immensity of ...
— The Heart of Unaga • Ridgwell Cullum
... her flushing face, And the fuschia with her form of grace, The balsam bright, and the lupin's crest, That weaves a roof for the firefly's nest; The myrtle clusters, and dahlia tall, The jessamine fairest among them all; And the tremulous lips of the lily's bell, Join in the music we ...
— Victor Roy, A Masonic Poem • Harriet Annie Wilkins
... out an old buggy with an old horse called Firefly and helped Miss Dorcas in, explaining carefully, "This ain't no kicker and it ain't no jumper. It's jest plain horse with good horse-sense. If you don't cross yo' lines, you ...
— Honey-Sweet • Edna Turpin
... this great city. The first night that one finds himself here he feels as though he were wandering about in a country village at home. No arc-lights shine. The window-lights are all extinguished. The few lights on the great boulevards are so dimmed that their luminosity is about that of a healthy firefly in June back home. One gropes his way about, feeling ahead of him and navigating cautiously, even the ...
— Soldier Silhouettes on our Front • William L. Stidger
... jutting out into the sea, the Heads of Ayr. Do you see that house with the flagstaff, at the top of the Links? It is Mr. Fordyce's house, The Anchorage, where I lived all summer. It is splendid here to-day. Stand still, Firefly, you impatient animal; we are not ready ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan
... even—the blaze was so infernal. I didn't see a sail after the first three days, and those I saw took no notice of me. About the sixth night a ship went by scarcely half a mile away from me, with all its lights ablaze and its ports open, looking like a big firefly. There was music aboard. I stood up and shouted and screamed at it. The second day I broached one of the AEpyornis eggs, scraped the shell away at the end bit by bit, and tried it, and I was glad to find it was good enough to eat. A ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... there burst, apparently from the base of the rock, about eight feet from the ground and a hundred yards from me, a strange, lurid glare, flickering and oscillating, gradually dying away and then reappearing again. No, no; I've seen many a glow-worm and firefly—nothing of that sort. There it was, burning away, and I suppose I gazed at it, trembling in every limb, for fully ten minutes. Then I took a step forward, when instantly it vanished, vanished like a candle blown out. I stepped back again; but it ...
— Stories by English Authors: Africa • Various
... delightful times she loved so dearly, of poetic wanderings with Shelley through woods and by the river, one of which she remembers long afterwards, when, making her note to the "Skylark," she recalls how she and Shelley, wandering through the lanes whose myrtle hedges were the bowers of the firefly, heard the carolling of the skylark which inspired one of the most beautiful of his poems. Precious memories which helped her through many after years devoid of the sympathy she yearned for. At the Baths they had the pleasure of a visit from Medwin, who gave a description ...
— Mrs. Shelley • Lucy M. Rossetti
... Miss Fennimore, faith must still have been much stronger than reason if she could detect the model parsoness in yonder firefly. ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Dolphin, Wizard, Escape, and Dragon-all vessels with rising floors and round bilges, and the coefficient of performance was found to be 1430. The fourth set of experiments was made in 1834, upon the vessels Magnet, Dart, Eclipse, Flamer, Firefly, Ferret, and Monarch, when the coefficient of performance was found to be 1580. The fifth set of experiments was made upon the Red Rover, City of Canterbury, Herne, Queen, and Prince of Wales, and in the case of those vessels the coefficient rose to 2550. The velocity of any ...
— A Catechism of the Steam Engine • John Bourne
... full of Indian boys and girls, little and big, dancing the firefly dance. Advancing and retreating, turning and twisting, bowing and whirling, they imitate the moving lights about them and ...
— Two Indian Children of Long Ago • Frances Taylor
... little creatures," the sprite continued. "They carry their own light about with them on warm summer nights and enliven the dark under the shrubbery where the moonlight doesn't shine through. So firefly can keep tryst with firefly even in the dark. Later, when we come to the human beings, you will make the acquaintance ...
— The Adventures of Maya the Bee • Waldemar Bonsels
... forest, and wait for the coming train. The evening fell while we looked; the train was late; and at last when it came I could only know it in the distance by the red spark of its locomotive gleaming like a firefly. ...
— Daisy • Elizabeth Wetherell
... walling eyes reflecting whole acres of "calf heaven" and his little tail wiggling in speechless bliss, he draws his evening meal from nature's commissariat. The snail lolls in his shell and thinks himself a king in the grandest palace in the world. And how brilliant is the horizon of the firefly when ...
— Gov. Bob. Taylor's Tales • Robert L. Taylor
... Philosophers The Demon Pope The Cupbearer The Wisdom of the Indians The Dumb Oracle Duke Virgil The Claw Alexander the Ratcatcher The Rewards of Industry Madam Lucifer The Talismans The Elixir of Life The Poet of Panopolis The Purple Head The Firefly Pan's Wand A Page from the Book of Folly The Bell of Saint Euschemon Bishop Addo and Bishop Gaddo The Philosopher and the Butterflies Truth and Her Companions The Three Palaces New Readings in Biography The Poison ...
— The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales • Richard Garnett
... That arc of dreadful lightnings held her with ghastly fascination. Suddenly all the guns ceased. Faintly in the distance she heard a tumult of human voices in the high notes of a savage cheer; the rattling din of rifles; the purring of automatics; and then, except for the firefly flashes of scattered shots around Engadir, silence and darkness. But she knew that chaos would soon be loosed again—chaos and murder, which were the product of her own chicanery. The Grays would find themselves in the trap of ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer
... to them "how Jack sighed and squeezed her hand; how Tom went down on his knees; how Dick swore and Sam vowed; and how—she was still Miss Martineau." And thus would she narrate and they listen until the sun went down, and the firefly danced, while the frogs lifted up ...
— Diary in America, Series Two • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... The kunang, or firefly, larger than the common fly, (which it resembles), with the phosphoric matter in the abdomen, regularly and quickly intermitting its light, as if by respiration; by holding one of them in my hand I could ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden
... cool and refreshing dip in the sea, and it was almost dark ere we left the water to return to the boat. A light was placed in her little cabin, which shone like a firefly over the sands, giving promise of good things within, to which we were shortly doing justice, in the shape of an excellent fowl curry (prepared by the murderer), washed down by a bottle of claret cool and fresh from the spring on shore, where it had ...
— On the Equator • Harry de Windt
... I went out on the path leading to the cove. It was pitch-black; the riding light of the Pied Witch was still there, looking no bigger than a firefly. Then from in front I heard sobbing—a man's sobs; no sound is quite so dreadful. Zachary Pearse got up out of the ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... Beauty in her, of the holding kind. Some men love the light, an' some the shade. Round that little Indian girl there played Soft an' shadowy tremblings, like the dark Under trees; yet now an' then a spark, Quick 's a firefly, flashing from her eyes, Made you think of summer-midnight skies. She was faithful, too, like midnight stars. As for Blackmouth, if you'd seen the scars Made by wounds he suffered for her sake, You'd have called him true, ...
— Dreams and Days: Poems • George Parsons Lathrop
... finest art, and who from their earliest years study it. Disease, sickness, and death have all to be accounted for. They know nothing of malaria, filth, or contagion. Hence they hold that an enemy causes these things, and friends have to see that due punishment is made. The large night firefly helps to point in the direction of that enemy, or the spirits of departed ones are called in through spiritists' influence to come and assist, and the medium pronouncing a neighbouring tribe guilty, the time is near ...
— Adventures in New Guinea • James Chalmers
... lay over the salt meadows; the fairy trilling of the little owl had ceased. Marsh-fowl were sleepily astir; the last firefly floated low into the shrouded bushes and its lamp glimmered a moment ...
— Athalie • Robert W. Chambers
... of carriages wound in and out like a snake with shining scales. The night was so dark that little was to be seen except the firefly lights and the bare tawny legs of ...
— An Ohio Woman in the Philippines • Emily Bronson Conger
... Saw the firefly, Wah-wah-taysee, Flitting through the dusk of evening, With the twinkle of its candle Lighting up the brakes and bushes; And he sang the song of children, Sang ...
— The Elson Readers, Book 5 • William H. Elson and Christine M. Keck
... March, and read quick assent in his friend's face. "But make her go dressed as she is; you've got to outrun rumor! Captain, go tell Tom to give him Firefly, won't you? She's mine, Fair," he continued, following to the stairs; "she's the mare I cured for Bulger; perfectly gentle, only—Fair!—don't touch her ...
— John March, Southerner • George W. Cable
... come. I will—if I can." This last was added with a little sigh. "Did you bring Firefly East with you, this year, Jane?" she ...
— Jane Allen: Right Guard • Edith Bancroft
... from his head his heavy sombrero, and stepped into a darker recess of the forest. After standing for a moment, hat in hand, a brilliant object shot out from the leaves of the palma redonda. It was the cocuyo—the great firefly of the tropics. With a low, humming sound it came glistening along at the height of seven or eight feet from the ground. The man sprang up, and with a sweep of his arm jerked it suddenly to the earth. Then, covering it with ...
— The Rifle Rangers • Captain Mayne Reid
... Firefly of France" is in the manner of the romance—in the manner of Dumas, of Walter Scott. It is a story of love, mystery, danger, and daring. It opens in the gorgeous St. Ives Hotel in New York and ends behind the Allied lines in ...
— The Golden Bird • Maria Thompson Daviess
... quickened his pace, for it was growing late, and the shadows creeping from tree to tree. At length he saw a light in the distance. It was a very little light, not much larger than a star, and at first Ned thought it might be a giant firefly. However, he kept on and after a while it turned out to be a little candle in the window of a poor woodcutter's hut. Knocking on the door, it was presently opened by a strange looking man. He had long hairy ears like a donkey and was dressed in the ...
— The Magic Soap Bubble • David Cory
... Kelham Towers for their architect, are pointed by a long and pleasing slope of wings. Carl Gruppe's slender Fairy stands upon them, poised, as though just alighted. This finial figure has a pretty wistfulness that suggests the whimsical firefly fairies of Peter Pan more than the conventional gauzy creatures of ordinary fairy tale, and is more like a female counterpart of Shakespeare's "delicate Ariel" who sucks "where the bee sucks" than any other creature of fancy. The curving antennae increase ...
— The Sculpture and Mural Decorations of the Exposition • Stella G. S. Perry
... Pietro d'Arena. It was the month of May—a month of May in that garden of the world—the blossoms of the fruit-trees were fading among thick, green foliage; the vines were shooting forth; the ground strewed with the fallen olive blooms; the firefly was in the myrtle hedge; heaven and earth wore a mantle of surpassing beauty. Torella welcomed me kindly, though seriously; and even his shade of displeasure soon wore away. Some resemblance to my father—some look and tone of youthful ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... been augmented on the West India station. The brig 'Firefly,' corvettes 'Croaker' and 'Joker,' touched at Nassau, New Providence, on the 2d instant, bound to leeward. We also learn that the United States have fitted out a squadron of small vessels, called the Musquito Fleet, to search for the noted pirate Brand, ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... Indies, being sorely pestered with mosquitoes, kept their light burning in hopes of scaring them off, but finding this did not answer, one suggested they should extinguish the light and thus puzzle their tormentors to find them, which was done. Presently the other, observing the light of a firefly in the room, called to his bedfellow, "Arrah, Mike, sure your plan's no good, for, bedad, here's one of them looking ...
— The Book of Noodles - Stories Of Simpletons; Or, Fools And Their Follies • W. A. Clouston
... breeze was astern and moved so evenly with the boat as to enfold her in a calm. Looking up for the stars, one saw only the giant chimneys towering straight into the darkness and sending their smoke as straight and as far again beyond, spangled with two firefly swarms of sparks that fell at last ...
— Gideon's Band - A Tale of the Mississippi • George W. Cable
... is of little economic importance to us at present but its peculiar habit of producing light makes it a very striking form and one which deserves study. The firefly is a beetle, and begins to make its appearance the latter part of June when the darkest nights may be one solid glow of fire. They live largely in damp places and bottoms at night are specked with their tiny flashes of light. The larval or grub stage is passed on the ground beneath ...
— An Elementary Study of Insects • Leonard Haseman
... that the light of the firefly (in any family possessing the luminous power) was a safeguard against the attacks of other insects, rapacious and nocturnal in their habits. This was Kirby and Spence's notion, but it might just as well be Pliny's for all the attention it would receive from modern ...
— The Naturalist in La Plata • W. H. Hudson
... destroy the "Ghost Gambler" and to liberate the many victims who had fallen into his power. To be enabled to traverse this dark and dismal path, he borrowed of K[)o]-ko-k[)o]-[-o]—the owl—his eyes, and received also the services of w-wa-t[-e]-si-w[)u]g—the firefly, both of which were sent back to the earth upon the completion of his journey. By referring to Pl. III, A, the reference to this myth will be observed as pictorially represented in Nos. 110 to 114. No. 110 is the Mid[-e]wign from which the traveler has to visit the Dzhibai Mid[-e]wign (No. ...
— Seventh Annual Report • Various
... Sparkling and darkling, dust of the milky way, Shifting and drifting, firefly legions at play; Fading and glowing, lights of a starry maze, Coming and going, ...
— The Last West and Paolo's Virginia • G. B. Warren
... laboured busily out of the bayou past misty reed-girt islands into the indolent waters of the great lake, dragging after her the fleet of forty odd canoes. A cigar under the awning of the tiny poop suggested a great firefly in the blue shadows, where lounged zu Pfeiffer with his favourite brandy and seltzer ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... fire on the hearth. We may feel around for the invisible poker, and when we find it, we may put it in the fire. When it becomes hot enough, it will glow red and become visible. We can make a match head glow by rubbing it on a wet finger. We can even see a firefly, if one comes around. But only those things which are glowing of themselves, like flames, and red-hot pokers, and ...
— Common Science • Carleton W. Washburne
... turned back into the woods, in whose weird darkness the light of Reube's lantern was no more than that of a firefly. The moonlight stole into little openings, outlined the trees upon the glittering sward, and hovered like a ghost on the path before them. The camp was a somewhat ruinous affair, but had lately been occupied by a party of surveyors. With the blaze of a great fire its interior might have ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, November 1885 • Various
... burning taper,—a mere speck. In the other he carried a rude lantern, its wavering light hovering about his feet. As he passed in his long brown cloak, the swaying light encircled his white beard and hair with a fluffy halo. He moved slowly, the spark he carried no larger than a firefly. The sacristan had come to ...
— A Gentleman Vagabond and Some Others • F. Hopkinson Smith
... I—think I should have a better chance of doing something if I were to obtain the command of the Firefly schooner; the lieutenant commanding ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat
... lose them hosses, Phil," continued old Matt, as he hobbled to a seat. "And if we can, them Injuns shan't hev 'em. I ain't a-goin' to hev old Firefly rid by them critters, and starved, and abused—I ain't a-goin' to do it! Them hosses must be got back. You're gittin' old enough to do sunthin' with Injuns now, Phil, and you must git them hosses ...
— Field and Forest - The Fortunes of a Farmer • Oliver Optic
... crimson petal, now the white; Nor waves the cypress in the palace walk; Nor winks the gold fin in the porphyry font: The firefly wakens: ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... astonishing swiftness, looking as wild as the scenery through which their chargers bounded. The effect was rendered more imposing by the reflection of the moon-beams from their polished spears, and the pieces of silver which were affixed to their caps; while the luminous firefly appeared in the air like rising and falling ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... and ran; and all was black and empty before him. On and on he ran, never daring to look back; and at last he saw a lantern, so far away that it looked like the gleam of a firefly; and he made for it. It proved to be only the lantern of an itinerant soba-seller, [2] who had set down his stand by the road-side; but any light and any human companionship was good after that experience; ...
— Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things • Lafcadio Hearn
... Pleasant Valley ever paid any attention to Freddie Firefly in the daytime. But on warm, and especially on dark summer nights he always appeared at his best. Then he went gaily flitting through the meadows. And sometimes he even danced right in Farmer Green's dooryard, together with a hundred or two of ...
— The Tale of Freddie Firefly • Arthur Scott Bailey
... Communication is the prime requisite to procreation. The firefly signals his mate by night, the human male entices his woman with honeyed words and is not the gift of a jewel a crystalline, enduring ...
— Instinct • George Oliver Smith
... ceased save the booming of the frogs, which but emphasises the loneliness of it all. A distant whistle of a locomotive dispels the idea that all the world is wilderness. The firefly lamps glow along the margin of the rushes. The frogs are now in full chorus, the great bulls beating their tom-toms and the small fry filling in the chinks with shriller cries. How remote the scene and how melancholy ...
— The Log of the Sun - A Chronicle of Nature's Year • William Beebe
... had gathered at the foot of the lawn were very silent; Dr. Howe, whose cigar glowed and faded like a larger firefly than those which were beginning to spangle the darkness, was the only one ready to talk. "Well," he said, knocking off his cigar ashes on the arm of his chair, "everything ready for to-morrow, girls? Trunks packed and gowns trimmed? We'll have to keep you, Helen, ...
— John Ward, Preacher • Margaret Deland
... long way off, her lantern bobbing along like a firefly, and walked faster. Impatience brought a cold sweat out upon his forehead and then he needs must call her name before she ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... there was left in his mind a picture that he could never forget. The face which had been so cruelly, so grotesquely revealed was that of Frenchy McAllister, and across his knees lay a heavy caliber Winchester. A curse escaped from the lips of the outlaw; the man on the stump spat at a firefly and smiled. ...
— Hopalong Cassidy's Rustler Round-Up - Bar-20 • Clarence Edward Mulford
... brilliant lines of illuminated cups, each a crimson, or white, or emerald star. Moreover, at the steps of the terrace below, there was a great bustle of boats; and each boat had its pink paper lantern glowing like a huge firefly in the darkness; and there was a confusion of chaffering and calling with brightly dressed figures descending by the light of torches, and disappearing into the unknown. Then these boats began to move away—with their glow-worm lanterns swaying in the ...
— The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols • William Black
... light had been darting about the room like a very much enlarged firefly, Jimmy did not know. It seemed to him like hours, for it had woven itself into an incoherent waking dream of his; and for a moment, as the mists of sleep passed away from his brain, he fancied that he was dreaming still. Then, sleep left him, and he realized that the light, which ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse |
