"Knot" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... puzzle, the thrice-tied knot, the deep and dark pool, all untied and illumin'd! O to speed where there is space enough and air enough at last! To be absolv'd from previous ties and conventions, I from mine and you from yours! To find a new unthought-of nonchalance ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman
... path, with the perversity of all Spanish roads, instead of following up the valley of the stream, diverged widely to the right through a cluster or knot of hills, in which we were involved until we reached a rapid stream called Rio Guanupalapa, flowing through a narrow gorge, over a wild mass of stones and boulders. Here we breakfasted, picturesquely enough, and, resuming our course, soon emerged from ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 6, No. 33, July, 1860 • Various
... round the shores of the bay: according to the depth alongside there was a rise of ten feet; after high-water the ebb set between North 1/2 West and North-North-East, at the rate of a quarter to three quarters of a knot. ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King
... revelation, as we are dealing with facts and phenomena in the natural life of man, rather than with creeds and dogmas that undertake to cut the "Gordian Knot," these questions stare everyone in the face, and in every age man has tried to ...
— The New Avatar and The Destiny of the Soul - The Findings of Natural Science Reduced to Practical Studies - in Psychology • Jirah D. Buck
... to what we call Providence and its mysteries, the very book of Job, from which my second text is taken, is one of the earliest attempts to grapple with the difficulty and to untie the knot; and I suppose everybody will admit that, whatever may be the solution which is suggested by that enigmatical book, the solution is by no means a complete one, though it is as complete as the state of religious knowledge at the time at which the book was written made possible to be ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... one's best friend go before one." Life was indifferent to him; if he recovered from his disorder it would only be to feel the loss of "that person for whose sake only life was worth preserving. I brought both those friends over that we might be happy together as long as God should please; the knot is broken, and the remaining person you know has ill answered the end; and the other, who is now to be lost, is all that was valuable." To Worrall he again wrote (in Latin) that Stella ought not to be lodged at the Deanery; he had enemies ...
— The Journal to Stella • Jonathan Swift
... stripped of their bark, offering wonder for savage and civilized man alike, for hundreds of miles across an uninhabited country. We could see the poles rubbed smooth at their base by the shoulders of the buffalo. Here and there a little tuft of hair clung to some untrimmed knot. High up in some of the naked poles we could see still sticking, the iron shod arrows of contemptuous tribesmen, who had thus sought to assail the "great medicine" of the white man. We heard the wires above us humming mysteriously in the wind, but if they bore messages east or west, we ...
— The Way of a Man • Emerson Hough
... that he still lived became stronger, and with it grew the desire for life. Animated by it he sat up and made an effort to loosen the cord that still bound his ankles. It was tightly knotted, and the knot was so hardened with the water that for a long time his trembling fingers could make no impression on it. Still he persevered, and his exertions infused him with a slight warmth. Finally the knot yielded and his limbs were free, though so numbed that it was several minutes ...
— The Copper Princess - A Story of Lake Superior Mines • Kirk Munroe
... condemned to be flogged and sent to the mines. So he was flogged with a knot, and when the wounds made by the knot were healed, he was driven to Siberia with ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... away in China, walking along the banks of the great Yellow River. Everything was very strange. The people talked an entirely different language from his own; had on different clothes; and, instead of the nice shaven head and top-knot of the Japanese, every one wore a long pigtail of hair, that dangled at his heels. Even the boats were of a strange form, and on the fishing smacks perched on projecting rails, sat rows of cormorants, each with a ring around his ...
— Japanese Fairy World - Stories from the Wonder-Lore of Japan • William Elliot Griffis
... their clousters of Grapes to be a cubite long. The coronettes of their Pasnepes, and Gardein Thistles (whiche we calle Hortichokes) as also of their Fenelle, to be twelue Cubites compasse. Their haue Cannes like vnto those of India, whiche may contein in the compasse of the knot, or iointe, the measure of ij. bushelles. Ther be sene also Sparagi, of no lesse notable bigguenesse. Toward the mounte Atlas trees bee founde of a wondrefull heigth, smothe, and without knaggue or knotte, vp to the hard toppe, hauyng leaues like the Cypres, but ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries - Vol. II • Richard Hakluyt
... Search narrowly the lines! they hold a treasure 5 Divine, a talisman, an amulet That must be worn at heart. Search well the measure— The word—the syllables. Do not forget The trivialest point, or you may lose your labor: And yet there is in this no Gordian knot 10 Which one might not undo without a sabre, If one could merely comprehend the plot. Enwritten upon the leaf where now are peering Eyes scintillating soul, there lie perdus Three eloquent words oft uttered in the hearing 15 Of poets, by poets—as the name is a poet's, too. ...
— Selections From Poe • J. Montgomery Gambrill
... wouldn't want to leave him here alone. He's an old man, you know, even if he is tough as a pine knot. Can't we persuade him to go with us? He's been so loyal and lovable ...
— The Lady of Big Shanty • Frank Berkeley Smith
... rage, he tried to undo the cord, but he only pulled the knot tighter. He had put down the sword on the grass, and Peronnik had been careful to fix the net on the other side of the tree, so that it was now easy for him to pluck an apple and to mount his horse, without being hindered by ...
— The Lilac Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... towering comb of silver filigree work, to which are attached a number of silver spangles, which glitter with every movement of her head. She wears her hair in a knot into which are stuck a number of large brass hair-pins, decorated with beads and little tags of red and yellow and white cloth. She possesses a bright coloured jacket of Dyak-woven cloth; but she does not wear it, it is slung over her ...
— Children of Borneo • Edwin Herbert Gomes
... Turton's "British Bivalves." Besides, aculeatum is a far thinner and more delicate shell. And a third species, C. echinatum, with curves more graceful and continuous, is to be found now and then with the two former. In it, each point, instead of degenerating into a knot, as in tuberculatum, or developing from delicate flat briar- prickles into long straight thorns, as in aculeatum, is close-set to its fellow, and curved at the point transversely to the shell, the whole being thus horrid with hundreds of strong tenterhooks, making his castle impregnable to the raveners ...
— Glaucus; or The Wonders of the Shore • Charles Kingsley
... so tight that it was almost in a knot. Mr. Wood said that was a sign that he was healthy and happy: and that when poor Daddy was at Penhollow he had noticed that his tail hung as limp and as loose as the tail of a rat. He came and leaned over the pen with Miss ...
— Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders
... forgot," said Madame Henrietta, "I forgot the secret spring; the fourth plank of the flooring—press on the spot where you will observe a knot in the wood. Those are the instructions; press, vicomte! ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... to horse, she watched him riding a moment, and saw how he waved his hand to her as he turned the corner of the market-place, and how a knot of lads and lasses stood staring on him after she lost sight of him. Then she turned her back into the chamber and laid her head on the table and wept. Then came in the goodman quietly and stood by her and she heeded him not. ...
— The Well at the World's End • William Morris
... changed, now-a-days, if the truth must be said, but yourself. To me, you be always, Mr. Mark, and Mr. Woolston, and we seem to sail along in company, much as we did the time you first went out a foremast-lad, and I teached you the difference between a flat-knot and ...
— The Crater • James Fenimore Cooper
... and took off her bonnet, then stood still. "Off with your things," I said throwing off some of mine. "I can't take them off,—if I do I can't fasten them again, they are in a knot." "Take them off." "If I do you will have to fasten me." "So I will." Slowly she stripped to her chemise. "Take that off." "I won't." "Come here then." She came. Laying hold of her I lifted her bodily, and threw her with her back on the bed, throwing up her ...
— My Secret Life, Volumes I. to III. - 1888 Edition • Anonymous
... well-dressed and handsome women is Helen Romer. She sits on an ottoman at the further end of the room, where she holds a little court of her own, dispensing her smiles and pleasant words among the little knot of men who linger admiringly ...
— Vera Nevill - Poor Wisdom's Chance • Mrs. H. Lovett Cameron
... matter-of-fact young north-country woman in district nurse's uniform, is sitting on the sofa, massaging one of her hands. OLIVIA GRAYNE sits on the old woman's right; holding a book; she is a subdued young woman of twenty-eight, her hair tied severely in a knot, wearing horn-rimmed spectacles; there is nothing in any way remarkable about her at the moment. HUBERT LAURIE is sitting in the armchair, scanning the "Daily Telegraph." He is thirty-five, moustached, hearty, and pompous, wearing plus fours ...
— Night Must Fall • Williams, Emlyn
... forward to look at the poor little clay-coloured body. At that moment a snake ran out from a tuft of grass at his feet and wriggled wildly over the sod. The dragoman shrieked, of course, but one of the soldiers put his heel upon the head of the reptile and it flung itself into the agonising knot of death. Then the whole crowd powwowed, turning from the dead man to the dead snake. Coleman signaled his contingent and proceeded along ...
— Active Service • Stephen Crane
... The knot was strongly tied, but Darsie's fingers were strong also and in a minute's time it was undone, and the corners of the handkerchief dropped on the grass to reveal an inner bag of thick grey linen tied ...
— A College Girl • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... altar on which we will burn again the incense and benjamin of friendship. Blow again the sparks now so nearly extinguished of our happy boyish days; revive again the holy flames of our youthful affections; and, above all things, have the scissors ready which are to cut the Gordian knot of my complicated diseases. Soon, in shaking you by the hand, my shadow shall ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle
... knot she went down. Half-way her naked feet brushed the needles. She looked over her shoulder, behind and down. Then, teeth clenched, she lowered herself steadily as she had learned to do in the school gymnasium, down, down, until her legs came astride ...
— The Flaming Jewel • Robert Chambers
... rug should measure three feet by six, without the fringe. This is to be knotted, allowing six threads to a knot. This kind of bath-rug—which is the simplest thing possible in weaving—will be found to be truly valuable, both for use and effect. If the filling is sufficiently heavy, and especially if it is made of half-worn rags, it will be ...
— How to make rugs • Candace Wheeler
... an oak knot, and you are, too; no, we can't make them think we are in need of a month in Wyoming. We shall have to try another tack. Now, there is no doubt that if we spend the month of September putting in extra work on our studies, we can stand the following ...
— Two Boys in Wyoming - A Tale of Adventure (Northwest Series, No. 3) • Edward S. Ellis
... arm, I became aware that it was but her lifeless form that I clasped to my breast. Giving her life for mine, she had made mine worse than worthless. My sword fell for a moment from my hand, retained only by the wrist-knot, as I placed her gently and tenderly on the ground, resting against the stone which had enabled her to effect the sacrifice I as little desired as deserved. Then, grasping my weapon again, and shouting instinctively the war-cry of ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... down at a vacant table, and, having ordered a stoup of wine, looked round. The man had joined a knot of young fellows like himself, seated at a table. They were dissipated-looking blades, and ...
— When London Burned • G. A. Henty
... of some rare painting. She was tall, and the magnificent proportions of her figure were enhanced rather than marred by the severely plain dress of dark print that she wore. The heavy masses of her hair, a shining auburn dashed with golden foam, were coiled in a rich, glossy knot at the back of the classically modelled head and rippled back from a low brow whose waxen fairness even the breezes of the ocean ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... is: Can you lace your shoes in the dark, or blind-folded, finishing with a neat double bow knot? ...
— Woodland Tales • Ernest Seton-Thompson
... away as he spoke—in the direction of a racking cough, that rose above the confused, murmuring, whispering, shaken voices on every hand; and in a little knot of people he was, for a moment, pressed close against ...
— The Miracle Man • Frank L. Packard
... one of her floursack dish-towels, which Lennon, with mock seriousness, permitted her to knot over his shoulder in a sling. The loop of cloth extended along his arm from elbow to finger tips without hiding ...
— Bloom of Cactus • Robert Ames Bennet
... the time set That thou wast born in thy degree! For now is the knot surely knit, ...
— Fifteenth Century Prose and Verse • Various
... the saddle horn, Joyce—with a double knot," she ordered. "And keep your hand on it to see that it ...
— The Highgrader • William MacLeod Raine
... of this desire is such, that it is ready, so far forth as it can, to dissolve that sweet knot of union that is betwixt body and soul, a knot more dear to a reasonable creature than that can be which is betwixt wife and husband, parent and child, or a man and his estate. For even 'all that a man hath will he give for his life,' and to keep body and ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... him said: "If you want to give me that, I will gladly take all chances for the future, whether in the Senate or elsewhere." Mr. Lincoln replied in his characteristic way: "Why, Schofield, that cuts the knot, don't it? Tell Halleck to come over here, and we will fix it right away." I bade the President adieu, and started at once for St. Louis, to turn over my command and proceed to my new ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield
... were climbing the mountain. The first was clothed in a shirt of mail, the other in the Circassian dress: except that he wore a Persian sabre instead of a shashka,[38] suspended by a laced girdle. His left arm was covered with blood, bound up with a handkerchief, and supported by the sword-knot. The faces of both were concealed. For some time he rode behind them along the slippery path, which overhung a precipice; but at the first open space he galloped by them, and turned his horse round. "Salam aleikom!" said he, opposing their passage along the rugged ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXIX. - March, 1843, Vol. LIII. • Various
... against a pile of tea boxes, glancing aimlessly around, and drumming with his fingers on his walking stick, as if it were a flute. It was difficult for me, a man dressed like a tramp, with a porter's knot over my shoulders, and grimy with coal dust, to open up a conversation with such a dandy. But to my astonishment I noticed that he never took his eyes off me, and that an unpleasant, greedy, animal light ...
— Creatures That Once Were Men • Maxim Gorky
... of their tubular stems, alternately, as they ascend. But in most of them there is also a peculiar construction, by which, at the base of the sheath, or enclosing tube, each leaf articulates itself with the rest of the stem at a ringed knot, or joint. {159} ...
— Proserpina, Volume 1 - Studies Of Wayside Flowers • John Ruskin
... of the gold-mines of Gotham. He wore a morning suit of light gray, low, dull kid shoes, a plain, finely woven straw hat, and his visible linen was the most delicate possible shade of heliotrope. His necktie was the blue-gray of a November sky, and its knot was plainly the outcome of a lordly carelessness combined with an accurate conception of the most recent ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry
... warriors threw themselves on the ground. Menard lay at the foot of a beech whose roots dipped in the water, and for the hundredth time since the sun had risen he cast about for some chance at escape. The thongs about his wrists were tied by skilful hands. He tried to reach the knot with his fingers, but could not. His guards were alert to every motion; they lay on either side, and he could not lift his eyes without meeting the sullen glance of one or the other. He was about ready to submit, trusting to his wits to seize the first opportunity ...
— The Road to Frontenac • Samuel Merwin
... a scutcheon, but there was two trees rampant, And then over them lay a sour tree passant, With a man like you in a green field pendant, Having a hempen halter about his neck, with a knot under the left ear, because you are a younger brother. Then, sir, there stands on each side, holding up the cres', A worthy ostler's hand in a dish of grease. Besides all this, on the helmet stands the hangman's hand, Ready to turn the ladder, whereon your picture did stand: Then under the helmet ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VI • Robert Dodsley
... behind his head ... the right was thrust under his bent body. The toes of his feet, in high sailor's boots, had been sucked into the slimy sea-mud; the short blue jacket, drenched through with brine, was still closely buttoned; a red scarf was fastened in a tight knot about his neck. The dark face, turned to the sky, looked as if it were laughing; the small close-set teeth could be seen under the lifted upper lip; the dim pupils of the half-closed eyes were scarcely discernible in the darkened ...
— Dream Tales and Prose Poems • Ivan Turgenev
... the upper walls. I dropped cautiously upon hands and knees, and crept slowly forward, beside the dancing shadows, taking concealment behind every irregularity. Thus approaching, I discovered the flaring beacon to be a huge pine knot stuck into the earth wall, blazing right merrily. Lying at full length, with head outstretched from behind the tree trunk that concealed my body, I gazed forward into a small room, possibly a dozen feet in width, the walls concealed by grotesquely pictured ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... projects quietly, affecting to consider them merely temporary, but with no indication of dissatisfaction or resistance. In truth she was not sorry that Jacqueline, whose companionship became more and more embarrassing every day, had cut the knot of a difficult position by a piece of wilfulness and perversity which seemed to put her in the wrong. The necessity she would have been under of crushing such a girl, who was now eighteen, would have been distasteful and unprofitable; she was very glad to ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... is especially desirable at this time, in view of the fact that our present governmental contract for ocean mail with the American Line will expire in 1905. Our ocean mail act was passed in 1891. In 1895 our 20-knot transatlantic mail line was equal to any foreign line. Since then the Germans have put on 23-knot, steamers, and the British have contracted for 24-knot steamers. Our service should equal the best. If it does not, the commercial public will abandon it. If we are to stay in the ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... on, in the guise of an Esquimaux woman, and so well was he got up that the crew looked round to see if Aninga (who, with her husband, had been allowed to witness the play) was in her place. Fred had intentionally taken Aninga as his model, and had been very successful in imitating the top-knot of hair. The baby, too, was hit off to perfection, having been made by Mivins, who proved himself a genius in such matters. Its head was a ball of rags covered with brown leather, and two white bone buttons with black spots in the centre did ...
— The World of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... "'Tain't no talk o' swingin', now: that was a bit o' brag on the boy's part: he's so eager to save his neck as you or me either. Awnly Jonathan's bin here and tawld up summat that makes un want to be off to wance, for he says, what us all knaws, without he's minded to it you can't slip a knot round Jonathan's clapper; and 'tain't that Jerrem's afeared o' his tongue, awnly for the keepin' up o' pace and quietness he fancies 'twould be better for un to make hisself ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, October, 1880 • Various
... is just what I intend they shall not have. My plan is to go there in the capacity of a servant. Once there I shall examine, as I say, every square inch of the rooms and places where this hiding-place is likely to exist. Every knob, knot, or inequality of any kind in the wood-work and stone-work shall be pressed, pulled, and twisted, until I find it. I am aware that the task may occupy months or even years, for, of course, my opportunities will be limited. Still, whether months or years, I intend to undertake ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty
... ARTHUR COLLINS. He has to "surpass himself," but he must not do it once for all or he would rob the critics of their most cherished phrase. He reminds me of the constructors of our Atlantic "greyhounds," each longer by a yard or two than the last, each swifter by a fraction of a knot, each with a few more tons displacement, all pronounced to be the final word in scientific invention, yet all reserving something for ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. CLVIII, January 7, 1920 • Various
... to a small knot of brother professionals that he needed change of air and scenery, Nickie the Kid started out of town that afternoon. We next discover him seated under a spreading gum in a pleasant sweep of sunny ...
— The Missing Link • Edward Dyson
... churches of North and South should be ruptured and so the integrity of the nation be the more imperiled. Withal there was a spreading and deepening and most reasonable disgust at the reckless ranting of a little knot of antislavery men having their headquarters at Boston, who, exulting in their irresponsibility, scattered loosely appeals to men's vindictive passions and filled the unwilling air with clamors against church and ministry and Bible and law and government, ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon
... antitheses selfish, unselfish, to be indebted, to work for nothing. I could draw closer the threads of the web which analysis has disclosed, and would then be able to show how they all run together into a single knot; I am debarred from making this work public by considerations of a private, not of a scientific, nature. After having cleared up many things which I do not willingly acknowledge as mine, I should have much to reveal which had better remain my secret. Why, then, do not I choose another dream ...
— Dream Psychology - Psychoanalysis for Beginners • Sigmund Freud
... it was indeed "war to the knife." Such was the Gordian knot that Lady Lanswell had to untie, and it was the most ...
— A Mad Love • Bertha M. Clay
... feet, saying, 'Enough has been put therein;' and I will cause him to go and tread down the food in the bag, and when he does so, turn thou the bag, so that he shall be up over his head in it, and then slip a knot upon the thongs of the bag. Let there be also a good bugle horn about thy neck, and as soon as thou hast bound him in the bag, wind thy horn, and let it be a signal between thee and thy knights. ...
— The Mabinogion • Lady Charlotte Guest
... without a bit, to the lower jaw: this he does by passing a narrow thong through the eye-holes at the end of the reins, and several times round both jaw and tongue. The two front legs are now tied closely together with a strong leathern thong, fastened by a slip-knot. The lazo, which bound the three together, being then loosed, the horse rises with difficulty. The Gaucho now holding fast the bridle fixed to the lower jaw, leads the horse outside the corral. If a second man is present (otherwise the trouble is much greater) he holds the animal's head, whilst ...
— The Voyage of the Beagle • Charles Darwin
... in which the short locks are wound is a good method for the girl who singes her top-knot every time she tries to curl a few little tendrils. Kid curlers are all right, providing the hair does not become entangled in the small ends, and so have to be torn when the hair is taken down. There is a certain secret in the hair-curling process which is too intangible for written description. ...
— The Woman Beautiful - or, The Art of Beauty Culture • Helen Follett Stevans
... once I uttered a cry of astonishment, for a long line of undulating creamy white seemed to dart at my fish, seize it with a jerk, and twist itself round it, till fish and the eel-like creature that attacked it resembled a knot. ...
— Nat the Naturalist - A Boy's Adventures in the Eastern Seas • G. Manville Fenn
... tokonoma—that portion of the Japanese room which is raised a few inches above the rest of the floor, and which is regarded as the place of honour—his reverence took his seat at the table, and adjusted his robes; then, tying up the muscles of his face into a knot, expressive of utter abstraction, he struck the bell upon the table thrice, burnt a little incense, and read a passage from the sacred book, which he reverently lifted to his head. The congregation joined in chorus, devout but unintelligent; ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... a very clear vision of her rush downhill past our labouring ascendant car—my colours fluttered from handle-bar and shoulder-knot—and her waving hand and the sharp note of her voice. She cried out something, I ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... most unimpressionable visitor could not fail to observe when the tall figure rose from behind the counter,—fascinating by reason of the beautiful hair, escaping in soft tendrils from the confining knot; fascinating still more by reason of the perfect grace of poise. The face was somewhat sallow and very thin; care and privation had left their marks upon it. The mouth was finely modelled, shrewd and humorous; but it was the eyes, dark, and darkly fringed as those of a ...
— Peak and Prairie - From a Colorado Sketch-book • Anna Fuller
... very sad, pathetic, and patriotic song called "Tender and True" by a composer, Alfred Pease, which I sing. Strakosch said, "You must have in your repertoire something American." This song is about a young soldier who takes "a knot of ribbon blue" from his ladylove, and who dies on the battle-field with the knot of ribbon on his breast. When I sing "the flag draped over the coffin lid" the whole audience is dissolved in tears. The women weep openly; the men hide behind their opera-glasses ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone
... of a sailor to know that no boat captain ever tied such a knot as could easily come loose. And yet this is what seemed to have happened. For when Bunny and Sue ran to the side of the Fairy to look over, they saw, trailing in the water, the long rope, or cable, by which the boat had been made fast to the dock. As Bunny had said, it had ...
— Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue at Christmas Tree Cove • Laura Lee Hope
... rope, the center knot first on one side of the line and then on the other. For several minutes it looked as if Dale's team might win. But then the tide turned again, and with a strength that was surprising, Pepper's team gave "a long pull, a strong pull, and a pull all together," and brought the center knot ...
— The Mystery at Putnam Hall - The School Chums' Strange Discovery • Arthur M. Winfield
... the truth, no doubt, but it is not all," said the sham lawyer, sniffing up his pinch of snuff. "You have had a finger in the Baron de Nucingen's love affairs, and you wish, no doubt, to entangle him in some slip-knot. You missed fire with the pistol, and you are aiming at him with a field-piece. Madame du Val-Noble is a ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... Bill's over to Pine Knot layin' in tobacker, an' nose- paint an' corn meal, an' sech necessaries, when Olson stands in to down Bill's pet. He goes injunnin' over to Bill's an' finds the camp all deserted, except the raccoon's thar, settin', ...
— Wolfville • Alfred Henry Lewis
... overspread the heavens in a pall that became ever more black and threatening. For a few days yet it seemed that perhaps even now the cataclysm might be averted, but gradually, in spite of all the efforts of diplomacy to loosen the knot, it became clear that the ends of the cord were held in hands that did not mean to release their hold till it was pulled tight. Servia yielded to such demands as it was possible for her to grant as an independent State; but the inflexible fingers never abated one jot of their strangling ...
— Michael • E. F. Benson
... Hawkhurst, let her come to and about; man the long gun, and see that every shot is pitched into her, while the rest of them get up a new foretopmast, and knot and splice the rigging.' ...
— The Pirate and The Three Cutters • Frederick Marryat
... At Milan, having discarded the weight of other cares, the emperor took into his consideration that most difficult gordian knot, how by a mighty effort to uproot the Caesar. And while he was deliberating on this matter with his friends in secret conference by night, and considering what force, and what contrivances might be employed for the purpose, before Gallus in his audacity should more resolutely ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... may be to the philanthropist, of getting clear of one of the evils of slavery, yet a full examination of local circumstances, must convince us that this would be, to cut, rather than untie the Gordian knot. ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 6, 1921 • Various
... in his night-shirt, and I must write it. Besides, my pen is tearing on. I cannot stop—he is dying. Will he speak before he dies? I do not know yet. His eyelids quiver, the black veins in his throat knot up, he gasps. I bend lower: 'his breath comes hurriedly: his eyes open and fix upon me: they are red, vitreous but conscious: then I know he will speak, he is going to—the next moment his half-strangled voice reaches my ear. He is ...
— To-morrow? • Victoria Cross
... Caleb Whitefoord, seeing a lady knotting fringe for a petticoat, asked her, what she was doing? "Knotting, Sir," replied she; "pray Mr. Whitefoord, can you knot?" He answered, "I can-not." ...
— The Book of Anecdotes and Budget of Fun; • Various
... both leaves wide—like all the Redford doors, they were never locked or barred—and drifting over the verandah, sat down on the edge of it, with her feet on the gravel. She had tossed off her pearl necklace and a breast-knot of wilted roses; otherwise, she sat in full evening dress, and the night air bathed her bare neck and arms. Also the mosquitoes found them—a delicious morsel!—so that she had to turn her lacy skirt ...
— Sisters • Ada Cambridge
... or overseer on a plantation seldom interfered in the domestic arrangements of the slaves. Their religious and moral instruction was neglected. The marriage tie was not regarded as an indissoluble knot, but as a slender thread, to be broken by either party at will. It is therefore not remarkable that the habits and conduct of these children of bondage were not of the most exemplary character. Each family, ...
— Jack in the Forecastle • John Sherburne Sleeper
... to intercept them. Firearms spat and bellowed luridly. In a close-knit, flame-spitting group, the knot of men raced over fallen bodies and hurtled areas where the pavement had cooled to no more than a dull-red heat where a thermit shell had struck. One man, two, three men fell under the small-arms fire. The gangsters went racing on, firing desperately. They dived into ...
— The Fifth-Dimension Tube • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... it their Interest to do so and so, that they might consider in Time what they had to do, and the like: When he talk'd with any of the Whig Lords, for there was a Squadron of them left, that had a great sway yet in the Country, then he would talk of him, and Party and Queen, as one Knot, in the plural Number, most haughtily, thus: We are resolved to do so and so, and we must have none but ...
— Atalantis Major • Daniel Defoe
... the scientists as to the make-up of the material universe deepened and widened wondrously. I sat often among the crowd of students in Kirchoff's lecture-room, watching the play of his delicate features as he unravelled mysteries which till he showed the way were a mere hopeless knot. Near him as he spoke, on a table were the wand, the rings, the vials, above all a spectroscope with its prisms, the apparatus with which the magician solved the universe. Once, as I stood near him, he indicated in a polite sentence, with a gesture toward the table, that I was free to ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer
... disposed to card-playing, he could not have indulged himself at Trimmerstone, for Mr. Sprout had banished almost all card-playing from the place, so that there was not a pack of cards in the parish, except two or three mutilated well-thumbed packs of quadrille-cards, which were still used by a knot of antiquated spinsters worthy of the good old days of Sacheverel and High Church. Quadrille-cards will not do for whist, for all the eights, nines, and tens are thrown out. Formerly, Lord Trimmerstone used to be proud of giving some of his ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 360 - Vol. XIII. No. 360, Saturday, March 14, 1829 • Various
... drop down on his steady eye. The centre of the rungs is the pathway of his glance, and he stands on top. No heaven exists for him, no earth, nothing but the broach-post and the ladder which he ties together with his rope. The knot is made; the spectators breathe with relief and give utterance in all the streets to their admiration for the daring man and his doings high up between heaven and earth. For a week the children of the ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various
... had passed while Brion made these discoveries. The knot of men still looked at him, silent and unmoving. They weren't expectant, their attitude could not have been called one of interest. But he had come to them and now they waited to find out why. Any questions or statements they ...
— Planet of the Damned • Harry Harrison
... wearing a long blue robe, flung on as if with desperate haste; her thick hair fell crazily out of a careless knot, down her back. "I couldn't sleep," she said, with quivering lips, at the sight of which Mrs. Bowen's involuntary smile hardened. "Isn't it eleven yet?" she added, with a glance at the clock. "It seems years since ...
— Indian Summer • William D. Howells
... she retorted, and with her sharp white teeth she again bit the black thread of her needle, tied the end into a little knot, and began to mend the waistcoat which she had laid down in the ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... wipe away thy tears, and show thy father A cheerful countenance. See, the tie-knot here Is off; this hair must not hang so dishevelled. Come, dearest! dry thy tears up. They deform Thy gentle eye. Well, now—what was I saying? Yes, in good truth, this Piccolomini Is a most ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... Saint-Simon tells us of him is true, it is not to be supposed that he gave himself much trouble concerning them. This does not make it the less astonishing that in the midst of a great and disastrous war a minister of State should be expected to waste time on matters worthy of a knot of old gossips babbling round a tea-table. That pompous spectre which calls itself the Dignity of History would scorn to take note of them; yet they are highly instructive, for the morbid anatomy of this little ...
— A Half Century of Conflict - Volume I - France and England in North America • Francis Parkman
... may enable them to instruct at LOW PRICES"—showing that the intention here was to assist education, and not provide it altogether gratuitously. I think that provision for public education is enjoined in the constitutions of all the States admitted into the Union since the first Federal knot was tied except in that of Illinois. Vermont was the first so admitted, in 1791; and Vermont declares that "a competent number of schools ought to be maintained in each town for the convenient instruction of youth." Ohio was the second, in 1802; ...
— Volume 1 • Anthony Trollope
... hurried out again, and Alicia returned to the sofa. The knot of her troubles had been rudely cut. Perhaps this summary ending was best. She herself would not, she knew, have had the strength to tear herself away from that place, but if fate tore her—perhaps well ...
— Half a Hero - A Novel • Anthony Hope
... that was what Benny said. Well, as I was saying, I hope you'll excuse this apron." Her fingers were fumbling with the knot at the back. "I take it off, mostly, when the bell rings, evenings or afternoons; but I heard Benny, and I didn't suppose 't was anybody but him. There, that's better!" With a jerk she switched off the dark blue ...
— Oh, Money! Money! • Eleanor Hodgman Porter
... from four to six revolutions of the vessel on its axis for the small arteries, and from eight to twelve for the large ones. The hemorrhage instantly stops. The vessel which had been drawn out is then replaced, as the surrounding parts give support to the knot which has been formed at its extremities. The knot becomes further concealed by the retraction of the artery, and this retraction will be proportionate to the shortening which takes place by the effect of the twisting, so that it will be scarcely visible ...
— The Dog - A nineteenth-century dog-lovers' manual, - a combination of the essential and the esoteric. • William Youatt
... The knot of mer-warriors stirred. Several spears thudded butt down into the sand. And Sssuri accepted that as an invitation to descend, summoning Dalgard after ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton
... piper's son, He learned to play when he was young, And all the tune that he could play Was "Over the hills and far away." Over the hills, and a great way off, The wind will blow my top-knot off. ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf; a Practical Plan of Character Building, Volume I (of 17) - Fun and Thought for Little Folk • Various
... I could see where that dear little black chamois horn came from! But Mother Bunch can't tell me about that I'm afraid, for she always went by sea, and here's the Tyrol without one bit of sea near it. It's just one of the strings to the great knot of mountains that tie Europe up in the middle. Oh! what ...
— Little Lucy's Wonderful Globe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... be an abbess, perhaps you will consent to follow this young Zingaro, and to co-operate with him and us. I am a priest, madam, and can join you both in an instant, connubio stabili, as I suppose the knot has not been ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... open-mouthed astonishment, Hay had been helped by the appointment of Michael Herbert as his successor, who counted for double the value of an ordinary diplomat. To reduce friction is the chief use of friendship, and in politics the loss by friction is outrageous. To Herbert and his wife, the small knot of houses that seemed to give a vague unity to foreign affairs opened their doors and their hearts, for the Herberts were already at home there; and this personal sympathy prolonged Hay's life, for it not only eased the effort of endurance, but it also led directly ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams
... wily foe With stratagem of wasteful war; no rage Of heat intemperate, or of winter's cold; But spring, full blown, with peace and concord reigns: Prime bliss of heart and season, fitliest join'd! Flowers fail not there: the lily and the rose, With many a knot of fragrant violets bound; And, loftier, clustering down the bended boughs, Blossom with fruit ...
— Tales of the Enchanted Islands of the Atlantic • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... see his master and to assure himself that the clump on the head was not intended as a sign of serious displeasure. Hawker took the dog's long ears and tried to tie them into a knot. ...
— The Third Violet • Stephen Crane
... of God, there is a time for all things; a time when the sword may cut the Gordian knot, and set free the principles of right and justice, bound up in the meshes of hatred, revenge, and tyranny, that the pens of mighty men like Clay, Webster, Crittenden, and Lincoln ...
— The Americanization of Edward Bok - The Autobiography of a Dutch Boy Fifty Years After • Edward William Bok
... whisper. "He won't last but a day or two. There's another man buried yesterday that was struck by lightnin', comin' acrost a field when that great shower begun. The lightnin' stove through his hat and run down all over him, and ploughed a spot in the ground." There was a knot of people about the door; the minister of that scattered parish stood among them, and they all looked at us eagerly, as if we too might be carrying news of a fresh disaster ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... paper-bag, he lighted it and puffed out clouds of bluish smoke into the clear air of the hot May morning. Then he looked at the position of the sun and verified the fact that his nickel watch had stopped again. The shaky little house hung like a chance knot in an endless wire in the middle of the glittering double row of rails that stretched from east to west across the flowery prairie. It looked like a ridiculous freak in the midst of the wide desert, for nowhere, so far as the eye could reach, was it possible to discover ...
— Banzai! • Ferdinand Heinrich Grautoff
... honourable departure. Wherefore, then, shall we longer mourn for Arcite?" This is the copious preamble. The conclusion is more briefly dispatched. Emelie must accept the hand of her faithful servant Palamon. He wants no persuasion; and the knot of matrimony happily ties up at last their destinies, wishes, and expectations, which the Tale in its ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 57, No. 356, June, 1845 • Various
... perhaps you can advise me. Now as you look at me—" The young man's eyes burned into hers so that with all her audacity Nora felt the colour rising in her face. "Which would you suggest as the most suitable style for me, the psyche knot ...
— The Major • Ralph Connor
... Philippe, deeply as the King himself was disliked and despised, narrow as was the electorate, unpopular as was the Ministry, was the act of a small minority. The Republic was imposed upon France by a knot of reckless journalists and semi-communistic dreamers, backed by the dreaded populace of Paris, against the will of the peasantry who formed four-fifths of the voters, and of the educated or semi-educated ...
— The Quarterly Review, Volume 162, No. 324, April, 1886 • Various
... knowed it!" a voice at once fond and threatening called to Reverdy's quailing figure. The owner of the voice was a young woman unkempt as to the pale hair which escaped from the knot at her neck, and stuck out there and dangled about her face in spite of the attempts made to gather it under the control of the high horn comb holding its main strands together. The lankness of her long figure showed in ...
— The Leatherwood God • William Dean Howells
... pensions had given him access to the king, and "by his witty demeanour he grew continually in the King's favour." But the favour had been won by more than "witty demeanour." In a private interview with Henry Cromwell boldly advised him to cut the knot of the divorce by the simple exercise of his own supremacy. The advice struck the key-note of the later policy by which the daring counsellor was to change the whole face of Church and State; but Henry still ...
— History of the English People, Volume III (of 8) - The Parliament, 1399-1461; The Monarchy 1461-1540 • John Richard Green
... eyed rattlesnake that lay All loathsome, yellow-skinned, and slept, Coil'd tight as pine-knot, in the sun With flat head through the center ...
— The California Birthday Book • Various
... had passed, and the Lord had not appeared. The believers knew that God's word could not fail; their interpretation of the prophecy must be at fault; but where was the mistake? Many rashly cut the knot of difficulty by denying that the 2300 days ended in 1844. No reason could be given for this, except that Christ had not come at the time they expected Him. They argued that if the prophetic days had ended in 1844, Christ would then have returned to cleanse the sanctuary by the purification ...
— The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan • Ellen G. White
... hotel, Rose and another girl had just come up from the rink together. A little knot of people were gathered on the verandah. Dinah and Billy kept behind Rose and her companion; but in a moment ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... already, and from every one, from the fine lady on her throne to the red-coat on his cock-horse and the school-boy on his forrum (as our Irish brethren call it), I have heard but one word, and that is, that it is the jolliest book they ever read. Among a knot of red-coats at the cover-side, some very fast fellow said, 'If I had had such a book in my boyhood, I should have been a better man now!' and more than one capped his sentiment frankly. Now isn't it a comfort to your ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury
... another inspection and then staked to the ground with a strong rope, fastened by a slip knot. Then the engine was started up and the ...
— The Rover Boys in the Air - From College Campus to the Clouds • Edward Stratemeyer
... this game seat yourselves in a circle, take a clean duster or handkerchief, and tie it in a big knot, so that it may easily be thrown from one player to another. One of the players throws it to another, at the same time calling out either of these names: Earth, Air, Fire, or Water. If "Earth" is called, ...
— Games For All Occasions • Mary E. Blain
... in an untidy knot, slipped from the hairpins, and fell, grey and scanty, over her neck; her bony shoulders, barely covered by ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone
... knot of a difficulty by the intervention of such a Power, shows but little ingenuity, ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... Is a phenomenon in our notions beyond the power of man? Then we instantly say—'Tis the handiwork of a God. Nothing short of that can content our vanity. Why can we not contrive to throw into our talk less pride and more philosophy? If nature offers us some knot that is hard to untie, let us leave it for what it is; do not let us employ for cutting it the hand of a Being, who then immediately becomes in turn a new knot for us, and a knot harder to untie than the first. An ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists (Vol 1 of 2) • John Morley
... It is substantial, reasonable, moral, acting according to law, temperate in all things, keeping the heart from extremes, permanent, and based upon principle. Passion, without love, may keep you in a state of pleasurable intoxication until the knot is tied, when you will soon get sober again, only to see, however, your folly and to contemplate the height from which you have fallen, and then, with the recklessness of sullen despair, to pass over into the opposite extreme of stoical indifference and misery. All emotions ...
— The Christian Home • Samuel Philips
... generally well made and tall: they wear for their entire clothing what they call a maro; it is a piece of figured or white tapa, two yards long and a foot wide, which they pass round the loins and between the legs, tying the ends in a knot over the left hip. At first sight I thought they were painted red, but soon perceived that it was the natural color of their skin. The women wear a petticoat of the same stuff as the maro, ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast of America in the years 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814 or the First American Settlement on the Pacific • Gabriel Franchere
... be linked together with a soft rope; the same precaution should be taken when the trail is very rough, steep, and rocky. The camper at the head of the line should tie the rope in a bow-line around her waist, with knot on left side, and eight or ten feet from her the next girl should link herself to the rope in the same manner; then another girl, and another, until the entire ...
— On the Trail - An Outdoor Book for Girls • Lina Beard and Adelia Belle Beard
... see now thy mind tied up, from thought to thought, within a knot the loosing of which is awaited with great desire, Thou sayest, 'I discern clearly that which I bear; but it is occult to we why God should will only this mode for our redemption.' This decree, brother, stands buried to the eyes of every ...
— The Divine Comedy, Volume 3, Paradise [Paradiso] • Dante Alighieri
... Shann had. And as he worked at the stretching of his snare, the Terran's heart pounded, and he tensed at every sound out of the night. Having tested all the anchoring of his net, he tugged at a last knot, and then crouched to listen not only with his ears, but with all his strength ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... marriage state without its peculiar defenders. Five deities were esteemed so necessary, that no marriages were solemnized without asking their favours; these were Jupiter-Perfectus, or the Adult, Juno, Venus, Suadela,[61] and Diana. Jugatinus tied the nuptial knot; Domiducus ushered the bride home; Domitius took care to keep her there, and prevent her gadding abroad; Maturna preserved the conjugal union entire; Virginensis[62] loosed the bridle zone or girdle; Viriplaca was a propitious goddess, ready to reconcile the married ...
— Thaumaturgia • An Oxonian
... that in a dispute between him and his wife, Parvati, alias Kali, she cursed the person that should thenceforward dare to drink of the water that flowed over his images on earth. The river Ganges is supposed to flow from the top- knot of Siva's head, and no one would drink of it after this curse, were it not that the sacred stream is supposed to come first from the heel of Vishnu, the Preserver. All the little images of Siva, that are made out of stones taken from the bed of the Nerbudda river, are supposed to ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman |
