"Nimble" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... that the Yankees meant them any harm. But unmitigated fear filled the breasts of the secessionists. There had been loud boasts of what they would do; but when the red trowsers approached, their bravery all ran down into their nimble feet. The battery of several large guns which they had planted, and which might have done great mischief to the Union troops, had they been bravely manned, was drawn off. In their confusion, the bridge was first fired, and then the fire ...
— Mary S. Peake - The Colored Teacher at Fortress Monroe • Lewis C. Lockwood
... glad, my friend, thy nimble pen has got so far upon its journey. What remains of my story may be despatched in a trice. I have just now some vacant hours, which might possibly be more usefully employed, but not in an easier manner or more pleasant. So, let me carry on ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown
... King had vanished before we touched the ground. But, the word was already passing from hut to hut to turn out quietly, and we knew that the nimble barbarian had got hold of the truth, ...
— The Perils of Certain English Prisoners • Charles Dickens
... pleasant creed, Jane and Sarah spent the night together, and this time there was no sprightly talk of Michael Daragh or Rodney Harrison and no pungent comparisons of them and their feelings for her; she was not talking now, the nimble-tongued Miss Vail, but the friend of her youth looked long at her glowing face, her deeply joyful eyes, and wondered, and sighed a little, and went back to talk of her most brilliant pupils and the worrying way her mother had of taking ...
— Jane Journeys On • Ruth Comfort Mitchell
... way as a seamstress, in the Gorbals of Glasgow, while her brother was making the fortune in India, and she was a clever needle-woman— none better, as it was said; and she, having some things to make, took Kate Malcolm to help her in the coarse work; and Kate, being a nimble and birky thing, was so useful to the lady, and the complaining man the major, that they invited her to stay with them at the Breadland for the winter, where, although she was holden to her seam from morning to night, her food ...
— The Annals of the Parish • John Galt
... words of Shibli Bagarag they arose quickly and clapped their hands, and danced with the nimble step of gladness, exclaiming, 'O our King! pleasant will be the time with him!' And one smoothed his head and poured oil upon it; one brought him garments of gold and silk inwoven; one fetched him slippers like the sun's beam in ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... "He was as nimble as a cat, and it seemed to me that he was twice as quick. But all he needed to unearth my scheme was a single glance at the gun and its crew on the quarter-deck. In the twinkling of an eye he dropped to the deck, called his ...
— A Victorious Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... calm, hugging his darling thought, full of Jehane, fearful to share her. Often he remembered it in later life; it held a place and commanded a mood which no hour of his wildest possession could outvie. The mountain air, still, but latently nimble, the great mountains themselves dreaming in the sunlight, the sailing birds, hinted a peace to his soul whither his last conquest of his baser part assured him he might soar. Now he could guess (thought he) that quality in love which it borrows from God and shares with the ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett
... and one thermometer. They were placed in a well-protected corner, farthest from the stove. We had no house as yet for our outside instruments, but the sub-director went to work to prepare one as quickly as possible, and so nimble were his hands that when the depot party returned there was the finest instrument-screen standing ready on the hill, painted white so that it shone a long way off: The wind-vane was a work of art, constructed ...
— The South Pole, Volumes 1 and 2 • Roald Amundsen
... of sport, age's breath is short; Youth is nimble, age is lame; Youth is hot and bold, age is weak and cold; Youth is wild, and ...
— The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought • Alexander F. Chamberlain
... in historic proof of instances of such lightning flashes of mind. To Lambert, then, Will and Thought were living forces; and he spoke of them in such a way as to impress his belief on the hearer. To him these two forces were, in a way, visible, tangible. Thought was slow or alert, heavy or nimble, light or dark; he ascribed to it all the attributes of an active agent, and thought of it as rising, resting, waking, expanding, growing old, shrinking, becoming atrophied, or resuscitating; he described its life, and specified all its actions by the strangest words ...
— Louis Lambert • Honore de Balzac
... and the woman that married either of them would not lean on a reed that would break and pierce her to the quick; and Captain Horton was also a strong man, although he had certainly been a very bad one. But this man, in spite of his nimble brains and eloquent tongue, was weak and unstable, hopelessly—fatally. The suffering and the poverty which had come to these two, which in the wife's case only made the innate virtue of her spirit to shine forth with starlike lustre, would make and could ...
— Fan • Henry Harford
... before the open fire. They were cordial and made me feel at home at once, marveling over my making the trip alone, and praising my pluck. I was much too weary and hungry to protest, even though I had been becomingly modest. Seeing this, they filled my plate and let me be, turning their nimble tongues on our host—What handsome whiskers—la! la! He'd better be careful with those hirsute adornments and a cabin with a plank floor! He couldn't hope to remain a bachelor long! ...
— A Mountain Boyhood • Joe Mills
... for Life; The boy I was that always older grew Destined to tread upon a path untrod Amidst the light, illumined. I was he Whose brow like an Olympian victor's shone And like the man's who tamed Bucephalus. I was the nimble dolphin with gold wings, Arion's ...
— Life Immovable - First Part • Kostes Palamas
... floating above. The gently sloping hills lend variety to the scene, stretching in undulations of soft and rich verdure; luxuriant meadow and cultivated fields lie in alternate range. The sons of toil are returning from labour; the birds have sought shelter in their nests; the nimble squirrel hides beneath the leafy boughs, or finds refuge in the sheltering grass, until the next day's wants shall urge a repeated attack upon the goodly spoils of harvest. Soon the golden sheen is departing, casting backward glances upon the hill tops with studied coyness, ...
— Lady Rosamond's Secret - A Romance of Fredericton • Rebecca Agatha Armour
... who is provided with these charms believes that he will be as hard to hold as the ox and the frog. Again, it seems plain that a South African warrior who twists tufts of rat's hair among his own curly black locks will have just as many chances of avoiding the enemy's spear as the nimble rat has of avoiding things thrown at it; hence in these regions rats' hair is in great demand when war is expected. One of the ancient books of India prescribes that when a sacrifice is offered for victory, ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... great pile of greens, and would have set me at once to work in tying them to long ropes. But I begged them to permit me first to pay my respects to the rest of my friends; for over in a dark corner I had seen Pelagie at work, with two or three young men around her, supplying her with greens for her nimble fingers to weave into garlands, and she had not come with the others to greet me. I thought at least that little courtesy was due me, for, whether she liked or resented my rescuing her, I had risked much ...
— The Rose of Old St. Louis • Mary Dillon
... went Fandy with nimble dignity through the hall; then soberly, but still lightly, up the stairs to the landing at the first turn; then rapidly and somewhat noisily across the great square hall on the second story, to the door of the enclosed stair-way, and, finally, with ...
— Donald and Dorothy • Mary Mapes Dodge
... her justice; Miss Jillgall is as nimble as a monkey—and (Faugh!) she kissed me for the second time. If I had been a man, I am afraid I should have called for that deadly poison (we are all temperance people in this house) known by the name ...
— The Legacy of Cain • Wilkie Collins
... my elder by three years and born to possessions. It may seem indeed that I was somewhat hasty to fall into this state, seeing that at the time of which I write I was not yet of age; but young blood is nimble, and moreover mine was half Spanish, and made a man of me when many a pure-bred Englishman is still nothing but a boy. For the blood and the sun that ripens it have much to do with such matters, as I have seen often enough ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard
... amongst women and decrepit old men, and even these were strictly commanded never to tell the boy aught of the great world beyond the forest, or what men did therein. None the less, he grew up active and fearless, as nimble and sure-footed as the goats, and patient ...
— Stories from Le Morte D'Arthur and the Mabinogion • Beatrice Clay
... nimble for him. Striking out his foot, he knocked half a dozen teeth down the janizary's throat; and, seconding the kick with a blow on the head from the butt-end of the pistol, stretched him, senseless and bleeding ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... He, flesh of His flesh, and bone of His bone; and if thou perish utterly, it is that He has perished utterly, too: for thou art He. Hope, therefore, most, and cheeriest smile, at the very apsis and black nadir of Despair: for He is nimble as a weasel, and He twists like Proteus, and His solstices and equinoxes, His tropics and turning-points and recurrences are innate in Being, and when He falls He falls like harlequin and shuttlecocks, shivering plumb ...
— The Purple Cloud • M.P. Shiel
... children playing on the beach. These took the alarm immediately, and ran away on seeing our armed men. In an instant the whole place was in confusion, and happy were they who could escape, the town being left destitute, and they were too nimble to be overtaken. Our party ransacked Payta, but found it as poor as our prisoners reported; so that they only found a few bales of coarse cloth, about five hundred-weight of dried dog-fish, two or three pedlars ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr
... Unmistakable bleatings issue from the fold, and five or six common fellows are sitting round the blazing wood. One might fancy they had stepped straight from the church floor to the stage, so natural do they look. Besides, they call themselves by common names—Colin, and Tom Lie-a-bed, and nimble Dick. Many a round laugh wakes echoes in the church when these shepherds stand up, and hold debate about a stolen sheep. Tom Lie-a-bed has nothing to remark but that he is very sleepy, and does not want ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... unreasonable, Master Seadrift. A wise merchant will always look to the state of the market, and one so practised should know that a nimble sixpence multiplies faster than a slow-moving shilling. 'Tis the constant rolling of the ball that causes the snow to cleave! Goods that come light should not go heavy, and quick settlements follow sudden bargains. Thou knowest our York saying, that ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... said John, "when you were an infant-in-arms, nay, before you existed at all, it was my custom to ramble o'er the dewy meads, plucking the nimble Nipplewort and the shy Speedwell. I breakfasted ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, April 14, 1920 • Various
... baby!" she yelled, and took to her nimble heels at a rate that made it impossible for the fleetest of her fellow fugitives ...
— When Grandmamma Was New - The Story of a Virginia Childhood • Marion Harland
... window-sash; and instantly there run out on the sill two or three minute lizards of a new kind, allied to the gecko, the common palette-tip (Sphoeriodactylus argus.) It is scarcely more than two inches long, more nimble than fleet in its ...
— Chambers' Edinburgh Journal, No. 421, New Series, Jan. 24, 1852 • Various
... Cook's Court, Cursitor Street. From suspicion to jealousy, Mrs. Snagsby finds the road as natural and short as from Cook's Court to Chancery Lane. And thus jealousy gets into Cook's Court, Cursitor Street. Once there (and it was always lurking thereabout), it is very active and nimble in Mrs. Snagsby's breast, prompting her to nocturnal examinations of Mr. Snagsby's pockets; to secret perusals of Mr. Snagsby's letters; to private researches in the day book and ledger, till, cash-box, and ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... ever hurried him back from the green fields where the lark, singing as she ascended higher and higher into the air, and nearer to the heavens, excelled, as he says, in her simple piety "all those little nimble musicians of the air (her fellows) who warble forth their various ditties with which Nature has furnished them, to the shame of art." Refreshed and exhilarated by the pure country air, we can fancy Walton returning homeward to his Chancery ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... probable etymological connection that I can discover is with the Sanscrit [Sanskrit: car] car, to move, to advance; the root of the Greek [Greek: karrhon], in English car, Latin curro, French cours. So Sanscrit caras, carat, movable, nimble; Greek [Greek: chraon], Latin currens. And Sanscrit caras, motion, Greek [Greek: choros], Latin currus, cursus, French char, English car, cart, &c. The early Russians were doubtless wanderers, an off-shoot of the people known to the Greeks as Scythians, ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 201, September 3, 1853 • Various
... son, The nimble-footed madcap, Prince of Wales, And his comrades, that daft the world aside ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... his helpers how the pretty scarlet balls were to be bunched, and found that Sister took hold of the work with nimble fingers, while Mr. Camp did very well ...
— Hiram The Young Farmer • Burbank L. Todd
... cut a hole about two feet square in the floor near the northeast corner of the upper room. A nicely fitting trapdoor completed the arrangement. Through this hole, helped by a rude rope ladder of strips of rags, and hoisted to the shoulders of a tall man by strong arms from below, a nimble officer could quickly ascend. Now those in the lower room were counted first. When they broke ranks, and the human automaton faced to the west and moved slowly towards the stairs with three or four "Yanks" clustering at his ...
— Lights and Shadows in Confederate Prisons - A Personal Experience, 1864-5 • Homer B. Sprague
... brood; Pleas'd from his lair on Othrys' rugged brow The lion seeks the vale below: Whilst to the lyre's melodious sound The dappled hinds in sportive measures bound; And as the vocal echo rings, Lightly their nimble feet they ply, Leaving their pine-clad forests high, Charm'd by the sweet ...
— Story of Orestes - A Condensation of the Trilogy • Richard G. Moulton
... in himself; biding his time. He held the men who understood the subject breathless with interest. There it was! the famous "staying power" that was to endure in the last terrible half-mile of the race, when the nimble and jaunty Fleetwood was run off his legs. Whispers had been spread abroad hinting at something which had gone wrong with Delamayn in his training. And now that all eyes could judge him, his appearance suggested criticism in some quarters. It was exactly the opposite of the criticism passed on ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... of the flying, and fierce Tops of the sharp-headed spear, Hard by the thickets that pierce, Lo! they are nimble and near. ...
— The Poems of Henry Kendall • Henry Kendall
... took place between the captain of the privateer and his lieutenant and a sailor, who seemed to be the mate of the vessel; then the mate gave a whistle, and the men jumped on board the Saint-Ferdinand, and completely dismantled her with the nimble dexterity of a soldier who strips a dead comrade of a ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Honore de Balzac
... which London holds almost any type of man can be found, if one looks long enough. The one which Gualtier wished is a common kind there, and he did not have a long search. A street boy, sharp, quick-witted, nimble, cunning—hat was what he wanted, and that was what he found, after regarding many different specimens of that tribe and rejecting them. The boy whom he selected was somewhat less ragged than his companions, with a demure face, which, however, ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... away oftener than usual: gone to the house of the spoiler. Nor did she come home, as she had been wont to do, with radiant eyes, and a soft, sweet smile coming and going, and many a pleasant piece of news to tell off on her nimble fingers. She returned with tear-stained eyelids and a downcast air, and was often altogether silent as to the result ...
— Cobwebs and Cables • Hesba Stretton
... over dales he fled, As if the wind him on his wings had borne; Nor bank nor bush could stay him, when he sped His nimble feet, as treading still on thorn; Grief, and Despite, and Jealousy, and Scorn, Did all the way him follow hard behind; And he himself himself loath'd so forlorn, So shamefully forlorn of womankind, That, as a snake, still lurked in ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Vol. 2 • Leigh Hunt
... grew blurred, however, as he applied himself to Healey Hanson's raw but vigorous whisky. He blended with the Bunch. He began to rejoice that Carrie Nork and Pete, the most nearly intelligent of the nimble youths, seemed to like him; and it was enormously important to win over the surly older man, who proved to be a railway ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... some other Indians, especially the Women. They have a Custom to wear their Thumb-nails very long, especially that on their left Thumb, for they do never cut it but scrape it often. They are indued with good natural Wits, are ingenious, nimble, and active, when they are minded; but generally very lazy and thievish, and will not work except forced by Hunger. This laziness is natural to most Indians; but these People's lazinesz seems rather to proceed not so much from their natural Inclinations, as from the severity of their ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898—Volume 39 of 55 • Various
... not by any means nimble, he came to a pause about twenty feet from the entrance, and, making a sudden turn, darted out. The Doctor was tall and unaccustomed to bend his perpendicular form. Half choked and panting heavily he too gave up, and turning about rushed out ...
— The Dodge Club - or, Italy in 1859 • James De Mille
... and Tashtego, that to fill out the vacancies made by the previous repast, often the pale Dough-Boy was fain to bring on a great baron of salt-junk, seemingly quarried out of the solid ox. And if he were not lively about it, if he did not go with a nimble hop-skip-and-jump, then Tashtego had an ungentlemanly way of accelerating him by darting a fork at his back, harpoonwise. And once Daggoo, seized with a sudden humor, assisted Dough-Boy's memory by snatching him up bodily, and thrusting his head into a great empty wooden trencher, ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... forward. Like all short and stout mortals, he was nimble on his feet, and his mother's voluble outburst warned him of an unforeseen ...
— Cynthia's Chauffeur • Louis Tracy
... nimble groom had appeared from out o a shrubbery path and seized Pepper's head. Austen alighted and followed Victoria into a great, cool hallway, and through two darkened rooms, bewilderingly furnished and laden with the scent of flowers, into a narrow passage beyond. She led the way simply, not ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... towards themselves. The emissary was particularly instructed to observe if the strong passes on the road were defended, or if any preparations of a hostile character were to be discerned. This last intelligence he was to communicate to the general by means of two or three nimble-footed attendants, who were to accompany ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... some Amazonian Dames Contrive whereby to glorify their names. A ruff for Boston Neck of mud and turfe, Reaching from side to side, from surf to surf, Their nimble hands spin up like Christmas pyes, Their pastry by degrees on high doth rise ... The wheel at home counts in an holiday, Since while the mistress worketh it may play. A tribe of female hands, but manly hearts, Forsake ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday
... futile, there is nothing left to do but to talk—not only politics, but art, poetry, religion, in fact, everything under the sun. At the time, however, when Albrecht, the hero of "Without a Centre," plied his nimble tongue, the country had a more liberal Government, and criticism of the Ministry was not yet high treason. But centuries of repression and the practical exclusion of the bourgeoisie from public life were undoubtedly the fundamental ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... man without dread in his spirit? Is it the hunter who chases the nimble deer and on the road meets a lion which mocks at his arrows? Is it the warrior who goes forth to gain glory with toiling, and meets a forest of sharp lances and bronze swords which are thirsting for his life blood? Is it the great king who under his purple puts ...
— The Pharaoh and the Priest - An Historical Novel of Ancient Egypt • Boleslaw Prus
... swiftly thro' the Woods The nimble Deer to take, And with their Cries the Hills and Dales An Eccho shrill ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... the joint, so that the leg gave way and the gigantic brute almost fell upon its side. With a roar, it bit off the protruding half of the tough hickory, and then came on again, on three legs. From A-ya's nimble bow it got another arrow, which went half-way through its neck; but to this deadly wound, which sent the blood gushing from its mouth, it seemed to pay no heed whatever. A-ya's next shot missed; and then, ...
— In the Morning of Time • Charles G. D. Roberts
... are a military people—strong, nimble, and hardy, fond of adventure, irascible, brotherly, and generous—they have all the qualities that tempt men to war and make them good soldiers. Dazzled by their great fame on the Continent, and hearing of their insular wars chiefly through the interested lies of England, Voltaire expressed ...
— Thomas Davis, Selections from his Prose and Poetry • Thomas Davis
... Teutonic and Anglo-Saxon honesty, which is the best legacy of the Middle Ages to Christendom, asserted itself in the old strongholds of theological thought, the universities. Neither the powerful logic of Bishop Butler nor the nimble reasoning of Archdeacon Paley availed. Just as the line of astronomical thinkers from Copernicus to Newton had destroyed the old astronomy, in which the earth was the centre, and the Almighty sitting above the firmament the agent in moving the ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... had, at first, pretended to join in the pursuit of the nimble runaways, but only pretended. Then he suddenly perceived that they were growing breathless and had almost fallen beneath the feet of a mighty Norman horse. The man beneath his motley uniform rose to the ...
— Dorothy's House Party • Evelyn Raymond
... gave a great impulse to the construction of roads for military as well as civil purposes. The nimble Highlanders, without baggage or waggons, had been able to cross the border and penetrate almost to the centre of England before any definite knowledge of their proceedings had reached the rest of the kingdom. In the metropolis itself little information could be obtained of the ...
— The Life of Thomas Telford by Smiles • Samuel Smiles
... could not be done. He was sure that the unwieldy combined mass could be rendered powerless by his comparatively homogeneous and mobile fleet, inferior as it was, so long as he could keep it at sea and to the westward. The appreciation of the power of a nimble inferior fleet which he wrote at this time has already been given.[23] When the worst of the position was fully known, and the enemy was reported off the mouth of the Channel, he wrote another to Middleton. His ...
— Some Principles of Maritime Strategy • Julian Stafford Corbett
... Her constant out-of-door exercise had made her as nimble and active as a young fawn. She loved to be out and about, and her two hours of lessons with her mamma in the afternoon were a grievous penance ...
— Out on the Pampas - The Young Settlers • G. A. Henty
... intrigue and influence in India, Ceylon, Afghanistan, Aden, Persia, Egypt, East Africa, the Straits Settlements, and China, he was reminded of the men and women of Pompeii who ate, drank, and were merry, danced and sang, pursued pleasure and the nimble ...
— Driftwood Spars - The Stories of a Man, a Boy, a Woman, and Certain Other People Who - Strangely Met Upon the Sea of Life • Percival Christopher Wren
... the woodlands, and a sighing in the breeze, For the Little Folk are busy in the bushes and the trees; They are packing up their treasures, every one with nimble hand, Ready for the coming journey back to ...
— The Verse-Book Of A Homely Woman • Elizabeth Rebecca Ward, AKA Fay Inchfawn
... lightning marks of passions, moody and suspicious, devil-ridden and lonely, doubting his truest friends, and even his son, striking blindly in his fury at the gracious, sunny poet- warrior who shows so bright, so full of resource, so nimble, so generous, by contrast with the heavy strength of the moody giant, and ever escapes the javelin that quivers harmlessly in the wall, with an inevitable destiny hanging over his head, and at last creeping to 'wizards ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... for my case of pistolles, that have Greek and Latin bullets in them; let me cling to your flanks, my nimble Giberalters, and blow wind in your calves to make them swell bigger. Ha, I'll caper in mine own fee-simple; away with puntillioes and Orthography! I serve the good Duke of Norfolk. Bilbo, Titere tu, patulae ...
— The Merry Devil • William Shakespeare
... whirlwind or close to its track, and every now and then gusts came first larboard then starboard, and again bows on and stern on, with a force that snapped the rigging like pipe stems, and tore the canvass from the bolt ropes, notwithstanding the prompt orders and nimble efforts of the seamen, before it could be secured. Half an hour of this strange weather nearly stripped the ship of her standing rigging, leaving her comparatively a helpless wreck upon the waters, a mere log at the mercy of ...
— The Sea-Witch - or, The African Quadroon A Story of the Slave Coast • Maturin Murray
... of the remark, she ran up the path with Brian after her. He had a long chase of it, for Madge was nimble and better acquainted with the garden than he was but at last he caught her just as she was running up the steps into the house, and ...
— The Mystery of a Hansom Cab • Fergus Hume
... air is, so are the inhabitants, dull, heavy, witty, subtle, neat, cleanly, clownish, sick, and sound. In [3148]Perigord in France the air is subtle, healthful, seldom any plague or contagious disease, but hilly and barren: the men sound, nimble, and lusty; but in some parts of Guienne, full of moors and marshes, the people dull, heavy, and subject to many infirmities. Who sees not a great difference between Surrey, Sussex, and Romney Marsh, the wolds in Lincolnshire and the fens. He therefore that loves his health, if his ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... Age and Youth Cannot live together: Youth is full of pleasance, Age is full of care; Youth like summer morn, Age like winter weather; Youth like summer brave, Age like winter bare: Youth is full of sport, Age's breath is short, Youth is nimble, Age is lame: Youth is hot and bold, Age is weak and cold; Youth is wild, and Age is tame:— Age, I do abhor thee, Youth, I do adore thee; O! my Love, my Love is young! Age, I do defy thee— O, sweet shepherd, hie thee, For methinks thou ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... with his vitality. He seemed to have eyes all around his head. The man was in repose, but it was the repose of a leopard; at a sudden call, every fibre would evidently become tense, the servant of a nimble brain, and an instant pounce upon any opposition could be depended upon. What a pity, I found myself thinking, that the fellow has no longer a chance for his live energy (the war was then well over), and I had to check an incipient wish that a turmoil might arise ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer
... usual miscellaneous appendages of a butler's pantry. All was still and quiet; not a sound, save the loud ticking of a timepiece, or the occasional creak of a jarring door, disturbed the solemn silence of the house. A nimble-handed mugger or tramp might have ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... the house, and whereas no one could find him, we feared for a long time that he had done himself a mischief. Nevertheless he was alive and of good heart. He had passed the months in a various life; first as a crier to a wandering quack, and afterwards, inasmuch as he was a nimble and likely lad, he had waited on the guests at one of the best frequented inns at Wurzberg. It came then to pass that his eminence Cardinal Branda, Nuncio from his Holiness the Pope, took up his quarters there, and he carried the lad away with him as his body-servant to Italy, and ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... search of even that one little Row when the hour was up, and he hastened to the place appointed to meet his men-at-arms. He found that his experience had been theirs, and, in his disappointment and disgust, he said some harsh things about Yarmouth tongues, which he estimated as entirely too nimble. ...
— A Boy's Ride • Gulielma Zollinger
... swiftly through the woods The nimble deer to take, That with their cries the hills and dales An echo ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester
... footways, amidst the jostling of the street traffic, her nimble fingers were ever flowering though she gave them not a glance, but boldly scanned the shops and passers-by. Sometimes she would rest in a doorway for a moment; and alongside the gutters, greasy with kitchen ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola
... creature, she could not have dodged, and wound, and doubled, with more conscious cunning and dexterity; and it was quite amusing to hear the endearing way in which the people spoke to her, each time the nimble creature contrived to elude some more than usually threatening tongue of ice. Once or twice, in spite of all our exertions, it was impossible to save her from a collision; all that remained to be done, as soon as it became evident she could not clear some particular floe, or go ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... Liliputians, since many of their stores measured less than eighteen by thirty feet. They were occupied by a class of active men, who bought of importers and sold to country dealers on the principle of the nimble sixpence. Of this class (now about extinct) a few built up large concerns, while others, after hopelessly contending year after year with adverse fortune, sunk eventually into bankruptcy, and may in some instances now be found in the ranks of clerkship. From Cedar street, trade moved to Liberty, ...
— The Continental Monthly , Vol. 2 No. 5, November 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... pinching Master Dobson's bull's-eyes and gingerbread, and him mayor of the town, though he's got lots grander than that since, but they never pinched any marry-me-quick, not in Master Noll's time. But he's gone now, and I'm not as nimble as I used to be. Jesus help me, how he had used to fight! He used to put my heart in my mouth, coming in here all blood and muck to wash himself afore he went home. But take your things off and ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... charm, fills one with amazement at the amount of toil, ingenuity, patience, and downright love for the work the ancient needlewoman must have possessed. Not only pictures, however, were made in petit point. Many dainty little accessories of the toilet gave scope to the delicate fancy and nimble fingers of the ladies who had found solace from the cessation of their labours for the priesthood in making dainty little handbags and other pretty articles, each a marvel of minute handicraft. One bag in my possession measures only four inches square, and is worked ...
— Chats on Old Lace and Needlework • Emily Leigh Lowes
... leave, feeling that I was a liar, it is true, but I thought that my deception was not only pardonable, but, indeed, a commendable piece of fore-sight. I am free to say that a man, in order to protect his commercial interests, must be an easy and a nimble liar; and I do not hold that a man who permits himself to be cheated simply that he may snatch the chance to tell a truth—I say that I could not regard him a prudent husband or a wise father. Divide the last cent with a friend, harden not thy heart against the distressed, but ...
— The Jucklins - A Novel • Opie Read
... daughter, wrote to Washington that there were twenty-five hundred shirts, the result of nimble and patriotic fingers; and, she added, "we wish them to be worn with as much pleasure as they ...
— A Little Girl in Old Philadelphia • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... then it is plaited in and out, each article being made double, so that the shiny silvery surface may show on either side. Even baby children manipulate the birch bark, and one may pass a cluster of such small fry by the roadside, shoeless and stockingless, all busily plaiting baskets with their nimble little fingers. We ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... she objects to this renunciation and attempts to make an independent career suited to her talents, then she is strong- minded and is trying to unsex herself. With the world full of work waiting for her nimble fingers and loving heart, she is compelled to suppress all secret hope of doing something to impress her own character on that world, because her only duty is in the home. A man is also called upon to be a good husband and father, but that by no means ...
— Daybreak: A Romance of an Old World • James Cowan
... out of sight of her window, I speeded towards the hopeful place; but was soon forced to slacken my pace, by her odious voice: Hey-day, why so nimble, and whither so fast? said she: What! are you upon a wager? I stopt for her, till her pursy sides were waddled up to me; and she held by my arm, half out of breath: So I was forced to pass by the dear place, without daring to look ...
— Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded • Samuel Richardson
... Here, also, they lost sight of one another; for it was a part of the King's appointment, that each one must pass that dark part alone—it was called "the shadow of death." Gehulfe, I saw, walked through it easily; his feet were nimble and active, his lamp was bright, his golden vial ever in his hand, his staff firm to lean upon, and the book of light close before his eyes: he was still reading it aloud, and I heard him speak of his King as giving "songs in the night,"—and so, with a glad heart, he passed through the darkness. ...
— The Rocky Island - and Other Similitudes • Samuel Wilberforce
... Dot should look upon the scene that would haunt her, as it would haunt him, to her dying day. He meant to hold her back until he could take a look inside; but her nimble feet carried her ahead, and she was on the porch before ...
— The Story of Red Feather - A Tale of the American Frontier • Edward S. (Edward Sylvester) Ellis
... said he. "A bull is not nearly as dangerous as he looks, even when he's angry, if you are only quick on your feet and don't lose your head. These bullfighters are very clever and nimble. And the people, especially the Spanish ladies, think no end of them. A famous bullfighter (or matador, as they call them) is a more important man in Spain than a king—Here comes another crowd of them round the corner, look. See the girls throwing ...
— The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle • Hugh Lofting
... over those jewels, lady, and be nimble, too, or we'll tear 'em off you! Egg, you relieve the gent ...
— Jolly Sally Pendleton - The Wife Who Was Not a Wife • Laura Jean Libbey
... clear as daylight to himself, but to others, dark as fog. And the difficulty of original writing lies in this, that what is new and individual must find expression in old symbols. This difficulty can only be mastered by a peculiar talent, strengthened and rendered nimble by practice, and the commerce with original minds. Great writers should be our companions if we would learn to write greatly; but no familiarity with their manner will supply the place of native endowment. Writers are born, no less than poets, and like poets, they learn to make their native gifts ...
— The Principles of Success in Literature • George Henry Lewes
... darling Spaniards from the pernicious designs of private adventurers; he knew not but some of Elizabeth's heroes might unfortunately revive, and terrify, with an unexpected invasion, the remotest corners of the Spanish colonies, or appear before their ports with his nimble sloops, and bid defiance to their navies and their garrisons. When, therefore, a bill was introduced into this house, by which encouragement was given to the subjects of this kingdom to fit out privateers, and by which those who should conquer any of the colonies of the Spaniards, were confirmed ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson
... so This way the Chamois leapt: her nimble feet Have baffled me; my gains to-day will scarce Repay my break-neck travail.—What is here? Who seems not of my trade, and yet hath reached 60 A height which none even of our mountaineers, Save our best hunters, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron
... anxious "skip" fill the keen air. I like best, though, to think of the Glamis of my young days, when the ancient stone-built passages and halls, that have seen so many generations pass through them and disappear, rang with perpetual youthful laughter, or echoed beautifully finished part-singing; when nimble young feet twinkled, and kilts whirled to the skirl of the pipes under the vaulted roof of the nine-hundred-year-old crypt; when the whole place was vibrant with joyous young life, and the stately, grey-bearded owner of the historic castle, and of many broad acres in Strathmore besides, found ...
— The Days Before Yesterday • Lord Frederick Hamilton
... directly to me; it had been reminiscent before that, fired at the ceiling, at the hangings in his sumptuous studio, or the fire crackling oil the hearth), "fell in love with that tramp—a boy of twenty-two,'mind you—Ah! but what a rounder he was! Such a trim, well-knit figure; so light and nimble on his feet; such a pair of eyes in his head, leaking tears one minute and flashing hate the next. And his mouth! I tried, but I couldn't paint it—nobody could—so I did his profile; one of those curving, seductive mouths you sometimes see on a man, that quivers ...
— Fiddles - 1909 • F. Hopkinson Smith
... he could not help remembering Huldah's sweet outlines, the dimple in her chin, her kissable mouth, her delicate ear. Why, oh, why, had she inherited her father's temper and her mother's gift of prophecy, to say nothing of her grandfather's obstinacy and her grandmother's nimble tongue! All at once it dawned upon him that he might have jilted Huldah without marrying Jennie. It would, it is true, have been only a half revenge; but his appetite for revenge was so dulled by satisfaction he thought he could have been perfectly comfortable with half the quantity, even if Huldah ...
— Ladies-In-Waiting • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... tiny cat is cunning, The long, lean cat is fleet, The nimble one is made for fun, The fluff-ball one is sweet, The Persian pussy's splendid, The Maltese kitty, too, But the special kind I have in mind Is best of all the crew. He's not too quick and frisky, Nor is he slow and ...
— Zodiac Town - The Rhymes of Amos and Ann • Nancy Byrd Turner
... already a hundred windles were turning, loaded with flax, girls and youths, with nimble fingers, were winding thread as fine ...
— Barn and the Pyrenees - A Legendary Tour to the Country of Henri Quatre • Louisa Stuart Costello
... That ever shone; and the most radiant hair, With which nor gold nor sunbeam could compare; The sweetest accent, and a smile all grace; Hands, arms, that would e'en motionless abase Those who to Love the most rebellious were; Fine, nimble feet; a form that would appear Like that of her who first did Eden trace; These fann'd life's spark: now heaven, and all its choir Of angel hosts those kindred charms admire; While lone and darkling I on earth remain. Yet is not comfort fled; she, who can read Each ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch
... keys of closets, sideboards, and store-rooms—the keys Aunt Rachel could distinguish from one another, and all others in the world, in the darkest night, without any labels whatever; which had grown smooth and bright by many years' friction of her nimble fingers. "But Mr. Aylett wishes me to assume the real, as well as nominal, government of the establishment"—Mrs. Aylett was fond of the polysyllable as conveying better than any other term she could employ the grandeur of her position as Baroness of Ridgeley. "He insists ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... not nimble either, and it was long since she had acted as attendant upon one of her own sex. And so the matter progressed but slowly; but the speed of Margery's tongue was apparently not affected by its length of service. It wagged ceaselessly; the girl between her own moods of curious ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... did Mrs Dashwood pursue her work. Neat little under-garments, and fairy-like little socks, and indescribable little articles of Lilliputian clothing of various kinds, all telling of the little rosebud in the crib, passed rapidly through Mary's nimble fingers, and came out of the tub fair as the driven snow. Soon the front of the fire-place became like a ship dressed with flags, with this difference, that the flags instead of being gay and parti-coloured, ...
— Life in the Red Brigade - London Fire Brigade • R.M. Ballantyne
... glanced at the cumbrous armor and weapons of his guests. Indeed the panoply of the Spaniards, made necessary by the constant possibility of attack, and the weight of their cross-bows and other weapons, was a source of continual wonder to the light and nimble Indians, and of much weariness and suffering to themselves. Many in time adopted the quilted cotton body armor of the natives, and used pikes when they could in place of the musketoun, ...
— Days of the Discoverers • L. Lamprey
... meadow so sweet, What do you play with your nimble feet?" "Little maid, little man, one, two, three; Hipperty, hopperty, can't catch me! Oh, such a merry, delightful game! Hop-scotch you young folks ...
— The Nursery, Number 164 - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest Readers • Various |
