"On and off" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... church that the early voyageurs belonged. And I do not use that word "belonged" as it is employed in modern times among protestants: I mean more than that convenient, loosely-fitting profession, which, like a garment, is thrown on and off, as the exigencies of hypocrisy or cupidity may require. These men actually did belong to the church. They were hers, soul and body; hers, in life and in death; hers to go whithersoever she might direct, to do whatsoever she might appoint. They believed the doctrines ...
— Western Characters - or Types of Border Life in the Western States • J. L. McConnel
... successes, this rich abundance of types, I ranged with an ever deepening zest. As a hunter of game I watched that endless human procession on and off the front pages of papers, the men who were for the moment news. Often small people too would be there—like the telephone girl from a suburb, who for one day, as the most important witness in a sensational case of graft, was suddenly before the whole country and then as ...
— The Harbor • Ernest Poole
... a month Frobisher's ship stood on and off the coast. Fresh water was taken on board. In a convenient spot the ship was beached and at low tide repairs were made and leaks were stopped in the strained timbers of her hull. In the third week, canoes of savages were seen, and presently ...
— Adventurers of the Far North - A Chronicle of the Frozen Seas • Stephen Leacock
... end. The flash of the guns lit up the whole sky for miles and miles, and the noise was far more penetrating than by day. Then you would see a great burst of flame from some poor devil, as the searchlights switched on and off, and ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... had moved on and off the prairie—and those who stayed barely made a mark on the engulfing spaces. The unyielding, harsh life had routed the majority of homesteaders—they had shut the door behind them and left the land to ...
— Land of the Burnt Thigh • Edith Eudora Kohl
... of examination of the theologies on and off—more years very much on than quite off—have given me a good title—to myself, I ask no one else for leave—to make the following remarks: A conclusion has premises, facts or doctrines from proof or authority, and mode of inference. There may be invention ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume II (of II) • Augustus de Morgan
... everybody. Mrs. Barrie played the gipsy and danced most of the time, which she said was her conception of the part as it was in the book. Her husband explained that this was a play, not a book, but she did not care and danced on and off. She played my daughter, and I had a great scene in which I cursed her, which got rounds of applause. Lady Lewis's daughters in beautiful Paquin dresses played Scotch lassies, and giggled in all the sad parts, and one actress who had made a great success as ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... rather proud. Travail had said that he had tried to tune in the noon news broadcast yesterday on the TV and had turned the set on from twelve o'clock until five minutes after. At a nearby appliance store Sutter purchased a clock control which would turn his television set on and off at any chosen time. He set the control for two o'clock, then managed to lure Travail out of the house for the afternoon by giving him an invitation he'd received for a lecture on marine life at a local club. Next, he drove ...
— Made in Tanganyika • Carl Richard Jacobi
... roofed over with tar-paper laid on to the rafters, which answers well if the wind doesn't blow the paper about, or that it has not any holes; but as the hen-house is only a lean-to of the stable, the roof of which we have been very busily painting, it has been trodden upon a good deal in getting on and off the roof, and, in consequence, the paper is much like a sponge, letting any rain in, and drenching the poor sitting fowls; but with the shingles overlapping each other on the tar-paper, the ...
— A Lady's Life on a Farm in Manitoba • Mrs. Cecil Hall
... I searched for, but could not find, the self-effacing spinster of former days. In her place was a capable woman, bright-eyed, happy. She was occupied and bustled at her work. She jumped on and off moving vehicles with the alertness, if not the unconsciousness, of the expert male. She never let me stand in omnibus or subway, but quickly gave me her seat, as indeed she insisted upon doing for elderly ...
— Mobilizing Woman-Power • Harriot Stanton Blatch
... a body near the mysterious light. He gave the '51 more power and closed to within a 1,000 yards, close enough to estimate that the light was 6 to 8 inches in diameter, was sharply outlined, and was blinking on and off. Suddenly the light became steady as it apparently put on power; it pulled into a sharp left bank and made a pass at the tower. The light zoomed up with the F-51 in hot pursuit. At 7,000 feet it made a turn. Gorman followed ...
— The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects • Edward Ruppelt
... at her. "So this is what you've been leading up to, with all the queer talk you've been giving me on and off, ever since we ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips
... of ancient Egyptian idols, and of coins of the early Persian and Chinese dynasties, goes to show that it must at different ages have been settled by people of the very earliest civilisations. Coming to more modern times, it was held on and off from 1505 to 1729 by the Portuguese, a permanent memorial of whose occupation remains in the shape of the grim old fortress, built about 1593—on the site, it is believed, of a still older stronghold. These enterprising sea-rovers piously named it ...
— The Man-eaters of Tsavo and Other East African Adventures • J. H. Patterson
... effected. Two people were silenced and uncomfortable, and a sort of mist hung over the spirits of the whole party. The dinner went on and off, like all other dinners; the ladies retired, and the men drank, and talked indecorums. Mr. Davison left the room first, in order to look out the word "truffle," in the Encyclopaedia; and Lord Vincent and I went next, "lest (as my companion characteristically observed) that d—d Wormwood ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... of some elms lights twinkled in the sky, incontinent sparks, as though glow lamps on an invisible pattern of wires were being switched on and off by an idle child. That was shrapnel. I walked along the empty street a little to get a view between and beyond the villas. I turned to say something to my companion, and saw then my silent neighbours, shadowy groups about me, as though they had not approached but had materialized where ...
— Waiting for Daylight • Henry Major Tomlinson
... the evening of the day; and June dressed Daisy for the party. This was a simple dressing, however, of a white cambrick frock; no finery, seeing that Daisy was to put on and off various things in the course of the evening. But Daisy felt a little afraid of herself. The perfected arrangements and preparations of the last few days had, she feared, got into her head a little; and when June had done and was sent away, ...
— Melbourne House • Elizabeth Wetherell
... electric-light smile was being turned on and off in the box opposite with unmistakable intention, and, glancing across, Craven noticed that the young men had disappeared, no doubt to smoke cigarettes in the foyer. Lady Wrackley and Mrs. Ackroyde were alone, and, seeing them alone, it was easier to Craven to compare their appearance ...
— December Love • Robert Hichens
... doubt that the drama was extremely popular both on and off the stage; and although it is now one of the scarcest of our old plays, it must have been a profitable speculation to the publisher. In order that the various parties interested might more effectually avail themselves of the favour with which it had been received, a sort of ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VI • Robert Dodsley
... of embarkation, while swimmers on horseback carried another set of ropes across the river and quickly made them fast. Only one wagon at a time could cross, and great difficulty was experienced in getting the vehicles on and off the boat. Those working near the bank stood in water up to their arm-pits, and frequently were in grave peril. By the time the ninth wagon ...
— The Expedition of the Donner Party and its Tragic Fate • Eliza Poor Donner Houghton
... excuse for instant dismissal, but there was now no hope of that happening. What was to be done? He would like to get rid of Linden, who was now really too old to be of much use, but as the old man had worked for Rushton on and off for many years, Hunter felt that he could scarcely sack him off hand without some reasonable pretext. Still, the fellow was really not worth the money he was getting. Sevenpence an hour was an absurdly large wage for an old man ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell
... Norfolk Island. These were needed by the settlers for curing their bacon. The brig sailed on June 2nd and, as usual, discharging the cargo at the island proved a difficult task. Before he could land all his stores, Symons was forced to stand on and off shore for several days. He finally left on July 7th in company with the Governor King ...
— The Logbooks of the Lady Nelson - With The Journal Of Her First Commander Lieutenant James Grant, R.N • Ida Lee
... is unresolved and the UN is attempting to hold a referendum on the issue; the UN-administered cease-fire has been in effect since September 1991; Spain controls five places of sovereignty (plazas de soberania) on and off the coast of Morocco-the coastal enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla which Morocco contests, as well as the islands of Penon de Alhucemas, Penon de Velez de la ...
— The 1998 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... glowed on and off all evening, but only once had they called for action. At 10:34 two sharp readings of 92.2 and 94 even, had sent Blaney back to his dials and screen. He'd narrowed it down to a four-block area when the telephone rang to report a fight at the Red Antler ...
— The Circuit Riders • R. C. FitzPatrick
... remember the day Bull came?" Whitey asked. "And how I said maybe it was a good omen, and there ought to be something doing on the ranch? Well, there has been something doing—on and off." ...
— Injun and Whitey to the Rescue • William S. Hart
... water out of the dredger, that it may not be lumpy; then put in a piece of butter, set it over a quick fire; have it on and off every instant to shake it, and it will not oil, but will become ...
— The Lady's Own Cookery Book, and New Dinner-Table Directory; • Charlotte Campbell Bury
... a welcome for him," he said, and so turned out the electric light at the end of the long flexible wire. He had arranged a neat little switch of the accumulator, and so snapped the light on and off at his pleasure, without the trouble of unscrewing the nuts which held in place one of the copper ends of the wire. Going to the edge of the stream and lighting his candle, he placed the glass bulb in the current, paid out the ...
— A Rock in the Baltic • Robert Barr
... that horse of yourn can get me anywhere I want to go fast enough to suit me. I got no time for all these new-fangled things, like wagons that run without horses, and lights you put on and off with a button. It goes good if you don't get ...
— Amanda - A Daughter of the Mennonites • Anna Balmer Myers
... ran into another little clutter of buildings and drew up, puffing, at the station. Conniston's eyes were alert, fixed upon the passageway from the observation-car rather than on the view from his window. Mail-bags were tossed on and off, a few packages handled by the Wells Fargo man, and the train pulled out. Conniston leaned back with ...
— Under Handicap - A Novel • Jackson Gregory
... several presents, to trade horses with me, and in this way I became the owner of the buckskin steed, not as my own property, however, but as a government horse that I could ride. I gave him the name of "Buckskin Joe" and he proved to be a second Brigham. That horse I rode on and off during the summers of 1869, 1870, 1871 and 1872, and he was the horse that the Grand Duke Alexis rode on his buffalo hunt. In the winter of 1872, after I had left Fort McPherson, Buckskin Joe was condemned and sold at public sale, and was bought by ...
— The Life of Hon. William F. Cody - Known as Buffalo Bill The Famous Hunter, Scout and Guide • William F. Cody
... In either case it will not be prudent to trust too much to the faulty pump, but the evil may frequently be remedied by working the pump a short time with the pet-cock open, or alternately turned on and off. ...
— Practical Rules for the Management of a Locomotive Engine - in the Station, on the Road, and in cases of Accident • Charles Hutton Gregory
... them how they harpooned one right whale, and by good luck were able. to make her fast to the stern of the ship. "And, if you will believe me, Miss Fountain, though there was just a breath on and off right aft, and the foresail, jib and mizzen all set to catch it, she towed the ship astern a good cable's length, and the last thing was she broke the harpoon shaft just below the line, and away she swam ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... time, when the animals were actually weighed on the scales. Most of his hunting for bear was done in northern Mississippi, where one of his plantations was situated, near Greenville. During the half century that he hunted, on and off, in this neighborhood, he knew of two instances where hunters were fatally wounded in the chase of the black bear. Both of the men were inexperienced, one being a raftsman who came down the river, and the other a man from Vicksburg. ...
— Hunting the Grisly and Other Sketches • Theodore Roosevelt
... to sit, on and off, on the bench as regularly as most of the other magistrates, whenever, indeed, my business permitted me to do so, and to my face no one ventured to ...
— The Reminiscences of an Irish Land Agent • S.M. Hussey
... there appeared in England a performer who claimed to be the original Ling Look. He wore his make-up both on and off the stage, and copied, so far as he could, Ling's style of work. His fame reached this country and the New York Clipper published, in its Letter Columns, an article stating that Ling Look was not dead, but was alive and working in England. His imitator had the ...
— The Miracle Mongers, an Expos • Harry Houdini
... shepherding patients to an entertainment in town as an agreeable form of holiday. I have had some very pleasant outings of that sort myself. But not—I am thankful to recall, in the light of Corporal Smith's narrative—with blind men. One-legged men are often a sufficient care, in manoeuvring on and off omnibuses. Apparently helpless cripples have a marvellous gift for losing themselves, entering wrong trains, and generally escaping—as the hour for return draws nigh—from one's custody. And the city seems to be full of lunatics ready to ...
— Observations of an Orderly - Some Glimpses of Life and Work in an English War Hospital • Ward Muir
... hold—though of what might be urged on the other side he was perfectly aware—that a representative should at least be as resident as possible. This gave Nick an opening for something that had been on and off his lips ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... pityingly. "He has been a very faithful adorer, I must say. I believe that he has been in love with Leam all his life, while she has held him on and off, and made use of him when she wanted him, and deserted him when she did not want him, with the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVII. No. 101. May, 1876. • Various
... up the priest's straw hat and held it about two inches over the head of his reverence during the whole of the service. The father, be it remembered, was standing in the shade. A few shoved their hats on and off uneasily, struggling between their disgust far the living and their respect for the dead. The hat had a conical crown and a brim sloping down all round like a sunshade, and the publican held it with his great red claw spread over the crown. To do the priest justice, perhaps ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... was then told by my father the chief facts of sex and warned to avoid masturbation. My first wet dream took place when I was 14. Rather before this I had begun to suffer with severe intermittent testicular neuralgia which practically defied all treatment and continued on and off for four or five years, the attacks gradually ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 3 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... pleasant service at the Eastern posts where his wife had attained a certain kind of social distinction in the army fast set. She was not especially enamoured of the prospect ahead of her in the Philippines; but the new colonel was a strict disciplinarian on and off the field. He expected to be a brigadier-general if fortune and favouritism supported him long enough. Mrs. Harbin could never be anything more than a private in the ranks, so far as his estimation of distinction was concerned. ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... The Ricci is a thin young woman, with a long, pale face, black eyes and hair, long neck and arms, and large hands; extremely pretty, it is said, off the stage, but very ineffective on it; but both on and off with a very distinguished air. Her voice is extensive, but wanting cultivation, and decidedly pea-hennish; besides that, she is apt to go out of tune. Her style of dress was excessively unbecoming to her style of beauty. She ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... the season closed Aline Proctor sailed on the first steamer for London, where awaited her many friends, both English and American—and to Paris, where she selected those gowns that on and off the stage helped to make her famous. But this particular summer she had spent with the Endicotts at Bar Harbor, and it was at their house Herbert Nelson met her. After Herbert met her very few other men enjoyed that privilege. This was her wish as ...
— The Lost Road • Richard Harding Davis
... be possible, she wondered, after Mark had left the house, that Bridget had two strings to her bow? Was she holding Colonel Faversham on and off until Mark's return to London? Did she intend to make a last bid for the younger man, and if he eluded her to fall back ...
— Enter Bridget • Thomas Cobb
... 1/2 in. On the top of A are 3 binding-posts, 1, 2, 3, which consist of metal strips 1-1/4 x 1/2 in. At the lower ends are screws which are connected with the cells, as shown. Spring binders can be easily slipped on and off the upper ends of the strips, so that one or two cells can be used at will. Bent strips, C, are nailed to B, to hold the tumblers firmly in place. This framework is not necessary, of course, to ...
— How Two Boys Made Their Own Electrical Apparatus • Thomas M. (Thomas Matthew) St. John
... last century the property was acquired by a Colonel Clutton. He was followed by Edward Bulwer, afterwards Lord Lytton, who lived there on and off (chiefly off) with his wife, until their separation in 1836. On one occasion he gave a dinner-party, among the guests being John Forster, "to meet Miss Landon, Fontblanque, and Hayward." To the invitation was added the warning, "We ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... slowly, used their lights carefully, in quick flickers on and off. Each branching from the main corridor had to be approached cautiously. Each, when checked by a rapid finger of light, showed only the sides of boxes marked by stenciled words and the blank walls of ...
— Take the Reason Prisoner • John Joseph McGuire
... on and off" the "lights" that enable any potential aggressor to see or appreciate the conditions and events concerning his forces and, ultimately, his society. What is radically different in Rapid Dominance is the comprehensive system assemblage and integration ...
— Shock and Awe - Achieving Rapid Dominance • Harlan K. Ullman and James P. Wade
... the Touaricks and Negroes so much as my gloves. Am obliged to put them on and off frequently a dozen times a day, for their especial gratification. My Leghorn hat, on the contrary, here, as in The Mountains, is an object of admiration, on account of the fineness of the platting. It astonishes them ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... listening on and off to guns for three years. I had been present at the big preparations before Loos and the Somme and Arras, and I had come to accept the racket of artillery as something natural and inevitable like rain or sunshine. But this sound chilled me with its eeriness, I don't know why. Perhaps it was its ...
— Mr. Standfast • John Buchan
... Strakosch, "I can't go on forever, tripping on and off the stage like that!" He answered, laconically, "Well, you see people have paid much for their tickets, and they want ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone
... this a good opportunity for repeating his remark, with variations. 'I shall sit here,' he said, 'on and off, for ...
— Alice's Adventures in Wonderland • Lewis Carroll
... really being profane. It isn't really God at all I'm talking about. It's what German Authority finds convenient to turn on and off, according as it suits what it wishes to obtain. It isn't ...
— Christine • Alice Cholmondeley
... beautiful expensive home for only $100. In fact people almost gave away their houses and furnishings. Finally, the night for the club to leave came and the crowds at the train were so large that the policemen had to just force them back in order to allow the people to get on and off. After the train was filled with as many people as it could hold, the old engine gave one or two puffs and pulled out, bound for the ...
— Negro Migration during the War • Emmett J. Scott
... walking with her eyes bent upon the sidewalk, thinking hard, when her way was blocked by Mrs. Abram Pantin extending a high supine hand with the charming cordiality which distinguished her best social manner. Mrs. Pantin slipped her manner on and off, as the occasion warranted, as ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... progress, still Losing true life forever and a day Through ever trying to be and ever being— In the evolution of successive spheres— Before its actual sphere and place of life, Halfway into the next, which having reached, It shoots with corresponding foolery Halfway into the next still, on and off! As when a traveller, bound from North to South, 790 Scouts far in Russia: what's its use in France? In France spurns flannel: where's its need in Spain? In Spain drops cloth, too cumbrous for Algiers! Linen goes next, and ...
— Men and Women • Robert Browning
... Saunders, we were very expeditious in regaining our station, where we got the 29th at noon, yet in plying on and off till the 6th of October we had not the good fortune to discover a sail of any sort, and then, having lost all hopes of making any advantage by a longer stay, we made sail to the leeward of the port in order to join our prizes; but when we arrived on the station appointed for them we ...
— Anson's Voyage Round the World - The Text Reduced • Richard Walter
... The bystanders, on and off the dining-room chairs, raised a murmur of sympathy with Mrs. Pegler, and Mr. Gradgrind felt himself innocently placed in a very distressing predicament, when Mr. Bounderby, who had never ceased walking up and down, and had every moment swelled larger and larger, and ...
— Hard Times • Charles Dickens*
... begot, And by what force they are constrained to this, And what the speed appointed unto them Wherewith to travel down the vast inane: Do thou remember to yield thee to my words. For truly matter coheres not, crowds not tight, Since we behold each thing to wane away, And we observe how all flows on and off, As 'twere, with age-old time, and from our eyes How eld withdraws each object at the end, Albeit the sum is seen to bide the same, Unharmed, because these motes that leave each thing Diminish what they part from, but endow ...
— Of The Nature of Things • [Titus Lucretius Carus] Lucretius
... true to himself he made the most of it. He used his eyes, and came to the conclusion that they were aboard a very fast train—a train that "would sure give a thoroughbred the run of its life"—Pete's standard of speed being altogether of the saddle—and that more people got on and off that train than could possibly have homes in that vast and uninhabited region. The conductor was an exceedingly popular individual. Every one called him by his "front name," which he acknowledged pleasantly in like manner. Pete wondered ...
— The Ridin' Kid from Powder River • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... having a pleasant time with these people. They are the wildest of any people that I have yet come across in Luzon. But like all wild people, they are cordial and hospitable. I live in their houses and so have their presence day and night. I hunt, fish and hike with them, see them on and off their guard, observe them in all their varying moods—in short, I'm very close to them all the time. Some time I will tell you a ...
— The Negrito and Allied Types in the Philippines and The Ilongot or Ibilao of Luzon • David P. Barrows
... to cross Momba Bar that night, all the more surely to cross because the watchers ashore, seeing us hang on and off in the late afternoon, would probably report that we were waiting for morning. So we hauled her to in the dusk where, were it light, we would have seen, under its three fathom of water, Momba Bar lying white and smooth and quiet ...
— Wide Courses • James Brendan Connolly
... was under way, standing on and off shore, when we got on board. We afterwards ran in closer, and, to my great joy, made out a boat pulling towards us, out of which presently stepped the doctor and the padre. The boat then pulled away; and we ran to the ...
— The Young Llanero - A Story of War and Wild Life in Venezuela • W.H.G. Kingston
... frozen tundra others—but there were a few items common to every emergency, and those were now at Raf's fingertips. The blast bombs, sealed into their pexilod cases, guaranteed to stop all the attackers that Terran explorers had so far met on and off worlds, a coil of rope hardly thicker than a strand of knitting yarn but of inconceivable toughness and flexibility, an aid kit with endurance drugs and pep pills which could keep a man on his ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton
... of wandering over portage and up river, has won our unbounded respect and created for herself a warm place in every heart. Se-li-nah, though, makes it impossible for us to pose as brave endurers of hardships. Each night and morning she carries her little pack on and off shore, takes her share of pot-luck at meat-su, and is never cross. Bless the kiddie! If ablutions seem to her a work of supererogation and our daily play of toothbrush furnishes all the fascination of the unknown, still hers is the right ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron
... wholly shuts, Ere through the first dry snow the runner grates, And the loath cart-wheel screams in slippery ruts, 150 While firmer ice the eager boy awaits, Trying each buckle and strap beside the fire, And until bedtime plays with his desire, Twenty times putting on and off his ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... the cake into a stout hat-box, and fasten a heavy cord and a handle on it, and you can get it there safely, I think. You won't have to carry it, except just getting on and off the train." Dr. Helen hurried off to see to ...
— The Wide Awake Girls in Winsted • Katharine Ellis Barrett
... have regretted many times that he had mentioned to me those unfortunate darbies. Now amid much laughter he was compelled to draw forth a pretty shining pair of steel wristlets and permit Jane to put them on. They were much too large for her; she could slip them on and off without unlocking; but as toys they were a delight. "I shouldn't mind being a prisoner," she declared, "if dear Colonel ...
— The Lost Naval Papers • Bennet Copplestone
... not spasmodic. She did not pass in and out of the holy place, or step on and off the highway of holiness. She dwelt there. That does not imply that never during those thirty years was she overcome by Satan. Once, into a deep sorrow was poured the bitterness of gall through the wickedness of another. ...
— The Angel Adjutant of "Twice Born Men" • Minnie L. Carpenter
... scooter down next to the other one, and flicked the toggle for the air pumps, then put on the fishbowl and went about unattaching the suit from the ship. When the red light flashed on and off, I spun the door, opened it, and stepped out onto the rock, moving very cautiously. It isn't that I don't believe the magnets in the boot soles will work, it's just that I know for a fact that they won't work if I happen to raise both ...
— The Risk Profession • Donald Edwin Westlake
... mechanism which engages the attention and a mechanism from which it can be diverted. The primitive steam-engine, as Newcomen conceived it, required the presence of a person exclusively employed to turn on and off the taps, either to let the steam into the cylinder or to throw the cold spray into it in order to condense the steam. It is said that a boy employed on this work, and very tired of having to do it, got the idea of tying the handles of the taps, with cords, to the beam of the engine. Then the machine ...
— Creative Evolution • Henri Bergson
... perhaps competent to pronounce upon this point, for Hermione and Emilie, in Corneille's "Cinna," are not characters abounding in tenderness. Lady M—— saw her the other day in "Marie Stuart," and cried her eyes almost out, so she must have some pathetic power. —— was so enchanted with her, both on and off the stage, that he took me to call upon her, on her arrival in London, and I was very much pleased with the quiet grace and dignity, the excellent bon ton of her manners and deportment. The other morning ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... with fresh water and seed. The canary-bird got a lump of white sugar and the linnet half an egg, because of her young ones. Then he stood and watched them washing their beaks and wings and splashing in the water, pecking at their troughs now full of seed and at their sugar and cheerfully hopping on and off their perches. Then, when they were all hung up again in their places on the wall, they all started whistling together till the kitchen rang with it. The baby screamed in its cradle. Trientje cried and mother stamped across the floor in her ...
— The Path of Life • Stijn Streuvels
... spend his leisure ashore in a cloud, or a gutter, or a flower-pot, or a thunder-storm, or anywhere else where water was needed. "That's only a little priming, a little carrying-over, as they call it. It'll happen all night, on and off. I don't say it's nice, but it's the best we ...
— The Day's Work, Volume 1 • Rudyard Kipling
... of the kind," cry I, very angry, and yet laughing: the laughter caused by the antagonism of the epithet with the many recollected blows and honest sounding cuffs that I have, on and off, exchanged with Bobby. ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... from the currents and eddies—and there provoking a series of sounds, as if the performer were pinching the tails of a dozen mice, that squeaked and squealed as he made the experiment. The bow (like the funambulist with the soles of his slippers fresh chalked) kept glancing on and off, till we hoped he would be off altogether and break his neck; and now the least harsh and grating of the cords snaps up in the fiddler's face, and a crude one is to be applied; and now—but what is the use of pursuing the description? Let us leave the old bass to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... debts, and quarrels, Lay heavy on him: let it not be thought A boast in me, though I say, I reliev'd him. 'Twas I that gave him fashion; mine the sword That did on all occasions second his; I brought him on and off with honour, lady: And when in all men's judgments he was sunk, And in his own hopes not to be buoyed up; I stepp'd unto him, took him by the hand, And brought him ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 4, April 1810 • Various
... On and off during the bitter night the white beam of light flashed out through the snow. For a few seconds it swept the sea close around and was then shut off. In the pall-like blackness which followed ears listened ...
— Submarine Warfare of To-day • Charles W. Domville-Fife
... centred in the individuality, when such a person may be said to have become a MAHATMA. At the time of his physical death, all the lower four principles perish without any suffering, for these are, in fact, to him like a piece of wearing apparel which he puts on and off at will. The real MAHATMA is then not his physical body but that higher Manas which is inseparably linked to the Atma and its vehicle (the sixth principle)—a union effected by him in a comparatively very short period ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various
... for the first half of the way consisted of a string of stepping-stones neatly laid in the ground, and for the latter fraction of no worse mud than could easily be met with elsewhere. The trouble came from a misunderstanding in foot-gear. It seemed too short a walk to put one's boots twice on and off for the doing of it. On the other hand, to walk in stocking-feet was out of the question, for the mud. So I attempted a compromise, consisting of my socks and the native wooden clogs, and tried to make the one take kindly to the other. But my mittenlike socks ...
— Noto, An Unexplored Corner of Japan • Percival Lowell
... wheel, etc., similar to those that were in the Burns cottage. But there is a reel that wuz used by Bonnie Jean herself, I took holt on't tryin' to bring to my mind what emotions she had time and agin as she reeled her threads on and off, love, anxiety, ambition, fear, hopes and sorrows; how they twined and ontwined in her faithful breast as the reel turned, emotions ...
— Samantha at the St. Louis Exposition • Marietta Holley
... officiates in the Basilica San Marco with some ceremonies which I believe are peculiar to the patriarchate of Venice, and which consist of an unusual number of robings and disrobings, and putting on and off of shoes. All this is performed with great gravity, and has, I suppose, some peculiar spiritual significance. The shoes are brought by a priest to the foot of the patriarchal throne, when a canon ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells
... continually jumping on and off whilst the train is in motion, and larking from one car to the other. There is no sort of fence or other obstacle to prevent "humans" or cattle from getting on ...
— Three Months in the Southern States, April-June 1863 • Arthur J. L. (Lieut.-Col.) Fremantle
... in the middle of a plate. I had to stop (p. 140) there for three days without food or drink. They were thinnin' me out, see! Then I was a draughts manager at a bank, and shut the ventilators; after that I was an electric mechanic; I switched the lights on and off at night and mornin'; now I'm a professional gambler, I lose ...
— The Red Horizon • Patrick MacGill
... all wise men do, With an intent, if things should turn, Rather to temporise, than burn; Gospel and loyalty were made To serve the purposes of trade; 160 Religions are but paper ties, Which bind the fool, but which the wise, Such idle notions far above, Draw on and off, just like a glove; All gods, all kings (let his great aim Be answer'd) were to him the same. A curate first, he read and read, And laid in, whilst he should have fed The souls of his neglected flock, Of reading such a mighty stock, ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill
... value and took part in making the plans and procuring the dynamite to execute them. The quality of his nerve (as well as his foolhardiness) is shown by the fact that he once carried a dress-suit case full of the explosive around the city, jumping on and off street cars, and dodging vehicles. When the proper moment came and the dynamite had been placed in an uncompleted building on Twenty-second Street, Guthrie gave the signal and the police arrested the dynamiters—all of them, including ...
— Courts and Criminals • Arthur Train
... that elapsed before G.H.Q. of the Expeditionary Force proceeded to the theatre of war, its cream thought fit to spend the hours of suspense in creeping on tiptoe in and out of my apartment, clambering on and off a table which fronted this portentous map, discussing strategical problems in blood-curdling whispers, and every now and then expressing an earnest hope that this sort of thing was not a nuisance. It was a most intolerable nuisance, but ...
— Experiences of a Dug-out, 1914-1918 • Charles Edward Callwell
... kept informed, through Henry, into whose hands had fallen a letter in Cora's handwriting, bearing the Bellair postmark, and addressed to Lucian Davlin, who, so Henry said, "went down, on and off," and always appeared satisfied with the result ...
— Madeline Payne, the Detective's Daughter • Lawrence L. Lynch
... flashed on and off with the lurid glare of sulphur pits burning in hell, and screaming, winged Orconites, all mixed up together, pelted toward us as thickly as the snowflakes of a blizzard. I don't suppose the destruction of one little mesh of wires had ever created ...
— The Winged Men of Orcon - A Complete Novelette • David R. Sparks
... things. Though he might never hope for a word from her; though he should learn in the coming moment that she was the other's promised wife; he could not for that reason banish her from his mind. His feelings were not to be put on and off, like clothes; he had no power over them. It was simply a case of accepting things as they were, and ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... 'Thirty-three years ago memorials in favour of the suffrage were presented to Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Disraeli. In 1896, 257,000 women of these British Isles signed an appeal to the members of Parliament. Bills or Resolutions have been before the House, on and off, for the last thirty-six years. All that "time" thrown away! At the opening of this year we found ourselves with no assurance that if we went on in the same way, any girl born into the world in our time would ever ...
— The Convert • Elizabeth Robins
... of the conventions and restraining influences of earlier forms of literature, and enjoys much of the liberty of choice of subject and licence of method that marks present-day conditions of literary production both on and off the stage. Its very existence presupposes a fuller and bolder intellectual life, a more advanced and complex city civilization, a keener taste and livelier faculty of comprehension in the people who appreciate it, than ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al
... all you can do in the way of avoiding soililoquies and getting your characters on and off the stage in a dramatic manner, a time will come when you realize sadly that your play is not a bit like life after all. Then is the time to introduce a meal on the stage. A stage meal is popular, because it proves to the audience that the actors, even when called Charles Hawtrey or Owen ...
— The Sunny Side • A. A. Milne
... how, and I've practised a good deal on and off just for fun," was the reply. "I might be able to hit a shark with it, if he wasn't very far off, and I might not. I'd have a chance though, and if I missed I could try again. This rope attached to it prevents its being lost, and I could draw ...
— The Rushton Boys at Treasure Cove - Or, The Missing Chest of Gold • Spencer Davenport
... "On and off the stage, I mean. And that's knowledge," said Rickman. "Anybody can know them on; but it's not one man in a thousand knows them off—really ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... from Dick ran along the thwarts and leaped ashore; Dick, taking the horse by the bridle, sought to follow, but what with the animal's bulk, and what with the closeness of the thicket, both stuck fast. The horse neighed and trampled; and the boat, which was swinging in an eddy, came on and off and pitched ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... dolls; dolls in suits and dolls in frocks; dolls in hats and dolls in nightgowns; a papa in trousers and a mamma in a magnificent blue dress with flounces and a train; a nurse in white cap and apron and the most bewitching baby doll you ever saw, with a frilled paper cap that slipped on and off, and a white frock with pink ribbons. And the best of these dolls was, that each of them had a piece of cardboard fastened on behind and a little bit of cardboard to stand on, so that when you spread out the piece behind they stood up as naturally as possible, and looked as if ...
— Milly and Olly • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... may be directed, too, to the need of deliberately cultivating friendships and acquaintances, not only on these "dark runs," but wherever one goes—both on and off duty. In the stores, along the street, on the cars, at the club, the alert reporter gathers many an important news item. The merchant, the cabman, the preacher, the barkeeper, the patrolman, the thug, the club-man, the porter, all make valuable ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer
... power, you could torture him at your own sweet will. Every minute, every hour, you could delight in his anguish and drink his tears. You could go down into his cell and speak to him and bargain with him, laugh at his tortures, and discuss his ransom; you could live on and off him, through his slowly ebbing life and his plundered treasures. Your whole castle, from the top of the towers to the bottom of the trenches, weighed on him, crushing, and burying him; and thus family revenges were accomplished by the family itself, ...
— Over Strand and Field • Gustave Flaubert
... briefly introduced us, he turned his attention to the electric light, and switched it on and off so rapidly that, as was very fitting, Mary and I may be said to have met for the first time to the accompaniment of flashes of lightning. I think she was arrayed in little blue feathers, but if such a costume is not seemly, I swear there ...
— The Little White Bird - or Adventures In Kensington Gardens • J. M. Barrie
... been refused.' To the last, we are told, Lady Morgan preserved the natural vivacity and aptness of repartee that had made her the delight of Dublin society half a century before. 'I know I am vain,' she said once to Mrs. Hall, 'but I have a right to be. It is not put on and off like my rouge; it is always with me.... I wrote books when your mothers worked samplers, and demanded freedom for Ireland when Dan O'Connell scrambled for gulls' eggs in the crags of Derrynane.... Look at the ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston
... dark-hued Martha who thumps out on a luckless shirt the damage she plans to inflict on a certain Pullman porter when he shows up at her back door again, provide an iron that cannot over-heat. With a thermostat that turns current on and off, it and the ironing board can remain forgotten for hours. The electric light company may benefit but no ...
— If You're Going to Live in the Country • Thomas H. Ormsbee and Richmond Huntley
... not his conception of the strong man that he must needs become as water at some woman's touch and go dancing and babbling like a sylvan brook. Women were the light of life—he was willing enough to admit it, but one must be able to switch the light on and off at will. All these were reasons for not falling in love—they were not reasons for not marrying. And so, Amber being determined to marry him, there was really less difficulty than if it had been necessary for him to ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... would not be long in making use of his "instrument." He recalled various individuals who a few days ago were strolling slowly along the wharf examining the vessel, and spying upon those going on and off. If he could manage to see them again he would go off the steamer just to say a couple ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... sad history; Marie must be enough of a friend to be trusted in return. In short, Caroline's manner had always been so conventional and unimpulsive, that these complaints of life had seemed to him a part of her society-tone, aa easily taken on and off as her bonnet or her paletot. They suited the enthusiasm that was necessary with music, and would be forgotten in her talk with Mr. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... crow's call, and the song-sparrow's ecstasy. Once or twice the notes of a bugle found their way down the hill, and reminded me that I was in a place of delightful novelty. It was just a fillip to my enjoyment, as I looked on and off my page alternately. ...
— Daisy • Elizabeth Wetherell
... a very theatrical air, and the extraordinary mouthpiece made him look like a demon in, or out of, a pantomime. In taking this ornament off his neck he broke the string, and I supplied him with a piece of elastic band, so that he could put it on and off without undoing it, whenever he pleased; but the extraordinary phenomenon to him of the extension of a solid was more than he was prepared for, and he scarcely liked to allow it to touch his person again. I put it over my head first, and this reassured him, ...
— Australia Twice Traversed, The Romance of Exploration • Ernest Giles
... aloft they literally carry their lives in their hands, and want nothing between their grasp of the hemp, and the hemp itself.—Therefore, it is desirable, that whatever things they cover their hands with, should be capable of being slipped on and off in a moment. Nay, it is desirable, that they should be of such a nature, that in a dark night, when you are in a great hurry—say, going to the helm—they may be jumped into, indiscriminately; and not be like a pair of right-and-left kids; neither of which will admit any ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... lugged the wood on board, or carried the cargo ashore, singing plaintive melodies as they worked. Then again, the steamer would be made fast to a wharf-boat by some small town, or to the levee of a larger landing-place, and goods went ashore, passengers flitted on and off, baggage was transferred, the gang-plank was hauled in with prodigious clatter, the engineer's bell tinkled, and, with a great snort from her engines, the "New Lucy" resumed her way down the river. Few passengers but those who were to go ashore could be seen on the upper deck viewing the ...
— The Boy Settlers - A Story of Early Times in Kansas • Noah Brooks
... beam in widening arcs over the ground. The light revealed a stubble field. Surely there must be a path which would lead to the road, thought the boy. Backward and forward over the field he waved the light. His hands trembled so that he could not hold the switch steady, and the lamp blinked on and off. ...
— The War Romance of the Salvation Army • Evangeline Booth and Grace Livingston Hill
... on in that way about your part, I shall think you want to play Mr. Gabblewig. Your role, though a small one on the stage, is a large one off it; and no man is more important to the Guild, both on and off. ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 1 (of 3), 1833-1856 • Charles Dickens
... to be shunted frequently and often re-shunted; some are left and others taken to far-off places; the guard's van has to be detached always in order to have it at the end of the train; the stoker is hard at work with the brake putting it on and off, jumping down to hold the points, or coupling wagons—this is not his business, but he does it to facilitate the work. When the luggage train had to get into a siding to let a passenger train go by, there was no pit (except ...
— The Stoker's Catechism • W. J. Connor
... Sliver, crawling along at a bare three-hundred miles an hour, approached that transparent, brilliantly violet wall of destruction, a violet light filled her control room and as suddenly went out; flashing on and off ...
— Triplanetary • Edward Elmer Smith
... task of the doctor is often one of even greater difficulty. Often enough there will be a combination of organic disturbance with functional trouble. For example, a girl of eighteen years old suffered from a pain in the left arm which has persisted on and off since the olecranon had been fractured when she was two years of age. She was the youngest of a large family, and had never been separated for a day from the care and apprehensions of her mother. The joint was stiff, and there was considerable ...
— The Nervous Child • Hector Charles Cameron
... this action on his part probably saved the ship, as an immediate echo answered the blast. In an instant we were going full-speed astern. We altered course sixteen points and proceeded ten miles westerly, where we lay on and off the coast all ...
— The Diary of a U-boat Commander • Anon
... adjustors were already working at capacity, transmitting the light and heat that filtered through the mirror-tone hull into stored, useful energy. Batteries were already overcharged and the voltage regulators snapped on and off like a crackling ...
— Master of the Moondog • Stanley Mullen
... cannot be put on and off like a dress-coat; they are lasting qualities, the growth of years, the result of constant practice and self-denial or self-neglect. And, as I wish you success in life, allow me to conclude this lecture by recommending to you the assiduous cultivation of gentlemanly habits. Cultivate them now, while ...
— Moral Principles and Medical Practice - The Basis of Medical Jurisprudence • Charles Coppens
... was joking, and laughed. The sort of a laugh that could be turned on and off, like a light. Rainsford assured him that the ...
— Little Fuzzy • Henry Beam Piper
... up boots, also, for most of the townsmen wore shoes, thus marking the decline of the military spirit. I never again owned a pair of those man-killing top-boots—which were not only hard to get on and off but pinched my toes, and interrupted the flow of my trouser-legs. Thus one great era fades into another. The Jack-boot period was over, the shoe, ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... "I've found the nest of Longlegs! He and Mrs. Longlegs may be good fishermen but they certainly are mighty poor nest-builders. I don't see how under the sun Mrs. Longlegs ever gets on and off that nest without ...
— The Burgess Bird Book for Children • Thornton W. Burgess
... "We-ll—on and off." He grew appealing and confidential. "I don't mind telling you, Mrs. Masterman," he began, as if acknowledging an indiscretion, "I went with Rosie once. Went with her ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King
... found, was the plan adopted. We stood on and off the land to watch the entrance. The next morning the whole fleet arrived, forming a line from the old head of Kinsale northward, which Prince Rupert, daring as he was, would not, it was believed, attempt to break through. It was somewhat trying work. Night and ...
— The Boy who sailed with Blake • W.H.G. Kingston
... to Toby's extravagantly friendly laughter with some mechanical cachinnations which, like an obliging salesman, he turned on and off with no effort. "Not by a dern sight!" he answered. "The campaign ain't ...
— In the Arena - Stories of Political Life • Booth Tarkington
... Heavens, Elisabeth!"—the irritation born of frayed nerves hardened Sara's voice so that it was almost unrecognizable—"you can't turn love on and off as you would a tap! I shall never marry anybody now. Tim understands that, and—you ...
— The Hermit of Far End • Margaret Pedler
... preparation for the dramatic recital before him. "On Tuesday afternoon," he began again, with impressive slowness, "I was walking on Throgmorton Street, about four o'clock. It was raining a little—it had been raining on and off all day—a miserable, rotten sort of a day, with greasy mud everywhere, and everybody poking umbrellas into you. I was out walking because I'd 'a' cut my throat if I'd tried to stay in the office another ten minutes. All that day I hadn't eaten ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... on and off, with a kind word that comforted her immensely, and gentle Ed would come and teach her new bits of music, while the other fellows were frolicking below. Ralph added his share to her amusement, for he asked leave ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott
... visited by civilised man, the name of the "Sandwich Islands" was given, in compliment to the First Lord of the Admiralty. On leaving these islands,—destined to be so fatal to the discoverer,—the ships steered for New Albion, which had been visited by Drake. After tacking on and off the shore for several days, they put into a harbour, which received the title of "Hope Bay." The morning afterwards three canoes, shaped like Norway yawls, came off from a village, and a man, dressed in the skin of an animal, with a rattle in each ...
— Notable Voyagers - From Columbus to Nordenskiold • W.H.G. Kingston and Henry Frith
... public street or in the friend's parlor. If this aversation had its origin in contempt and resistance like his own he might well go home with a sad countenance; but the sour faces of the multitude, like their sweet faces, have no deep cause,—disguise no god, but are put on and off as the wind blows and a newspaper directs. Yet is the discontent of the multitude more formidable than that of the senate and the college. It is easy enough for a firm man who knows the world to brook the rage of the cultivated classes. Their rage is decorous and ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)
... not so much the force of his arguments as a kind of tendency to jump as the bellwether jumps, well known in flocks not included in the Christian fold. His bereaved congregation immediately began pulling candidates on and off, like new boots, on trial. Some pinched in tender places; some were too loose; some were too square-toed; some were too coarse, and did n't please; some were too thin, and would n't last;—in short, they could n't ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... Fourth Junior that afternoon lasted, on and off, from half-past four to half-past eight. Among the speakers were Bramble, Paul, and Stephen; while Padger, Walker, and Rook did very good execution with their fists. About half-past seven the dust was so dense that it was impossible to see across the room; but those who knew reported ...
— The Fifth Form at Saint Dominic's - A School Story • Talbot Baines Reed
... that I saw a young man stepping carelessly on and off a railway track, near a curve around which the express train might come thundering and screaming at any moment. Whether on the track or off it, the young man was indifferent to danger and wanton in his movements. But as I looked I saw ...
— Fighting the Traffic in Young Girls - War on the White Slave Trade • Various
... hours following—while the rest of you were in the library, I looked through his room, and I found a pair of straw sandals in the closet—such as a man could slip on and off without having to bend down to adjust them. And they were wet, inside ...
— No Clue - A Mystery Story • James Hay
... in connection with the use of elevators, and which no doubt is common, is the habit many parties have of keeping a key or wrench to turn on and off the water at the curb. This we have sought to remedy by embracing in our plumbers' rules the following: "All elevator connections in addition to the curb stop for the use of the Water Company must be provided with another ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 392, July 7, 1883 • Various
... of outlines, the black lace, the silver hair, the harmonious, restrained movements of those white, soft hands like the hands of a queen—or an abbess; and in the general fresh effect of her person the brilliant eyes like two stars with the calm reposeful way they had of moving on and off one, as if nothing in the world had the right to veil itself before their once sovereign beauty. Captain Blunt with smiling formality introduced me by name, adding with a certain relaxation of the formal ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... of sea-otter and other furs and he bore up for the island, with the intention of testing the truth of the tradition he had heard. He had more difficulty in entering the cave than in finding it, his schooner having to beat on and off shore for three days. Finally, he succeeded in effecting a landing, and clambering up the rocks he found himself in the presence of the dead chief, his family ...
— An introduction to the mortuary customs of the North American Indians • H. C. Yarrow
... highly attractive. She was small, thin, with a long, colorless face, and looked older than her years. Her eyes were, however, soft and dreamy, her smile piquant, her hair like gold-colored silk, and exquisitely long. Her manner and carriage both on and off the stage were so refined and charming, that of all the singers of the day she best expressed that thorough-bred look which is independent of all beauty and physical grace. "Never was there woman less vulgar, in physiognomy or in manner, ...
— Great Singers, Second Series - Malibran To Titiens • George T. Ferris
... easier! On and off, one had done the same thing since the year 1858, at frequent intervals, and had now reached the month of March, 1897; yet, as the whole result of six years' dogged effort to begin a new education, one could not recommend it to the young. The outlook lacked hope. The object of ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams
... "Officer Dutchy" would be an interesting one, as his previous career was—according to the reporter—full of "good stories." Mr. Hilliard was hoping, however, that it might be hurried on and off, taking up as little time as possible, as he had use for every moment other than hanging about a court-room giving evidence. Born in New York, he had gone West while a boy, and had never since been in the East till a day or two ago, when he had arrived from the neighbourhood of Bakersfield, California, ...
— The Port of Adventure • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... would hardly wait for me to dress, but flew on and off the window-sill, seeming to say, "Why don't you get up? why don't you get up? I have five little birds; they came out of the shells this very morning, so hungry that I can't get enough for them to eat! Why don't you get up, I say? I have five little birds, and I am taking care of them while my wife ...
— The Story Hour • Nora A. Smith and Kate Douglas Wiggin
... Constantinople are ridiculously narrow, their only practical use being to keep vehicles from running into the merchandise of the shopkeepers, and to give pedestrians plenty of exercise in jostling each other, and hopping on and off the curbstone to avoid inconveniencing the ladies, who of course are not to be jostled either off the sidewalk or into a sidewalk stock of miscellaneous merchandise. The Constantinople sidewalk is anybody's territory; the merchant encumbers ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... two watches. Of these the chief mate commands the larboard, and the second mate the starboard, being on and off duty, or on deck and below, every other four hours. The watch from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. is divided into two half, or dog, watches. By this means they divide the twenty-four hours into seven instead of six, and thus shift the ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books - Vol. II: Fiction • Arthur Mee, J. A. Hammerton, Eds.
... ecstasies. She would have Sophie to look over all her "toilettes," as she called frocks; to furbish up any that were "passees," and to air and arrange the new. For herself, she did nothing but caper about in the front chambers, jump on and off the bedsteads, and lie on the mattresses and piled-up bolsters and pillows before the enormous fires roaring in the chimneys. From school duties she was exonerated: Mrs. Fairfax had pressed me into her service, and I was all day in the storeroom, ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... in the Champs de Mars, and it was said that nearly a hundred thousand men were under arms for the occasion. I think there might have been quite seventy thousand. These mere reviews have little interest, the evolutions being limited to marching by regiments on and off the ground. In doing the latter, the troops defile before the king. Previously to this, the royal cortege passed along the several lines, ...
— Recollections of Europe • J. Fenimore Cooper
... they were gone, and she was gone, the garden felt very lonely. The Sunflowers stretched out their round faces just as if they were looking to see if the cab was coming back; and there was a robin, which kept hopping on and off the pump and peeping about with his eyes, as if he could not imagine what had become ...
— Last Words - A Final Collection of Stories • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... essentially a poet that whole pages of his are like so many litanies of alternating chants and recitations. His thoughts slip on and off their light rhythmic robes just as the mood takes him, as was shown in the passage I have quoted in prose and in verse. Many of the metrical preludes to his lectures are a versified and condensed abstract of the leading doctrine of the discourse. ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... idea, at first strange in its novelty, of the brain being external to the supreme force which is you, and in subjection to that force. You will, as a not very distant possibility, see yourself in possession of the power to switch your brain on and off in a particular subject as you switch electricity on and off in a particular room. The brain will get used to the straight paths of obedience. And—a remarkable phenomenon—it will, by the mere practice of obedience, become less forgetful and more effective. It will ...
— The Human Machine • E. Arnold Bennett
... ponies starting off at full gallop, we soon reached an enclosure of stone dykes, within which the black tents were pitched. The dogs were of immense size, and ragged, like the yaks, from their winter coat hanging to their flanks in great masses; each was chained near a large stone, on and off which he leapt as he gave tongue; they are very savage, but great cowards, and not remarkable ...
— Himalayan Journals (Complete) • J. D. Hooker |
