"Taps" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... some years afterwards, I found a set of modest young women who were much pleased with gifts of needles, thread, and thimbles; they also enjoyed a game of croquet after the lessons were done, and it was wonderful to see what smart taps of the mallet were fearlessly given under their bare feet; for of course the ...
— Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak • Harriette McDougall
... Danidoff had time to utter a cry or make a movement, a strong hand was over her lips, and another gripped her wrist, preventing her from reaching the button of the electric bell that was fixed among the taps. The Princess was almost fainting. She was expecting some horrible shock, expecting to feel some horrible weapon that would take her life, when the pressure on her lips and the grip upon her wrist gradually relaxed; and at the same moment, the mysterious ...
— Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... about the dining-room is permitted. After all the divisions are in and seated, the deputy Warden taps a small bell, and the convicts begin the work of "concealing the hash." Before the men enter the dining-room the coffee, bread and hash are placed on the table for each man. The prisoners are given all the food they can ...
— The Twin Hells • John N. Reynolds
... in spirit. He swung his cane, gave Jove a dozen love-taps and whistled operatic airs. What a charming young creature it was, to be sure! The brain of a woman and the heart of a child. And he had forgotten all about her. Now, of course, his recollection became clear. He remembered a mite of a girl in short frocks, wonder-eyes, and candy-smudged lips. ...
— Half a Rogue • Harold MacGrath
... and tense. Great experience is required to accustom the ear to the correct intonation, as in general the tensile strain on the saws approximates so closely to the breaking point that one or two extra taps on the keys are quite ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various
... day or two saw no traceable developments in the situation, but Miss Mapp's trained sense told her that there was underground work of some kind going on: she seemed to hear faint hollow taps and muffled knockings, and, so to speak, the silence of some unusual pregnancy. Up and down the High Street she observed short whispered conversations going on between her friends, which broke off on her approach. This only confirmed her view that these secret ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... visited cleanliness was discouraged, and the water system seemed a mere after-thought. In most cases the taps were buttons requiring continuous pressure, and then yielding only an exiguous supply; a kettle took nearly a minute to fill, so that while one tenant drew service others stood waiting. He spoke indignantly of it to Sister Jenifer. What were the ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... better! Why the devil should I scratch around for pennies. I'll make one swoop, and that's an end to it! Only God give us the nerve! Thanks, Lazar. You've treated me like a friend. [He rises] Now, get busy! [He goes up to him and taps him on the shoulder] If you get the thing done properly, you and I'll divide the profits. I'll reward you for the rest ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... covered with rolls of fat, his voice has changed; it has become thin and sharp. His temper has changed, too: he has grown ill-humoured and irritable. When he sees his patients he is usually out of temper; he impatiently taps the floor with his stick, and shouts in his ...
— The Lady with the Dog and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... scarcely keep; and there were several daughters amongst them. The loveliest was the youngest daughter; who was very beautiful indeed. One evening in autumn, in bad weather, the family sat round the fire; and there came three taps at the window. The father went out to see who it was, and he found only a great White Bear. And the White Bear said, "If you will give me your youngest daughter, I will make you rich." So the peasant went in and asked his daughter if she would be the wife of the White Bear; and the daughter ...
— Fairy Tales; Their Origin and Meaning • John Thackray Bunce
... of the pop-shop. He was now very unwilling to let us go. He did not ask another question about his mother, but he was consumed with trivial curiosity about us. Once again he alluded to Biddy. We were standing outside, and his eye fell upon the row of shining pop-taps— ...
— We and the World, Part II. (of II.) - A Book for Boys • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... the corner, and the chairs and the babies piled out of the way, and the real celebration of the evening begins. Then Tamoszius Kuszleika, after replenishing himself with a pot of beer, returns to his platform, and, standing up, reviews the scene; he taps authoritatively upon the side of his violin, then tucks it carefully under his chin, then waves his bow in an elaborate flourish, and finally smites the sounding strings and closes his eyes, and ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... duty. The officers were always, if possible, prominent athletes, to whom the boys could look up as being capable in physical as well as spiritual fields. There was a brief address each night before "taps" in the big marquee used for mess; and one night was always a straight talk on the problems of sex by the medical officers, whom the boys were advised to consult in their perplexities. These camps were among the happiest memories of my life, and many of the men to-day gratefully acknowledge ...
— A Labrador Doctor - The Autobiography of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... and, beckoning to his staff officer to join us, stumped onward to the garrison. The prolonged wail of the bugle, aided by the rising night wind, sent the solemn strains of taps sailing down the dimly-lighted valley, and with staring eyes old Folsom stood gazing after the departing officers, then whirled about toward the tents. There in front of Dean stood Pappoose, her hands clasped ...
— Warrior Gap - A Story of the Sioux Outbreak of '68. • Charles King
... in winter to the Platten See, when it is frozen and they begin to fish under the ice. It is capital sport. You might say to-morrow, 'While this cold lasts, I will be off to Fured to see how the fogasch get on,' and then you might shut yourself up in your other house here, and wait till some one taps at your window and says 'Now.' Then you would come ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... Secretly rejoicing in his own wisdom, he walked from window to window, slily listening for the gipsy's signal. "There it is!" cried he with more joy sparkling in his eyes than had ever enlightened them before. "Come this way, Archer; but don't tell anybody. Hark! do ye hear those three taps at the window? This is the old woman with twelve buns for me. I'll give you one whole one for yourself, if you will ...
— The Parent's Assistant • Maria Edgeworth
... Till it taps upon my heartstrings, And my very life goes dripping, Dropping, dripping, drip-drip-dropping, In ...
— Poems by William Ernest Henley • William Ernest Henley
... I said, "To dig that fellow up and get the money." He said, "The money be damned; I never saw the bloomin' grave before," or something like that. I was disappointed. He said, "Wait a few minutes until after 'taps,' and you will see that ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... appeal, but began to drum very softly with his fingers on the table. And the drumming, at first vague and of no significance, gradually took on, of itself as it seemed, a definite rhythm. There was a variation, too, in the strength of the taps—now they fell light, now they struck hard. Scrope was quite unconsciously beating out upon the table a particular tune, although, since there was but the one note sounded, Wyley could get no more than an elusive hint ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... done under that odious Hessian, Oswald—in hospital now, thank Heaven—though some time, when I tell you the story, you will see that in this, as in most other things, Heaven helps those who help themselves. Taps will sound in five minutes, and I can only add that I am in good health, glorious spirits, and unshaken confidence that we shall return to Acredale before your longing to see your son overcomes your love of glory. We shall return victors, if not heroes—at least ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... flower of women, and that if Messer Dante laid his heart at her feet it was no doubt a piece of great presumption, but otherwise an act highly to be applauded. We were very young in Florence in those days, and our hearts were always quick to beat time to the drum-taps of love or any other high and generous passion. If we have changed since, it is the fault of the changing years and the ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... and the time and the scene they sketched: these constituents clustered and combined to give me further support, to give me what I may call the note absolute. There it stands, accordingly, full in the tideway; driven in, with hard taps, like some strong stake for the noose of a cable, the swirl of the current roundabout it. What amplified the hint to more than the bulk of hints in general was the gift with it of the old Paris garden, for in that token were sealed up values infinitely ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... becoming sleepy, what with the fatigue she had undergone during the day and the heat of the fire, when suddenly there came three distinct taps ...
— The Rising of the Red Man - A Romance of the Louis Riel Rebellion • John Mackie
... wainscot or the door, Ready to thrill the being's core Of every enterprising bore 662 With their astounding glamour; Whatever ghost one wished to hear, By strange coincidence, was near To make the past or future clear (Sometimes in shocking grammar) By raps and taps, now there, now here— It seemed as if the spirit queer Of some departed auctioneer 670 Were doomed to practise by the year With the spirit of his hammer: Whate'er you asked was answered, yet One could not very deeply get Into the obliging spirits' ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... steel nail, and with the latter tapped several times upon the bit of veneering. Immediately they saw the sitting boy begin to fumble, as though he might be getting something out of his pocket. Then came an answering series of staccato taps, ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour - The Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain • George A. Warren
... same day I had asked her as to the agencies at work in producing the taps so constantly heard at Spiritualistic Seances. "You don't use spirits to produce taps," she said; "see here." She put her hand over my head, not touching it, and I heard and felt slight taps on the ...
— Annie Besant - An Autobiography • Annie Besant
... considered a very serious case. If this test were put to our license lawmakers, I fear they would have to go to the incurable ward. They have for many years been picking up drunkards from the gutters and opening taps for them to keep on pouring into the streets. Under this system the saloon keepers are playing ten-pins. You know in playing ten-pins there is a long alley, at one end of which stand the pins, while at the other stands the player with a ball in his hand. He rolls the ball ...
— Wit, Humor, Reason, Rhetoric, Prose, Poetry and Story Woven into Eight Popular Lectures • George W. Bain
... stand, with a huge water-tank raised on a staging near it. The mill pumped water from a hundred-foot well into this tank, which supplied, not only the cattle-troughs, but also the dwellings, for there were taps outside Government House, the cook-house, and the blacksmith's shop—a very unusual convenience ...
— In the Musgrave Ranges • Jim Bushman
... had burned low while they talked, and Elise was yawning sleepily. Miss Allison looked at her watch. "How the time has flown!" she exclaimed in surprise. "Where is the bugler of this camp? It is high time for him to play taps." ...
— The Little Colonel's Hero • Annie Fellows Johnston
... the Germans rained upon his face and shoulders, kicking out with their feet the while. Harris paid no more attention to these than he would have to the taps ...
— The Boy Allies at Jutland • Robert L. Drake
... is writing a poem of which a part is given in the first stanza—which is therefore put in italics. The action proper begins with the second stanza. The soul of the dead woman taps at the window in the shape of a night-butterfly or moth—imagining, perhaps, that she has still a voice and can make herself heard by the man that she loves. She tells the story of her wandering in space—privileged to pass to heaven, yet afraid of the journey. Now the subject of the poem ...
— Books and Habits from the Lectures of Lafcadio Hearn • Lafcadio Hearn
... as I am," he said to himself, as he turned on the hot and cold water taps. "And she is perfectly right about not coming with me. Of course it's jolly hard to leave her; but I believe I ...
— The Upas Tree - A Christmas Story for all the Year • Florence L. Barclay
... on, uttering private chuckles as numerous as a woodpecker's taps, and Ethelberta with him. She walked as by a miracle, but she would walk. She would have died rather than not have ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy
... Three taps on the door of my prison jerked me round as if I had been pulled by a string. My revolver was in my hand. The door opened slowly and ...
— The Pirate of Panama - A Tale of the Fight for Buried Treasure • William MacLeod Raine
... premeditated. It is eloquence itself! The light of heaven playing on her beautiful face betrays the passion of it—the rich pallor! One hand resting on the back of the seat taps upon the iron work, the other is now in ...
— April's Lady - A Novel • Margaret Wolfe Hungerford
... dame. But toil was hard, for trade was good, And gallants sometimes will be rude. "And what can a lone woman do? The nights are long and eerie too. Now, Guillot there's a likely man, None better draws or taps a can; He's just the man, I think, to suit, If I could bring my courage to't." With thoughts like these her mind is crossed: The dame, they say, who doubts, is lost. "But then the risk? I'll beg a slice Of Father Haulin's ...
— The Bon Gaultier Ballads • William Edmonstoune Aytoun
... and elbows, and behind them, making a dark line along the wall, were the marks where the heads of the sitters rubbed as they tilted back. Nor can I forget the spittoons,—large shallow boxes, two feet square,—four of them, full of sand. On a third side of the room stood the basin and water-taps, and beside them a large black-walnut cabinet, full of shelves. The shelves were full of mugs, and on every mug was a name, in gilt letters, generally Old English. Those mugs were a town directory of our leading citizens. My father's mug was on the next to the top shelf, third from the end on the ...
— Penguin Persons & Peppermints • Walter Prichard Eaton
... by a writer in Poor Robin's Almanack, for 1723, thus:—"Now comes on old merry plentiful Christmas. The Husbandman lays his great Log behind the fire, and with a few of his neighbours, over a good fire, taps his Christmas beer, cuts his Christmas cheese, and sets forward for a merry Christmas. The Landlord (for we hope there are yet some generous ones left) invites his Tenants and Labourers, and with a good Sirloin of Roast Beef, and a few pitchers of nappy ale or beer, he wisheth ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... durable batteries and very wide amplification. As with their first radio and the one for their good old friend, Mr. Hooper, they made nearly all the parts themselves, even to the switch arms, contacts, buzzer and binding posts, cutting all threads with a fine set of standard taps and dies. ...
— Radio Boys Loyalty - Bill Brown Listens In • Wayne Whipple
... of view, on this microscopic grand parade, close to the spring whose waters are caught in pipes with taps, three bronze statues stand in different spots. One, a Virgin, in the most preposterous garments, her headgear a sort of pastry-mould, a Mohican's bonnet, is on her knees weeping, with her face hidden in her hands. Then the same Woman, standing up, ...
— The Cathedral • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... by a resounding knock on the door by which the lads had so recently entered—three light taps, followed by a single loud tap. Immediately Georges was upon his feet again, and unlocked and unbarred the door and peered out. Then he threw wide the door and another ...
— The Boy Allies in the Trenches - Midst Shot and Shell Along the Aisne • Clair Wallace Hayes
... and I am glad enough of it." The punches now smoked upon the table; and as the general drew up his chair beside the secretary, that functionary began to relate the cause of his absence. "I got safe into Baltimore, you see, and having no more fears of the finger-taps of sheriffs, was quietly wending my way for the Gilmore House, and had reached a fine old mansion that stood a little from the street, when my attention was attracted by a voice singing so sweetly that I became like one transfixed, ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"
... he will open the door of business himself—safe. I'll drink his health. He's not a bad sort, Cheetham: only he'd sell his soul for money. I hate such rubbish. Here's 'Perdition to the lot; and no heel-taps.'" ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... to the masts, where they stopped and made a concerted clicking with pieces of wood hanging at their sides, simulating perfectly the rattling of dry bones and gnashing of teeth. Twice they went in a circle around the masts, marching in time to low taps on the drums, and then joined in a lugubrious religious chant. Having once more made the concerted rattling of their artificial bones and jaws, they executed some contortions painful to ...
— The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ - The Original Text of Nicolas Notovitch's 1887 Discovery • Nicolas Notovitch
... my little friend, you are just let loose from school, and come hither to scrub your blooming face, and drown the memory of certain taps of the ferule, and other schoolboy troubles, in a draft from the Town Pump. Take it, pure as the current of your young life; take it, and may your heart and tongue never be scorched with ...
— Eighth Reader • James Baldwin
... and his death is believed to have been caused by magic, the people resort to divination in order to discover the wicked magician who has perpetrated the crime. For this purpose they place the corpse on a bier, cover it with a mat, and set it on the shoulders of four men, while a fifth man taps lightly with an arrow on the mat and enquires of the departed whether such and such a village has bewitched him to death. If the bier remains still, it means "No"; but if it rocks backward and forward, it means "Yes," and the avengers of blood must seek their victim, the guilty ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer
... chatted like warblers escaped from their cage. It was a perfect delirium. From time to time they bestowed little taps on the young men. Matutinal intoxication of life! adorable years! the wings of the dragonfly quiver. Oh, whoever you may be, do you not remember? Have you rambled through the brushwood, holding aside the branches, on account of the charming head which is coming ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... played as follows:—It is agreed by the player and his confederate that one tap on the floor shall represent A, two taps E, three taps I, four taps O, and five taps U, and that the first letter of each remark the confederate makes shall be one of the consonants of the word or sentence decided upon by the company. The consonants must be taken in order. On the ...
— Games For All Occasions • Mary E. Blain
... like Scaramouch's in the pantomime. See, there comes another blue-riband, as I live. My Lord Bamborough. The descendant of the Hotspurs. The proudest man in England. He stops, he bows, he smiles; he is hat in hand, too. See, she taps him with her fan. Get away, you crowd of little blackguard boys, and don't tread on the robe of the lady whom ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... of clapboards beside him, and he took one up and he lifted the edge of the one above, and he tucked the thin edge of the clapboard that he held in his hand under the edge that he had lifted; and he gave it little taps with his hammer until it was in the right place, and then he drove fine nails through the thick edge that he had lifted, and through the thin edge of the clapboard beneath, and into ...
— The Doers • William John Hopkins
... was speedily hurled to the ground: and Jem, who had thrown himself upon him, was apparently searching about for some weapon to put a bloody termination to the conflict, when the trampling of a horse was heard at the door, three taps were repeated slowly, one after the other, and a ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... side of his nature was brilliantly illustrated a year later. Being invited to spend the day with a playmate of his own age, he built a big fire with newspapers in the bath room, turned on all the taps, pretending that they were the hydrants, and then ran through the hall, banging a dustpan and shouting "fire" at the top ...
— Bert Lloyd's Boyhood - A Story from Nova Scotia • J. McDonald Oxley
... Cha taps and calls, while I take off my shoes upon the worn wooden steps of the temple; and after a minute of waiting, we bear a muffled step approaching and a hollow cough behind the paper screens. They slide open; ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan - First Series • Lafcadio Hearn
... through the white water, we talked of the northern spring that was just beginning. He sells cream, eggs, poultry, potatoes, honey, occasionally pork and veal; but at this season it was the time for the maple sugar crop. He has a sugar orchard, where he taps twelve hundred trees and hopes soon to tap as many more in addition. Said Cherrie: "It's a busy time now for Fred Rice"—Fred Rice is the hired man, and in sugar time the Cherrie boys help him with enthusiasm, ...
— Through the Brazilian Wilderness • Theodore Roosevelt
... "Make it southeast for ten miles or so—and then swing south. I'll tap you on the shoulder when I want you to turn. Whichever shoulder I tap, turn that way. Middle of your back, go straight ahead; two taps will mean fly low; three taps, land. ...
— Skyrider • B. M. Bower
... children, docile, gay, and lovable, in the midst of this war for freedom on which they have intelligently entered. Last night, before "taps," there was the greatest noise in camp that I had ever heard, and I feared some riot. On going out, I found the most tumultuous sham-fight proceeding in total darkness, two companies playing like boys, ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... have to, pay. Yet they made grim faces when, all too soon, the retreat call from the barracks sounded, and away they would have to go on the double quick, to be at post by the time of roll call, and in bed at sound of taps. ...
— The Expedition of the Donner Party and its Tragic Fate • Eliza Poor Donner Houghton
... town band gets on the square On concert night you'll find me there. I'm right beside Elijah Plumb, Who plays th' cymbals an' bass drum; An' next to him is Henry Dunn, Who taps the little tenor one. I like to hear our town band play, But, best it does, I want to say, Is when they tell a tune's to come With ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume V. (of X.) • Various
... "tattoo," and finally far away a trumpet sounded "taps"; then another and another and another still. At last, when all were through, "taps" rose once more out of the darkness to the left. This last trumpeter had waited—he knew his theme and knew his power. The rest had simply ...
— Crittenden - A Kentucky Story of Love and War • John Fox, Jr.
... they were conscious of not sharing with their neighbours and contemporaries. If a myth is a piece of unscientific philosophizing, it must sometimes be applied to the explanation of obscure psychological as well as of physical phenomena. Where the modern calmly taps his forehead and says, "Arrested development," the terrified ancient made the sign of the ...
— Myths and Myth-Makers - Old Tales and Superstitions Interpreted by Comparative Mythology • John Fiske
... from letter which Ruby holds) "And, my darling Ruby—if your father dies"—there's not much "if" about it. He does. (taps her hair) I've seen ...
— Oh! Susannah! - A Farcical Comedy in Three Acts • Mark Ambient
... experience had taught her to suspect them. As was the custom in that locality, the water supply depended on a rickety windwheel. It was with a dark foreboding that she returned to the kitchen and turned on one of the taps. For perhaps three seconds a stream of the dimension of a darning-needle emerged, then with a sad gurgle the tap relapsed into a stolid inaction. There is no stolidity so utter as that of ...
— Uneasy Money • P.G. Wodehouse
... doubtful. The funeral was not ceremonially complete till Grandfather Vine had done choking over his heel-taps, but Ellen had undoubtedly endured a good deal with remarkable patience—her virtue ought in justice to be rewarded. Also Joanna noticed for the first time that she was looking grotesque as well as uncomfortable, owing perhaps to the hat being ...
— Joanna Godden • Sheila Kaye-Smith
... a couple of taps like—to settle it," deprecated the other. "Three fences from home I see I'd got the measure of 'em, and come away from the ruck with a rattle. Then ...
— Boy Woodburn - A Story of the Sussex Downs • Alfred Ollivant
... merely to lie on the grass was sufficient satisfaction for the canine mind. And Nebbie, yawning extensively, and stretching himself a little more, closed his eyes in a rapture of peace, and stirred his tail slightly with one, two, three mild taps on the soft grass, when a sudden clear whistle caused him to spring up with every hair bristling on end, fore-paws well ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... all whom it might concern that it was five minutes past the half-hour 'twixt seven and eight, and there were girls in every group, and many a young fellow in the rigid line of gray and white before them, resentful of the fact that dress parade was wofully late and long, with tattoo and taps only two hours or so away. The season for the regular summer "hops" had not yet begun, for this was away back in the eighties, when many another old West Point fashion still prevailed; but there was to be an informal dance ...
— To The Front - A Sequel to Cadet Days • Charles King
... age she attends banquets, chiefly as a drum-player. She is then the most charming little creature imaginable, and already knows how to fill your wine-cup exactly full, with a single toss of the bottle and without spilling a drop, between two taps of her drum. ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... he spoken, ere three taps were heard at the door—the guests looked at each other ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... in a jiffy and didn't say a word, but I notice that she pays attention to the signals now, and does her reading before they sound 'taps.' All this is teaching yours truly a wonderful amount of self control, and I have come to the conclusion that everything at Warwick Hall, disagreeables and all, are working together ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston
... then strangled him, somewhere, and placed him in the quicklime in the Sapsea vault, locked him in, and went to bed. Next, according to Mr. Proctor, Durdles, then, "lying drunk in the precincts," for some reason taps with his hammer on the wall of the Sapsea vault, detects the presence of a foreign body, opens the tomb, and finds Drood in the quicklime, "his face fortunately protected by the strong silk shawl with which Jasper has intended to ...
— The Puzzle of Dickens's Last Plot • Andrew Lang
... the house, besides he had Perezvon, who had been told to lie flat, without moving, under the bench in the hall. Every time Kolya, walking to and fro through the rooms, came into the hall, the dog shook his head and gave two loud and insinuating taps on the floor with his tail, but alas! the whistle did not sound to release him. Kolya looked sternly at the luckless dog, who relapsed again into obedient rigidity. The one thing that troubled Kolya was "the ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... pieces of metal, and the entire thing is buried in the fired charcoal. In fifteen minutes the metal melts and runs down through the gate at the bottom of the funnel into the hollow, wax-lined mold. Since the entire mold is hot, the metal does not cool or harden promptly, and the pipe maker taps and jars the mold in order to make the metal ...
— The Bontoc Igorot • Albert Ernest Jenks
... brave since, as I used to feel as I jumped into bed conscious of an ordeal creditably over. Why is bed such a safe place? I am not half so brave as I used to be. I remember at the age of ten doing a thing that I have never dared to do since. I sat in the bath with my back to the taps. Do you suppose the innocent designer of baths meant everybody to sit like that, with a tap looking over each shoulder? Taps are known to be savage brutes, and it is everybody's instinct to sit the other way round, and keep an eye on the danger. If I were as brave ...
— This Is the End • Stella Benson
... long time," and the odor of moth-balls got down into Carl's throat, while in the golden Olympian atmosphere at the other end of the room Gertie coyly pretended to slap the dentist's hand with a series of tittering taps. "A long, long time before either you or I were born, Carl, and we can't very well set ourselves up to be wiser than the wisest men that ever lived, now can we?" Again the patronizing smile. "That ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... While the orchestra taps its boomerangs and claps its hands and grunts, two boys in mere nature progress towards the fire in a series of stiff, stilty jumps, the legs from the hips to the ankles being rigid; then the knees shake in a rapid succession of spasmodic ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... represented in a fright, is waiting for his master Harlequin in his apartment; having put everything in order, according to his confused notions, he takes the guitar, seats himself in an arm-chair, and plays. Pasquariel comes gently behind him, and taps time on his shoulders—this throws Scaramouch into a panic. "It was then that incomparable model of our most eminent actors," says Gherardi, "displayed the miracles of his art; that art which paints the passions in the face, throws them into every gesture, ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli
... but instead of simply resuming where he had left off, from force of habit he first gave the leader's usual three sharp taps upon his music desk, and then—so queer a thing is an audience—those people, brought to their feet in an agony of terror, of fire, panic, and sudden death by a woman's cry, now at that familiar tap, tap, tap, broke here and there into laughter. ...
— Stage Confidences • Clara Morris
... upon penetrating still farther into the wilderness to another cattle farm. Then, left alone with Cousin Egbert, I was not long in discovering that, strictly speaking, he had no establishment. Not only were there no servants, but there were no drains, no water-taps, no ice-machine, no scullery, no central heating, no electric wiring. His hut consisted of but a single room, and this without a floor other than the packed earth, while the appointments were such as ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... when the pressure at the first burner connected to the pipe after it enters the house is not more than half an inch above the pressure at the burner furthermost removed from the first one, all the burner-taps being turned on at the time the pressures are observed. If the acetylene generating plant is not many yards from the building to be supplied, it is a safe rule to calculate the size of pipes required on the basis of a fall of pressure of only half an inch from the ...
— Acetylene, The Principles Of Its Generation And Use • F. H. Leeds and W. J. Atkinson Butterfield
... illuminate, and make ever plainer and plainer the significance of animal and vegetable structure. It dealt from floor to ceiling and end to end with the Theory of the Forms of Life; the very duster by the blackboard was there to do its share in that work, the very washers in the taps; the room was more simply concentrated in aim even than a church. To that, perhaps, a large part of its satisfyingness was due. Contrasted with the confused movement and presences of a Fabian meeting, or the inexplicable enthusiasm behind the suffrage demand, ...
— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells
... staff officers should co-operate vigorously in trying to attain it. His impulsiveness, however, led him sometimes into personal efforts at discipline where the results were at least doubtful. He would sometimes go out through the camps in the evening, and if he saw a tent lighted after "taps," or heard men singing or talking, he would strike loudly on the canvas with the flat of his sword and command silence or the extinguishment of the light. The men, in good-humored mischief, would try different ways of "getting even" ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V1 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... answered, between taps of his noisy hammer, "it's foolish of you to take it so to heart, and look on nothing but the dark side. Of course, it is dreadful to be burned out of house and home, but it might have been lots worse. All the down-stairs furniture was saved, and the insurance company is going to put ...
— Flip's "Islands of Providence" • Annie Fellows Johnston
... perceived between the visible taps of a hammer, is, to my mind, exactly like the relation of succession between the tangible taps; the unlikeness between red and blue is a mental phenomenon of the same order as the unlikeness between ...
— Critiques and Addresses • Thomas Henry Huxley
... though it were nectar fit for the gods. Heavens, how we did drink! Then when we had done drinking we tore off our clothes and sat down in the pool, absorbing the moisture through our parched skins. You, Harry, my boy, who have only to turn on a couple of taps to summon "hot" and "cold" from an unseen, vasty cistern, can have little idea of the luxury of that muddy wallow in brackish ...
— King Solomon's Mines • H. Rider Haggard
... anticipating the Morse code the Africans employed this "telegraph drum" in sending messages from village to village for long distances and with great speed. Differences of speech were no bar, for the tom tom code was interlingual. The official drummer could explain by the high and low alternations of his taps that a deed of violence just done was not a crime but a pourparler for the forming of a league. Every week for three months in 1800 the tom toms doubtless carried the news throughout Ashantee land that King Quamina's funeral had just been repeated and two hundred more slaves slain ...
— American Negro Slavery - A Survey of the Supply, Employment and Control of Negro Labor as Determined by the Plantation Regime • Ulrich Bonnell Phillips
... mentioned in the presence of Kings! Yet, . . notwithstanding the incivility of the statement, . . it is most certain that His Most Potent Majesty as well as His Majesty's Most Potent Laureate, MUST..DIE.. !" And he accompanied the words "must..die..." with two decisive taps of his staff, smacking his withered lips meanwhile as though ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... murmured, "in the reserve; that is easy to say. But where is there any room? And this one needs a lot." At last Hermance, after having given a number of little taps to the right and left, succeeded in making a sort of slit, into which I had great difficulty in sliding. Hermance gave me and my neighbors some more little taps to lump us together, and then shut the door. Darkness reigned. I was placed between a blue velvet ...
— Parisian Points of View • Ludovic Halevy
... thence to the admiring eyes of beauty-loving women. The human freight that was brought to the big doors in these days consisted of the pierced and mutilated bodies of men; soldiers for whom the final taps would soon sound. If they chanced to be of the British troops, and held fast to the spark of life within them, then they were close enough to the seaport to be taken across the channel for ...
— The Flag • Homer Greene
... three, sharp, jerky taps. Madge Steele quickened her pace along the path and the newcomers followed her. Other girls were pouring into the building nearest to the main structure of Briarwood. A broad stairway led up to assembly rooms; ...
— Ruth Fielding at Briarwood Hall - or Solving the Campus Mystery • Alice B. Emerson
... hour after this when taps was sounded and all the cadets were supposed to turn in for the night. Previous to this Andy and ...
— The Rover Boys Under Canvas - or The Mystery of the Wrecked Submarine • Arthur M. Winfield
... taps at the door made him start; but the visitor was only one of the brewery boys, who gave him ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843 • Various
... cigarette paper after the scattered tobacco he thrust one hand into his trouser pocket. With the other he held the cane, emphasising his points by ringing taps upon the pavement. Geiger, taking the cigar between his fingers, listened with open mouth to the outburst that followed. Valmore and Freedom Smith dropped their conversation and with broad smiles upon their faces gave attention, ...
— Windy McPherson's Son • Sherwood Anderson
... and machine production. "Since that time one can trace a steady substitution of wholesale and collective methods for household and family methods. It has gone far with us now. Instead of the woman drawing water from a well, the pipes and taps of the water company. Instead of the home-made rushlight, the electric lamp. Instead of home-spun, ready-made clothes. Instead of home-brewed, the brewer's cask. Instead of home-baked, first the little baker and then, clean ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... continues, 'is unknown on the Continent; on your washing-table you find, not one miserable water-bottle with a single earthenware jug and basin, and a long strip of towel, but positive tubs of porcelain in which you may plunge half your body; taps which instantly supply you with streams of water at pleasure; half-a-dozen wide towels, a large standing mirror, foot-baths and other conveniences of the toilet, ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston
... evening after that Olga heard light footsteps and voices in the hall, and taps on Lizette's door. Elsie and Alice were determined she should no longer feel that "nobody cared," so they were her first callers, but others followed. Lizette welcomed them all with shining eyes, and once ...
— The Torch Bearer - A Camp Fire Girls' Story • I. T. Thurston
... say so. I say so. E'en so. Technic. (He taps his parchmentroll energetically) This book tells you how to act with all descriptive particulars. Consult index for agitated fear of aconite, melancholy of muriatic, priapic pulsatilla. Virag is going to talk about amputation. Our old friend caustic. They must be starved. Snip off with horsehair ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... mouth of the mine was now intense, and every man who came up from it was besieged by anxious inquiries for the very latest news. What was the meaning of the three taps three times repeated? Did it signify that there were nine persons in the breast, or only three? If only three, where were the others? Who were the three? How many were alive? Were any dead? These and a thousand like questions were asked and discussed, but nobody ...
— Derrick Sterling - A Story of the Mines • Kirk Munroe
... in the telegraph office. Instead of the rat-tat-tat of the little instrument so familiar to both of us, Jack, by a series of long or short howls and grunts, gave me his message, to which I replied by careless taps of my cane or hand, nobody suspecting that my casual movements meant anything, nor supposing for an instant that a sudden burst of African forest yells, which sent a fat lady nearly into hysterics, and made two small children howl ...
— Half-Hours with Great Story-Tellers • Various
... huge sport to their companions, yet even in their intoxication they were surprisingly capable. There was a great deal of laughter and disorder on every hand, and all made frequent trips to the water-taps, returning adrip to the waist, their hair and beards bejewelled with drops. Boyd saw one, a well-dressed fellow in a checked suit, remove his clothes and hang them carefully upon a nail, then painfully ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach
... say so, but stuck it together wi' yaller soap, and thought I wouldn't see it. Then one of the customers made her laugh, and she let seven pewters fall, and they be battered outrageous. And she has been chuckin' the heel taps to the hog, and made him as drunk as a Christian. She'll drive me out of my ...
— The Broom-Squire • S. (Sabine) Baring-Gould
... stirring scenes had been witnessed here since the days of the civil war. Troop trains arriving or departing, drills at camp and practice marches through the town, martial music from many bands, reveille and taps, all contributed to impress the town folk with the fact that ...
— A Virginia Village • Charles A. Stewart
... bugle sang "TAPS"—translatable, this time, into "Good-bye, and God keep us all!" for taps is the soldier's nightly release from duty, and farewell: plaintive, sweet, pathetic, for the morning is never sure, for him; always it is possible that he ...
— A Horse's Tale • Mark Twain
... open place in the sunlight, and yet she knew well that robins do not drum upon the bark of trees like woodpeckers. So she jumped lightly up and ran to the tree, and at once she was aware that the tapping was from inside the tree. And between the taps that were no louder than those of a branch against a window-pane she distinctly heard a ...
— Childhood's Favorites and Fairy Stories - The Young Folks Treasury, Volume 1 • Various
... on the stairs, then three light taps on the door. She scrambled to her feet before she remembered Birdie's caution, ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice
... the "holy hour" strike, and as the last stroke sounded he fancied he saw the Cupid and Psyche surmounting his clock entwine their alabaster arms about one another. At the same moment two timid taps ...
— Bohemians of the Latin Quarter • Henry Murger |
