"Thoroughbred" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... his fictitious origin. The Master of Ravenswood attitudinises a little too much with his Spanish cloak and his slouched hat; but we feel really sorry for him when he disappears in the Kelpie's Flow. And when Scott has to do with his own peasants, with the thoroughbred Presbyterian Scotchman, he can bring intense tragic interest from his homely materials. Douce Davie Deans, distracted between his religious principles and his desire of saving his daughter's life, and ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... whirled through the air towards the crested neck. One missed its mark, but the other fell, true as a gun-shot over the small, thoroughbred head. It was Jacky's rope which had found its mark. A hitch round the horn of her saddle, and her horse threw himself back with her forefeet braced, and faced the captive. Then the rope tightened with a jerk which taxed its rawhide strands to their ...
— The Story of the Foss River Ranch • Ridgwell Cullum
... blood seemed to come and go in the tanned cheeks, the square shoulders were just ready to make that quick, impatient little movement that had been so characteristic of him, so like the sudden tension of every muscle when a thoroughbred scents sport or danger. No ordinary artist would ever have seen all there was in the man, even in a dozen sittings, but the twin gifts of sight and memory had unconsciously absorbed and held the whole, and a skill that was never outdone in its time had made memory ...
— The White Sister • F. Marion Crawford
... to camp. It did not suit him to be a modern soldier. In the thick, gritty, hideous khaki his subtle physique was extinguished as if he had been killed. In the ugly intimacy of the camp his thoroughbred sensibilities were just degraded. But he had chosen, so he accepted. An ugly little look came on to his face, of a man who has accepted his ...
— England, My England • D.H. Lawrence
... vigil underneath the drawing-room windows, he had been shocked into sobriety by his sister's violence, and his own rage against her tormentors. Growing more and more sober, and more and more sullen, he stabled the ill-used thoroughbred with his own hands, and then, avoiding alike both servants and family, he crept into the house, and ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch
... woman who lived at first in the kitchen of "the other house" and afterward on the home farm. Tall and thin, with big, thoroughbred eyes, and long, straight hair, like a witch, turning gray, she was rather terrifying, but more than ...
— Reminiscences of Tolstoy - By His Son • Ilya Tolstoy
... me, upon your honour, if you know what that word means—upon your conscience, if you ever heard of any such thing—don't you think yourself a most pitiful dog, to persist in coming here to be made game of for twopence? 'Tis wonderful how much your thoroughbred Jew will do and suffer for gain. We poor good Christians could never do as much now—could we any soul of ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth
... thing; there was no thought of preference in the matter. If you were not one of those fellows who mistake an illustration, and see everything in a figure but the parallel, I should say that I had trained too finely. Now had she been thoroughbred, I was all right; as a cocktail, I ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever
... to his own, by his sister across the table. No one, reflected Edith, could image Mary Vertrees the sort of girl who would "really flirt" with married men—she was obviously the "opposite of all that." Edith defined her as a "thoroughbred," a "nice girl"; and the look given to Roscoe was astounding. Roscoe's wife saw it, too, and she was another whom it puzzled—though not ...
— The Turmoil - A Novel • Booth Tarkington
... replied Sam. 'These here ones as is below, though, ain't reg'lar thoroughbred sawbones; they're only in trainin'.' 'In other words they're medical students, I suppose?' said ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... the Senator that he did not offer to shake hands, just as most of us would think more highly of Judas Iscariot if he had not kissed Christ. Being a Westerner, she had the Westerner's horror of a maverick sporting the brand of a thoroughbred. The Senator took off his glasses and sat tapping them above the U. S. ...
— The Freebooters of the Wilderness • Agnes C. Laut
... was a thoroughbred Northerner, having first opened his eyes in Illinois. He came to New Mexico just prior to the acquisition of the territory by the United States prior to the granting of the ranch then known as the Beaubien Grant. He was in the employ as hunter ...
— The Second William Penn - A true account of incidents that happened along the - old Santa Fe Trail • William H. Ryus
... the hand-writing compensated for the hands; and as she attached great importance to blood and race, that she did not live to read Byron's "thoroughbred and tapering fingers," or to be shocked by his theory that "the hand is almost the only sign of blood which aristocracy can generate." Her Bath friend appeals to a miniature (engraved for this work) by Roche, of Bath, taken ...
— Autobiography, Letters and Literary Remains of Mrs. Piozzi (Thrale) (2nd ed.) (2 vols.) • Mrs. Hester Lynch Piozzi
... lately, however, as if Charlotte was growing a little weary of the gorgeous spectacle—the ever-changing, ever-splendid diorama of West End life. She no longer exclaimed at the sight of each exceptional toilette; she no longer smiled admiringly on the thoroughbred horses champing their bits in the immediate neighbourhood of her bonnet; she no longer gave a little cry of delight when the big drags came slowly along the crowded ranks, the steel bars shining as they swung loosely in the low afternoon sunlight, the driver, ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... Kate Wilkes' did, only made her the more misunderstood. She did not have less talent than Vina or Beth; indeed, she had been considered of rather rich promise in Paris; but she had less developed energies and balance to use them, less physique. She lacked the spirit of that little thoroughbred, Vina Nettleton, and the pride and courage of Beth Truba. The Grey One had been badly hurt in that sadly sensitive period which follows the putting away of girlish things—when womanhood is new and wonderful. She was slow ...
— Fate Knocks at the Door - A Novel • Will Levington Comfort
... agreed Gavin, smiling at the man's new ardor for battle. "It would be a pleasant little brush—if it weren't for your sister. Miss Standish has seen about enough of that sort of thing for one night. If she weren't a thoroughbred, with the nerves of a thoroughbred and the pluck as well, she'd be a wreck, from what has happened already. More of it might ...
— Black Caesar's Clan • Albert Payson Terhune
... to a little hollow where a hundred or more cattle were gathered, like the rapt spectators in an amphitheater, around two bulls engaged in mortal combat. One, as Seth quickly saw, was a red Hereford, his best thoroughbred; the other, a black Angus, and even more valuable, was Haig's. The red bull, bleeding from many wounds, was plainly being worsted in the encounter. With a roar of rage, Huntington drew his revolver, urged his unwilling horse down into the arena where the turf was torn up for ...
— The Heart of Thunder Mountain • Edfrid A. Bingham
... of confidence in himself, and seeing in the queen's desire a road to success, hastened to obey her command, sang before her, and pleased her. She begged him then of Moreto, making no more of it than if she had asked of him a thoroughbred dog or a well-trained falcon. Moreta presented him to her, delighted at finding such an opportunity to pay his court; but scarcely was Rizzio in her service than Mary discovered that music was the least of his gifts, that he possessed, besides ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... yes! Just my view, Sukey. Yes, old girl, Alaska's a funny kind o' place for you and me to be in, isn't it? Hey? Ye-e-yes." And he stroked the cow and sniffed back the salt water, and called out, seeing the Boy, "Look! They've got a thoroughbred bull, too, an' a heifer. Lord, I haven't been in any place so like home for a coon's age! You go and look at the caches. I'll stay here ...
— The Magnetic North • Elizabeth Robins (C. E. Raimond)
... of both men sparkled with a curious exhilaration. The plain-clothes man drew a deep and sudden breath, and appeared to shiver. So a soldier may breathe at the command to charge; so a thoroughbred shivers when the barrier is ...
— The Penalty • Gouverneur Morris
... both spirit and tenderness, when either is wanted. I'm not going to bemoan their light-mindedness; at all events, I thought it was very pleasant, and they were very good to me. They saw I wasn't a first-hander or a thoroughbred, and they made it easy for me. No, it was a happy time for me—and, by George, how they fed us! I expect the women looked after all that. I daresay that, as far as economics go, it was all wrong, and that these people are only ...
— Father Payne • Arthur Christopher Benson
... there are geniuses on both sides of the law; and the pariah-dog is always just a bit quicker mentally than the thoroughbred hound who hunts him; indeed, to save his ...
— The Voice in the Fog • Harold MacGrath
... to cut the grass furiously, reminding me of a thoroughbred hunter I once saw harnessed ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... set is the daughter-in-law of a Missouri senator and a very pretty woman. Another of this set is the woman who was voted the best dressed woman at the horse show in a newspaper scheme. Her father is a millionaire doctor and her husband is a thoroughbred. It cannot be said even of this set, however, that it is fast in the immoral sense in which that word usually is employed. It is gay and the women are only unfortunate in having nothing to do ...
— Volume 10 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... sometimes saw a queer character known as "Billy Button." He was a sight to behold, for he was decorated with buttons, mostly brass, from top to toe, and presented a sight that was enough to make a thoroughbred ...
— A Tale of One City: The New Birmingham - Papers Reprinted from the "Midland Counties Herald" • Thomas Anderton
... time young Monkey saw thoroughbred horses. They were a revelation to the lad. He stood ...
— Boy Woodburn - A Story of the Sussex Downs • Alfred Ollivant
... liked about him was the air of thoroughbred ease with which he adapted himself to his surroundings. He was in swell society on the occasion of our first meeting, being bestridden by the colonel of the regiment. He was dressed and caparisoned in the height of martial fashion; his clear eyes, glistening ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King
... was there, a stripling on a small and weedy beast, He was something like a racehorse undersized, With a touch of Timor pony — three parts thoroughbred at least — And such as are by mountain horsemen prized. He was hard and tough and wiry — just the sort that won't say die — There was courage in his quick impatient tread; And he bore the badge of gameness in his bright and fiery eye, And ...
— The Man from Snowy River • Andrew Barton 'Banjo' Paterson
... and four, with black postilions in livery, for the use of Mrs. Washington and her lady visitors. As for himself, he always appeared on horseback. His stable was well filled and admirably regulated. His stud was thoroughbred and in excellent order. His household books contain registers of the names, ages, and marks of his various horses; such as Ajax, Blueskin, Valiant, Magnolia (an Arab), &c. Also his dogs, chiefly fox-hounds, ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving
... and puffing, sweating like diggers in a sewer, with their collars wilted to rags, watching the great hall-clock with the intentness of a man waiting to be hanged. "Still an hour left before closing time!" a speaker's friends would say. And the great orator, like a wearied horse, but a thoroughbred, would find new energy somewhere and start on another lap, round and round, repeating what he had already said a dozen times, summarizing the two ideas he had managed to produce in four hours of sonorous chatter. With duration as the test of quality, no one on the government had yet succeeded in ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... "When thoroughbred horses want to leap a barrier, they go up to reconnoitre it, and smell it over. Calyste ...
— Beatrix • Honore de Balzac
... said, laughing. "So don't talk about it—I don't believe it exists." She stood watching him for a moment as he tried to mount; his big young thoroughbred resented the idea of anyone on his back, and Jim had to hop beside him, with one foot in the stirrup, while he danced round in a circle, trying to get away. Jim seized an opportunity, and was in the saddle with a lithe swing; whereupon ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... gave me!" said Chunk, broadening his grin; "well, it was this way. I sat down at the supper table last night at Riddle's, and I looked at Rosy, and I says to myself, 'Chunk, if you get the girl get her on the square—don't try any hocus-pocus with a thoroughbred like her.' And I keeps the paper you give me in my pocket. And then my lamps fall on another party present, who, I says to myself, is failin' in a proper affection toward his comin' son-in-law, so I watches my chance and dumps that powder in ...
— The Four Million • O. Henry
... it was especially beautiful. Alice and I also wished that you could have been with us when we were out riding at Geneseo. Major Wadsworth put me on a splendid big horse called Triton, and sister on a thoroughbred mare. They would jump anything. It was sister's first experience, but she did splendidly and rode at any fence at which I would first put Triton. I did not try anything very high, but still some of the posts and rails were about ...
— Letters to His Children • Theodore Roosevelt
... him any vicious habit; a nervousness and restlessness and switch of the tail, when everything about him was in repose, being the only indication that he might be untrustworthy. No one but a novice could be deceived by this, however, for the intelligence evinced in every feature, and his thoroughbred appearance, were so striking that any person accustomed to horses could not misunderstand such a noble animal. But Campbell thought otherwise, at least when the horse was to a certain degree yet untrained, and ...
— The Memoirs of General P. H. Sheridan, Complete • General Philip Henry Sheridan
... said to be lying at anchor off Aber, between Bangor and Conway: and in that direction expresses were sent off one upon the heels of the other; some having orders to go on to Parkgate and Liverpool. A favourite groom of Sir Morgan's, on this occasion, rode a thoroughbred horse in two hours and a quarter to Bangor Ferry: between Beddgelart and Carnarvon he had learned that the sloop was anchored off Beaumaris: he turned aside therefore from the Bangor road to the Ferry. There he jumped into a six-oared boat, and made for Beaumaris. ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. II. • Thomas De Quincey
... had an idea of taking it and giving it to Sylvia, but they wouldn't have that either,—are just fixing up the old house a bit, and going to summer at the farm, while the old lady will keep on selling eggs the same as ever. Not but what she's a thoroughbred all right, though in a cheap stable. I was down at Vivvy's the day she came to call on Sylvia! Just as quiet and cool, except that her hands in the openwork silk mits shook, as if her son was a duke. I thought there would ...
— People of the Whirlpool • Mabel Osgood Wright
... deemeth the king of fetching him?" So the king bade fetch him, and when he saw the two horses[FN343] he said, "This is worth a thousand and that two thousand ducats." Quoth the folk, "This horse thou misjudgest is evidently a thoroughbred and he is younger and faster and compacter of limb and finer of head and clearer of colour and skin than the other;" presently adding, "What assurance hast thou of the sooth of thy saying?" And the old man said, "This ye state is true, ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... before the kiss of your grandfather's lips is yet dry on them. The damask petticoat, the powdered wig, and the coquettish little patch by her dimpled little mouth are off and into the garret, and she sweeps by in a Worth gown, or takes a fence on a thoroughbred, or waits ankle deep in the clover blossoms for some whistling lover, while your eyes ...
— Dwellers in the Hills • Melville Davisson Post
... stride and power. Her knees across the pan were wide, the cannon-bone below them short and thin; the pasterns long and sloping; her hoofs round, dark, shiny, and well set on. Her mane was a shade darker than her coat, fine and thin, as a thoroughbred's always is whose blood is without taint or cross. Her ear was thin, sharply pointed, delicately curved, nearly black around the borders, and as tremulous as the leaves of an aspen. Her neck rose from the withers to ...
— A Ride With A Mad Horse In A Freight-Car - 1898 • W. H. H. Murray
... could have seen the swift flood of worship that flowed into his face, she would have felt no scorn. She was of the cities, caste had hardened her as far as it could harden one of her nature, she was a thoroughbred to the last inch, used to flattery and the attentions of men of her own class; yet she would have held no contempt for this tall, bronzed man that looked at her with such awe and wonder. The surge of feeling was real in him; and reality is one thing, over the broad earth, ...
— The Snowshoe Trail • Edison Marshall
... dinner on the hill, and come home on the last boat! You be sure to meet Phenie and me." The astounded Major murmured his delight and surprise. "Oh! Popper will let us go up there. He likes you—he says that you are a thoroughbred. So, we'll cut the other fellows and come alone. Say, can't you scare up another fellow like yourself for Phenie?" Whereat Alan Hawke laughed, and promised to secure an eligible "fellow" among the migratory Englishmen hovering around Lausanne-Ouchy, and he pledged a future friendship ...
— A Fascinating Traitor • Richard Henry Savage
... which would not have been misplaced in the mouth of Robespierre or Danton. "The pale head, compressed lips, and intense expression of the young lawyer of the Mountain," says an eyewitness, "reminded the auditors, not without a shudder, of such a thoroughbred Jacobin as St. Just." He declared that the laws of proscription were just, and ought to be maintained. "The Revolution can not ask pardon of the dynasties it has justly upset. Have the family of Orleans laid ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... nobleman at the Castle. Of his power and goodness Jamie could believe anything, and though he opened his eyes wide at his sister's story, his face grew radiant with joy, as just at that moment he caught sight of Lord Dundale trotting slowly down the lane on his beautiful thoroughbred bay mare. In a moment he was over the fence, in the road, in the very path of the rider, crying out in an agony of entreaty, "Stop, stop, my lord! our Rab is dead; ye maun ...
— Stories of Many Lands • Grace Greenwood
... 'yellow dog,' and not a few of that animal's characteristics are seen in his domesticated representative. For the plebeian cur is shrewd, active, and hardy, and far better equipped for the real struggle of life than any of his 'thoroughbred' kinsmen. ...
— Wild Animals I Have Known • Ernest Thompson Seton
... in Kerry, owing to the importation of shorthorns by Mr. Crosbie, and in a smaller degree by other proprietors, is very marked; but despite this the thoroughbred Kerry still remains and is likely to remain lord of the mountain until mayhap he be displaced by the smaller Scotch cattle, as he has already been in some localities by the black-faced sheep, who leads an equally hardy and independent ...
— Disturbed Ireland - Being the Letters Written During the Winter of 1880-81. • Bernard H. Becker
... are up, and find it is not over: a small thoroughbred, white bull-terrier, is busy throttling a large shepherd's dog, unaccustomed to war, but not to be trifled with. They are hard at it; the scientific little fellow doing his work in great style, his pastoral enemy fighting wildly, ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... the Yorkshire Coach Horse Society, the Cleveland Bay Horse Society, the Polo Pony Society, the Shetland Pony Stud Book Society, the Welsh Pony and Cob Society and the New Forest Pony Association. Thoroughbred race-horses are registered in the General Stud Book. The Royal Commission on Horse Breeding, which dates from 1887, is, as its name implies, not a voluntary organization. Through the commission the money previously ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... of it, Madge," Dicky interrupted. "Forget that scientific foolishness you absorbed when you were school ma'aming. Besides, this cat is a thoroughbred, never been outside the home where she was born till now. Do you happen to know what this gift you are tossing aside so nonchalantly would have cost if it hadn't been given me by a dear friend? A cool two hundred, that's all. It seems to me you might try to get over your prejudices, especially ...
— Revelations of a Wife - The Story of a Honeymoon • Adele Garrison
... was thoroughbred. He had sat down to play a desperate game with Fortune, and he could not withdraw with the ...
— The Gates of Chance • Van Tassel Sutphen
... name, and he has two brothers to help him. When there is an important job to do, the three go 'ato partnership, but they spend most of their time and all their money in litigation over an inheritance, and I'm afraid they are getting involved, Thoroughbred Sikhs of the old rock, obstinate, touchy, bigoted, and cunning, but good men for all that. Here is Bishen Singn—shall we ask him ...
— Under the Deodars • Rudyard Kipling
... "Faith, a thoroughbred hoss," says he; "sech nostrils, and sech a gray eye with the devil in it fer go—yellow ha'r, and ez ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... horse to face the black brute, which stood looking at him with wicked eyes, its ears flattened like those of a panther. In spite of its evil temper Ted admired it for its lithe beauty. It was as clean of limb as a thoroughbred, and its black skin shone like polished ebony. While he was looking at it thus it suddenly sprang at him, reared on its hind legs, striking at him like a boxer. Had he not wheeled on the instant it would have killed him. Ted was thoroughly angry, and went to the attack himself, ...
— Ted Strong's Motor Car • Edward C. Taylor
... it was bully." Oddington's cool, thoroughbred manner chilled her ardor like a cold blast. "It was mighty fine. You are excited, girl." And the young man removed the cigarette which had been between his lips. Virginia ...
— Dan Merrithew • Lawrence Perry
... was a high-spirited little animal, a thoroughbred Arab no less, and Hollyhock knew that at the top of the gorge, when all things looked so ghostly, he would start at every shadow and at the slightest sound. He was all nerves, was Lightning Speed—all nerves and gallant bearing, and ...
— Hollyhock - A Spirit of Mischief • L. T. Meade
... Revised and enlarged by the author. The points of the various English and American breeds are thoroughly discussed, and the great advantage of using thoroughbred males clearly shown. The work is equally valuable to the farmer who keeps but few pigs, and to the breeder on an extensive scale. By Joseph Harris. ...
— Mushrooms: how to grow them - a practical treatise on mushroom culture for profit and pleasure • William Falconer
... round the curve of the road she came. A finely slender and spiritedly erect girl's figure, upon a satin-skinned bright chestnut with a thoroughbred gait, a smart groom riding behind her. She came towards them, was abreast them, looked at Mount Dunstan, a smiling dimple near her lip as she ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... cleanly up and stopped just short of scraping on the stones at the edge, obeying the paddles like a thoroughbred the bit, the chief trader of De Seviere stepped forward and held out ...
— The Maid of the Whispering Hills • Vingie E. Roe
... jerk which threw the smoking horses on their haunches, pulled up at the door of the Waterloo hotel. A beautiful sight it is—a fine, well appointed coach, of what we must now call the ancient fashion, with its smart driver, brilliant harness, and thoroughbred team. Then it is a spectacle pleasing to gods and men, the knowing and instantaneous manner in which the grooms perform their work in leading off the horses, and putting fresh ones to—the rapid diving for carpet-bags and portmanteaus into ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... consideration of what must be going on. Concierges and people like that perpetually blow their brains out, or fly into the Seine, 'a cause des pertes sur la Bourse.' I hardly ever take up a French paper without lighting on such a paragraph. On the other hand, thoroughbred horses without end, and red velvet carriages with white kid harness on jet black horses, go by here all day long; and the pedestrians who turn to look at them, laugh, and say 'C'est la Bourse!' Such crashes must be staved off every week as have not been ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... him. He was as near a thoroughbred as I ever saw, Bobby, and he was nailed down, as you ...
— The Making of Bobby Burnit - Being a Record of the Adventures of a Live American Young Man • George Randolph Chester
... "And he ain't no thoroughbred neither!" cries the Master. "He's 'Unknown,' ain't he? Kid can't help it, of course, ...
— Ranson's Folly • Richard Harding Davis
... respectable, not to say venerable, appearance, insanely flying over horizontal pegs, inserted, for the purpose, in their own street doors. There were beasts of all sorts; horses, in particular, of every breed, from the spotted barrel on four pegs, with a small tippet for a mane, to the thoroughbred rocker on his highest mettle. As it would have been hard to count the dozens upon dozens of grotesque figures that were ever ready to commit all sorts of absurdities on the turning of a handle, so it would have been no easy task to mention any human folly, vice, or weakness, ...
— The Cricket on the Hearth • Charles Dickens
... republic. As for beauty, the world, surely, in this later time, had flowered here —flowered with something of Aspasia's grace and something of the haughty coldness of Agrippina. And yet it was American. Here and there in the boxes was a thoroughbred portrait by Copley—the long shapely neck, the sloping shoulders, the drooping eyelids, even to the gown in which the great-grandmother ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... run from Al Hammond? Gene, your skull is as thick as an old cow's. Al will never know anything about what you did to his sister unless you tell him. And if you do that he'll shoot you. She won't give you away. She's a thoroughbred. Why, she was so white last night I thought she'd drop at my feet, but she never blinked an eyelash. I'm a woman, Gene Stewart and if I couldn't feel like Miss Hammond I know how awful an ordeal she must have had. Why, she's one of the most beautiful, the most sought after, ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey
... in the boarding-house he saw her at the other end of the table, he was a bit sorry. This was rather too forcible a reminder of the bargain. He noticed that the girl was browned with Southern suns, but that she was pretty and looked thoroughbred. Also, she was very quiet, ...
— Frank of Freedom Hill • Samuel A. Derieux
... were Twenty-One I would be happy VI. If I were Twenty-One I would get married VII. If I were Twenty-One I would save money VIII. If I were Twenty-One I would study the art of pleasing IX. If I were Twenty-One I would determine, even if I could never be anything else in the world, that I would be a thoroughbred X. If I were Twenty-One I would make some permanent, ...
— 21 • Frank Crane
... dozen, a score,—enough to make up the allotment, and again. In silence they came, grim-faced, more grimly accoutred. All manner of horseflesh was represented: the broncho, the mustang, the frontier scrub, the thoroughbred; all manner of apparel, from chaperajos to weather-beaten denim; but, saddled or saddleless, across the neck of every beast stretched the barrel of a long rifle, at the hip of every rider hung a holster, from every belt peeped the hilt ...
— Where the Trail Divides • Will Lillibridge
... of the ferry-house were inexorably shut against them when at last Maitland brought the big machine to a tremulous and panting halt, like that of an over-driven thoroughbred. And though they perforce endured a wait of fully fifteen minutes, neither found aught worth saying; or else the words wherewith fitly to clothe their thoughts were denied them. The girl seemed very weary, and sat with head drooping and hands clasped idly in her lap. ...
— The Brass Bowl • Louis Joseph Vance
... a good horse—I have often heard you say so. You love a good horse in spite of the fact that you once harnessed Colonel Jack Chinn's thoroughbred saddle animal to a trap, the subsequent events producing a better story than any you will find in these pages. Nevertheless, my dear sir, they are respectfully, even firmly ...
— Old Man Curry - Race Track Stories • Charles E. (Charles Emmett) Van Loan
... lifted, and the cloud over his face also. "How is she?" he asked. "Bang up!" answered Arthur. "She's the sort of a sister a man's proud of—looks and style, and the gait of a thoroughbred." He interrupted himself with a laugh. "There she is, now!" ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips
... adjustment before I was ushered into a large dim room, and confronted by a figure in a reclining chair by the window. Here, in spite of years and illness, were the same good looks and thoroughbred courage that seemed to characterize the women of this family. Mrs. Thornhill greeted me in Ina Vandeman's very tones, a little high-pitched for real sweetness, full of a dominating quality, and she showed a composure I had not expected. To Skeet, standing by, watching ...
— The Million-Dollar Suitcase • Alice MacGowan
... Wolfe caught with a quick pleasure the contour of the white hand, the blood-glow of a red ring he wore. His voice, too, and that of Kirby's, touched him like music,—low, even, with chording cadences. About this man Mitchell hung the impalpable atmosphere belonging to the thoroughbred gentleman, Wolfe, scraping away the ashes beside him, was conscious of it, did obeisance to it with his artist sense, unconscious that he ...
— Life in the Iron-Mills • Rebecca Harding Davis
... said Wild Bill, pointing to a black horse, full sixteen hands high, and evidently a thoroughbred. "Name your price, and he ...
— Wild Bill's Last Trail • Ned Buntline
... him?' So the king bade fetch him, and when he saw the two horses, he said, 'This one is worth a thousand and the other two thousand dinars.' Quoth the folk, 'This [horse that thou judgeth the lesser worth] is an evident thoroughbred and he is younger and swifter and more compact of limb than the other, ay, and finer of head and clearer of skin and colour. What token, then, hast thou of the truth of thy saying?' And the old man said, 'This ye say is all true, but his sire is old and this other is the son of ...
— Tales from the Arabic Volumes 1-3 • John Payne
... believe that the poor boy used to get up at five in the morning, and went off to settle his business that he might be back by four o'clock in the country where the lady was? In fact, he ruined a very nice thoroughbred that I had just given him. Forgive my chatter, mademoiselle; I have but just come home from Germany. For a year I have heard no decent French, I have been weaned from French faces, and satiated with Germans, to such a degree that, I believe, in my patriotic mania, I could talk to the chimeras ...
— The Ball at Sceaux • Honore de Balzac
... he and a man from the Embassy followed Theydon from Waterloo to Forbes's place on Tuesday night, and again to Innesmore Mansions, he didn't recognize him today. Or perhaps he did. I don't know. Talk about the impassive Red Indian! A thoroughbred Chink would give a Pawnee chief one glass eye and a coat of paint, and then beat him hollow at the ...
— Number Seventeen • Louis Tracy
... her in," said Alice. "Haven't those Southern girls a thoroughbred air? Of course, she will stay here. You will look after Mr. ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... ere the dawning each one of them might be claiming the hospitality of six feet of English sod, their hearts were light. To them a message that the fray was up was like the sound of the huntsman's horn in the ears of a thoroughbred hunter. ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... Ryan, the traction| |magnate, and a band of volunteer fire | |fighters—many of them | |millionaires—fought a blaze which | |started in the garage of young Ryan's | |country estate near Suffern, N. Y., early| |in the morning, three valuable | |automobiles, seven thoroughbred horses | |and several outbuildings were ...
— Newspaper Reporting and Correspondence - A Manual for Reporters, Correspondents, and Students of - Newspaper Writing • Grant Milnor Hyde
... thirty-eight persons during the first two weeks—all of them on account of ancient grudges. I burned a dwelling that interrupted my view. I swindled a widow and some orphans out of their last cow, which is a very good one, though not thoroughbred, I believe. I have also committed scores of crimes, of various kinds, and have enjoyed my work exceedingly, whereas it would formerly have broken my heart and turned my hair gray, I have ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... And so, thoroughbred that he was, Amedee overcame his emotion and recited, in a thrilling voice, his military rhymes, that rang out like the report of a ...
— A Romance of Youth, Complete • Francois Coppee
... neck; it was in her graceful attitude; it was everywhere. 'No doubt,' the ghosts might have said, 'there are more beautiful women in England than this one, but surely there is none more like a thoroughbred and ...
— The Primadonna • F. Marion Crawford
... doubt was still in the colonel's heart. The younger man pressed the colonel's hand, and the two moved toward the door. Suddenly tears flushed into the dimmed eyes of the colonel, and he cried, through a smile, "Bob Hendricks, I believe in my soul you're a liar—a damn liar, sir, but, boy, you're a thoroughbred—God bless you, you're a thoroughbred." And he turned and shuffled from the room and out of ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... long flowing cloak, and a sombrero casting a strong shadow over one of his eyes, which was afflicted with a weakness of the eyelid, which kept dropping down so frequently that the pupil was seldom seen for any time; the horse was a thoroughbred; two magnificent greyhounds (the originals we could admire, at rest upon a raised platform of carved oak and red cushions) ran alongside of him, and this tall-looking, dignified, romantic rider was—little, spare, merry M. Rajon. Gossip whispered that he had been somewhat intoxicated ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... also, for I don't think Sara could have helped telling him. If he did know, however, he did not let me see that he did, and never insulted me by any implied sympathy; on the contrary, he asked me to be his best man. Jack was always a thoroughbred. ...
— Further Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... To a thoroughbred American, with two and more centuries of the traditions of independence behind him, this question of the divine right of kings is a commonplace. He is a king himself, he holds his own rights to be divine, ...
— Germany and the Germans - From an American Point of View (1913) • Price Collier
... sick headache. Can't you see the arteries throbbing under the almost hairless skin of my temples—the transparent, bluish skin that denotes a thoroughbred? It's atrocious! The veins on my forehead are like writhing vipers, and I don't know what gnome forges in my brain! Oh, be quiet! Or at least speak so low that the coursing of my agitated blood may drown the sound ...
— Barks and Purrs • Colette Willy, aka Colette
... and there, and there are some excellent herds of dairy cattle, though the scarcity of reliable labor makes this form of farming hazardous. The cattle tick is being conquered, and more beef is being produced. Thoroughbred ...
— The New South - A Chronicle Of Social And Industrial Evolution • Holland Thompson
... shocks them. I can well believe it. It is the first time a French musician has dared to think in French; and that is the reason why I warned you of the danger of accepting too meekly German ideas about Berlioz. Men like Weingartner, Richard Strauss, and Mottl—thoroughbred musicians—are, without doubt, able to appreciate Berlioz's genius better and more quickly than we French musicians. But I rather mistrust the kind of appreciation they feel for a spirit so opposed to their own. It is for France and French people ...
— Musicians of To-Day • Romain Rolland
... with a pride almost maternal. "That's Billy. He is a thoroughbred Yorkshire. Isn't he ...
— Phebe, Her Profession - A Sequel to Teddy: Her Book • Anna Chapin Ray
... wonder," Caroline continued, with the usual simper which her favorite theme inspired, "what you would think of Radcliff. Ah, Lavinia dear! it is a comfort for me to reflect that it was a Betterson—nobody less than a thoroughbred Betterson—who took the place in our family which you ...
— The Young Surveyor; - or Jack on the Prairies • J. T. Trowbridge
... the business I cannot recall a single case of success, and, on the other hand, I learned of failures without end. I had the reputation of having the best planned and most completely equipped in this part of Washington, and perhaps in the entire state. My stock was thoroughbred and healthy, and they seemed to attend to business strictly. I devoted about all my waking hours to them, did everything that seemed necessary that was suggested by my own success, and yet I could not make it go, am glad I am clear of it, and have no desire to try it again. ...
— Three Acres and Liberty • Bolton Hall
... drawbacks and discomforts attendant upon a new settlement having been overcome, Newera Ellia forms a delightful place of residence. I soon discovered that a pack of thoroughbred foxhounds were not adapted to a country so enclosed by forest; some of the hounds were lost, others I parted with, but they are all long since dead, and their progeny, the offspring of crosses with pointers, bloodhounds and half-bred foxhounds, have turned ...
— The Rifle and The Hound in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... pitch, and Michael cursed his horse roundly as the willing animal, jumping under the spur, grazed the great gate as he sprang through it. Soon they were all out on the main road, where the thoroughbred that carried a double burden settled down into a long swinging stride that fairly devoured the distance, league ...
— High Noon - A New Sequel to 'Three Weeks' by Elinor Glyn • Anonymous
... three oxen, two mules and a bronco pulling it; a prospector in his red flannel undershirt, driving a laden donkey; a hurdy-gurdy troupe on its way to the barbecue; a stage-coach drawn by six half-broken wild horses; an old Spanish settler on a beautiful, black thoroughbred; a late arrival from Oregon, mounted upon a sturdy mule with his young wife upon a pillion behind him, and a whole drove of China-men being taken out to work a white man's claim up ...
— Down the Mother Lode • Vivia Hemphill
... following classes are provided: Percheron, Belgian, Clydesdale, Shire, Suffolk-Punch, Standard Trotter, Thoroughbred, Saddle Horses, Morgan, Hackney, Arabian, Shetland Pony, Welch Pony, Roadsters, Carriage Horses, Ponies in Harness, Draft Horses, Hunters, Jumpers, and Gaited Saddle Horses. Among special events in this section are the following: trot ...
— The Jewel City • Ben Macomber
... they can stand disappointment, but success puts them out, it is so unwonted a thing. The lame horse, the battered old gig,—they feel at home with these; but they would be confused if presented with my friend Smith's drag, with its beautiful steeds, all but thoroughbred, and perfectly sound. To struggle on with a small income, manifold worries, and lowly estimation,—to these things they have quietly reconciled themselves. But give them wealth, and peace, and fame (if these things ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... disorder no matter how long or freely it is used. It is so delicious and nourishing that there is no fish in the world that can even come second to it. It is as far superior in all food qualities to the finest Salmon or Trout as a first-prize, gold-medalled, nut-fed thoroughbred Sussex bacon-hog is to the roughest, toughest, boniest old razor-backed land-pike that ever ...
— The Arctic Prairies • Ernest Thompson Seton
... its head and he shot to the front, but Grady was nearly a field in the lead, and it promised to be a long chase, as he was on the Major's black thoroughbred. The cowboy rode along with a loose rein and an easy balance seat. At his fences he swung his hat and cheered. He seemed to be enjoying himself, and Mr. Carteret was anxious lest he might begin to shoot for pure delight. Such a demonstration would ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VIII (of X) • Various
... thoroughbred—I saw that right away. And you're my guest! Could I, as a gentleman, let you ride off alone on a lonely road at night? Hurray! You're A 1! ...
— Dorothy on a Ranch • Evelyn Raymond
... you think the men in these boats prosecute the fishing as vigorously and successfully as those in the Shetland boats, who are paid on a different principle?-They prosecute it with great rigour. Generally they are thoroughbred fishermen. They have all been apprenticed to the fishing when they were boys of 8 or 10 ...
— Second Shetland Truck System Report • William Guthrie
... all know it when you see it; it is barefaced and shameless; it reeks with the mire of falsity and is foul with the slime of the pit infernal. This lie contains not an atom of truth, is tinctured not with a grain of fact, but is a full-blooded, thoroughbred, out and out lie. Then we have the campaign lie. A large, open-faced fellow, loud-voiced and blatant; bold, daring and sweeping; it claims everything, asserts ...
— The Jericho Road • W. Bion Adkins
... a range mare for dam, and roped wild only two weeks before. I never have seen so beautiful a horse. He had the round, deep-chested, big-hearted, well-coupled body of the ideal mountain pony, and his head and neck were true thoroughbred, slender, yet full, with lovely alert ears not too small to be vicious nor too large to be stubborn mulish. And his legs and feet were lovely too, unblemished, sure and firm, with long springy pasterns that made him a wonder of ease under ...
— On the Makaloa Mat/Island Tales • Jack London
... was a fine Kentucky thoroughbred, but for the kind of work at hand I had full confidence in my mount. Whenever Custer was not looking I slyly spurred the mule ahead, and when he would start forward I would rein him in and pat him by way of restraint, bidding him not to be too fractious, as we hadn't yet reached the sandhills. ...
— An Autobiography of Buffalo Bill (Colonel W. F. Cody) • Buffalo Bill (William Frederick Cody)
... my boy," answered the Squire heartily. "It's just the sort of thing you ought to do to make yourself popular. Lady June is a charming woman, you know, thoroughbred to the finger-nails; but she has kept herself a little too much to herself. There are people old enough to remember what Briarwood was in your grandfather's time. This day week you say. I'll arrange everything. ...
— Vixen, Volume I. • M. E. Braddon
... at Prague, May 30, 1794, his parents being well-to-do people of Hebrew stock. His father, a cloth merchant, was passionately fond of music, and was accustomed to say, "One of my children must become a thoroughbred musician." Ignaz was soon selected as the one on whom the experiment should be made, and the rapid progress he made justified the accident of choice, for all of the family possessed some musical talent. The boy progressed too fast, for he attempted at the age of seven to play Beethoven's ...
— Great Violinists And Pianists • George T. Ferris
... smiled incredulously. 'I don't know that I do, quite,' he answered languidly. 'I confess I attach more importance than you do to the mere question of race and family. A thoroughbred differs from a cart-horse, and a greyhound from a vulgar mongrel, in mind and character as well as in body. Oswald seems to me in all essentials a ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... the moment's alarm had subsided, And the oath with which nothing can find unprovided A thoroughbred Englishman, safely exploded, Lord Alfred unbent (as Apollo his bow did Now and then) his erectness; and looking, not ruder Than such inroad would warrant, survey'd the intruder, Whose arrival so nearly cut short in his glory My hero, and ...
— Lucile • Owen Meredith
... institution. Besides, even from the courtly point of view the situation is a delicate one. Why emphasize the fact that, formally speaking, the war is between two grandsons of Albert the Good, that thoroughbred German whose London monument is so much grander ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... ladies turned from him in disgust; the Father of Ice bade him begone and hide his infamy. Going out in obedience to that harsh command he found a litter with two mules waiting in charge of Mahmud, in addition to the thoroughbred horse of the missionary and the donkeys of the two ladies, which were guarded by Costantin, the ...
— The Valley of the Kings • Marmaduke Pickthall
... of business; and did—with one sad and memorable exception—whatever the ordinary course of things threw in his way, in exactly the businesslike fashion which might have been expected from the son of a thoroughbred old Clerk to the Signet, who had never ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... attempt on foot to catch De Wet on a thoroughbred. It was hopeless from the first, and yet went within measurable distance of succeeding, though even if we had rounded up some of his force at Olifant's Nek, it is very doubtful if De Wet himself would have ...
— The Second Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers in the South African War - With a Description of the Operations in the Aden Hinterland • Cecil Francis Romer and Arthur Edward Mainwaring
... the crowd rapidly subsided. Carker spoke to them calmly, explaining that the two young men who had brought his speech to such a sudden termination were his bosom comrades of old times, even thought they might not be thoroughbred socialists. ...
— Frank Merriwell's Son - A Chip Off the Old Block • Burt L. Standish
... baskets of trout seem to have been, if not quite so regular as he sometimes makes them out, at any rate fully historical as occasional feats. As has been hinted, he really did win the trotting-match on the pony, Colonsay, against a thoroughbred, though it was only on the technical point of the thoroughbred breaking his pace. His walk from London to Oxford in a night seems to have been a fact, and indeed there is nothing at all impossible in it, for the distance ...
— Essays in English Literature, 1780-1860 • George Saintsbury
... (Monarquia, tom. i. lib. 3, cap. 6.) It might seem strange, that a Christian should look for authority in the practices of the race he so much abominates, instead of the inspired precepts of the Founder of his religion! But in truth your thoroughbred casuist is apt to be very ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V3 • William H. Prescott
... with difficulty; and the studio, too, it was hidden behind great crumbling walls, in the middle of a plot of ground in which some one was growing cabbages. Octave was always, as he would phrase it, dans une deche epouvantable, but he managed to keep a thoroughbred horse in the stable at the end of the garden, and this horse was ordered as soon as the light failed. He would say, "Mes amis et mes amies, je regrette, mais mon cheval m'attend." And the women liked to see him mount, and many thought, I am sure, ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore
... fell to her. The next deal the cards deserted her, and after that the lieutenant blundered. But even though the ruby was inevitably lost, she finished the rubber pluckily; the flush deepened in her cheek; the blue fires flamed in her eyes. "You thoroughbred!" Morganstein ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... ears that ever a horse possessed—ears that told of some thoroughbred's wild loves with wild mares among the hills—and snapped at Forrest with wicked teeth and ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London
... best looking girl I ever saw," he declared, "and she's a thoroughbred too!" he added, "or she wouldn't have stuck it out in this country when she had a clean yacht to fall back on. She's been riding around on a mule, so they tell me, along with her father and the engineering experts, and just as though she enjoyed it. ...
— Captain Macklin • Richard Harding Davis
... violets half hidden in silver leaves. Old Mr. Bell not unfrequently joined in these excursions. His white hair, and long silky white beard, formed a picturesque variety in the group; while all recognized at a glance the thoroughbred aristocrat in his haughty bearing, his stern mouth, his cold, turquoise eyes, and the clenching expression of his hand. Mrs. King seemed to have produced upon him the effect Gerald had predicted. No youthful gallant could have been more assiduous at her bridle-rein, and he seemed to envy his ...
— A Romance of the Republic • Lydia Maria Francis Child
... know how I know, but I just do. Plants show their breed just like people and animals. I've no need when I look at old Jim Ramsey's horse to be told it's mighty common stock. Yes; it has the same number of legs and hoofs and its eyes are in the right place, but it isn't a thoroughbred. Anyone can see that at a glance. It is just the same with plants. There's a wide difference. Though I suppose it is only ones who work about them and love them that see the difference. And with people! Some people are ...
— Hester's Counterpart - A Story of Boarding School Life • Jean K. Baird
... are up, and find it is not over: a small thoroughbred, white Bull Terrier, is busy throttling a large shepherd's dog, unaccustomed to war, but not to be trifled with. They are hard at it; the scientific little fellow doing his work in great style, his pastoral enemy fighting wildly, but with the sharpest of teeth and a great courage. ...
— Short Stories Old and New • Selected and Edited by C. Alphonso Smith
... a rifle with the Boers in South Africa, hunted wild beasts in Asia and in Hottentot land, took snapshots in St. Petersburg, and almost got to the North Pole with one of the expeditions. To do and be all of these he had to be a manly man. Not in a month's journey would you meet a truer thoroughbred, a more agreeable chap, a more polished vagabond, than Hollingsworth Chase, first lieutenant in Dame Fortune's army. Tall, good looking, rawboned, cheerful, gallant, he was the true comrade of those merry, ...
— The Man From Brodney's • George Barr McCutcheon
... Ring-Necks were secured from the Wyandache Club, Smithtown, L. I. These birds were crossed, thus producing the English Ring-Neck Mongolian Pheasants, which are larger and better birds, and by introducing the old English Ring-Neck blood, a bird was produced that does not wander, as the thoroughbred Mongolian ...
— Birds Illustrated by Color Photography [December, 1897], Vol 2. No 6. • Various
... ridiculous, you know! She'd marry you out of hand—unless she's perfectly idiotic. And she doesn't look that. Leave her alone, Brook. Talk to the mother. She's one of the most delightful women I ever met. She has a dear, quiet way with her—like a very thoroughbred white cat that's been ill ...
— Adam Johnstone's Son • F. Marion Crawford
... "You're a thoroughbred. I promised to let you have your way, and you shall. Even if we lose the patient it ...
— The Auction Block • Rex Beach
... hanged!" replied the incorrigible Strachan. "Bailie Beerie is a brick, and I won't hear a word against him. But, O Fred! if you only knew what you missed last night! Such a splendid woman—by Jove, sir, a thoroughbred angel. A bust like one of Titian's beauties, and the voice of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various |
