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More "Snatch" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... incident itself to-day reminds me of the family-party smallness of the old New York, those happy limits that could make us all care, and care to fond vociferation, for the same thing at once. It was a moment of the golden age—representing too but a snatch of elation, since the wretched Arctic had gone down in mortal woe and her other companion, the Pacific, leaving England a few months later and under the interested eyes of our family group, then temporarily settled in London, was never heard of ...
— A Small Boy and Others • Henry James
... heard nice calculations as to the precise number of calls, that an able-bodied, well-trained New-Year's visiter can accomplish between midnight and midnight; allowing, of course, a couple of hours for the toilette, and a moment to snatch a mouthful at breakfast and dinner: it is affirmed, however, that as great generals have passed days of battle without food, so your chivalrous Knickerbocker should be willing to forego, on such an occasion, even ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... After giving her the sele of the day, and complimenting her on her hair, I asked her to give me one of the threads; whereupon she gave me such a look, and, calling me fellow, told me to take myself off. 'I must have a hair first,' said I, making a snatch at one. I believe I hurt her; but, whether I did or not, up she started, and, though her hair was unbound, gave me the only drubbing I ever had in my life. Lor! how, with her right hand, she fibbed me whilst she held me round the neck with her left arm; ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... a fresher trail made them hurry on. They drank at every stream and ate a snatch of food as they rode. They reached the hurriedly quitted Kiowa camp, and searched for the sign of vengeance on a captive there. Jondo knew those signs, and his ...
— Vanguards of the Plains • Margaret McCarter
... bookseller to the sale of the unsaleable; the Scots Worthies, opening of itself at the memoir of Mr. Alexander Peden; the Pilgrim's Progress, that wonderful inspiration, failing never save when the theologian would sometimes snatch the pen from the hand of the poet; Theron and Aspasio; Village Dialogues; and others of a like class. To these must be added a rare edition of Blind Harry. It was clear to Hugh, unable as he was fully to appreciate the wisdom of David, ...
— David Elginbrod • George MacDonald
... the faithful Cador oblig'd you to obey my Orders, and to fly the Court, but he ventur'd to enter my Apartment in the Dead of Night thro' a private Door. He snatch'd me up, and convey'd me directly into the Temple of Orosmades, where the holy Magus, who was his Brother, lock'd me up in that august and awful Statue, that stands erect upon the Pavement of the Temple, ...
— Zadig - Or, The Book of Fate • Voltaire
... blasphemous. This optimism was enhanced on the voyage by the conduct of the officers who were my companions. They carried their spirit of dedication to an excess that was almost irksome. They refused to play cards. They were determined not to relax. Every minute they could snatch was spent in studying text-books. Their country had come into the war so late that they resented any moment lost from making themselves proficient. When expostulated with they explained themselves by saying, "When we've done our bit it will be time to amuse ourselves." They were ...
— Out To Win - The Story of America in France • Coningsby Dawson
... hour later, when we ceased our game, I noticed the odor of roast turkey was no longer prevalent; so with apprehensive heart, though nonchalant air, I made my way over to the kitchen again, and was just in time to see Ovide snatch the turkey—which now looked cold and forlorn enough—from the shelf and shove it into the still fervent oven, and to hear him mutter, "Dat's too bad I'm forgot to put you back for ...
— A Lover in Homespun - And Other Stories • F. Clifford Smith
... the stage should bring it to Cobre by the next night; third, he telegraphed to a trusty satellite at Silverbell, telling him to hold an automobile in readiness to carry a telegram to Mayer Zurich, should Dewing send such telegram later. Then Dewing lay down to snatch a little sleep. ...
— Copper Streak Trail • Eugene Manlove Rhodes
... Pendle was desirous of concealing not only the amount of the cheque—since he had kept no note of the sum on the butt—but of hiding the fact that the cheque had been drawn at all. This conduct, coupled with the fact of Jentham's allusion to Tom Tiddler's ground, and his snatch of extempore song, confirmed Cargrim in his suspicions that Pendle had visited London for the purpose of drawing out a large sum of money, and intended to pay the same over to Jentham that very night on Southberry Heath. With this in his mind it was no ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume
... place, for the mere exterior of a pretty face and form. Be as alert in the choice of a wife as you are in a bargain. You don't invest in a house just because it looks well, or buy a suit of clothes at first sight, or dash on change and snatch at the first deal. After you are once married stand by your choice like a man. If you must have your beer, don't sneak out of it on a clove and a lie; carefully weigh the cost, and if you conclude to risk everything for the gratification of an appetite drink at home and above board, and don't ...
— A String of Amber Beads • Martha Everts Holden
... and she would repay the father's kindness by screening the son from this disgrace. How beautiful, how noble had Orion's image been in her heart. She would not stain it with this disgrace in her own eyes and in those of the world. But every other reservation must be cast far, far away, to snatch the victory from him and to save Hiram. Every fair weapon she might use; only this treachery she could not, might not have recourse to. He must be made to feel that she was more magnanimous than he; that she, under all conceivable circumstances, kept her word. That was ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... of the epidemic I fell asleep for a few seconds, and dreamed that Mors was sweeping down, with extended arms, to snatch you. By the clock I had not slept quite two minutes, yet the countenance of Mors was indelibly stamped on my memory, and now I am transferring it to paper. You are mistaken; it is terrible, but not hideous!" Beulah laid aside her pencil, and, leaning her elbows on the table, sat, ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans
... the confiscation of James I., proving that it was by no means so poor and wild and barren a region as it is generally represented by modern writers. The two chiefs had a personal altercation at the council table, and O'Neill so far lost his temper as to snatch a paper out of the hand of O'Cahan. Whereupon Sir John Davis remarked: 'I rest assured, in my own conceit, that I shall live to see Ulster the best reformed province in this kingdom; and as for yourself, my lord, I hope to live to see you the best ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin
... be rewarded? Or would thirteen, that was symbolical of evil, and its bearer, Diablo, who was an agent of evil, together snatch from her this prize that meant so much? It was strange that she should not think of the other horses at all. It was as though there were but two in the race—Lucretia and Diablo—and yet they ...
— Thoroughbreds • W. A. Fraser
... you want to know about the Germans. They are a quarter of a mile away at this part, or nearly a quarter of a mile. When you snatch a peep at them it is like a low parti-coloured stone wall—only the stones are sandbags. The Germans have them black and white, so that you cannot tell which are loopholes and which are black bags. Our people haven't been so clever—and the War Office love of uniformity ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... of noisy reservists drinking and smoking; and we were very glad indeed when the drums and bugles began to go about the streets, and one and all had to snatch shakoes and ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... ..." Drew caught a snatch of sentence passed between the leader of the newcomers and his own officer. He recognized the voice of John Castleman, his former ...
— Ride Proud, Rebel! • Andre Alice Norton
... and well-timed these controversial pamphlets were, they were not enough to occupy even the few spare hours that Gillespie was able to snatch from his attendance on the business of the Assembly. He had planned, and was all the while prosecuting, a much larger work. That work appeared about the close of the year 1646, under the title of "Aaron's Rod Blossoming: or, the Divine Ordinance of Church ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie
... it, then," said the Knight of Valence; "this done, I myself will lie down without doffing my mail-shirt, and snatch a sleep till the ruddy dawn calls me again to duty, when you, Augustine, will hold yourself ready to attend me ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... and covered his damp shirt with a jacket. But the woman did not move. She was beyond all conception of time. She was beyond any thought of personal comfort or fatigue. All she knew was that she must wait—wait for the coming of her now hated lover, that at least she might snatch her child from his contaminating arms. And after that—well, after that—She had no power to think of ...
— The Twins of Suffering Creek • Ridgwell Cullum
... caught a glimpse of the bottle and tumbler, also of Sepia's face. Seeing her now retiring with the bottle in her hand, he sprang after her, and, thanks to the fact that she had locked the door, was in time to snatch it from her. She turned like a wild beast, and a terrible oath came hissing as from a feline throat. When, however, she saw, not Mary, but the unknown figure of a powerful man, she turned again to the door and fled. Joseph shut and locked it, and went back to the closet. Mary drew ...
— Mary Marston • George MacDonald
... stopped, and this time succeeded in forcing his reluctant hand to the cold steel, only to snatch it away almost immediately and resume his ...
— Tarzan of the Apes • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... (46. 'The Naturalist in Nicaragua,' 1874, p. 321.) that as soon as he saw its happy sense of security, he felt sure that it was uneatable. After several trials he succeeded in tempting a young duck to snatch up a young one, but it was instantly rejected; and the duck "went about jerking its head, as if trying to throw ...
— The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex • Charles Darwin
... meal, Keferinis, proposing that in the course of the day they should fly one of the Queen's hawks, left them, when the conversation, of which we have given a snatch, occurred. Yet, as we have observed, they were on the whole moody and unusually silent. Fakredeen in particular was wrapped in reverie, and when he spoke, it was always in reference to the singular spectacle of the morning. His musing forced him to inquiry, having ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli
... week Don Roberto was very ill. The doctor came three times a day. Mrs. Yorba and Magdalena sat up on alternate nights. Mr. Polk was constantly at the bedside. When he retired to snatch an hour's sleep, Don Roberto's temperature became alarming; of the presence of his wife and daughter he took ...
— The Californians • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... marched forwards towards our fortifications. Now, of course, I saw my chance and made sure that my double-barrelled elephant rifle was ready and that Hans held a second rifle, also double-barrelled and of similar calibre, full-cocked in such a position that I could snatch it ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard
... hadn't told about that, nor why she asked for the "room to herself" that turned out to be a servants' garret on a deserted floor. You could wake at five o'clock in the light mornings and read Plato, or snatch twenty minutes from undressing before Miss Payne came for your candle. The tall sycamore swayed in the moonlight, tapping on the window pane; its shadow moved softly in the room like ...
— Mary Olivier: A Life • May Sinclair
... companions rose to take leave of their host and return to the camp of the fur-traders. The remainder of that night was spent in making preparations for setting forth on the morrow; and when, at gray dawn, Dick and Crusoe lay down to snatch a few hours' repose, the yells and howling in the Snake camp were going on as vigorously ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... chemistry and mechanics while working at his trade of a mathematical instrument maker, at the same time that he was learning German from a Swiss dyer. Stephenson taught himself arithmetic and mensuration while working as an engine-man, during the night shifts; and when he could snatch a few moments in the intervals allowed for meals during the day, he worked his sums with a bit of chalk upon the sides of the colliery wagons. Dalton's industry was the habit of his life. He began from his boyhood, for he taught a little village school when he was only about twelve years ...
— How to Get on in the World - A Ladder to Practical Success • Major A.R. Calhoon
... men were for once too astonished to act quickly, but one recovered himself soon enough to make a snatch for the roll of bills in Uncle's hand. Two or three corners of bills were torn away, but Uncle held the money. In an instant a dozen men were crowding around, and among them ...
— The Adventures of Uncle Jeremiah and Family at the Great Fair - Their Observations and Triumphs • Charles McCellan Stevens (AKA 'Quondam')
... maritime commerce, the sugar estates within nine years reached the number of eighty-one, a good many of which were doubtless the property of San Domingan refugees who were now pouring into the province with whatever slaves and other movables they had been able to snatch from the black revolution. Some of these had fled first to Cuba and after a sojourn there, during which they found the Spanish government oppressive, removed afresh to Louisiana. As late as 1809 the year's immigration ...
— American Negro Slavery - A Survey of the Supply, Employment and Control of Negro Labor as Determined by the Plantation Regime • Ulrich Bonnell Phillips
... first pale, then ardent and incandescent, returned at the date assigned to it by calculation, three years after the death of the illustrious astronomer. Shining upon his grave it bore witness to the might of human thought, able to snatch the profoundest ...
— Astronomy for Amateurs • Camille Flammarion
... a large bleeding wound above his eye-brow; that same morning on leaving us, as he was carrying away one of the copies of the Proclamation which I had dictated, a man had thrown himself upon him to snatch it from him. The police had evidently already been informed of the Proclamation, and lay in wait for it; Milliere had a hand-to-hand struggle with the police agent, and had overthrown him, not without bearing ...
— The History of a Crime - The Testimony of an Eye-Witness • Victor Hugo
... Greece itself, if it had not been for the strength which it acquired from the contentions and disputations of the most learned men; and therefore I recommend all men who have abilities to follow my advice to snatch this art also from declining Greece, and to transport it to this city; as our ancestors by their study and industry have imported all their other arts which were worth having. Thus the praise of oratory, ...
— Cicero's Tusculan Disputations - Also, Treatises On The Nature Of The Gods, And On The Commonwealth • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... camping-area for the night was allotted to the Squadron near by. The animals having been off-saddled and fed, everyone was glad to be able to lie down in his clothes and snatch some sleep during the few remaining hours, until it was time to "stand to" in the morning. Before daybreak the Squadron saddled-up and moved off into the plain outside the town. Here it halted in "Line of Sub-section ...
— Through Palestine with the 20th Machine Gun Squadron • Unknown
... marigold and jasmine stronger even than the reek of the dust. One could see the bride's litter, a blur of red and tinsel, staggering through the haze, while the bridegroom's bewreathed pony turned aside to snatch a mouthful from a passing fodder-cart. Then Kim would join the Kentish-fire of good wishes and bad jokes, wishing the couple a hundred sons and no daughters, as the saying is. Still more interesting and more to be shouted over it was when a strolling juggler ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling
... What hold have I, a wanderer and vagabond, on the future which respectable people map out for themselves with such mathematical precision? And even the respectable people are sometimes out in their reckoning. To snatch the joys of to-day must always be the policy of the adventurer. So I took one more happy afternoon at Newhall. Nor was the afternoon entirely wasted; for, in the course of my farewell visit, I heard more of poor Susan Meynell's history from honest uncle Joseph. He ...
— Birds of Prey • M. E. Braddon
... traveller may snatch a rest for wearied eyes. The sandbanks and distance are so level that the views are less interesting than they were below, but, after all, appearances depend so much on the weather effect. To-day, sky, water, and sand are so alike in colour, that ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... Catholics were desirous of robbing you, and after having sacrificed myself and incurred such risks in your behalf, you would have been willing to make me so miserable a requital. You hide yourself from me, your mother, and take counsel of your enemies. You snatch yourself from my arms that saved you, in order to rest in the arms of those who wished to murder you. I know that you hold secret deliberations with the admiral. You desire inconsiderately to plunge into a war with Spain, and so to expose your ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... mother's conservatism—well-nigh a communiste, to whom woman's rights and wrongs meant a burning question of the day, which, next to her love of art, came very near to her heart. She was almost powerless to assist her sister women, so overworked was she on her own account, but whenever she could snatch a moment half a dozen clubs and societies claimed her for their own. She had really a wide personal knowledge of the working-women ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... without undressing, he threw himself upon his bed in the little convent-like cell to snatch a few moments of sleep. Its spotless, peaceful walls and draperies affected him strangely, as if he had brought into its immaculate serenity the sanguine stain of war. He was awakened suddenly from a deep slumber by an indefinite sense of alarm. His first thought was that he had been ...
— Clarence • Bret Harte
... has no reason to regret that heart affection, that love for humanity which sent him out to snatch the dusky child of Malta from the fangs ...
— Miss Caprice • St. George Rathborne
... her hand, and flourishing a whip. He trotted up to the sofa, and began instantly to 'whip sister Sophy;' serve her right, if I had but the whip, thought Mrs. Ferrars, as his mother hurried to snatch him off. Leaning over Sophy's averted face, she saw a tear under her eyelashes, but took ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... tried to snatch it again, Elof stepped back and held it up, as if he were holding out a lump of sugar to a dog. Then Halvor vaulted the counter; and he looked so angry that Elof got frightened and, instead of standing still and handing him ...
— Jerusalem • Selma Lagerlof
... off another beastly little scrap of paper to-day, because it was impossible to write more. Here (7 p.m.) is another moment, so I snatch it. ...
— Letters to Helen - Impressions of an Artist on the Western Front • Keith Henderson
... certain that they were well known to the foot man, whom the Captain had declared to be a spy, as the coat and cap which his master used in traveling. Had Mr. Bowmore discovered (since the afternoon) that he was really in danger? Had the necessities of instant flight only allowed him time enough to snatch his coat and cap out of the hall? And had the treacherous manservant seen him as he was making his escape to the post-chaise? The cook's conclusions answered all these questions in the affirmative—and, if Captain Bervie's ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... line, to see if all were ready to attack. The French regulars—half-fed, sorely harassed, interfered with by Vaudreuil—were still the victors of Ticonderoga, against the British odds of four to one. Perhaps they might snatch one last desperate victory from the fortunes of war? Certainly all would follow wherever they were led by their beloved Montcalm, the greatest Frenchman of the whole New World. He said a few stirring words to each of his well-known ...
— The Winning of Canada: A Chronicle of Wolf • William Wood
... of the elephant for coolness and shade renders him at all times more or less impatient of work in the sun, and every moment of leisure he can snatch is employed in covering his back with dust, or fanning himself to diminish the annoyance of the insects and heat. From the tenderness of his skin and its liability to sores, the labour in which he can most advantageously be employed ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent
... be observed, that in many of his plays the latter part is evidently neglected. When he found himself near the end of his work, and in view of his reward, he shortened the labour to snatch the profit. He, therefore, remits his efforts where he should most vigorously exert them, and his catastrophe is ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume V: Miscellaneous Pieces • Samuel Johnson
... after. The greatest risk he ran was from over-kindness, or from having a tumble among the numerous candidates for the pleasure of dandling him when once they got him among them on the maindeck; and no set of schoolgirls could make a more eager rush to snatch up the little child left among them, than did the big-bearded, whiskered, and pig-tailed tars to catch hold ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston
... bulged out beyond it, I was unable to get at it and said, 'O my uncle, I cannot reach thee the Lamp, but I will give it to thee when outside the Treasury.' His only need was the Lamp and he designed, O my mother, to snatch it from me and after that slay me, as indeed he did his best to do by heaping the earth over my head. Such then is what befel me from this foul Sorcerer." Hereupon Alaeddin fell to abusing the Magician in hot wrath and with a burning heart and crying, ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... calculations. Her son did not follow her in these speculations, but he rarely disputed the conclusions that she drew from her astrological studies. While she was turning night into day he was glad to entertain a few learned friends, for all the hours of leisure that he could snatch from his pursuit of fortune, he devoted to philosophy, and the most distinguished thinkers of Alexandria were happy to be received at the hospitable table of so rich a patron. He was charmed to ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... like to take Annie back to Springfield as soon as possible; for I fear that she is again losing her health, and for the last day or two, she has been quite ill. Yesterday she received a letter from Pattmore, which I tried to snatch from her; but she was too quick for me, and I obtained only a small part of it. Here it is," he continued, showing me the lower corner of a letter; "see how he ...
— The Somnambulist and the Detective - The Murderer and the Fortune Teller • Allan Pinkerton
... followed the words. He went to the meat and began carving off chunks for the pack, and for a long time after that one would have thought that he was dumb. Philip made greater effort than ever to rouse him into speech. He laughed, and whistled, and once tried the experiment of singing a snatch of the Caribou Song which he knew that Bram must have heard many times before. As he roasted his steak over the fire he talked about the Barren, and the great herd of caribou he had seen farther east; he asked Bram questions about the weather, the wolves, and the country farther ...
— The Golden Snare • James Oliver Curwood
... eggs, bacon, and so on. At the village of Ellgoth in Silesia a ceremony called the King's Race is observed at Whitsuntide. A pole with a cloth tied to it is set up in a meadow, and the young men ride past it on horseback, each trying to snatch away the cloth as he gallops by. The one who succeeds in carrying it off and dipping it in the neighbouring Oder is proclaimed King. Here the pole is clearly a substitute for a May-tree. In some villages of Brunswick at Whitsuntide ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... very kind—but one's busy, you know. It's been hard enough to snatch these few days. Besides, Robin isn't alone in the same way ...
— The Wooden Horse • Hugh Walpole
... appear at the breakfast table, and the servant had not seen him about. Eve ran upstairs full of anxiety. He was not in his room. The bed had not been slept in; the impress of his body outside showed, however, that he had flung himself down on it to snatch ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... her say, as I came running down swiftly—for I was dread afraid Dame Elizabeth should overtake me and snatch back the money—and I might have spared my fears, for had I harried the Queen's crown along with her crowns, no such a thing should ever have come in her head—"O Hilda!" saith the child, "see here the good Messire who gave us the denier ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt
... before I ran away, he had been forced to confess that I was very well able to cope with him. Now, therefore, in my extremity, seeing death so near at hand—for up to this moment I had hardly believed that my cousin would kill me—I made shift to snatch at an oar, and drawing it to me just in time put myself in a posture of defence before he could ...
— Athelstane Ford • Allen Upward
... used his two hands in manipulating his match and cigarette, his rifle leaned against the limbs of one of the largest mesquite bushes, where he could snatch it up without ...
— The Great Cattle Trail • Edward S. Ellis
... Nettie in charge; perhaps a recusant husband with Nettie mounting guard over him; perhaps a thrilling scene of family explanation and reconciliation. The day had been a specially long and hard one. He had been obliged to snatch a hurried lunch at one of his patients' houses, and to postpone his hard-earned dinner to the most fashionable of hours. It was indeed quite evening, almost twilight, when he made his way home at last. As he neared the scene of action, the tired man condoled with himself over the untimely ...
— The Doctor's Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... with treasures? Especially when she turns her neck to meet your burning kisses, or with a gentle cruelty denies, what she would more delight to have ravished than the petitioner—or sometimes eagerly anticipates to snatch ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace
... punished. A complaisant husband could not resist the entreaties of his wife, who longed for one of our sheets. One day, when the sailors were washing in the river, he took an opportunity, unperceived as he thought, to snatch up one of these coveted articles and run off with it. Some of his countrymen, who had watched him, directly brought him back, bound him to a tree, and informed me and a Missionary of the circumstance. On reaching the spot, I already found the Judge of ...
— A New Voyage Round the World in the Years 1823, 24, 25, and 26. Vol. 1 • Otto von Kotzebue
... watery orbs, that dare not scan His interlocutor, and his goatee, With hair and whiskers like a furnace be: Concave the mouth from which his nose-tip flies In vain attempt to shun vulgarity. O haste, ye gods, to snatch from him the prize, And send him hence to ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell
... mother, spell-bound at first, needed no second bidding, and, forgetful of her disheveled dress, sprang forward, and with outstretched arms, bare to the shoulder, was about to snatch her child. The pirate, however, with his red eyes gleaming with unholy fire, threw his great arm around the lovely woman's waist, and with a hoarse, fiendish chuckle of triumph, attempted to draw her toward him. But, quick as lightning, ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... with her troupe came also Alfred Wilkie, tenor, and Frank Gilder of New York, an organist and pianist of high repute. He was a genius in a class of his own. As the Salt Lake papers said of him, "Frank Gilder, who can snatch more music out of a piano than Beethoven could write in a week, is with the Lingard Company and will play a number of solos tonight. He is an entire orchestra, a sort of a condensed brass band, and those who don't hear him will never know what pianos were ...
— Sixty Years of California Song • Margaret Blake-Alverson
... pie in a brown earthen dish nestled to catch the warmth, a tin of Canadian salmon, which Billy had neglected to open, leaned affectionately against the other. Suddenly the engineer's kettle boiled over, and as Billy hurried to snatch it from the coals, the salmon-tin exploded with an awe-inspiring bang, and oily fragments of fish rained from ...
— Golden Stories - A Selection of the Best Fiction by the Foremost Writers • Various
... Katie some time to convince him that, just because he had the licence in his pocket, he could not snatch her up on his saddle-bow and carry her off to the nearest clergyman after the manner ...
— The Man with Two Left Feet - and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... afraid of me, but would hop about within a yard's distance, looking for worms and other food, with as much indifference and security as if no creature at all were near them. I remember, a thrush had the confidence to snatch out of my hand, with his bill, a of cake that Glumdalclitch had just given me for my breakfast. When I attempted to catch any of these birds, they would boldly turn against me, endeavouring to peck my fingers, which I durst not venture within their reach; and then they would hop ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift
... mountains," went on Sandersen. "You come to find Quade. You ride down off'n the hills, and you come up to Quade's house. You call him out to talk to you. You're sitting on your horse. All at once you snatch out a gun and shoot Quade down. We know! That bullet ranged down. It was shot from above him, plain murder! He didn't ...
— The Rangeland Avenger • Max Brand
... privileges which had cost this disinherited daughter so dearly few ever equaled in sweet enjoyment this cottage chapel arrangement. She no longer had to steal away and snatch a few minutes once or twice a month to associate with the advocates of free grace, as she once did, nor be shut entirely away from their beloved society, as for nearly a year, in that terrible season of persecution and despair. The church she loved came to her door. Her ...
— Elizabeth: The Disinherited Daugheter • E. Ben Ez-er
... and tides, toward whom all men and maids must look, though only Eros knows why! Evidently there was no answer to the Italian's question, for he faced about and walked moodily toward the entrance. Here he paused, looking up at the empty window. Again a snatch of song— ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath
... who guards the Sea-boy's head, He, who can save or can destroy, Snatch'd up to Heav'n the purest soul That ...
— The Olden Time Series, Vol. 6: Literary Curiosities - Gleanings Chiefly from Old Newspapers of Boston and Salem, Massachusetts • Henry M. Brooks
... into office. As to his nepotism, simony, and fraud, there was no doubt at all. He had richly provided all his friends and relations in Friesland with benefices. He had become in his old age a priest and churchman, in order to snatch the provostship of Saint Bavon, although his infirmities did not allow him to say mass, or even to stand erect at the altar. The inquisitors had further accused him of having stolen rings, jewels, plate, linen, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... illustrations we may note, along the lines of electric science, the names of Professor Kinnersly, who probably first led Franklin into that line of research which enabled him to "snatch the sceptre from tyrants and the lightning from heaven," and Professor Moses Gerrish Farmer, who broke new paths into the once unknown. As early as 1859, Mr. Farmer lighted his whole house with electric lights, and blew up a little ship by ...
— Charles Carleton Coffin - War Correspondent, Traveller, Author, and Statesman • William Elliot Griffis
... rightly, the withering of the flowers upon each footstep we have taken upwards, is no discouragement; for if we shape our path aright, there is a wreath of bright blossoms crowning each craggy peak before us, as we ascend to snatch the garland of immortal glory, placed just beyond the ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various
... genius of mine, it seems," he muttered, "who forever appears in my path to snatch from me every prize I set my heart on, is secretly an officer in the British service, commissioned, probably, to head a regiment of tories, whom he is now by his false statements and delusive promises, attempting to gather from the weak and wavering of our overawed ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... of his fancied grievance, and at last he made threats. "He's an outlaw, that's what he is—and as for that woman, well, I'm going up there some fine day and snatch the bunnit off her and see what ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland
... the time appointed, along came a native lad with a small basket of cocoa-nut stalks, filled with powders, pill-boxes, and-vials, each with names and directions written in a large, round hand. The sailors, one and all, made a snatch at the collection, under the strange impression that some of the vials were seasoned with spirits. But, asserting his privilege as physician to the first reading of the labels, Doctor Long Ghost was at last permitted to take possession ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville
... "Snatch my bowlines!" he cried, in a tone reminding me of Captain Cawson; "he'd better 'ware of running across my course. If I come athwart his hawser I'll turn him keel ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang
... fort had stood they now beheld a smoking rubbish heap, and the victorious Frenchman with the lily standard trailing from his mastheads was sweeping forward to snatch the rich prize whose ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... existing entanglements, the girl's speedy death would prove the most felicitous solution of this devouring riddle, which so unexpectedly crossed his smooth path; then what meant the vehement protest of his throbbing heart, the passionate longing to snatch her from disease, and disgrace, and keep her safe forever in the close cordon ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... broke the stillness or mingled with it. A snatch of melody came like the strains of a fairy pipe from the edge of the larch wood. Again there came a sharp movement in some long grass near the gate that led from the open down into the Burchester estate. It sounded as if some small imprisoned ...
— Charles Rex • Ethel M. Dell
... subjects of the conversation, and then uttered words which gave evidence of a deeply feeling and thinking spirit. Susanna regarded her with joy and admiration. Yet often a painful thought seemed to snatch her away from the genial impression, some dark memory appeared spectre-like to step between her and gladness; the words then died on her pallid lips, the hand was laid on the heart, and she heard and saw no more of what was going on around her, till the ...
— Strife and Peace • Fredrika Bremer
... officer, with emotion, "what a happiness it is for a soldier, who is often obliged to snatch each morsel from unwilling hands, to meet with a generous and benevolent family! I wish it were in my power, my dear child, to give you some pledge of my gratitude, but I have nothing—not so much as a single groat. You must be content with my ...
— Among the Trees at Elmridge • Ella Rodman Church
... death of Alexander the Great his empire was broken into fragments ruled by those of his generals who were able to snatch these smaller kingdoms for themselves. One of them named Ptolemy seized Egypt. His descendants, known as the Ptolemies, reigned there for centuries. Another, named Seleucus, gained control of the greater part of the old Persian empire. He built the city of Antioch, ...
— Hebrew Life and Times • Harold B. Hunting
... money to pay her, saying to myself, "I will present this curiosity to my wife, as it may please her." When I was going to pay the money, the damsel would not take it, but said, "My lord, I have a request to make, which is, that I may snatch one kiss from your cheek as the price of my jewelry, for I want nothing else." Upon this, I thought to myself, a single kiss of my cheek is an easy price for the value of a thousand deenars, and consented; ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... on the seat of his limousine as the car, now halting at a corner, now racing with a hundred others to snatch a block or two of distance before the next monarchial traffic officer of Fifth Avenue should hold it up again a victim to the evening rush, turned from first one to another of the pile of papers beside him. His strong, clean-shaven face was grave; and there was a sober light ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... persecuted man—some patient toil-worn son of science, whom Genius loves to call her own—though, haply, to the schools, to fortune and to fame unknown. One whose transcendent, superconscious mind has dared, Prometheus-like, to snatch from heaven the fire of the immortal gods and offer it ...
— Valere Aude - Dare to Be Healthy, Or, The Light of Physical Regeneration • Louis Dechmann
... Katherine of Spain; And a seat, too,'mongst the joys Of the blest Tobacco Boys; Where, though I, by sour physician, Am debarr'd the full fruition Of thy favours, I may catch Some collateral sweets, and snatch Sidelong odours, that give life Like glances from a neighbour's wife; And still live in the by-places And the suburbs of thy graces; And in thy borders take delight, An ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... nothing of her past; I am glad the girl's in luck at last; Such ones, though stale to native eyes, Newcomers snatch at ...
— Satires of Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries, with - Miscellaneous Pieces • Thomas Hardy
... life. But suddenly Nature had asserted her own inexorable laws, which teach forgetfulness and inspire hope. The bitterest ears were dried—the heaviest sighs suppressed; people had learned to reconcile themselves to life, and to snatch eagerly at every ray of sunshine which could illumine the cold, hopeless ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... end. To-morrow he must snatch "the make-up" off his face. He felt a sadness that was more than half a joy. He should be free; he should be honest, and being honest, he could summon that most sterling of all strength, a manly self-respect. He had thought himself strong, but had found himself weak. The love of money, which ...
— The Colossus - A Novel • Opie Read
... swivel-chair robbers, land- and highway-robbers, not pick-locks and sneak-thieves who snatch away the ready cash, but who sit on the chair [at home] and are styled great noblemen, and honorable, pious citizens, and yet rob and steal ...
— The Large Catechism by Dr. Martin Luther
... gathered fresh armfuls of sticks and sapling boughs until the fire burned Philip's face and his drying clothes sent up clouds of steam. Once, a hundred yards out in the plain, Philip heard the outlaw burst into a snatch of wild forest song as he pulled ...
— Philip Steele of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • James Oliver Curwood
... with himself as steward. It was only a year ago in Germany that a former high-placed German statesman admitted to me that one of the few fundamental mistakes that the Iron Chancellor ever made was to permit Leopold to snatch the Congo from under the very eyes and hands of Germany. I quote this episode to show that when it came to business Leopold made every king in Europe look like an office boy. Even so masterful a manipulator of men as Cecil ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson
... name was Vesalius. And the only way he could get to know anatomy as he did, was by going to snatch bodies at night, from graveyards ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... New Year water. At Bromyard in Herefordshire it was the custom, at midnight on New Year's Eve, to rush to the nearest spring to snatch the "cream of the well"—the first pitcherful of water—and with it the prospect of the best luck.{49} A Highland practice was to send |333| some one on the last night of the year to draw a pitcherful of water in silence, and without the vessel touching the ground. The water was drunk ...
— Christmas in Ritual and Tradition, Christian and Pagan • Clement A. Miles
... way of discussing matters showed itself the other day, when the gentlemen fought for "the poor man," as if they had to do with the body of Patroclus. Mr. Lasker took hold of him at one end, and I tried to snatch him away from Mr. Lasker as best I could. But where do imputed motives, and class-hatred, and the excitement of misery and suffering lead us? Such behavior comes too near being socialism in the sense in which Mr. von Puttkamer ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... for the little garrison, Dona Christina so far laid aside her dignity as to prepare the dining-room table and set it for breakfast; for day was by this time breaking, and we had decided that it would be sound policy to snatch a meal, if ...
— A Middy of the King - A Romance of the Old British Navy • Harry Collingwood
... a dandy end who is like lightning on his pins; and once he gets the ball he can bewilder the best of them by his ducking and doubling. Well, enough for the present. I don't want to discourage you, Winters, but take my word for it, Chester has to go the limit if she hopes to snatch that game from us. We're full of ginger and—say, that was as fine a kick at goal as could be. That big chap is Jeffries, isn't he? I remember his fielding when we played ball last summer; and the way he swatted the pill was a caution. It nearly broke our ...
— Jack Winters' Gridiron Chums • Mark Overton
... more cordial glance and pressure of the hand than she had yet received from him; told his father that he would only snatch an hour's sleep and be with him again, and left ...
— Evenings at Donaldson Manor - Or, The Christmas Guest • Maria J. McIntosh
... not redeemed within a short and definite term. The barons apprised their sovereign of the hard treaty and impending loss and as the empire could not afford a ransom of seven thousand pounds sterling, Baldwin was anxious to snatch the prize from the Venetians, and to vest it with more honor and emolument in the hands of the most Christian king. [51] Yet the negotiation was attended with some delicacy. In the purchase of relics, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon
... being given, to go on, and give one more, the best? Aye, to save and redeem and restore him, maintain at the height This perfection—succeed with life's day-spring, death's minute of night? Interpose at the difficult minute, snatch Saul the mistake, 280 Saul the failure, the ruin he seems now—and bid him awake From the dream, the probation, the prelude, to find himself set Clear and safe in new light and new life—a new harmony yet To be run, and continued, and ended—who knows?—or endure! The man ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning
... and dogs have equal claims on Heav'n, Though dogs but bark, and men more wisely prate, That to thyself one friend alone was giv'n, That Friend a Dog, now snatch'd away by Fate. ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron
... fully expected her to snatch it up, and he wished to be ready to turn before she could actually fire. But, indeed, nothing was further from her thoughts, for she did not know in the least how to use the weapon or even how to fire ...
— The Bittermeads Mystery • E. R. Punshon
... an eternity, as it seemed to me, I stood there alone. There was a scurrying of the vermin in the place to snatch up a few valuables and flee, as if they had been the crawling things under some soon-to-be-lifted stone, to whom light was a calamity. I was left with the Stillness before me, and the dreadful breathings and inarticulate ...
— Aladdin & Co. - A Romance of Yankee Magic • Herbert Quick
... to me: Never again, maybe, can we two sit At love together, unwatched, unknown of all, In the Queen's chamber, near the Queen's crown And with no conscious Queen to hold it from us: Now let me wear the Queen's true crown on me And snatch a breathless knowledge of the feeling Of what it would have been to sit by you Always and closely, equal and exalted, To be my light when ...
— Georgian Poetry 1913-15 • Edited by E. M. (Sir Edward Howard Marsh)
... unparalleled. The strain of such constant travel and continual excitement would have broken most men; but he possessed an iron constitution, and though he spent weeks on end in trains and steamboats, it never affected him in the least. He could snatch sleep at any time, and ...
— The Doctor of Pimlico - Being the Disclosure of a Great Crime • William Le Queux
... horse and splendid armor, that he might ride like a warrior into Valhalla. The true Scandinavian, by age or sickness deprived of dying in battle, ran himself through, or flung himself from a precipice, in this manner to make amends for not expiring in armed strife, if haply thus he might snatch a late seat among the Einheriar. With the same motive the dying sea king had himself laid on his ship, alone, and launched away, with out stretched sails, with a slow fire in the hold, which, when he was fairly out at sea, should flame up and, as Carlyle says, "worthily bury the old hero at once ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... and it occurred to him whether it would not be well to spring upon him, snatch the key, release himself from the room, and dash downstairs. So far as the boy was concerned, this plan was practicable. Rufus was much his superior in strength, and could master him without difficulty. But, doubtless, Martin ...
— Rufus and Rose - The Fortunes of Rough and Ready • Horatio Alger, Jr
... voracious creatures immediately devour; our misfortunes and reforms have diminished the number of favours; either through pride or through indolence I am but a bad suitor, and if at last I obtain something, it may perhaps be on the eve of a fresh revolution, which will in an instant snatch from me that which has cost me so ...
— Gibbon • James Cotter Morison
... do; for if our last-night's work was severe, you may be sure that our next will be far more so. And so good-night, or rather good-morning." And, throwing himself on the grass, the guerilla, accustomed to snatch sleep at all hours, had his eyes shut ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... head thrown back, receives it, as it falls, on her hands and breast, extracting a cry from the terrified beholders. Is it possible she can be singing? Yes, in the wildest style of her people; and here is a snatch of the song, in the language of ...
— George Borrow - The Man and His Books • Edward Thomas
... equal truth and grief, That little C—'s an arrant thief, Before the urchin well could go, She stole the whiteness of the snow. And more—that whiteness to adorn, She snatch'd the blushes of the morn; Stole all the softness aether pours On primrose buds in ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 14, - Issue 403, December 5, 1829 • Various
... he believed, fairly upon the track of the fleeing canoe, and having eaten nothing since breakfast, Leslie deemed the moment a fitting one wherein to snatch a meal; and this he did, steering with one hand and feeding himself with the other as he alternately eyed the compass and looked ahead on the watch for the first glimpse of the canoe's triangular sail, although he knew full well that several hours must elapse ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... of money. If you held out to him a penny in one hand and a threepenny-bit in the other, he would snatch at the threepence, and then break his heart because he could not get the penny in as well. You might safely have left him in the room with a leg of mutton, but it would not have been wise to ...
— Novel Notes • Jerome K. Jerome
... owns the fost'ring soil; Imbibes our sun through all its swelling veins, And grows a native of Britannia's plains. Soft-ey'd compassion, with a look benign His fervent vows he offer'd at thy shrine; To guilt, to woe, the sacred debt was paid,[60] And helpless females bless'd his pious aid: Snatch'd from disease, and want's abandon'd crew, Despair and anguish from their victims flew; Hope's soothing balm into their bosoms stole, And tears of penitence restor'd the soul. Nor did philanthrophy alone expand His liberal heart, and ope his bounteous hand; His ...
— A Poetical Review of the Literary and Moral Character of the late Samuel Johnson (1786) • John Courtenay
... as he shook his fat little fist at her. "I'll make you suffer for this. You shall find out what it is to heap injury and insult upon one like me, and to snatch from him the repose that he has earned by long years of toil." And, shaking his head savagely, he hurried ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... the brood of corrupt, self-seeking, unscrupulous, unprincipled politicians" (here she named one of the two rival parties in the State) "continue to infest and poison our local councils and undermine our Parliamentary representation; if they continue to snatch votes ...
— The Chronicles of Clovis • Saki
... entered the grove when the laughter he had heard was changed into a scream of terror. Little Ronald, dragging his sister by the hand, came running towards him, pursued by a score of savage Norsemen. Kenric was about to snatch up the children in his arms when he saw it was too late. The Norsemen were upon him. He gripped his sword and stood his ground. At the same moment Ailsa Redmain brushed past him and took the little Ronald by the hand. One of the men of Colonsay ...
— The Thirsty Sword • Robert Leighton
... was down. But let us suppose that he had been a moment earlier. He would then have been in time to turn around the corner with the other men and would have seen him rush upon a defenseless woman, push her down, snatch her purse and dash away, but, fortunately, in the direction of the men who assaulted and stopped him. Had the last arrival seen the entire affair he would have reversed his opinion and said that the thief got what he deserved. And so it is in our inadequate physical plane view of what we call a ...
— Elementary Theosophy • L. W. Rogers
... intrigue. My bold ambition, destitute of grace, Scorns still to beg their votes from place to place. On the fair stage my scenic toils I raise, While each is free to censure or to praise; And there, unaided by inferior arts, I snatch the applause that rushes from their hearts. Content by Merit still to win the crown, With no illustrious names I cheat the town. The galleries thunder, and the pit commends; My verses, everywhere, my only friends! 'Tis from ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... the afternoon, and asked to be made useful. No doubt out of good feeling, the Boers did not shell at all that day till late evening, but at the hospital all was sad perturbation. There had only been time to attend to the worst cases, and the poor nurses were just sitting down to snatch a hasty meal. The matron asked me if I would undertake the management of a convalescent home that had to be organized to make more room for the new patients. Of course I consented, and by evening we were busy installing ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson
... Our excellent Sub-Prioress knows no Milky Way! She is the brier, which hath sharply taught the tender flesh of each. She is the bed of nettles from which the most weary moves on to rest elsewhere. She is the fearsome burning, from which the frightened brands do snatch themselves!" ...
— The White Ladies of Worcester - A Romance of the Twelfth Century • Florence L. Barclay
... other forms of insect life. The whole matter is based upon the slenderest foundations. I don't mean, by this, that these ill-famed species are wholly innocuous. It would be highly inadvisable to snatch a kiss from a copperhead or to stroke a tarantula's fur the wrong way. But one could do it and live to boast of the achievement. Pseudoscience to the contrary notwithstanding, there is no living thing within the boundaries of the United States of ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine
... snatch the paste away before it should take fire, flinging aside the packet in his hurry. Agamemnon, jumping upon the piazza at the same moment, trod upon the paper parcel, which exploded at once with the shock, ...
— The Peterkin Papers • Lucretia P Hale
... rolling stone usually continues to roll merrily onward. They will protest to the ignorant that "to be good is to be happy," but very few of them will go out of their way to do good, if, by being "bad," they can snatch a personal advantage without anybody being any the wiser. "Life would be endurable if it were not for its pleasures," they declare in the face of a pile of social invitations. Yet they still endure that treadmill of entertainments which ...
— Over the Fireside with Silent Friends • Richard King
... Newcastle, where he smiled at a facetious Northumbrian, who at dinner caused the beef to be eaten before the broth was served, in obedience to an ancient injunction, lest the hungry Scotch should come and snatch it. On his way back he saw, what proved to be prophetic of his own fortune—the roup of an unfortunate farmer's stock: he took out his journal, and wrote with a troubled brow, "Rigid economy, and decent ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... to wrap your shivering person in its warm folds, lo! it yawns from end to end. There is nothing but a border, a fringe, left. You fling on your clothes in unusual haste, for it is mail day morning. The most indispensible of them all has scarcely a remnant of a button remaining. You snatch up another which seems in better condition, and scramble into it; but, in the course of the day, a cold current of wind, penetrating where it ought not, makes you aware of what your friends behind your back have noticed for some time, ...
— Behind the Bungalow • EHA
... between them and appeared to pronounce it a trifle he didn't care a fig for. "I surrender you that privilege then—of presenting him to his host—if I've seemed to you to snatch it from you." To which Lord John added, as with liberality unrestricted, "But I've been taking him about to see what's worth while—as only last ...
— The Outcry • Henry James
... rose before him. He saw her lying stiff and cold, with glazed eyes and drenched hair. Was there to be a yet more terrible separation between them? Was death to snatch her from him? Ah, no that should never be! They would ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... who were hardly dismissed before the lodging letters arrived, followed by somebody with a list of les seigneurs and dames as long as a Welsh pedigree. Half-an-hour was wasted in speeches and recommendations; another passed before we could snatch a morsel of refreshment; they then finding I was neither inclined to go to the ball, nor enter the land where Pharaoh reigneth, peace was restored, a few feeble bows were scraped, and I found myself in perfect solitude. Taking advantage of this quiet moment, I stole out of town, and followed ...
— Dreams, Waking Thoughts, and Incidents • William Beckford
... fury and kept on belabouring and throttling the corpse. Presently the Charley came up and, finding a Nazarene kneeling on a Moslem and frapping him, asked, "What harm hath this one done?"; and the Broker answered, "The fellow meant to snatch off my turband." "Get up from him," quoth the watch man. So he arose and the Charley went up to the Hunchback and finding him dead, exclaimed, "By Allah, good indeed! A Christian killing a Mahometan!" Then he seized the Broker and, tying his hands behind his ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... length of the platform he had gained on the train, his nose almost even with the brass railing over which the girl leaned, the handkerchief in her hand. Midway between the platform and the cattle guard they saw the Duke lean in his saddle and snatch the ...
— The Duke Of Chimney Butte • G. W. Ogden
... only for the rich. As for the people, to get bread fit for dogs, they must stand in a line for hours. And here they fight for it; "they snatch food from one another." There is no more work to be had; "the work-rooms are deserted;" often, after waiting a whole day, the workman returns home empty-handed. When he does bring back a four-pound loaf it costs him 3 francs 12 sous; that is, 12 sous for the bread, and ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 2 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 1 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... example of graceful submission to what was inevitable, by soliciting the office of godmother. Her sister was happily too young to be infected with court-jealousies, or to behold in a brother an unwelcome intruder, who came to snatch from her the inheritance of a crown: between Elizabeth and Edward an attachment truly fraternal sprung up with the first dawnings of reason; and notwithstanding the fatal blow given to her interests by the act of settlement extorted from his dying hand, this princess never ceased to ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... they do not love them even as dogs. Mark this, a hen, a goose, a wolf, will always remain to woman inaccessible ideals of animal love. It is a rare thing for a woman to throw herself, at the peril of her life, upon an elephant to snatch her child away, whereas a hen or a sparrow will not fail to fly at a dog and sacrifice itself utterly for its children. Observe this, also. Woman has the power to limit her physical love for her children, which an animal cannot do. Does that mean that, ...
— The Kreutzer Sonata and Other Stories • Leo Tolstoy
... habit to snatch up the flaxen little maiden, seat her upon her shoulder, and trot merrily round a circular path in the garden. But the sister next in age, whose thirteenth year had developed deep convictions, ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... cried Mark; and the little sailor, who had laid in his oar and stood ready with the boat-hook, made a snatch at the dog's collar, but did not succeed in gaffing him, and Bruff ...
— Mother Carey's Chicken - Her Voyage to the Unknown Isle • George Manville Fenn
... starvation. Then, in that last state, but not before, I might reveal myself; stand by the hopeless and succourless bed of death; shriek out in the dizzy ear a name, which could treble the horrors of remembrance; snatch from the struggling and agonizing conscience the last plank, the last straw, to which, in its madness, it could cling, and blacken the shadows of departing life, by opening to the shuddering sense the threshold of an ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... of the landscape has been changed for him, as though the sun had just broken forth, or a great artist had only then completed, by some cunning touch, the composition of the picture? And not only a change of posture - a snatch of perfume, the sudden singing of a bird, the freshness of some pulse of air from an invisible sea, the light shadow of a travelling cloud, the merest nothing that sends a little shiver along the most infinitesimal nerve of a man's ...
— Virginibus Puerisque • Robert Louis Stevenson
... cap, with brave shoe buckles on his wee brogues. You will catch him sometimes, if the 'glamour' is on you, under a burdock leaf or a thorn bush, and he is always making or mending a shoe. He commonly has a little purse about him, which, if you are quick enough, you can snatch; and a wonderful purse it is, for whatever you spend, there is always money to be found in it. Truth to tell, nobody has yet succeeded in being quicker than Master Leprehaun, though many have offered ...
— Penelope's Irish Experiences • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... and natural as could be. They said, a Dane here had told them that an Englishman, friendly to the Greek cause, was here, and that, as they were reduced to beg their way home, they thought they might as well begin with me. I write in haste to snatch the post. ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... when they rode up to the gate next morning. Dressed in a white sweater and a short skirt, and holding biscuits for a handsome collie to snatch from her hand, she made a charming picture of young and vigorous life. Her slim body was as strong and supple as the dog's, and her face glowed like a child's. Haney, sitting on the porch, was watching her ...
— Money Magic - A Novel • Hamlin Garland
... had brought it upon her. His evil power over her had increased. He felt instinctively that he need not in future be so much on his guard. His manner toward her became freer. She had never yet returned him the kisses which, as on this day, she had sometimes allowed him to snatch. But before they reached Paris she had kissed him; she had sought his hands with hers; and she had promised to ...
— The Case of Richard Meynell • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... twinkled. He liked jaunts as well as his master. One could snatch all manner of nice things ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... dark man with an eager face and restless, discontented eyes; the same man who had watched Melody over the wall of the old burying-ground, and heard her sing. He had never heard her sing since, save for that little snatch of "Robin Ruff," which she had sung to the children the day when he stood and pleaded with Vesta Dale to sell her soul for ...
— Melody - The Story of a Child • Laura E. Richards
... and scaped. Conrad who bore the doom is innocent, Save fellowship with guilt." And so he fled; The voice of prayer around him, but the soul Beyond its reach. The kneeling Pastor rose Sadly, as when the Shepherd fails to snatch A wanderer from the Lion. But the truth Couch'd in that dismal cry of parting life He treasured up, and bore to those who held Power to investigate and to reprieve; And authorized by them with gladness sought The gloomy prison. Conrad there he found ...
— Man of Uz, and Other Poems • Lydia Howard Sigourney
... deed: his bloody hand Snatch'd two, unhappy of my martial band; And dash'd like dogs against the stony floor; The pavement swims with brains and mingled gore. Torn limb from limb, he spreads his horrid feast, And fierce devours it ...
— Notes and Queries 1850.03.23 • Various
... as I came running down swiftly—for I was dread afraid Dame Elizabeth should overtake me and snatch back the money—and I might have spared my fears, for had I harried the Queen's crown along with her crowns, no such a thing should ever have come in her head—"O Hilda!" saith the child, "see here the good Messire who gave us the ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt
... Thad, who was a born fisherman, and always looking for a chance to snatch a mess of the finny tribe out of the water, had kept a couple of baited lines dangling behind; and during the afternoon several bites had resulted in a couple of captures, both being of an edible variety, known ...
— The House Boat Boys • St. George Rathborne
... and completely. Detestable as the impulse was, it came quite naturally to him. He had helped to kill butterflies often—why not a woman? The murderous instinct was the same in both cases. He tried to snatch the mare's bridle-rein, but she jerked her head away from him, and stood like a rock. He could not move her an inch. Only her great soft eyes kindled with a warning fire as he hovered about her,—and a decided movement of one of her hind hoofs suggested that possibly he might have the worst of ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... done," she faltered, "to be so punished? I have not, save the day before yesterday, left the house this year; and you offer me the greatest of pleasures only to snatch it ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... with us long, as I've said, and so I'm not going to build you into the line, Gilbert. I've got some good-looking guard material and I can't afford to work over you and get dependent on you and then have Robey snatch you away about the middle of the fall. That won't do. But I'll tell you what we will do, Gilbert. We'll use you enough to bring you around in form slowly. You'll play left guard for awhile every day. But what I want ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour
... decidedly. "We'll just snatch a bite here and follow you at once. I couldn't enjoy a dinner till I know she is safe." And so, though both Jasper Kemp and her husband urged her otherwise, she would take a hasty meal by the way and ...
— A Voice in the Wilderness • Grace Livingston Hill
... every road was infested with robbers, every pilgrim was robbed; within the city the churches lay in ruins, while the priests caroused. Daily assassinations made the streets insecure. Roman nobles, sword in hand, forced their way into St. Peter's itself to snatch the gifts which pious hands still ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 5 • Various
... unfriendly fellow. Next morning thou must be off early and go to the farm nearest Hrutstede. There thou must offer thy goods for sale, praising up all that is worst, and tinkering up the faults. The master of the house will pry about and find out the faults. Thou must snatch the wares away from him, and speak ill to him. He will say, 'twas not to be hoped that thou wouldst behave well to him, when thou behavest ill to every one else. Then thou shalt fly at him, though it is not thy wont, but mind and spare thy strength, ...
— Njal's Saga • Unknown Icelanders
... away, the ostracized New Yorker bade us farewell with a snatch of a song once more or less popular: ...
— The River and I • John G. Neihardt
... three, Mary was entering a copse which led into Mr. Edmonstone's field, when she heard gay tones, and a snatch of one of the sweetest of ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... To snatch his hat—to run to the hotel—to find that Captain Smith had indeed gone off in his phaeton, bag and baggage, the, same as he came, except that he had now two horses to the phaeton instead of one—having left with ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 2 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... humanly, or very seldom do, and that is why they do not love them even as dogs. Mark this, a hen, a goose, a wolf, will always remain to woman inaccessible ideals of animal love. It is a rare thing for a woman to throw herself, at the peril of her life, upon an elephant to snatch her child away, whereas a hen or a sparrow will not fail to fly at a dog and sacrifice itself utterly for its children. Observe this, also. Woman has the power to limit her physical love for her children, which an animal cannot do. ...
— The Kreutzer Sonata and Other Stories • Leo Tolstoy
... mud, and frontier desolation. Inspired by the ceaseless profanity of both mates, the roustabouts began unloading cargo at once, a steady stream of men, black and white, burdened with whatever load they could snatch up, moving on an endless run across the stiff plank, and up the low bank to the drier summit. It chanced to be my good fortune to escape this labor, having been detailed by Mapes to drag boxes, bales and barrels forward to where ...
— The Devil's Own - A Romance of the Black Hawk War • Randall Parrish
... Government can be carried out without costing life, that is unless there is resistance, and I hope there will be none here. The incapables over there will slink away. Why, Flourens and a few hundred men were enough to snatch the government out of their feeble hands. If the people declare that they will govern themselves, who is to withstand them. I hope to see the triumph and then to go. You know I am not a coward, Minette; our corps have shown that ...
— A Girl of the Commune • George Alfred Henty
... some tape stored at the project base. It was very difficult for Ross to remember that this was reality, that he was to be one of the main actors in the coming event, with no timely aid from Operation Retrograde to snatch him to safety. ...
— The Time Traders • Andre Norton
... tone, And feel at least one pleasure gone; A prowling cat, foe to thy kind, Thus wrought the evil she designed. Thy life and songs forever o'er, Thou wilt charm my ear no more. Thus in life's uncertain day, The singing birds oft snatch'd away: And they who linger long in pain Suffered to linger and remain. But God is just in his decrees, And ...
— Withered Leaves from Memory's Garland • Abigail Stanley Hanna
... very exciting hours that began when we moved from Jan Massibi's at daybreak on Wednesday and ended when we lay down to snatch a little rest at daybreak on Thursday. Many miles were travelled, a great enterprise was brought to a successful issue, a tough battle was fought, men received wounds and died, Mafeking was relieved: enough incident and adventure to fill months of ordinary life. The bare events are recorded here, ...
— The Relief of Mafeking • Filson Young
... garments fit him not, he stumbles at every step, and when he trips an underdress is unveiled that's like a City waiter's. What is he—the arch conspirator—doing himself? He starts, tries to conceal a book, but we snatch it from him. Sketches! lots of sketches! caricatures, low and vulgar portraits of ourselves! 'What are you?' we scream, 'and why this orgy? Speak, caitiff, or for ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Harry Furniss
... went, even Juke, who had failed to snatch Jane from the burning. I don't know that it was a much queerer party than other wedding parties, which are apt to be an ill-assorted mixture of the bridegroom's circle and the bride's. And, except for Jane's own personal friends, these two circles largely overlapped in ...
— Potterism - A Tragi-Farcical Tract • Rose Macaulay
... Robin, "but methinks it would be rather a dull world if none of us spoke to each other when it was cold. You see it's very often cold here in old England, and the winters are very long and dark. I should like to know what we should all do without a little cheerful talk, and an occasional snatch of song?" ...
— What the Blackbird said - A story in four chirps • Mrs. Frederick Locker
... confidence had been accorded him. He could now betray it whenever it suited him. He would inhabit the very palace. He would be in the secret of all the operations for the defense of the town. He thus held the situation in his hand, as it were. No one in Irkutsk knew him, no one could snatch off his mask. He resolved therefore to ...
— Michael Strogoff - or, The Courier of the Czar • Jules Verne
... have to wait even three or four hours for a physician begin one of the treatments below until he comes; you may save the child's life by doing so. Cholera infantum and pneumonia claim so many of our little ones each year, and in many cases snatch them away within a few hours of the first noticeable symptoms that we must advise you to call a physician as soon as you suspect it is serious. Cases vary and only a trained eye can detect the little ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... insulting Souldiers rudely trample, The dear Veins of my Country I have open'd, And sail'd upon the torrents that flow'd from her, The bloody streams that in their confluence Carried before 'em thousand desolations; I rob'd the Treasury, and at one gripe Snatch'd all the wealth, so many worthy triumphs Plac'd there as sacred to the Peace of Rome; I raz'd Massilia, in my wanton anger: Petreius and Afranius I defeated: Pompey I overthrew: what did that get me? The slubber'd Name of an authoriz'd Enemy. ...
— The False One • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... away from me, as if he expected me to snatch it from him and run, but he was still trying in an elephantine way to treat the matter as ...
— When a Man Marries • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... fellow-slaveholders against it. It is certainly the interest of all, and I am convinced that it is also the desire of every one of us, to treat our slaves with proper kindness. It is necessary to our deriving the greatest amount of profit from them. Of this we are all satisfied. And you snatch from us the only consolation we Americans could derive from the opprobrious imputation of being wholly devoted to making money, which your disinterested and gold-despising countrymen delight to cast upon us, when you nevertheless declare that we are ready to sacrifice it for the pleasure of being ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... with hidden dangers, a perilous path, among muddy channels where conscience is inevitably bespattered. The bent of Lucien's character determined for the shorter way, and the apparently pleasanter way, and to snatch at the quickest and promptest means. At this moment he saw no difference between d'Arthez's noble friendship and Lousteau's easy comaraderie; his inconstant mind discerned a new weapon in journalism; he felt that he could wield it, so he wished to ...
— A Distinguished Provincial at Paris • Honore de Balzac
... open. We may, by good fortune, obtain a glimpse of a great poet, and hear the sound of his voice; or put a question to a man of science, and be answered good-humoredly. We may intrude ten minutes' talk on a cabinet minister, answered probably with words worse than silence, being deceptive; or snatch, once or twice in our lives, the privilege of throwing a bouquet in the path of a Princess, or arresting the kind glance of a Queen. And yet these momentary chances we covet; and spend our years, and passions, and powers in pursuit of little more ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various
... forth a catch, ('Twas twelve o'clock) we wak'd the watch, I at his jazy made a snatch, [8] And try'd for to nab his rattle! [9] But I miss'd my aim and down I fell, And then he charg'd both me and Nell, And bundled us both to St. Martin's cell Where we sung fal de ral ...
— Musa Pedestris - Three Centuries of Canting Songs - and Slang Rhymes [1536 - 1896] • John S. Farmer
... marketing; but instead of these it held a very sharp and active boy seven years old, one of the younger members of the Low family. As the tall brother pushed rapidly here and there among the hurrying people on the sidewalks, the boy in the basket would suddenly stretch out with his wiry young arm, and snatch the hat or the wig of some man who might pass near enough for him to reach him. This done, the porter and his basket would quickly be lost in the crowd; and even if the astonished citizen, suddenly finding himself hatless and wigless, beheld the long-legged Low, he would have no reason to suppose ...
— Buccaneers and Pirates of Our Coasts • Frank Richard Stockton
... unknown to yield, Shall crowd from Cressy's laurel'd field, And gaze with fix'd delight; Again for Britain's wrongs they feel, Again they snatch the gleamy steel, 35 And wish ...
— The Poetical Works of William Collins - With a Memoir • William Collins
... 'but our intellectual and our spiritual passions as well. To force our will in the obedience of a higher will, to leave behind all our mundane desires in the pursuit of the one great desire, herein lies the essence of true virtue. St. Anthony would snatch his hours of devotion from the Devil. Even prayer to him was a struggle, an effort not to feel the joy of it. Yes, we must always disobey our impulses, and resist the tyranny of our desires. When I have a strong ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... mad impulse to snatch up the precious bottle then and there and make off with it, and might have yielded to the temptation, with disastrous consequences, had not an elderly man entered the shop at that moment. He was bent, and wore rather more fluff and flue upon his person than ...
— The Brass Bottle • F. Anstey
... this moment have your note; and as a packet of ours is going to England, I snatch up a pen to do what I can with it in the brief moments between this and post time. I don't wait till it shall be possible to write at length, because I have something immediate to say to you. Your letter is ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1 of 2) • Frederic G. Kenyon
... one by one our ties are torn, And friend from friend is snatch'd forlorn; When man is left alone to mourn, Oh, then, how ...
— Life and Public Services of John Quincy Adams - Sixth President of the Unied States • William H. Seward
... "And don't you think that whoever seized that diamond would have the sense to snatch up anything connected with it! I believe in what Mr. Penniket said just now—you find Levendale. If there's a man living who knows who killed my grandfather, Levendale's ...
— The Orange-Yellow Diamond • J. S. Fletcher
... dyke-breakers were digging their own graves, and rolled, one after another, into the breach which they were so obstinately creating. Upon that slender thread of land the hopes of many thousands were hanging. To tear it asunder, to roll the ocean-waves up to Antwerp, and thus to snatch the great city triumphantly from the grasp of Philip—to accomplish this, the three thousand had come forth that May morning. To prevent it, to hold firmly that great treasure entrusted to them, was the determination of the Spaniards. ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... was gone. I'll teach thee in a word One truth for all. War doth not willingly Snatch off the wicked, but still ...
— The Seven Plays in English Verse • Sophocles
... heartily appreciated, applauded, and approved them. They cheered and shouted "Hear, hear," after their own fashion, and then the whole band rushed back into the mountain gorge,—doubtless with the intent to gorge themselves with raw blubber, prepare their weapons, and snatch a little repose ...
— The Norsemen in the West • R.M. Ballantyne
... Ursins governs him through the Queen, 154; in disguise, meets his bride at Hostalnovo, 157; his mental defects—rather constituted to serve than reign, 166; his first entrance into Spain radiant with youth and hope, 166; Europe forms a coalition to snatch the two peninsulas from the domination of France, 167; compels the recall of Cardinal d'Estrees, 174; takes command of the army on the frontiers of Portugal, 179; baffled at Barcelona, and takes, in mortal agony, ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... I am cruel to myself. I had the chance of happiness a year ago, and I lost it. I have the chance of happiness now—yes, of consummate bliss—and haven't the courage to snatch at it. Take off this horrid gown, Kibble; my head is splitting: I shan't ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... Basinghall Street, and I snatch this quarter of an hour, the only quarter of an hour which I am likely to secure during the day, to write to you. I will not omit writing two days running, because, if my letters give you half the pleasure which your ...
— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan
... and asked to be made useful. No doubt out of good feeling, the Boers did not shell at all that day till late evening, but at the hospital all was sad perturbation. There had only been time to attend to the worst cases, and the poor nurses were just sitting down to snatch a hasty meal. The matron asked me if I would undertake the management of a convalescent home that had to be organized to make more room for the new patients. Of course I consented, and by evening we were busy installing sixteen ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson
... she had long wanted and which she knew he could ill afford:—a circlet of topazes for her hair. She kissed him and put it on to please him, but it was to her as if she were crowned because of her infamy and she longed to snatch the thing off and trample it. And yet always she was well aware that it was not remorse which she felt, but a miserable humiliation that she, Margaret Edes, should have cause for remorse. The whole day had been hideous. The letters and calls of congratulation ...
— The Butterfly House • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... morning of Rupert's Day (Shrove Tuesday?), a straw-man, dressed in a fur coat and a fur cap, is laid in a hole outside the village and there burned, and that while it is blazing every one seeks to snatch a fragment of it, which he fastens to a branch of the highest tree in his garden or buries in his field, believing that this will make the crops to grow better. The ceremony is known as the "burying of Death."[298] Even when the straw-man is not designated as ...
— Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I. • Sir James George Frazer
... central slab of dark-veined marble was to be inscribed with the names of buried ones. They doubted, too, whether the form of Lilias Fay could appertain to a creature of this earth, being so very delicate and growing every day more fragile, so that she looked as if the summer breeze should snatch her up and waft her heavenward. But still she watched the daily growth of the temple, and so did old Walter Gascoigne, who now made that spot his continual haunt, leaning whole hours together on his staff and giving as deep ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... not general suicide in such a community of unmitigated misery. Why did they not spring upon me and snatch the purse I displayed or die in the attempt? How did they resist eating up their own wares? It seemed strange that these sunken-chested, hobbling, halt, shuffling, shivering, starved creatures should still fight on for life. Why did they ...
— Tramping Through Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras - Being the Random Notes of an Incurable Vagabond • Harry A. Franck
... can attend to you, you pay for it. Then you may wait any time until the third person concerned will do it up in paper and string. This last proceeding is often so interminably delayed that if you were not in Germany you would snatch at what you have paid for and make off. But the Polizei alone knows what would happen if you ran your head against the established pedantry of things in the city of the Spree. You would probably find yourself in prison for Beamtenbeleidigung or lese ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... the corners of her mouth moistened as she thought of the dinner she would snatch from the jaws of the system on the day these young strangers ...
— The Desert and The Sown • Mary Hallock Foote
... from the cradle to womanhood, she would probably have been as other mothers, but now Rose was to her as the infant she had never borne. She felt the intense jealousy of ownership which the mother feels over the baby in her arms. She wished to snatch Rose from every clasp ...
— The Shoulders of Atlas - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... smoking cot, Chirp on the roof, or at the window peck, To tell their wants to those who lodge within. The poor lank hare flies homeward to his den, But little burthen'd with his nightly meal Of wither'd greens grubb'd from the farmer's garden; A poor and scanty portion snatch'd in fear; And fearful creatures, forc'd abroad by want, Are now ...
— Poems, &c. (1790) • Joanna Baillie
... her round. Heave, ah heave her short again! Over, snatch her over, there, and hold her on the pawl. Loose all sail, and brace your yards back and full — Ready jib to pay her off and heave short all! Well, ah fare you well; we can stay no more with you, my love — Down, set down your ...
— Verses 1889-1896 • Rudyard Kipling
... head was on a level with those gaping jaws, the lips curled backward in a ghastly parody of a smile, a weird, uncanny sound whizzed through the bared teeth, the passive body bulked as with a shock, and Cleek had just time to snatch the boy back when the great jaws struck together with a snap that would have splintered a skull of iron ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... been really and sorely afflicted. Mercury appeared as before, and, diving, brought him up a golden hatchet, asking if that was the one he had lost. Transported at the precious metal, he answered "Yes," and went to snatch it greedily. But the god, detesting his abominable impudence, not only refused to give him that, but would not so much as let him have ...
— Favourite Fables in Prose and Verse • Various
... inured to these horrid perils by daily association, the seizing of one of their number meant little, and they pressed on, careless of their dull lives, eager only to snatch the jewels which still flaunted on Phorenice's breast. Of the vengeance that might come after they recked nothing; let them but get the wherewithal for one night's good debauch, and they would forget that such a thing as the morning of a morrow ...
— The Lost Continent • C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne
... at him with frightened eyes, her lips apart, her hands to her breast. The tableau was brief. He could not strike her down. With a curse he was turning to the man on the floor, eager to snatch the keys from his belt. A scream from her drawn lips held him; he whirled and looked into the now haggard face of the girl he had considered beautiful. The penalty for her crime was already written there. She was ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... distance off was a high bank which projected some way into the channel. As the trees which grew on it hung over the water it would afford shelter to the boats, and the men while there might take some refreshment, and snatch a couple of hours' sleep. They accordingly pulled in, and found that the place fully answered their expectations. Jack was too wise, however, not to take precaution against surprise. He and Terence ...
— The Three Lieutenants • W.H.G. Kingston
... constantly repeated acts. In spite of the protests of his weakened will the trained nerves continue to repeat the acts even when the doer abhors them. What he at first chooses, at last compels. Man is as irrevocably chained to his deeds as the atoms are chained by gravitation. You can as easily snatch a pebble from gravitation's grasp as you can separate the minutest act of life from its inevitable effect upon character and destiny. "Children may be strangled," says George Eliot, "but deeds never, they have an indestructible life." The smirched ...
— Architects of Fate - or, Steps to Success and Power • Orison Swett Marden
... Jesus must have approached the coming contact with the sin of a world. With bated breath and reverent gaze one follows that lonely figure among the trees; now kneeling, now falling upon His face, lying prostrate, "He prayed that if it were possible the hour might pass away from Him." One snatch of that prayer reaches our ears: "Abba, Father, all things are possible unto Thee—if it be possible let this cup pass away from Me; nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt." How long He remained so in prayer we do not know, but so great was the tension of spirit ...
— Quiet Talks on Prayer • S. D. (Samuel Dickey) Gordon
... and I knew enough Hindustani now to be able to snatch at the meaning of their words. "You must ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... denied to the elder Herschel. He was able, from his childhood, to devote himself almost exclusively to intellectual pursuits. William Herschel, in the early part of his career, had only been able to snatch occasional hours for study from his busy life as a professional musician. But the son, having been born with a taste for the student's life, was fortunate enough to have been endowed with the leisure and the means to enjoy it from the commencement. His early years have ...
— Great Astronomers • R. S. Ball
... sudden, close by in the snowy road ahead, he saw a State Trooper on snow-shoes, — saw the upflung arm warning him — screamed curses at his horses, flogged them forward to crush this thing to death that dared menace him — this object that suddenly rose up out of nowhere to snatch from him the keys ...
— The Flaming Jewel • Robert Chambers
... said Vasili Andreevich. 'Lose an hour and you can't catch it up in a year,' he added, remembering the grove and the dealers who might snatch that deal from him. 'We shall get there, shan't we?' ...
— Master and Man • Leo Tolstoy
... missionary boards first tortured savages whose chief offense was that they worshipped God in their own way, and it will continue to be so until the last missionary has taken up his last collection and laid in his winter's coal therewith. The ICONOCLAST has done its level best to snatch the Chicago brand from the burning and now and then some Chicago man walks straight for a little way under the influence of its teaching, but one journal cannot do the work of a hundred, nor is the whole ...
— Volume 10 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... thing certain; at the finish, control would be in his own hands! But how to secure it and still float the company promptly and advantageously? There was the problem. He liked this crowd. They were good, keen, vigorous, enterprising men, fine men with whom to do business, men who would snatch control away from him if they could, and throw him out in the cold in a minute if they deemed it necessary or expedient. Of course that was to be expected. It was a part of the game. He would rather deal with these progressive ...
— The Early Bird - A Business Man's Love Story • George Randolph Chester
... food than the field labourers, but have the advantage of eking it out by what is left from the master's table,—if possible, with even less comfort in one respect, inasmuch as no time whatever is set apart for their meals, which they snatch at any hour and in any way that they can—generally, however, standing or squatting on their hams round the kitchen fire; the kitchen being a mere outhouse or barn with a fire in it. On the estate where I lived, as I have mentioned, they had no sleeping-rooms ...
— Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation - 1838-1839 • Frances Anne Kemble
... So, as I said, Mrs. Strathsay sat in her broad bower-window looking down the harbor, and a ship was coming up, and Effie and I stood on its deck, our hearts full of yearning. Mine was, at least, I know. And I could but snatch the glass up, every breathing, as we went, and look, and drop it, for it seemed as if I must fly to what it brought so near, must fly to fling my arms about the fair neck bending there, to feel the caressing finger, to have that kiss imprint ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... nor, it may be safely said, can the whole library of human history present us a form of heroism superior in kind or degree to that which this illustrious advocate exhibited during nearly two years, when he went forth daily, with his life in his hand, in the holy hope to snatch some human victim from the clutch of the destroyer thirsting ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... politically is out of reach, out of sight, out of mind. It has to be explored, reported, and imagined. Man is no Aristotelian god contemplating all existence at one glance. He is the creature of an evolution who can just about span a sufficient portion of reality to manage his survival, and snatch what on the scale of time are but a few moments of insight and happiness. Yet this same creature has invented ways of seeing what no naked eye could see, of hearing what no ear could hear, of weighing immense masses and infinitesimal ones, of counting and separating more items than he can ...
— Public Opinion • Walter Lippmann
... said, 'you upbraid me, promise that this you will never do while we are sailing or while we are near to sea or lake or tiny rivulet. For should one of my race hear you use harsh words toward me, then would they regain their power, and snatch me away from you for ever. Then would I be forced to dwell all the rest of my life in the crystal palace below the blue sea. Nor could I ever come up to you unless, indeed, I was sent by my kindred, when alas! only great sadness would befall us both. Promise ...
— Undine • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... life. Here it is the man who is the victim of a marriage not of his own making (as far as love was concerned), and the author, through the mouthpiece of the woman's confidante, makes ample excuse for his desire to snatch some ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, June 17, 1914 • Various
... he began to think about this great possibility, the thought held him in its grip. In fact, it shut out all others. Through busy days and sleepless nights he turned it over and over. And often, while engaged in other duties, he would snatch his notebook from his pocket in order to outline the new instrument he had in mind and jot down the signs he would use in ...
— Stories of Later American History • Wilbur F. Gordy
... one of a thousand but he hath done more worthy of dispraise and animadversion than commendation; no better means to help this than to be private." Let them run, ride, strive as so many fishes for a crumb, scrape, climb, catch, snatch, cozen, collogue, temporise and fleer, take all amongst them, wealth, honour, [3945]and get what they can, ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... your dreamy, tranquil life, How can you fathom the rage and strife, The blinding envy, the burning smart, That, worm-like, gnaws the Maestro's heart When he sees another snatch the prize Out from under his very eyes, For which he would barter his soul? You see I taught him his art from first to last: Whatever he was he owed to me. And then to be browbeat, overpassed, Stealthily jeered behind the hand! Why that was more than a saint could ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 11, - No. 22, January, 1873 • Various
... said he would go in to his mistress's tea-table. The young lad, with a heightened color and voice, began singing a snatch of a song, and marched out of the room. Esmond heard him presently calling his dogs about him, and cheering and talking to them; and by a hundred of his looks and gestures, tricks of voice and gait, was reminded of the dead ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... our grief Who, but Thou, can give relief? Who can pour Salvation's light On the darkness of our night? Bowed our load of sin beneath, Who can snatch our souls from death? Vain the help of man!—in dust Vainly do we put our trust! Smitten by Thy chastening rod, Hear us, save us, SON OF GOD! From the perils of our path, From the terrors of thy wrath, Save us, when we look ...
— Gifts of Genius - A Miscellany of Prose and Poetry by American Authors • Various
... a hurricane," said Bob, inventing something on the spur of the moment. "Only, instead of blowing straight ahead or around in a circle it blows up and down. It's liable to snatch you right up to the clouds, or suck you down ...
— Bob the Castaway • Frank V. Webster
... flowing out to the stairhead. A dressing room door banged noisily. Two women in their stays skipped across the passage, and another, with the hem of her shift in her mouth, appeared and immediately vanished from view. Then followed a sound of laughter, a dispute, the snatch of a song which was suddenly broken off short. All along the passage naked gleams, sudden visions of white skin and wan underlinen were observable through chinks in doorways. Two girls were making very merry, showing ...
— Nana, The Miller's Daughter, Captain Burle, Death of Olivier Becaille • Emile Zola
... the tiny storeroom/greenhouse adjacent to our grade school science class. It was full of what looked like black, crumbly soil and zillions of small, red wiggly worms, not at all like the huge nightcrawlers I used to snatch from the lawn after dark to take fishing the next morning. Mr. Campbell's worms were fed used coffee grounds; the worms in turn were fed to salamanders, to Mr. Campbell's favorite fish, a fourteen-inch long smallmouth bass named Carl, to various snakes, and to turtles living in aquariums ...
— Organic Gardener's Composting • Steve Solomon
... pitch 'em over yon fence. I've felled an Irishman like an ox when he called me names. The anger's in me, and the boldness and the roughness, and the cursin'; I didn't put 'em there, and I can't git 'em out now, if I tried ever so much. Why did they snatch the sewin' from me when I wanted to learn women's work, and send me out to yoke th' oxen? I do believe I was a gal onc't, a six-month or so, but it's over long ago. I've ...
— The Story Of Kennett • Bayard Taylor
... of speech that came naturally to him, "you and I must carry this thing through, General! My father is glued to Paris, you know. He has lost some of his enthusiasm, and one must be enthusiastic to the point of death itself if he would snatch a Kingdom out of such a fire as is raging now in Kosnovia. Austria has never seen me, probably has never even heard of me. I can slip through her cordon, swim ten Danubes if need be. What say you, General? Will I fill the bill? If I fail, what does it matter? If I win—well, ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy
... time enough to wait. It's not such a case as mine: without the Italian campaign, which gave me a chance to snatch the baton, they would have slit my ear like a condemned horse, under the empty pretext that I was sixty-five years old. You're not yet twenty-five, and you're on the point of becoming a brigadier: the Emperor promised it to you before me. In four or five ...
— The Man With The Broken Ear • Edmond About
... Ethel," so many things say,— The wind, that has played in the grasses all day, The pretty red squirrels you never can catch, And the kitten, that tries all your playthings to snatch. ...
— The Nursery, December 1877, Vol. XXII. No. 6 - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest Readers • Various
... the length of our days? Banished from the world which these friends have made for themselves; an intruder into the charmed circle in which the wand of fancy has enclosed them; a dreaded power standing over them, to snatch away the only bliss which they ever expect to enjoy. O gilded butterflies, made for a few days of sunshine, and doomed to perish at the first touch of frost! had they no souls; were there no hereafter, no heaven, no hell; if it would not be as desirable ...
— Catharine • Nehemiah Adams
... wind will blow every house away. It will snatch up the sticks of which the houses are built and carry them over the top of Blue Mountain. Then I guess you'll wish you had taken my advice and not built that ...
— The Tale of Brownie Beaver • Arthur Scott Bailey
... sprang forward to snatch the Amulet that had swallowed his. But Anthea caught it up, and at the same moment the Priest was jerked back by a rope thrown over his head. It drew, tightened with the pull of his forward leap, and bound his elbows to his sides. Before ...
— The Story of the Amulet • E. Nesbit
... eyes riveted on her face till her uneasiness became manifest. Instantly his suspicion took form, and, surveying her still more fixedly, he espied a corner of the precious paper protruding slightly above her corsage. To snatch it out, open it and realize its value was the work of a moment. Her cry of dismay and his shout of mad triumph rang out simultaneously, and never have I seen such an ebullition of opposing passions ...
— The Gray Madam - 1899 • Anna Katharine Green (Mrs. Charles Rohlfs)
... something to eat. "And talk to me about your will-o'-the-wisps, or what they call jack-o'-lanterns, such as flit around graveyards or damp places nights, that certainly did beat the record. Lots of times I was just stretching out my hand to grab it when I'd hear a laugh, and Steve, he'd snatch the old field-glass case away. I woke up still on the trail, and as set as ever ...
— The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields • Lieut. Howard Payson
... you have said I still wouldn't think of myself," protested Miss Haldin. "I would take liberty from any hand as a hungry man would snatch at a piece of bread. The true progress must begin after. And for that the right men shall be found. They are already amongst us. One comes upon them in their obscurity, ...
— Under Western Eyes • Joseph Conrad
... answer to her call, the elevator shot up to the second floor, and Tryon Dunham stepped out in time to see the two men snatch Mary's hands again and attempt to ...
— The Mystery of Mary • Grace Livingston Hill
... will to his and made you a wife to him? Who was it that told you the secret of the treasure-pit, and what footsteps went before you down its stair? Who was it that led you past the sentries of the Amandabele and gave you wit and power to snatch your lord's life from Maduna's bloody hand? Yes, with you it has gone and with you it will go. No more shall the White Witch stand upon the pillar point at the rising of the sun, or in the shining ...
— Benita, An African Romance • H. Rider Haggard
... air, and might vanish, like a glimmering light that comes we know not whence and goes we know not whither. Beholding it, Hester was constrained to rush towards the child—to pursue the little elf in the flight which she invariably began—to snatch her to her bosom with a close pressure and earnest kisses—not so much from overflowing love as to assure herself that Pearl was flesh and blood, and not utterly delusive. But Pearl's laugh, when she was caught, though full ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Cambridge readers, and little for others. But it may be fairly objected that this is not, in strictness, a parody. That is true, and indeed as a parodist Sir George Trevelyan belongs to the metrical miocene. His Horace, when serving as a volunteer in the Republican Army, bursts into a pretty snatch of song which has ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell
... will probably long that it should be so; he will feel it an injustice, a wrong to humanity that so generous a soul should have no reward; it will seem to him almost a personal injury that there should not be a noble chevalier at hand to snatch that devoted Maid out of the danger that threatened her, out of the horrible fate that befell her; and we can imagine a generous boy, and enthusiastic girl, ready to gnash their teeth at the terrible and dishonouring thought ...
— Jeanne d'Arc - Her Life And Death • Mrs.(Margaret) Oliphant
... assumed an air of such fearlessness and calm authority, that the young lawyer, surprised and overawed, forbore, as he had intended, to snatch the letter from his hand, and confined himself to bitter complaints of the impropriety of his conduct, and of the light in which he himself must be placed to Redgauntlet should he present him a letter with a ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... he be so different from others? Listen. This very cousin whose offer I refused had a son,—wild, wayward, by all report the most degraded of men. It was part of my cousin's reformation to save this son, and, if it were possible, snatch him from that terrible fate which seemed to be ...
— Two Men of Sandy Bar - A Drama • Bret Harte
... her constancy,—or by his own greed,—"Bossie" ventured near enough to snatch the proffered tidbit; then off he scampered, in ungrateful ...
— Peak and Prairie - From a Colorado Sketch-book • Anna Fuller
... former days been marked; and on the basis of this undeniable fact, he has endeavored to show that his own welfare and Mrs. Fenwick's are, in some occult fashion, knit together, and that only by aiding him in some extraordinary experiment can the physician snatch his beloved Lilian from ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... their attention upon Scraggs, who had dodged below like a frightened rabbit and sought shelter in the shaft alley. He had sufficient presence of mind, as he dashed through the engine room, to snatch a large monkey wrench off the tool rack on the wall, and, kneeling just inside the alley entrance he turned at bay and threatened the invaders with this weapon. Thereupon Hicks and Flaherty pelted him with lumps of coal, but the sole result of this assault was to force Scraggs ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... after another, while Cynthia clung to the colt's bridle, and he was uncertain till the last whether he had any letter for her. When it appeared she made a flying snatch at it and ran; and the comedy was over, to be repeated in some ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... along the quiet country roads, chatting, laughing, and occasionally singing a snatch of a song, no one would have dreamed that any shadows rested on the party except those which slanted eastward from the trees, which often hung ...
— A Day Of Fate • E. P. Roe
... I knew it was bound to happen. I told you so only last Tuesday—at least, if it wasn't you it was somebody else. "Baghdad," I said, "is sure to be captured. The English are in great force, and if we don't watch it carefully they're sure to snatch it from us." That's what I said; but you wouldn't have it. You were all so cock-sure, and now ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 152, March 21, 1917 • Various
... times. Kit Carson had located the Indians pretty well by this time and told Col. Willis to set his cannon so it would shoot very low, to barely miss the ground, and then he thought they would have a chance to snatch a "piece of sleep" before daylight. When the cannon exploded the Indians retreated, taking with them their dead and wounded and did not come back any more that, night. An Indian will risk his life rather than leave a dead member of his band in the white man's possession. It is an ...
— The Second William Penn - A true account of incidents that happened along the - old Santa Fe Trail • William H. Ryus
... heart—see how the blood rushed over me! Then the Prince pulled me up, and called me a brave lad, and set me on my feet, and asked me if I were sure I was not hurt. And by that time the archers were coming in, when all was over; and Long Robin must needs snatch up a joint stool and have a stroke at the Moor's head. I trow the Prince was wrath with the cowardly clown for striking a dead man. He said I alone ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... fellow. Between the putting up of the articles, he sang comic songs, and the funnier the song, the livelier the bidding that followed. The horses brought a decent price, and the machinery a disappointing one; and then, after a delicious snatch about Nell who rode the sway-backed mare at the county fair, he got down to the furniture,—the furniture which Jim had bought ...
— A Mountain Woman and Others • (AKA Elia Wilkinson) Elia W. Peattie
... that, henceforward, no matter what daring or outrageous act any president may perform, you have forever hermetically sealed the mouth of the Senate. Tell them that he may fearlessly assume what powers he pleases, snatch from its lawful custody the public purse, command a military detachment to enter the halls of the Capitol, overawe Congress, trample down the Constitution, and raze every bulwark of freedom; but that the Senate must stand ...
— Henry Clay's Remarks in House and Senate • Henry Clay
... cylinder lowered to point at the floor. A wild thought swept me that I could snatch it. But of what use would that be? Its ray would decompose all human flesh, but it would not harm a Robot; and if I startled Migul, fought with him in the confines of this narrow room, he would kill Mary and me ...
— Astounding Stories, July, 1931 • Various
... chambers? Julius, therefore (whose own conduct had been that night so extraordinary), must be familiar with his whole mysterious course, and consequently with the peril he was in. Before Lefevre could out of his perplexity snatch a resolution, Lord Rivercourt had pulled the cord to stop the coachman. The coachman, however, having received orders to drive home, was driving at a goodly pace, and it was only on a second summons through the cord that he slackened speed, and obeyed his master's direction to "draw ...
— Master of His Fate • J. Mclaren Cobban
... Future. Alice had refused his hand, Alice herself had ratified and blessed his union with another! Evelyn, so madly loved,—Evelyn might still be his! No law—from the violation of which, even in thought, Human Nature recoils appalled and horror-stricken—forbade him to reclaim her hand, to snatch her from the grasp of Vargrave, to woo again, and again to win her! But did Maltravers welcome, did he embrace that thought? Let us do him justice: he did not. He felt that Alice's resolution, in the first hour of mortified ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book X • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... that of the Queen. That the horrid object might not escape observation, the monsters had mounted upon each other's shoulders so as to lift the bleeding head quite up to the prison bars. The King came just in time to snatch Her Majesty from the, spot, and thus she was prevented from seeing it. He took her up in his arms and carried her to a distant part of the Temple, but the mob pursued her in her retreat, and howled the fatal truth even at her, very door, adding that her head would be the next, the nation would ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... the old stone walls, the banners, the flaring lamps and worn slippery stairs—all so much barer, smaller, more dilapidated than he had remembered—stirred the deep springs of his piety for inanimate things, and he was seized with a fancy to snatch up a light and explore the recesses of the castle. But he had been in the saddle since dawn, and the keen air and the long hours of riding were in his blood. They weighted his lids, relaxed his limbs, and gently divesting him of his hopes and fears, ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... branches and not uproot the succouring trunk, is like casting pearls into the waste of time. My heart will ever be with the destinies of those children, my feelings bound in unison with theirs; our hopes are the same, and if fortune should smile on me in times to come I will keep my word-I will snatch them from the devouring ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... see what you're driving at, my christian friend; but I'm glad you like us, and I hope you'll like us better before you are done with us." When he talks like this, I am content to see the hand of Fate snatch at his scalp, as it will before long. Gibe on, ungrateful mocker: retribution will soon overtake you in your mad career. Where then will be your gibes, your quips, your quiddities? You'll want my sympathy by and by, and I'll see about ...
— A Pessimist - In Theory and Practice • Robert Timsol
... heaving on this, nippering and fleeting up, they lifted the fore-hatch and forecastle scuttle out of water—which was enough. Before this another gang had been able to slip the other chain to position abaft the mizzenmast, hook on the tackle, and lead the fall through a snatch-block at the quarter-bitts forward to the midship capstan. Disdaining the diving-suit, they swam down nine feet to do these things, and when they had towed the rope forward they descended seven feet to wind it around the capstan and ship ...
— "Where Angels Fear to Tread" and Other Stories of the Sea • Morgan Robertson
... to snatch the child from him. But Luis stretched out his hand, caught the Valencian by the hair, and after shaking her roughly three or four times, he cast her away from him, and made for the drawing-room door. He flew down the staircase ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... quite impossible that any one, during those frenzied six weeks, could have thought calmly on any serious subject. But Lalage is a very wonderful young woman and my mother is able to retain her self-possession under the most trying circumstances. They managed somehow to snatch an hour or two for that long talk about my future of which my mother had spoken to me. I do not know whether Miss Battersby's advice was asked. Mine certainly was not. Nor was I told at the time the result of ...
— Lalage's Lovers - 1911 • George A. Birmingham
... can, unafflicted, bear Such manly merit in distress, beset By cruel foes, and faction's savage cry? My good, my gracious mistress, stretch, betimes, Your saving arm, and snatch him from destruction, From deadly malice, treachery, and Cecil. Oh, let him live, to clear his conduct up! My gracious queen, he'll nobly earn your bounty, And with his dearest ...
— The Earl of Essex • Henry Jones
... it, and these great, fair, muscular giants were often attractive to women, through the very strength and rude force with which they pushed their suit. But such a lumbering, vulgar fellow in Miss Barry's dainty, womanish parlor! and he smiled at the thought. Yes, he would be doing a good deed to snatch Sylvie from any ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas
... in the market, is the "jobber", whose main object is to take advantage of the small fluctuation caused by chance, but we must not forget the big speculators. By these, we do not mean those despicable people who aim to snatch a profit, and who, on having to face a loss, plead the gaming act. Experience and force of circumstances have, luckily, driven these parasites almost out of the market. But we do mean those big operators, who having weighed carefully "the ...
— Bremen Cotton Exchange - 1872/1922 • Andreas Wilhelm Cramer
... she felt almost easy in her mind. New York, with its shoving, jostling, hurrying crowds; a giant fowl-run, full of human fowls scurrying to and fro; clucking, ever on the look-out for some desired morsel, and ever ready to swoop down and snatch it from its temporary possessor, had numbed her. But now she felt a slackening of the strain. New York might be too much for her, but she ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... singing an unfamiliar song, whose burden was, "Following the Queen of the Gipsies, O!" This refrain haunted him often in the after years. That beautiful fantastic romance, "The Flight of the Duchess," was born out of an insistent memory of this woman's snatch of song, heard in childhood. He was ten when, after several passions malheureuses, this precocious Lothario plunged into a love affair whose intensity was only equalled by its hopelessness. A trifle of fifteen ...
— Life of Robert Browning • William Sharp
... haven't got the time to devote to it with the July term of court coming on, but I have to get it out every week or lose the county printing contract. There's a hungry dog over at Glenmore looking on to snatch the bone on the least possible excuse, and he's got two of the ...
— Trail's End • George W. Ogden
... bride, too happy boy, And while thy lambent glance of joy Plays over all her blushing charms, Delay not, snatch her to thine arms, Before the lovely, trembling prey, Like a young birdling, wing away! Turn, Stratocles, too happy youth, Dear to the Queen of amorous truth, And dear to her, whose yielding zone Will soon resign her all thine own. Turn to Myrilla, turn thine eye, Breathe to Myrilla, breathe ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... she would create for herself in marriage, the deliverance from the dull insignificance of her girlhood—all immediately before her; and yet they had come to her hunger like food with the taint of sacrilege upon it, which she must snatch with terror. In the darkness and loneliness of her little bed, her more resistant self could not act against the first onslaught of dread after her irrevocable decision. That unhappy-faced woman and her children—Grandcourt ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... they would shoot at the hat. This hat trick was tried several times. Kit Carson had located the Indians pretty well by this time and told Col. Willis to set his cannon so it would shoot very low, to barely miss the ground, and then he thought they would have a chance to snatch a "piece of sleep" before daylight. When the cannon exploded the Indians retreated, taking with them their dead and wounded and did not come back any more that, night. An Indian will risk his life rather than leave a dead member of his band in ...
— The Second William Penn - A true account of incidents that happened along the - old Santa Fe Trail • William H. Ryus
... the night of the snatch division on the Tenants' Redemption Bill, on which the Government was saved by a majority of three. You remember? No one on our side—perhaps very few on the opposite side—expected the end that night. Then the debate collapsed like eggshells. I and Hotchkiss were dining ...
— The Door in the Wall And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... the chapel gate when Mrs. Rean ran from behind the hedge, and, getting in front of me who was going to the chapel with the baby in me arms, she said: "Now I'll be damned if I'll have that child christened a Catholic!" and didn't she snatch the child and run away, taking a short-cut across the fields to ...
— The Lake • George Moore
... front pawhands dangling over its creamy vest, came out fully into the open, black eyes flicking from the motionless Dalgard to the bright beads on the rock. But when one of those paws shot out to snatch the treasure, the traveler's hand was already cupped protectingly over the hoard. Dalgard formed a mental picture and beamed it at the twenty-inch creature before him. The hopper's ears twitched nervously, its blunt nose wrinkled, and then it bounded back into ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton
... if he had been really and sorely afflicted. Mercury appeared as before, and, diving, brought him up a golden hatchet, asking if that was the one he had lost. Transported at the precious metal, he answered "Yes," and went to snatch it greedily. But the god, detesting his abominable impudence, not only refused to give him that, but would not so much as let him have his ...
— Favourite Fables in Prose and Verse • Various
... bosom, and continues in a tone of fervent adjuration.) Oh! Louisa! Louisa! Fallen, perhaps already lost, daughter! Treasure in thy heart the solemn counsels of a father! I cannot eternally watch over thee! I may snatch the dagger from thy hands; but thou canst let out life with a bodkin. I may remove poison from thy reach; but thou canst strangle thyself with a necklace. Louisa! Louisa! I can only warn thee. Wilt thou rush boldly forward till the perfidious phantom which ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... Not only did Mrs. Halfpenny get the half- unconscious girl into bed, but she stayed till evening, and then came back to snatch a meal ...
— Beechcroft at Rockstone • Charlotte M. Yonge
... quarrel over the cards, the high words and a snatch for the winnings, a tilted table, an extinguished taper, a stab in the dark and a groan. Exit Thevenin Pensete. Your ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... all Bud had learned from his experience. After this he would let Ted snatch his own chestnuts out of the fire. Small use trying to show such a chap the real significance of his wrong-doing. Paul did not try, ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour - The Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain • George A. Warren
... closed on the last guest and Bess at the piano was playing a snatch of a waltz, Carl pounced upon his aunt and carried her off ...
— The Story of the Big Front Door • Mary Finley Leonard
... Death that had come so close while he slept. He was not conscious of the danger that had threatened him. He did not feel gratitude for his escape. He could not think. He could only strive madly, with the strength of despair, in the fight to snatch others from the grip of an awful fate; and, as he fought, he prayed to be ...
— Their Yesterdays • Harold Bell Wright
... way we can snatch a brand from the fire at any stage of its decomposition, or analyze a decaying tree trunk during any month of its existence, and thus manufacture as many chemical formulae as we like, and give them specific names; ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 362, December 9, 1882 • Various
... into Henry. The wind had a clear sweep over the frozen lagoon, and the rustling of the icy bushes above him was like a whisper from the cold. He wrapped himself thoroughly in the painted coat and the two blankets, put the rifle in front of him, where he could snatch it up instantly, and beat his hands together at times to keep them warm, and at other times ...
— The Eyes of the Woods - A story of the Ancient Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... "speak, for I know you hear me. Are you a devil, Silencieux; a devil I have worshipped all this time? God help me! Have you no pity,—what is her little flower-life to you? Why should you snatch ...
— The Worshipper of the Image • Richard Le Gallienne
... the light. So now you understand.—I live in fear Lest one like you should carry it away; A poor, pot-boiling thing, but oh, how dear! "Don't let them buy it, pitying God!" I pray! And hark ye, sir—sometimes my brain's awhirl. Some night I'll crash into that window pane And snatch my picture back, my little girl, And run and run. . . . I'm talking wild again; A crab can't run. I'm crippled, withered, lame, Palsied, as good as dead all down one side. No warning had I when the evil came: It struck me down in all my strength ...
— Ballads of a Bohemian • Robert W. Service
... into his horse, and the animal dashed forward with a bound, Cuthbert striking with his long sword at one or two men who made a snatch at the reins. In another minute he was cantering out of the village, convinced that he had killed the leader of his foes, and that he was safe now to pursue the rest of his ...
— The Boy Knight • G.A. Henty
... this undeniable fact, he has endeavored to show that his own welfare and Mrs. Fenwick's are, in some occult fashion, knit together, and that only by aiding him in some extraordinary experiment can the physician snatch his beloved Lilian from her ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... in his chair, and staring now up at the ceiling, now straight forward at his hostess (in a manner that made me strongly inclined to kick him out of the room), now whistling sotto voce to himself a snatch of a favourite air, now interrupting the conversation, or filling up a pause (as the case might be) with some most impertinent question or remark. At one time it was,—'It, amazes me, Mrs. Graham, how ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte
... the ground. She is in tears. Her friend Skip has left her. Her cake has gone too. Did Skip snatch ...
— The Nursery, Number 164 - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest Readers • Various
... the down-pouring rain, the Girl Scouts, garbed in such protective garments as they could snatch from the clothes-tree in the hall of Rosabell, raced over to cover the short distance to the pavilion, where the crowd was seen to gather ...
— The Girl Scouts at Sea Crest - The Wig Wag Rescue • Lillian Garis
... night, November ninth, I had repaired to my dugout near Bouillonville, planning to say two Masses at distant points the following morning. I retired early to snatch ...
— The Greater Love • George T. McCarthy
... curious, certainly more comical. .. There weekly arrive in this town scores of green Vermonters and New Hampshire men, all athirst for gain and glory in the fishery. They are mostly young, of stalwart frames; fellows who have felled forests, and now seek to drop the axe and snatch the whale-lance. Many are as green as the Green Mountains whence they came. In some things you would think them but a few hours old. Look there! that chap strutting round the corner. He wears a beaver ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... robbed me and therefore I hate thee, and therefore I will deliver thee to Ospakar, whom thou dost loath—ay and yet win Brighteyes to myself. Am I not also fair and can I not also love, and shall I see thee snatch my joy? By the Gods, never! I will see thee dead, and Eric with thee, ere it shall be so! but first I ...
— Eric Brighteyes • H. Rider Haggard
... beyond it, I was unable to get at it and said, 'O my uncle, I cannot reach thee the Lamp, but I will give it to thee when outside the Treasury.' His only need was the Lamp and he designed, O my mother, to snatch it from me and after that slay me, as indeed he did his best to do by heaping the earth over my head. Such then is what befel me from this foul Sorcerer." Hereupon Alaeddin fell to abusing the Magician in hot wrath ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... guardian, all his labour's done, For every maid is willing to be won. Before the lords of verse a suppliant stand, And beg our passage through the fairy land: Beg more—to search for sweets each blooming field, And crop the blossoms woods and valleys yield, To snatch the tints that beam on Fancy's bow; And feel the fires on Genius' wings that glow; Praise without meanness, without flattery stoop, Soothe without fear, ...
— Inebriety and the Candidate • George Crabbe
... would make a snatch with his other hand, swing about for a few moments, and then up would go his legs to be crossed over the branch, when he would swing to and fro head downwards, making derisive gestures at ...
— Brownsmith's Boy - A Romance in a Garden • George Manville Fenn
... would go in to his mistress's tea-table. The young lad, with a heightened colour and voice, began singing a snatch of a song, and marched out of the room. Esmond heard him presently calling his dogs about him, and cheering and talking to them; and by a hundred of his looks and gestures, tricks of voice and gait, was reminded of the dead lord, ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... have called it, and began asking who had dared to open the wound and expose it to the air: and, seeing Miss Arnold preparing to apply a bread-and-water poultice, which she had made, fell into such a passion of rage and jealousy that she forgot herself so far as to snatch it from Lettice's hand, vowing, if any body was to be allowed to meddle with her arm, she would never touch it again so ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... leave this shadow-peopled cave And live among the Gods, and pass each day In high communion, sharing what they have Of profuse wealth and unexhausted prey; 225 And from the portion which my father gave To Phoebus, I will snatch my share away, Which if my father will not—natheless I, Who am the king ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... little incident was a French military officer. His services were necessarily dispensed with on the abolition of the feudal system. Memories of him still linger in Matsue; and old people remember a popular snatch about him—a sort of rapidly-vociferated rigmarole, supposed to be an imitation of ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... establisheth That nature of mind and soul corporeal is: For when 'tis seen to drive the members on, To snatch from sleep the body, and to change The countenance, and the whole state of man To rule and turn,—what yet could never be Sans contact, and sans body contact fails— Must we not grant that mind and soul consist Of a corporeal nature?—And ...
— Of The Nature of Things • [Titus Lucretius Carus] Lucretius
... It is dangerous to snatch meat away from hungry dogs. If Kesshoo hadn't been slashing at them with his whip, and if Menie and Koko hadn't been screaming at them with all their might, so the dogs were nearly distracted, Koolee ...
— The Eskimo Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins
... overtake, snatch, capture, discover, grip, secure, take, clasp, ensnare, gripe, seize, take hold of. clutch, entrap, lay hold ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... end) Some lucky license answer to the full Th' intent proposed, that license is a rule. Thus Pegasus, a nearer way to take, May boldly deviate from the common track; From vulgar bounds with brave disorder part, And snatch a grace beyond the reach of art, Which without passing through the judgment, gains The heart, and all its end at once attains. In prospects thus, some objects please our eyes, Which out of nature's common order rise, The shapeless rock, or hanging precipice. Great wits ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
... the men's turn to laugh. "And give you a show to snatch that six-shooter and blow a hole through me, as you did to the Sheriff of Calaveras, eh? Not if this court understands itself," said the ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte
... He saw that Rudyard was armed, and that the end might come at any moment. There was in the wronged husband's eyes the wild, reckless, unseeing thing which disregards consequences, which would rush blindly on the throne of God itself to snatch its vengeance. He spoke again: and ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... absolutely necessary to preserve their numbers and the business connected with them. Of course, I know there is a feeling that, if they are going to disappear, the best thing to do is to exploit them to the utmost in the meanwhile, so as to snatch every present advantage, regardless of consequences. But is this business, sense, or conservation? Even if any restriction in the way of numbers, sex, age or season should be imposed on seal hunting, a small sanctuary cannot but be beneficial. While, if there is no other ...
— Animal Sanctuaries in Labrador • William Wood
... the fireplace and lit the fire, and although she had just left her bed, she could not resist the temptation offered by Valentine's sleep, so she threw herself into an arm-chair to snatch a little more rest. The clock striking eight awoke her. Astonished at the prolonged slumber of the patient, and frightened to see that the arm was still hanging out of the bed, she advanced towards Valentine, and for the first time noticed the white lips. She tried to replace ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... up from her chair and watched it go. In the sunlight its black hull was so sharply outlined on the sea, its lines and spars were so trim that it looked a miniature ship which she could reach out her hand and snatch. But her eyes grew dim as she watched, so that it became shapeless and blurred, and long before the liner was out of sight it was ...
— Witness For The Defense • A.E.W. Mason
... each other. To the crown prince, his father is in every sense of the word "William second to none;" while the kaiser himself is entirely wrapped up in his heir. For the last few years the emperor has given every spare moment that he could snatch away from his multifarious occupations to the task of instilling his ideas and views into the crown prince. In talking and reasoning with him, he has treated the lad as far older than his years, has discussed with him, in fact, as if he were a man; and it is ...
— The Secret Memoirs of the Courts of Europe: William II, Germany; Francis Joseph, Austria-Hungary, Volume I. (of 2) • Mme. La Marquise de Fontenoy
... adoration by diverting my mind from the hideous memories that racked it. At first indeed this wanton spirit played a false part & appearing with sable wings & gloomy countenance seemed to take a pleasure in exagerating all my miseries—and as small hopes arose to snatch them from me & give me in their place gigantic fears which under her fairy hand appeared close, impending & unavoidable—sometimes she would cruelly leave me while I was thus on the verge of madness and without consoling me leave me nought but heavy leaden sleep—but ...
— Mathilda • Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
... that it was not hers until she had made it her own by choosing and willing to be good-tempered when she was disinclined—holding it fast with the hand of determination when the hand of wrong would snatch it from her. ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald
... bridge-players were serious and silent—much in the mood of a tired actress who has the good fortune to be "off," while her mates are on, almost long enough for a nap on the property sofa in the wing. Maggie's nap, had she been able to snatch forty winks, would have been of the spirit rather than of the sense; yet as she subsided, near a lamp, with the last salmon-coloured French periodical, she was to fail, for refreshment, even of ...
— The Golden Bowl • Henry James
... have snatch'd his wand And bound him fast. Without the rod reversed, And backward mutters of dissevering power, We cannot free the lady that sits here Bound in ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... to love for a moment, to whom she had been unconsciously faithful, alone could give her. Moreover, her reason working side by side with her imperious desires, assured her that if he really were spying, and, whatever his passion, meant to remold her will to his and snatch the keystone from the arch, it were wise to keep him here. It was evident that he had no suspicion of the imminence ...
— The White Morning • Gertrude Atherton
... on the prudent Ant thy heedless eyes, Observe her labours, Sluggard, and be wise; No stern command, no monitory voice, Prescribes her duties, or directs her choice; Yet, timely provident, she hastes away To snatch the blessings of a plenteous day; When fruitful Summer loads the teeming plain, She crops the harvest, and she stores the grain. How long shall sloth usurp thy useless hours, Unnerve thy vigour, and enchain thy powers? While artful shades thy downy ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... Dick's impulsive answer with a quick snatch at his elbow. He looked his questioner ...
— Facing the German Foe • Colonel James Fiske
... who seems disposed to dispute Tully's title to the embers. In the struggle the coals fly in every direction; of a surety, the dingy rascals will burn my house before my eyes. Now comes Philip, a fourth negro, and tries to snatch the stick from Plato's hand; but the latter is on his guard, and fetches his adversary a wipe over the pate, that snaps the stick—a tolerably thick one, by the way—in two. Both retreat a short distance, and lowering their heads like a couple of angry steers, run full tilt ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... already risen in the hitherto sunny skies of his life. He passed the examination with his usual success. The certificate was duly signed, and, happy that he could carry it down to his parents, he looked out the train to Penzance. Finding that he had an hour or so to spare, he went to an inn to snatch a meal before he started off on his ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various
... of the same cage. She instantly mounted the top perch, put up her bill and seized the worm; but he held on, dragged it away, and then retired to his own cage with it. She positively could not resist this temptation, and even from her own cherished spouse she would sometimes snatch the desired tidbit. ...
— In Nesting Time • Olive Thorne Miller
... Humphry Repton.—To snatch from utter oblivion the once highly reputed Humphry, the king of landscape gardeners, to whom many of our baronial parks owe much of their picturesque beauty, and who, by the side of Sir Joseph Paxton, would now most duly have taken knightful station in these go-ahead days, I ask, in what ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 235, April 29, 1854 • Various
... was so idiotic that I lost all patience with you. If you had been willing to wait a while, a year or so, you could have got the position in a perfectly honorable way. But, no! you must have it right now, in order to further your own selfish ends. And so you reach out and snatch it, just as you try to grasp ruthlessly whatever you need or desire for your own purposes. And, as usual, you left the mark of your pitchy fingers. Your soul is so blackly selfish, Felix Brand, that it oozes corruption out of your very ...
— The Fate of Felix Brand • Florence Finch Kelly
... apartments on the first-floor of the chateau. Djalma, too severely hurt to be carried upstairs, has remained in a room below. At the moment of the shipwreck, a weeping mother had placed her child in his arms. He had failed in the attempt to snatch this unfortunate infant from certain death, but his generous devotion had hampered his movements, and when thrown upon the rocks, he was almost dashed to pieces. Faringhea, who has been able to convince him of his affection, remains to watch ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... stimulus of delirium. The count writhed and shrank beneath the fierce stabbing of those incisive words, and, in his ungovernable grief, flung himself beside the son, whom he feared death would shortly snatch from his arms, pouring forth assurances Maurice would once have hailed as words of life, but which now fell powerless upon his unheeding ears. While Count Tristan's overwhelming anguish lasted, there was no promise he would not have made to purchase ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie
... islands which lie off the coast, in a trip from port to port, and supplies herself with choice goods from a vessel from Oahu, which has been lying off and on the islands, waiting for her. Two days after the sailing of the Avon, the Loriotte came in from the leeward, and without doubt had also a snatch at the brig's cargo. ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... she cried; and still holding his hand, hurried up the dune, and down the other side of it. Malcolm accompanied her step for step, strongly tempted, however, to snatch her up, and run for the bored craig: he could not think why she made for the road— high on an unscalable embankment, with the park wall on the other side. But she ran straight for a door in the embankment itself, dark between two buttresses, which, never having seen it open, ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... and means to make the most of it. It will lead me upward somewhere. But whether I am to be king of New Babylon or Prime Minister of New Zealand or lawgiver to a Polynesian tribe is a secret as yet hidden in the lap of the gods, whence Carlotta doubtless will snatch it in her own ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... present themselves for capture of their own free will, or be taken after a little coyness only. They are like wealth and power, which, if a man is not born to them, are the more likely to take him, the more he has restrained himself from an attempt to snatch them. They hanker after those only who have tamed their nearer thoughts. Nevertheless, it is impossible not to feel that the early Pantheists were true prophets and seers, though the things were unknown to them without which a complete view was unattainable. What does Linus mean, we ask ...
— God the Known and God the Unknown • Samuel Butler
... the night-duty was of course taken in rotation, but during the pressure of these four days we had to snatch our rest when ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... him. Cyrus had marked the officer one day when he was drilling his men; he had drawn up the ranks in two divisions, opposite each other, ready for the charge. They were all wearing corslets and carrying light shields, but half were equipped with stout staves of fennel, and half were ordered to snatch up clods of earth and do what they could with these. [18] When all were ready, the officer gave the signal and the artillery began, not without effect: the missiles fell fast on shields and corslets, on thighs and greaves. ...
— Cyropaedia - The Education Of Cyrus • Xenophon
... off; but, having a creepy instinct in her back that he was on the point to follow, catch, and snatch her away, she span round again, crying: "Do not follow me! Mind you! If you like, be at the elm-tree again at half-past ten-and I will communicate ...
— The Lord of the Sea • M. P. Shiel
... dare recommend unto the perusal of our English nation, whose glorious actions it containeth. What relateth unto the curiosity hereof, this Piece, both of Natural and Humane History, was no sooner published in the Dutch Original, than it was snatch't up for the most curious Library's of Holland; it was Translated into Spanish (two impressions thereof being sent into Spain in one year); it was taken notice of by the learned Academy of Paris; and finally recommended as worthy our esteem, by the ingenious Author of the Weekly Memorials ...
— The Pirates of Panama • A. O. (Alexandre Olivier) Exquemelin
... easy; I'm not the sort to be taken in with: 'She has such beautiful hair and she is so devoted to her mother!' You see, mamma, I've thought a great deal about marriage, although you may not imagine I have. The most difficult thing to get in this world, the thing we pay the most dearly for, snatch from each other, fight for, the thing we only obtain by force of genius or by luck, by meanness, privations, by wild efforts, perseverance, resolution, energy, audacity or work, is money—isn't that so? Now money means happiness and the honour ...
— Rene Mauperin • Edmond de Goncourt and Jules de Goncourt
... am not bad all through!" she cried, clasping her hands. "Vouchsafe to rescue Thy wandering lamb, strike her, crush her, snatch her from foul and adulterous hands, and how gladly she will nestle on Thy shoulder! How willingly she will return ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... chanted of late, and of Troy burg wasted of war - Now of the sorrows of Menfolk that fifty years have been, Now of the Grace of the Commune I sing, and the days of a Queen! Surely I curse rich Menfolk, "the Wights of the Whirlwind" may they - This is my style of translating [Greek text],—snatch them away! The Rich Thieves rolling in wealth that make profit of labouring men, Surely the Wights of the Whirlwind shall swallow them quick in their den! O baneful, O wit-straying, in the Burg of London ye dwell, And ever of Profits and three per cent. are ...
— New Collected Rhymes • Andrew Lang
... preceding volume of this series of aviation adventures, where Jack and "Perk," in order to get their man—one of the boldest and most successful counterfeiters known in the annals of crime—found it necessary to fly across the Mexican boundary line and snatch their victim out of an extinct volcano crater that had once been the fort of the fierce Yaqui Indian tribe,[1] will think it a rather far cry for the Sky Detectives to be detailed to active duty some thousands of miles distant, and in the extreme ...
— Eagles of the Sky - With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes • Ambrose Newcomb
... exactly a success. You know a steamer rug's too narrow to cover two people properly. If it was over Jack, I was left out in the cold, and vice versa. We had to take turns shivering. After one of us got to the point where his teeth chattered, he'd snatch the rug off the other fellow and warm up. But it wasn't till this morning that I took any particular notice of that rug. And Ruth, it belongs ...
— Peggy Raymond's Vacation - or Friendly Terrace Transplanted • Harriet L. (Harriet Lummis) Smith
... receptivity. Poetry is not science, any more than painting is photography, or architecture is building in squares and cubes and circles. To approach the great poetry of "high seriousness" when we are in a cynical or flippant mood; to snatch glances at a great drama or epic when we are in a hurry; to begin from the very first line by examining with a cold-blooded criticism a passionate elegy or fiery lyric, is to act as if one sat at a concert of unfamiliar music only to criticise ...
— Platform Monologues • T. G. Tucker
... failed of accomplishing its will, which would have been to snatch her from the cart and toss her to the horizon in company with the tumbleweeds. It shrieked its despair, the despair of a jealous woman balked of her ...
— The Way of the Wind • Zoe Anderson Norris
... put them in the way to make some real money. They played the game in a small-town way. Some men can think of thousands of dollars, others have to think of hundreds. It's all their minds are big enough to comprehend. They snatch at a little measly advantage and miss the big one. That's what ...
— Poor White • Sherwood Anderson
... into the open. Instantly the weight of the wind became evident. Although on the lea side of the pond, the light boat drifted forward rapidly; and Bobby had to snatch suddenly for his cap. Mr. Kincaid snubbed her at the edge of the flock ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White
... a gimlet and a small hammer, some leather shoe-strings, three or four tallow candles, a match-box and an extinguisher, the key of his door, the bolt of his casement window, and a few other miscellanies. He could not come upon the false keys, and, finally, he made a snatch at the tray, and turned it upside down. ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... mail is the most exciting event of every day now. Father just snatches the paper—I never saw father snatch before—and the rest of us crowd round and look at the headlines over his shoulder. Susan vows she does not and will not believe a word the papers say but she always comes to the kitchen door, and listens and then goes back, shaking ...
— Rilla of Ingleside • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... three days. Shall we not journey to London in company with Mary. This tournament needs much preparation; I did but snatch a few days to speak on our father's affairs and to breathe freely for a short space, ...
— Penshurst Castle - In the Days of Sir Philip Sidney • Emma Marshall
... the epidemic I fell asleep for a few seconds, and dreamed that Mors was sweeping down, with extended arms, to snatch you. By the clock I had not slept quite two minutes, yet the countenance of Mors was indelibly stamped on my memory, and now I am transferring it to paper. You are mistaken; it is terrible, but not hideous!" Beulah laid aside her pencil, and, leaning her elbows on the ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans
... her, Frederik caught up the torn blue letter. Tossing it in a metal ash tray he struck a match. Peter Grimm, divining his intent, sprang forward with a wordless cry to stop him. The Dead Man's hands tore at the wrists of the Living; sought by main strength to snatch the paper out of his reach; with pitiful helplessness tried to thrust back the hand that ...
— The Return of Peter Grimm - Novelised From the Play • David Belasco
... mercy. Two years ago a tragedy was enacted here of strange interest. At a religious festival held here in April, 1892, and attended by all the high officials and by a crowd of sightseers, a thief, taking advantage of the crush, tried to snatch a bracelet from the wrist of a young woman, and, when she resisted, he stabbed her. He was seized red-handed, dragged before the Titai, who happened to be present, and ordered to be beheaded there and then. An executioner was selected from among the soldiers; but so clumsily did ...
— An Australian in China - Being the Narrative of a Quiet Journey Across China to Burma • George Ernest Morrison
... me,' said Hera, trying to snatch it; 'for I am the queen, and gods and men honor me as ...
— Hero Tales • James Baldwin
... compulsory there; so are weightiness, and fervour, and erudition. He must seem to abound in these advantages, or another man will take his place. He must disguise himself at all costs. But disguises are not easy to make; they require time and care, which he cannot afford. So he must snatch up ready-made disguises—unhook them, rather. He must know all the cant-phrases, the cant-references. There are very, very many of them, and belike it is hard to keep them all at one's finger-tips. But, at least, there is no difficulty ...
— Yet Again • Max Beerbohm
... I thank you for your letter, and with God's help I will meet you at Bowling Green Gate—." The girl could endure no more. She sprang with a scream toward her father and tried to snatch the letter. Sir George drew back, holding firmly to the paper. She followed him frantically, not to be thrown off, and succeeded in clutching the letter. Sir George violently thrust her from him. In the scuffle that ensued the letter was torn, and the lower portion ...
— Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall • Charles Major
... that two Eskimo men of average strength and courage are more than a snatch for the Polar bear, if armed with spears. The mode of attack is simple. The two men separate. The one who arranges to be the slayer of the animal advances on its left side; the other on its right. Thus the victim's attention is distracted; it becomes undecided ...
— Red Rooney - The Last of the Crew • R.M. Ballantyne
... Lilian flew at him and tried to snatch them away from him. He scowled fiercely, and jabbered ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls, Vol. XII, Jan. 3, 1891 • Various
... wheels along the ground, While rapid hoofs of flying steeds resound, The drivers by no vulgar flame inspir'd, But with the sparks of love and glory fir'd, With furious swiftness sweep along the way, And from the foremost chariot snatch the day. So at Olympick games when heros strove, In rapid cars to gain the goal of love. If on her fav'rite youth the goddess shone He left his ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... want to know about the Germans. They are a quarter of a mile away at this part, or nearly a quarter of a mile. When you snatch a peep at them it is like a low parti-coloured stone wall—only the stones are sandbags. The Germans have them black and white, so that you cannot tell which are loopholes and which are black bags. Our people haven't been so clever—and the War Office love ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... bright hook a swing and cast it half-a-dozen yards from the boat to where it fell with a splash, which was followed by a curious movement of the amber-hued water; and then he began to snatch with the line, so as to make the bright iron ...
— Nic Revel - A White Slave's Adventures in Alligator Land • George Manville Fenn
... with all the headlong thump of a gannet after its prey. Loveday's dive was as the gull's for grace contrasted with it. Their hands met; Loveday divined in an instant, by the tug of Cherry's, that she was suspected of trying to snatch the fairings, instead of merely restoring them, and she straightened herself with a return of her sick anger. Cherry clutched the frail morsels of riband and lace in her lap, then, seeing there was no danger, began to straighten them ...
— The White Riband - A Young Female's Folly • Fryniwyd Tennyson Jesse
... passage agreeably to its plain sense, in consequence of the ignorance of some who maintain the ideas of their own mind to be the truth of God, and often say, 'Every one of us will be able by his prayers to snatch whomsoever he will from hell,' and introduce iniquity to the Lord; not seeing that the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him; so that each shall die in his own sin, and each ...
— Primitive Christian Worship • James Endell Tyler
... in this Custrin epoch, and indeed in all epochs and parts, is still little other than a whirlpool of simmering confusions, dust mainly, and sibylline paper-shreds, in the pages of poor Dryasdust, perhaps we cannot do better than snatch a shred or two (of the partly legible kind, or capable of being made legible) out of that hideous caldron; pin them down at their proper dates; and try if the reader can, by such means, catch a glimpse of the thing with his own eyes. Here ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. VIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... care for the dying, Snatch them in pity from sin and the grave; Weep o'er the erring ones, lift up the fallen, Tell them of Jesus, ...
— General Gordon - A Christian Hero • Seton Churchill
... movie, if Sprague got the job of directing it," Dundee reminded him. "Miles, victim of a deep-rooted sexual inferiority complex, must have felt sure that Flora, on discovering she was not legally married, would snatch at the chance to marry Sprague—which was of course what Sprague had planned in case ...
— Murder at Bridge • Anne Austin
... comes for purpose him I gratify * With boons, though 'twere with eyen-light of me: I back my neighbour whenas harmed by * Dolour of debt and foeman's tyranny: Whoso hath moneys lacking liberal mind * Though he snatch Fortune ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... laughed at his suspicion, and we passed on. The orchestra was tuning up. There were two violins, a concertina, and the 'cello. Billy Breen was lovingly fingering his instrument, now and then indulging himself in a little snatch of some air that came to him out of his happier past. He looked perfectly delighted, and as I paused to listen he gave me a proud glance out of his deep, little, blue eyes, and went on playing softly to himself. Presently Shaw ...
— Black Rock • Ralph Connor
... some of the gaiety and exuberance and fun got no less into his manner towards the people whose habit is to shield their eyes with the spectacles of convention. Beardsley had a keen sense of humour that helped him to snatch all the joy there is in the old, time-honoured, youthful game of getting on the nerves of established respectability. Naturally, so Robert Ross, his friend, has said of him, "he possessed what ...
— Nights - Rome, Venice, in the Aesthetic Eighties; London, Paris, in the Fighting Nineties • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... rose. The sun peeped over the bank of dense green forest and spread rainbow colors on the still waters of the river. Now and again a fish broke, or a great bird swooped down and slit the surface. A far-off snatch of melody came to our ears,—the slaves were going to work. Nothing more. And little by little grave misgivings gnawed at my soul of the wisdom of coming to this place. Doubtless there were ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... said her father, placing his hands upon the creature's temple, close beside her, while Mr. Armstrong caught her arms to snatch her safely away. Faith sprang, or was lifted as she sprang, quite to the top of the huge bank of snow under and against which they had, among them, beaten in and trodden down such a hollow, and the instant after, Mr. Gartney releasing Major's ...
— Faith Gartney's Girlhood • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... turned their attention upon Scraggs, who had dodged below like a frightened rabbit and sought shelter in the shaft alley. He had sufficient presence of mind, as he dashed through the engine room, to snatch a large monkey wrench off the tool rack on the wall, and, kneeling just inside the alley entrance he turned at bay and threatened the invaders with this weapon. Thereupon Hicks and Flaherty pelted him with lumps of coal, but the sole result of this assault was ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... the deep window of one of the smaller rooms; a pretty young woman and an attractive man. The young man had disposed his hat and a newspaper in such a way as not to make it indecently obvious that he was holding her hand. It was she who called attention to the fact by hasty attempts to snatch it ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods
... manner: for when night came on, as long as the boys were suppliants they arranged dances of maidens and youths, and in arranging the dances they made it a rule of the festival that sweet cakes of sesame and honey should be carried, in order that the Corcyrean boys might snatch them and so have support; and this went on so long that at last the Corinthians who had charge of the boys departed and went away; and as for the boys, the Samians carried ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 1(of 2) • Herodotus
... through the door. How he the basket snatch'd up! How he urged me away! how press'd I thy hand! ...
— The Poems of Goethe • Goethe
... the scene, one from the barn and one from the house. They were Uncle Jack and Mrs. Posset. The latter had happened to look out of the window just as the grand turn-out came round for the third time, and she had flown down stairs to rescue her Downy, but arrived only in time to snatch him from the ruins of the cart, very much frightened and covered with dust, and what was worse with blood, which flowed from a cut in his forehead. As for Uncle Jack, he had been very busy in the barn arranging matters with ...
— Five Mice in a Mouse-trap - by the Man in the Moon. • Laura E. Richards
... from his Betty snatch'd by Fate, Shows how uncertain is our state; He smiled at morn, at noon lay dead— Flung from a horse that kick'd his head. But tho' he's gone, from tears refrain, At judgment he'll get ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, - Issue 493, June 11, 1831 • Various
... point, the old prophetic narrative (Exod. xxxii.-xxxiv.), interrupted by Exodus xxxv. 1-Numbers x. 28, is resumed with an account of the precautions taken to secure reliable guidance through the wilderness, x. 29-32, and a very interesting snatch of ancient poetry, through which we may easily read the unique importance of the ark for early Israel, x. 33-36. The succeeding chapters make no pretence to be a connected history of the wilderness period; the incidents with which they deal ...
— Introduction to the Old Testament • John Edgar McFadyen
... to the figure of the groom before the throne. They saw him raise his hand and snatch off the golden mask, and Tara of Helium in wide-eyed incredulity looked up into the ...
— The Chessmen of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... beautiful night!" she murmured. "On such a night—" Lavis, as he turned the corner of the house, saw him snatch her close and ...
— Sonnie-Boy's People • James B. Connolly
... of corrugated iron, and planks fished out of the river. Carol leaned over the rail of the bridge to look down at this Yang-tse village; in delicious imaginary fear she shrieked that she was dizzy with the height; and it was an extremely human satisfaction to have a strong male snatch her back to safety, instead of having a logical woman teacher or librarian sniff, "Well, if you're scared, why don't you get away from ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... soul resolving springs, And reaches forth to better things; And high above the world would rise, To eager snatch the offered prize; Then, Gift of Christ desired most, Come to our help, ...
— Hymns from the Greek Office Books - Together with Centos and Suggestions • John Brownlie
... daybreak that David ceased his supplications and lay down to snatch a moment's rest. When he awoke, he sprang up suddenly and saw Mantel still sitting before the open window where he left him, smoking his cigar and ...
— The Redemption of David Corson • Charles Frederic Goss
... out two gold coins and hold them out in such a way that she could look at them without the opportunity to snatch. ...
— Rung Ho! • Talbot Mundy
... much natural talent for singing; and, on all occasions, are exceedingly fond of it. I have often heard a stave or two of psalmody, hummed over by rakish young fellows, like a snatch ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville
... quiet within the belt of magnolias and cypresses and orange trees and but little noise came from the town, the stray shout of a reveler, a snatch of a ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler
... not to choose, Ayesha, since I think that when there is work to be done by both of us, we shall find more comfort side by side than if I were on the ground seeking to kiss a garment that doubtless then it would delight you to snatch away." ...
— She and Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... at once that he thought he could fly better than he could do anything else. And he felt so happy, because he was sure Jimmy Rabbit was going to help him, that he began to laugh gaily. And he couldn't help singing a snatch of a new song he had heard that morning. And then ...
— The Tale of Jolly Robin • Arthur Scott Bailey
... the good, after all, of being a woman if one didn't keep fresh, and cram one's life with all sorts of views and experiments? Thus she always gave herself a little shake, as she turned the corner, and, as often as not, reached her own door whistling a snatch of ...
— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf
... idly, attracted, in the beginning, by that sudden raising of the hand. But as they passed me, there came a sudden puff of wind, strong enough to flurry the water into wrinkles. It lifted the gentleman's hat, so that he saved it only by a violent snatch which made the boat rock. As he jammed the hat down he broke or displaced some string or clip near his ears. At any rate his beard came adrift on the side nearest to me. The man was wearing a false beard. He remedied the matter at once, very ...
— Martin Hyde, The Duke's Messenger • John Masefield
... when face to face with the public, young Douglass lost courage. The stake for which he played was so great! Like a man who has put his last dollar upon the hazard, he was ready to snatch his gold from the boards. The whole thing seemed weakly tenuous at dress-rehearsal, and Royleston, half-drunk as usual, persistently bungled his lines. The children in the second act squeaked like nervous ...
— The Light of the Star - A Novel • Hamlin Garland
... road to-morrow, and let you welcome him; settle down a wooden chair in the middle of the house; snatch the hat from him, and do not give him any ease until you get back the beautiful comb that was high on ...
— Poets and Dreamers - Studies and translations from the Irish • Lady Augusta Gregory and Others
... Pasha!" cried the mother, rushing to the table and then addressing the officer: "Why do you snatch people away thus?" ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky
... power or might of God—"His goodness, for He did not despise the weakness of His own handiwork; His justice, since, on man's defeat, He caused the tyrant to be overcome by none other than man, and yet He did not snatch men forcibly from death; His wisdom, for He found a suitable discharge for a most heavy debt; His power, or infinite might, for there is nothing greater than for God to become incarnate ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... a blanket is thrown, the head being covered with a fur cap or band. Their manner is reserved and their habits are selfish; they beg with unceasing importunity for everything they see. I never saw men who either received or bestowed a gift with such bad grace; they almost snatch the thing from you in the one instance and throw it at you in the other. It could not be expected that such men should display in their tents the amiable hospitality which prevails generally amongst the Indians of this country. A stranger ...
— The Journey to the Polar Sea • John Franklin
... cold day they were all left within, and the bear had nothing to do. So, seeing a woman leave her washing-tub, which she had just filled with boiling water, he thought he would do some of her work, and put his paws into it: the pain made him snatch them out, and in so doing he upset the tub—all the scalding water fell over him—and his agonies were such that, in mercy, some soldier shot him dead at once. The women, when they told me this, sobbed with grief, saying, "He was so kind to our babies! he would have died in their ...
— Kindness to Animals - Or, The Sin of Cruelty Exposed and Rebuked • Charlotte Elizabeth
... did a series of cart-wheels around the room, bringing up just in front of her, and waltzing with her again without either of them losing a step. Then he lifted her hands by the finger tips high above her head, and they writhed their bodies in and out under this arch, he occasionally stooping to snatch a kiss, and all the time their feet waltzing in perfect time to the music. Suddenly, with another yell, he leaped into the air, and, with Rosa waltzing demurely in front of him, began the fantastic part of the schuplattle, which ...
— Abroad with the Jimmies • Lilian Bell
... lusty life. All manner of novel temptations beset them,—perils by night and perils by day,—perils in the house and by the way. Their fierce and hungry young souls, rioting in awakening consciousness, ravening for pleasure, strong and tumultuous, snatch eagerly at every bait. They want then a mother able to curb, and guide, and rule them; and only a mother who commands their respect can do this. Let them see her sought for her social worth,—let them see that she is familiar with all the conditions of their life,—that ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., April, 1863, No. LXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics. • Various
... seeing My imaginary Being, And I'd rather that my marrowbones should bleach In the winds, than that a cruel Fate should snatch from me the jewel Which I bought for one ...
— Fly Leaves • C. S. Calverley
... reasons for thinking the Emperor's government would be more mischievous or more oppressive to human nature than that of the Turk; yet, on mere motives of policy, that prince has interposed, with the threat of all his force, to snatch even the Turk from the pounces of the Imperial eagle. If this is done in favor of a barbarous nation, with a barbarous neglect of police, fatal to the human race,—in favor of a nation by principle in eternal enmity with the Christian name, a nation which ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IV. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... an' Regent Street to-night?" "Come along, my dear; let's get home out of this." "Absolute bosh, my dear boy, from beginning to end—doing business with 'em every day o' my life!" And then a hoarse snatch of song: "'They'll never go for England'—not they! What ho! 'Because England's ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson
... listen to my proposal. The papers you are so anxious about are here,"—tapping the envelope on the table. "No, don't try to snatch them; you wouldn't get out of here alive with them, lacking my leave. Such of them as relate to your complicity in the Universal Oil deal are yours—on one condition; that your health fails and you ...
— The Grafters • Francis Lynde
... of some lone world-neglected persecuted man—some patient toil-worn son of science, whom Genius loves to call her own—though, haply, to the schools, to fortune and to fame unknown. One whose transcendent, superconscious mind has dared, Prometheus-like, to snatch from heaven the fire of the immortal gods and offer it ...
— Valere Aude - Dare to Be Healthy, Or, The Light of Physical Regeneration • Louis Dechmann
... observing the body of Brown on the ground, Adams at once leaped into the bush and ran. He was hotly pursued by the four men, but being strong and swift of foot, he soon left them behind. In passing Williams's house, he went towards it, intending to snatch up some thick garments, and, if possible, a musket and ammunition, for he had no doubt now that some of his countrymen must have been killed, and that he would have to take to the bush along with them. An exclamation of horror escaped him when he came upon the armourer's ...
— The Lonely Island - The Refuge of the Mutineers • R.M. Ballantyne
... watziznames. Dey kin walk biggity, en dey kin talk biggity, en mo'n dat, dey kin feel biggity, but yit all de same deyer gwine ter git kotch up wid. Dey go 'long en dey go 'long, en den bimeby yer come trouble en snatch um slonchways, en de mo' bigger w'at dey is, de wusser does dey ...
— Nights With Uncle Remus - Myths and Legends of the Old Plantation • Joel Chandler Harris
... public wrong: What else to Troy the assembled nations draws, But thine, ungrateful, and thy brother's cause? Is this the pay our blood and toils deserve; Disgraced and injured by the man we serve? And darest thou threat to snatch my prize away, Due to the deeds of many a dreadful day? A prize as small, O tyrant! match'd with thine, As thy own actions if compared to mine. Thine in each conquest is the wealthy prey, Though mine the sweat and danger of the day. Some trivial ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... me, O Lord my God! I call on Thee: Make me to know the path of life aright, From sore and wasting sickness snatch Thou me, Lead me from ...
— Hebrew Literature
... but also almost without wounds, keeping six enemies at bay, and with ten corpses at his feet for a rampart. When the fight began again, Monsoreau commenced to draw away the bodies, lest Bussy should snatch a sword from one of them. Bussy was surrounded; the blade of his sword bent and shook in his hand, and fatigue began to render his arm heavy, when suddenly, one of the bodies raising itself, pushed a rapier into his hand. It was Remy's last act ...
— Chicot the Jester - [An abridged translation of "La dame de Monsoreau"] • Alexandre Dumas
... could know nothing of this at the time. He was sleeping too heavily. He had merely taken a moment to snatch a bit of food, and then, at the suggestion of his commanding officer, he had rolled himself in his blankets. Sleep came instantly, and it was not interrupted until Warner's hand fell upon his shoulder at dawn, and Warner's voice said in ...
— The Guns of Shiloh • Joseph A. Altsheler
... would snatch them from thy weak defence; But that due reverence, which I owe my prince, Permits me not to quarrel in his sight; To him I shall refer ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. II • Edited by Walter Scott
... face down and her plump legs kicking in the air. Aurelia caught her up, but the capture produced a powerful yell, and out, all at once hurried into the corridor, Mrs. Aylward, a tidy maid servant, a stout, buxom countrywoman, and a rough girl, scarcely out of bed, but awake enough to snatch the child out of the young lady's arms, and carry her off. The housekeeper began scolding vigorously all round, and Aurelia escaped into her room, where she completed her toilette, looking out into a garden below, laid out in the formal Dutch fashion, with walks and beds centring in a fountain, the ...
— Love and Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... towards the bright morning sky. An occasional dash from the branch was now sufficient to keep the fire under, and the greater part of the worn and jaded working people, after partaking of refreshments at the Grange kitchen, went home to snatch a few hours' rest, and among those who went to seek rest were Mr Inglis and the boys. But on entering the house they found the blinds open, and the breakfast cloth spread, so that they all sat down to a refreshing meal; after which everybody declared that it would ...
— Hollowdell Grange - Holiday Hours in a Country Home • George Manville Fenn
... employed together with him upon his holy books, and giving ear to his wholesome advice and the sighs of his most deep devotion. There came all at once a knock at the king's door from a certain mighty duke of the realm, and the king said: 'They do so interrupt me that by day or night I can hardly snatch a moment to be refreshed by reading of any holy ...
— Henry the Sixth - A Reprint of John Blacman's Memoir with Translation and Notes • John Blacman
... not so easy as he had expected to snatch an opportunity of interesting Ena in Miss Child. His sister was even more than ordinarily interested in her own affairs, which had reached a critical stage, and if Peter, having run her to earth in her cabin, attempted to talk of any one save Ena Rolls or Lord Raygan her eyes became like shut windows. ...
— Winnie Childs - The Shop Girl • C. N. Williamson
... emperor held his peace. He listened to them at all hours; he often seated himself on his throne at day-break to attend to their wishes and requests, and the evening twilight saw him still in the same place. Very frequently he could not snatch time to refresh himself with meat and drink. During many nights he could not obtain any repose, and was obliged to indulge in an unrefreshing sleep upon his throne, with his head resting on his hands. ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... passion: he rails at the murderers: he proclaims his horror at their deed. All the way home he refuses to be comforted. He upbraids the assassins, he utters the most frightful threats against them; he rushes at them to snatch their weapons from them and dash them in pieces. But they easily wrench the weapons from his unresisting hands. For the whole thing is only a piece of acting. His sole intention is that the ghost may see and hear it all, and being convinced ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer
... thy friends; thy sons, thy wives, thy father, and thy mother; O thou best of those that bear life, people desire renown (in this world) and lasting fame in heaven, without wishing to sacrifice their bodies. But as thou desirest undying fame at the expense of thy life, she will, without doubt, snatch away thy life! O bull among men, in this world, the father, the mother, the son, and other relatives are of use only to him that is alive. O tiger among men, as regard kings, it is only when they are alive ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... leaped to this as a speckled trout snaps at a fly. Nothing so near a proposal had ever reached me before. But a New England woman is modest; she does not snatch at the first offer—far from it. I pretended not to understand the badly hidden meaning of his metaphor. A little art of this kind is feminine and excusable, even in a young girl dignified with Society membership and ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens
... and with a dim idea that it might be of use to him he tucked it under his free arm. The piazza was clean and dry, and he walked its length, finding the exertion a relief to his feelings. The megaphone was an awkward burden, and he started to put it down, only to snatch it up again before it had touched the piazza floor. When he had brought it out he had thought he might shout a triumphant "found" through it. Now a better purpose ...
— Glenloch Girls • Grace M. Remick
... suite of well-furnished rooms and waited on by a close-cropped nun. She had been surprised in the bungalow and overpowered by three of the Chinamen before she realised her danger or could seize a weapon with which to defend herself. Had she been able to snatch up a revolver she would have made a desperate fight for freedom. But with fettered hands, a helpless captive, she had been carried away on a mule. From the first she had recognised the pock-marked, one-eyed leader of the gang as the Amban's officer, and so had known who was the author ...
— The Jungle Girl • Gordon Casserly
... the darkness. The company adopted her as a pet. The director babied her. Once, as the afternoon rehearsal was disbanding, she crept up through a box to the stage. The footlights were dark, but she came down quite freely toward them, seeming to feel their mock blaze, and sang a snatch or two from the tenderest Lieder ever written, bits of Schubert and Hugo Wolf, the company gathering in the wings to ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst
... it was horrid of me to snatch you like that from those infants, but—I really had the claim to have you for a little time to hear your impressions of Hayesville, now, didn't I?—you boy with eyes as beautiful as a girl's!" she said to me as I walked down the wide street ...
— The Daredevil • Maria Thompson Daviess
... a sudden he realized all that she meant to him, and cursed himself anew. While he had the power to possess her he had dallied and hesitated, but now that he had no voice in it, now that she was irretrievably beyond his reach, he vowed to snatch her and hold ...
— The Barrier • Rex Beach
... was one of elopement and seduction; and, superstitious as usual, I was sure that my good genius had sent me in the nick of time to save her and care for her, and in short to snatch her from the hands ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... early morning I would subsidize the eight native sailors, getting them to open the shelled treasures, while I garnered the pearls. With this thought uppermost, I turned in on a cushionless bench to snatch a few hours' sleep. But slumber was out of the question; my brain was planning what might be done with the pearls I was soon to possess. Yes, there surely would be plenty for a pearl-studded tiara for the loved ...
— East of Suez - Ceylon, India, China and Japan • Frederic Courtland Penfield
... terror, the Rajah is. I wouldn't work on his road for a farm down East—not if my job took me within cussing distance of him. Bet a hen worth fifty dollars he is up in Mr. Colbert's office right now, raising particular sand because his special engine wasn't standing here ready to snatch his private car on the fly, so's to ...
— A Fool For Love • Francis Lynde
... Apollonius—"I will snatch off before your eyes the armour of the Gods; we shall force the sanctuaries; I will make ...
— The Temptation of St. Antony - or A Revelation of the Soul • Gustave Flaubert
... and then at Dion with an air of profound astonishment. The quail dropped from his hands, and he did not even snatch at them as he listened to the remarkable sounds which, he could not doubt, flowed from his Amazon. His brows came down over his fiery eyes, and he seemed to stand at gaze like an animal, half-fascinated and half-suspicious. The voice died away and was followed by a sound ...
— In the Wilderness • Robert Hichens
... wool. We killed as they kill, to fend off our enemies. The Danish sea-wolves and the armored wild beasts of Strongbow and de Lacy hunted us as if we were wolves indeed. What could we do but hunt as the wolves hunt, snatch our meat where we could, hide like foxes in the holes of the mountain, make ourselves dreaded that we might live, and not die? The Normans brought to Dermot MacMurragh two hundred heads of the men of Ossory for his delight. All my mother's children were killed by them ...
— Masters of the Guild • L. Lamprey
... imprecation. He had forgotten that the downstairs door would be shut. It was of heavy mahogany and secured by an ordinary variety of lock against which the bunch of keys in his pocket were of no service whatsoever. He was shaking his fist angrily when the sound of footsteps accompanied by a snatch of song attracted his attention. A young man in evening dress, wearing an opera hat at a raffish angle and carrying his hands in his trousers pockets turned out of the adjoining side street and approached the spot where he was standing. A single glance was enough to convince Harrison Smith that ...
— Men of Affairs • Roland Pertwee
... his ugly face curved in a look of intense hate. He felt Jim snatch the revolver from his ...
— Colorado Jim • George Goodchild
... Say, here he gives too little, there too much; Destroy all creatures for thy sport or gust, Yet cry, If man's unhappy, God's unjust,— If man alone engross not Heaven's high care, Alone made perfect here, immortal there; Snatch from his hand the balance and the rod, Re-judge his justice, be the god of God. In pride, in reasoning pride, our error lies; All quit their sphere, and rush into the skies. Pride still is aiming at the blest abodes: Men would be angels, angels would be gods. Aspiring to be ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman
... was the land deal and syndicate on which his future depended, and the savage fate which seemed about to snatch his fortune away as it had done so often before; as it had done on the day when Flamingo went down near the post at the Derby with a madwoman dragging at the bridle. He had had a sure thing then, and it was whisked away just when ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... strong modern school of writers care only to talk of misery and gloom and frustration, I retain a taste for joy and sweetness and kindliness. Life has so many sharp crosses, so many inexplicable sorrows for us all, that I hold it good to snatch at every moment of gladness, and to keep my eyes on beautiful things whenever they can be seen. During the days when I was pondering the subject of tragic marriages, I read the letters of the great Lord Chatham. The mighty statesman ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman
... the terrible and torturing progress of gnawing want to utter starvation. Then, in that last state, but not before, I might reveal myself; stand by the hopeless and succourless bed of death; shriek out in the dizzy ear a name, which could treble the horrors of remembrance; snatch from the struggling and agonizing conscience the last plank, the last straw, to which, in its madness, it could cling, and blacken the shadows of departing life, by opening to the shuddering sense the threshold of an ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... feelings, skilfully as only Orientals can, but the women and the little children do not scruple to show what their sentiments really are. When he goes abroad, the old women snarl at him as he passes, and spit ostentatiously, after the native manner when some unclean thing is at hand. The mothers snatch up their little ones and carry them hurriedly away, casting a look of hate and fear over their shoulders as they run. The children scream and yell, clutch their mothers' garments, or trip and fall, howling dismally the while, in their frantic efforts to fly his presence. He is Frankenstein's ...
— In Court and Kampong - Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula • Hugh Clifford
... in this view; at the same time, it is lamentably insufficient. The fact is that in the vast flux of destiny which is involved in such a war as the present, and which no argument can really adequately represent, we are fain to snatch at some neat phrase, however superficial, by way of explanation. And we are compelled, moreover, to find a phrase which will put our own efforts in an ideal light—otherwise we cannot go on fighting. No nation can fight confessedly for a mean or base object. Every nation inscribes ...
— The Healing of Nations and the Hidden Sources of Their Strife • Edward Carpenter
... first appearance of such few books as he believed to be the production of some powerful intellect. He has seen people slowly rise up to them, like carp in a pond when food is thrown into it; some of which carp snatch suddenly at a morsel, and swallow it; others touch it gently with their barb, pass deliberately by, and leave it; others wriggle and rub against it more disdainfully; others, in sober truth, know ...
— Citation and Examination of William Shakspeare • Walter Savage Landor
... But his troops being soon put into disorder, were just upon the point of being cut to pieces, when Fabius, alarmed by the sudden outcries of the wounded, called aloud to his soldiers: "Let us hasten to the assistance of Minucius: let us fly and snatch the victory from the enemy, and extort from our fellow-citizens a confession of their fault." This succour was very seasonable, and compelled Hannibal to sound a retreat. The latter, as he was retiring, said, "That the cloud which had been long hovering on the ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin
... entanglements, the girl's speedy death would prove the most felicitous solution of this devouring riddle, which so unexpectedly crossed his smooth path; then what meant the vehement protest of his throbbing heart, the passionate longing to snatch her from disease, and disgrace, and keep her safe forever in the close cordon ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... be sure, he could not play it—much of it—until four o'clock in the afternoon came; for Mr. Holly did not like violins to be played in the morning, even on days that were not especially the Lord's. There was too much work to do. So David could only snatch a strain or two very, very softly, while he was dressing; but that was enough to show him what a beautiful song it was going to be. He knew what it was, at once, too. It was the gold-pieces, and what they would bring. All through the day it tripped through his consciousness, and danced ...
— Just David • Eleanor H. Porter
... letter." And almost before she could snatch book and pencil he was dictating, rapidly, dynamically. When Malcolm Lightener dictated a letter he did it as though he were making a public speech, with emphasis and gesture. "There," he said, "read it back ...
— Youth Challenges • Clarence B Kelland
... you, how the writing of them was Occasion'd, which in short was thus. As I was just going out of Town, hearing that an Ingenious Gentleman of my Acquaintance, lately return'd from Italy, had a Diamond, that being rubb'd, would shine in the Dark, and that he was not far off, I snatch'd time from my Occasions to make him a Visit, but finding him ready to go abroad, and having in vain try'd to make the Stone yield any Light in the Day time, I borrow'd it of him for that Night, upon condition to restore it ...
— Experiments and Considerations Touching Colours (1664) • Robert Boyle
... meddler," the "maker of trouble," and the duke as "Old Grumpy"—Brummbaer. To use a familiar Yankee expression, Barscheit had a finger in every pie. Whenever there was a political broth making, whether in Italy, Germany or Austria, Barscheit would snatch up a ladle and start in. She took care of her own affairs so easily that she had plenty of time to concern herself with the affairs of her neighbors. This is not to advance the opinion that Barscheit was wholly modern; far from it. The fault of Barscheit may be traced back to a certain historical ...
— The Princess Elopes • Harold MacGrath
... marches, a few of the heedless youth occasionally lagged behind to snatch a handful of berries; sometimes a matron halted for a while to nurse her baby, and, not to lose time, dressed its hair while it took its meal. Now and then a young lady, excited by jealousy or some sneering look or word, made an ugly mouth at one ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... other remarks scarcely so flattering. He drove at once to Stepney, and found his headquarters besieged by a crowd which his little staff of helpers was wholly unable to cope with, and half-a-dozen reporters waiting to snatch a word with him. Mary watched his entrance with a little sigh ...
— A Prince of Sinners • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... am all attention," said Lady Delacour, with a composed voice; "only take care, don't make a mistake: I'm in no hurry; don't read any thing Mrs. Stanhope might not wish. It is dangerous to garble letters, almost as dangerous as to snatch them out of a friend's hand, as I once did, you know—but you need not now be under ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... was a little rainwater washing about the bottom of the boat. I permitted them to snatch some of it in the hollow of their palms. But as I gave the command, 'En route!' I caught them exchanging significant glances. They thought I would have to go to sleep sometime! Aha! But I did not want to go to sleep. I was more awake than ever. It is they who went to sleep as they pulled, ...
— A Set of Six • Joseph Conrad
... the traveller may snatch a rest for wearied eyes. The sandbanks and distance are so level that the views are less interesting than they were below, but, after all, appearances depend so much on the weather effect. To-day, sky, water, and sand are so alike in colour, that ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... second, or less, whilst the words were spoken outside his door, and whilst all other thoughts in him were absorbed in this one mad desire for escape. He even made a movement, as if to snatch up the letter-case and to hide it about his person. But it was heavy and bulky; it would be sure to attract attention, and might bring upon him the additional indignity of being forced to submit to ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... at Basinghall Street, and I snatch this quarter of an hour, the only quarter of an hour which I am likely to secure during the day, to write to you. I will not omit writing two days running, because, if my letters give you half the pleasure which your letters give me, you will, I am sure, ...
— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan
... Castle, Connemara. I took out my tablets, and wrote down the address. I certainly had no reason for so doing, except that nothing should he neglected, as there was no saying what might turn out. I had hardly replaced my tablets when the party awoke, made a sort of snatch at the packet, as if recollecting it, and wishing to ascertain if it were safe, looked at it, took off his hat, let down the window, and then looked round upon ...
— Japhet, In Search Of A Father • Frederick Marryat
... late, for Jem had chosen a delicately green mossy and ferny patch, and plumped himself down, to utter a cry of horror, and snatch at the extended hands. For the green ferny patch was a thin covering over a noisome hole full of black boiling mud, into which the poor fellow was settling as he ...
— The Adventures of Don Lavington - Nolens Volens • George Manville Fenn
... preparations as were necessary for his dismal ride over the mountains to Fairbanks. She had the supper dishes to wash up in Tennie's absence, and as she was a busy little housewife she found herself singing a snatch of song as she passed back and forth from dining-room to kitchen. He heard it, too, and smiled to himself as he bolted the windows on the ground floor and examined the locks of the three lower doors, and when he finally came into the kitchen with his ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... wear it are racing with the demon Drink to save men and women, (ourselves included, perhaps), from his clutches; racing with Despair to place Hope before the eyes of those who are blindly rushing to destruction; racing with Time to snatch the young out of the way of the Destroyer before he lays hand on them; and singing—ay, shouting—songs of triumph and glory to God because of the tens of thousands of souls and bodies already saved; because of the bright prospect of the tens of thousands more to follow; ...
— Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure • R.M. Ballantyne
... rocked lazily at the harbour-mouth waiting for the tide to rise and float them in. Beth heard the men on them shouting an occasional remark to one another, and now and then one of them would sing an uncouth snatch of song, but the effort was spiritless, ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... golden toy, laughing maid, lovely maid, Lovely maid, laughing maid, toss me your toy! It's all one to me, girl, whatever it be, girl So long as it's round that's enough for a boy. Boy, come and catch it then!—there now! Don't snatch it then! Here comes your toy! Apples were made for ...
— Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard • Eleanor Farjeon
... A snatch of the South mixing with your dream of England and the past, and making of the whole a charm ...
— The Ghost Girl • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... after laughing at the funny look on Trouble's face when he saw the monkey snatch away the banana, ...
— The Curlytops and Their Pets - or Uncle Toby's Strange Collection • Howard R. Garis
... it failed of accomplishing its will, which would have been to snatch her from the cart and toss her to the horizon in company with the tumbleweeds. It shrieked its despair, the despair of a jealous woman balked of her vengeance, ...
— The Way of the Wind • Zoe Anderson Norris
... host, and return to the camp of the fur-traders. The remainder of that night was spent in making preparations for setting forth on the morrow, and when, at grey dawn, Dick and Crusoe lay down to snatch a few hours' repose, the yells and howling in the Snake camp were going on as vigorously ...
— The Dog Crusoe and his Master • R.M. Ballantyne
... 'natural law.' Laws which permit such things are must unnatural, and to endow one with such a love of life, such boundless capabilities of enjoying life, and then at the supreme moment when the loss will be most bitterly felt to snatch it away, looks to me more like the work of devilish ingenuity than of a 'beneficent nature.' I feel with father, it ...
— A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century • E. P. Roe
... heavens, yes, he'll snatch up his hat instantly. And then I will say: "Now put on your overcoat, like a good boy, Erhart Borkman! And your goloshes! Be sure you don't forget the goloshes! And then follow me! Do as I bid you, as I bid you, as ...
— John Gabriel Borkman • Henrik Ibsen
... still watching her enthusiastically, "is horrible—all this glorious facial expression, this mysterious eye with its green fires, this demonic hair, this magnificence of body. The idea fills me with a horror of death, of annihilation. But the hand of an artist shall snatch you from this. You shall not like the rest of us disappear absolutely and forever, without leaving a trace of your having been. Your picture must live, even when you yourself have long fallen to dust; your ...
— Venus in Furs • Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
... d'Artagnan, in pursuing his researches, found near the wall a woman's torn glove. This glove, wherever it had not touched the muddy ground, was of irreproachable odor. It was one of those perfumed gloves that lovers like to snatch from a pretty hand. ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... Up! Alive! See him who doth our sex deride! Hunt him to death, the slave! Thou snatch the thyrsus! Thou this oak-tree rive! Cast down this doeskin and that hide! We'll wreak our fury on the knave! Yea, he shall feel our wrath, the knave! He shall yield up his hide Riven as woodmen fir-trees rive! No power his life can save; Since women he hath dared ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... these shadows seemed to be endowed with life, and to move. The apartment was open to the breeze, and the curtain was occasionally blown from its ordinary position. This motion was not unaccompanied with sound. I failed not to snatch a look, and to listen when this motion and this sound occurred. My belief that my monitor was posted near, was strong, and instantly converted these appearances to tokens of his presence, and ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown
... converse forced, The old name and style retain, A right Katherine of Spain; And a seat, too,'mongst the joys Of the blest Tobacco Boys; Where, though I, by sour physician, Am debarr'd the full fruition Of thy favors, I may catch Some collateral sweets, and snatch Sidelong odors, that give life Like glances from a neighbor's wife; And still live in the by-places And the suburbs of thy graces; And in thy borders take delight, An ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb
... they shine in the sun, And each of the team must weigh nearly a ton. They stamp and they sidle, Their great necks they arch, And snatch at the bridle This ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, March 18, 1914 • Various
... devotion to the tree god. Here and there a neem, its delicate branches dusted with tiny white star blossoms, cast a sensuous elusive perfume to the vagrant breeze. Once a gigantic jamon stretched its gnarled arms across the roadway as if a devilfish held poised his tentacles to snatch ...
— Caste • W. A. Fraser
... bound to take my word for the meaning of the snatch of talk you heard, and I tell you that he acted like a gentleman and a very honorable gentleman; moreover, that from that good hour I began to be ashamed of my rash estimate of him (I always do jump in overhead ...
— Flint - His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes • Maud Wilder Goodwin
... longings under such dry statements. But the thought of giving him pleasure, and of a gallop with hounds fortified intensely her feeling that she ought to go. Now that baby was so well, and Fiorsen still not drinking, she might surely snatch this little holiday and satisfy her conscience about the girl. Since the return from Cornwall, she had played for him in the music-room just as of old, and she chose the finish of a ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... fortuitous events. If built upon a basis fundamentally erroneous, it can only be retrieved by some of those unforeseen dispensations which the all-wise, but mysterious, Governor of the world sometimes interposes, to snatch nations from ruin. It would not be pious error, but mad and impious presumption, for any one to trust in an unknown order of dispensations, in defiance of the rules of prudence, which are formed upon the known march of the ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. V. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... looked down a moment in thought, then, raising his head quickly, said, in a tone not so benign as his wonted one, "This would seem a rare chance, indeed; why, upon first hearing it, did you not snatch at it? I mean ...
— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville
... things which will never be attended to, if left to be daily watched. We Americans have so much work to do, that we have no time to be careful and watchful. If a child fall into the fire, we take time to snatch him out. If a sheep or ox get mired in a ditch, we leave our other business, and fly to the rescue. Even if the cows break into the corn, all hands of us, men and boys and dogs, leave hoeing or haying, and drive them out. And, by the ...
— Farm drainage • Henry Flagg French
... devoted to each other. To the crown prince, his father is in every sense of the word "William second to none;" while the kaiser himself is entirely wrapped up in his heir. For the last few years the emperor has given every spare moment that he could snatch away from his multifarious occupations to the task of instilling his ideas and views into the crown prince. In talking and reasoning with him, he has treated the lad as far older than his years, has discussed with him, in fact, as if he were ...
— The Secret Memoirs of the Courts of Europe: William II, Germany; Francis Joseph, Austria-Hungary, Volume I. (of 2) • Mme. La Marquise de Fontenoy
... refuge with some fellow-Christians," remarked Porphyrius. "Olympius told me all about her. I know plenty of the same sort in the Church. They fling away life and happiness as if they were apple-peelings to snatch at something which they believe to constitute salvation. It is folly, madness! pure unmitigated madness! To have sung in the temple of the she-devil Isis with Gorgo and the other worshippers would have cost ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... full over the valley rose the battle cry of the trumpets, a joyous inspiring sound calling men on to glory or death. Out from the hill came the moving mass of white horsemen, rank after rank, and Dick saw one in front, a man with long yellow hair, snatch off his hat, wave it around his head, and come on at a gallop. Behind him thundered the whole army, ...
— The Last of the Chiefs - A Story of the Great Sioux War • Joseph Altsheler
... on thy bride, too happy boy, And while thy lambent glance of joy Plays over all her blushing charms, Delay not, snatch her to thine arms, Before the lovely, trembling prey, Like a young birdling, wing away! Turn, Stratocles, too happy youth, Dear to the Queen of amorous truth, And dear to her, whose yielding zone Will soon resign her all thine own. Turn to Myrilla, turn thine ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... School. Do they suppose by any chance that their books grapple with the real life of Nurseries and Young Ladies' Schools? If they grappled with that they might grapple with anything. It is a subterfuge, a sham, and with fatty degeneration eating away the muscular fibre of their hearts, they snatch at it. ...
— Impressions And Comments • Havelock Ellis
... bounds with brave disorder part, And snatch a grace beyond the reach of art. 831 POPE: E. on ...
— Handy Dictionary of Poetical Quotations • Various
... swim in the broken water, which, as it rushed across the sand, impelled alike by the rising tide behind it and the force of the wind, hurried them along at a rapid pace, breaking in short steep waves. They could only cling to the mast and snatch a breath of air from time to time as it rolled over and over. Had they not been able to swim they would very speedily have been drowned; but, accustomed as they were to diving, they kept their presence of mind, holding their breath when ...
— By England's Aid • G. A. Henty
... curiosity, the bridge above being alone used for transit, and is quite inaccessible except to birds and the climbing wicked boys of the neighbourhood, who sometimes at the risk of their lives contrive to get upon it from the frightfully steep northern bank, and snatch a fearful joy, as, whilst lying on their bellies, they poke their heads over its sides worn by age, without parapet to prevent them from falling into the horrid gulf below. But from the steps in the hollow the view of the Devil's Bridge, and likewise of the cleft, ...
— Wild Wales - Its People, Language and Scenery • George Borrow
... hesitating for a second, made a snatch at his collar; and, clutching hold of it, in the very nick of time, saved him by a miracle—had he been carried overboard, no earthly power could ...
— The Wreck of the Nancy Bell - Cast Away on Kerguelen Land • J. C. Hutcheson
... years. Deep down in her heart was the unformulated but inevitable conviction that the logs were moving and that she was standing still. Tom loomed large in the immediate foreground. He, too, moved so swiftly that his huge form lacked definition. She saw him snatch a pole from one of the men and stab viciously at a log which refused to budge; and every time that his arm rose and fell a little shudder trickled down her spinal column. The log seemed to receive ...
— Bunch Grass - A Chronicle of Life on a Cattle Ranch • Horace Annesley Vachell
... more where that comes from." His quick ear had caught the rustling sound inside the handbag. "There's other notes in there, old lady;" and, laughing, he tried to snatch the bag from her. "How much? Here's a miser, ...
— The Devil's Garden • W. B. Maxwell
... had better imitate the friend of Richard Coeur de Lion, who, in the war of the Crusades, was captured and imprisoned, but none of his friends knew where. So his loyal friend went around the land from stronghold to stronghold, and sung at each window a snatch of song that Richard Coeur de Lion had taught him in other days. And one day, coming before a jail where he suspected his king might be incarcerated, he sung two lines of song, and immediately King Richard responded ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage
... Spirit, too, our hearts we pray, That somebody's boy We may watch for, and snatch from the death-trodden way, Yes, ...
— Mother Truth's Melodies - Common Sense For Children • Mrs. E. P. Miller
... now are on their way, Or shall hereafter, to attain that end, Theme of my argument, come when it will; And, 'midst the other fair, and fraught with grace, Most happy she whom Death has snatch'd away, On this side far the natural bound of life. The angel manners then will clearly shine, The meet and pure discourse, the chasten'd thought, Which nature planted in her youthful breast. Unnumber'd beauties, worn ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch
... till he harnessed a dog once that didn't have no hind legs, because they'd been saw'd off by a circular saw, and when the thing had gone along far enough, and the money was all up, and he come to make a snatch for his pet holt, he saw in a minute how he'd been imposed on, and how the other dog had him in the door, so to speak, and he 'peared surprised, and then he looked sorter discouraged-like, and didn't try no more ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... his rival was constantly augmenting, while his was already on the decline." It seemed to him that Alexander, on the banks of the Niemen, only waited the intelligence of his death, to possess himself of the sceptre of Europe, and snatch it from the hands of his feeble successor. "While all Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Prussia, and the whole of Germany, were marching under his banners, why should he delay to anticipate the danger, and consolidate the fabric of the great empire, by driving back Alexander and ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... peaceful purpose, amid the bayonets of a Tory administration. His influence was felt in all parts of the island. Wherever an unlawful association existed, his great legal knowledge enabled him at once to detect its character, and, by urging its dissolution, to snatch its deluded members from the ready fangs of their enemies. In his presence the Catholic and the Protestant shook hands together, and the wild Irish clansman forgot his feuds. He taught the party in power, and who trembled at the dangers around them, that security and peace could ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... stole from the cave to snatch a mouthful of grass, for I was closely besieged by wolves. They made their rush, and I barely escaped from them. They sat beyond the cave staring ...
— Irish Fairy Tales • James Stephens
... are stretched to snatch him back to worthless life, but the shield alone floats on the swirl of the wave;—King ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... murders had been going on for several days, and though the houses had been guarded by a man armed with a campilan at night, the children would be mysteriously missing in the morning. It was evidently, said the priest, the work of devils. A big hand had been seen to snatch one of the children from its parent's arms; and under the houses of those afflicted could be seen a weird fire glowing in ...
— The Great White Tribe in Filipinia • Paul T. Gilbert
... blow! I tell ye that I struck the blow, and scaped. Conrad who bore the doom is innocent, Save fellowship with guilt." And so he fled; The voice of prayer around him, but the soul Beyond its reach. The kneeling Pastor rose Sadly, as when the Shepherd fails to snatch A wanderer from the Lion. But the truth Couch'd in that dismal cry of parting life He treasured up, and bore to those who held Power to investigate and to reprieve; And authorized by them with gladness sought The gloomy prison. Conrad there he found In sullen syncope of sickening thought, ...
— Man of Uz, and Other Poems • Lydia Howard Sigourney
... of serene indifference, and the assumed habit had at last become in some degree a part of her nature. Giovanni, whose first impulses had originally been quicker than they now were, had learned the power of waiting by constant intercourse with his father, whose fiery temper seemed to snatch at trifles for the mere pleasure of tearing them to pieces, and did injustice to the generous heart he concealed under his ...
— Sant' Ilario • F. Marion Crawford
... against you his countless warriors, drowned in steel, and provided with every store and description of arms. What can you oppose to them? You have no other weapons than your swords, no provisions but those that you may snatch from the hands of your enemies; you must therefore attack them immediately, or otherwise your wants will increase; the gales of victory may no longer blow in your favor, and perchance the fear that lurks in the hearts of your enemies may be changed ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... there, pressing his fists into his temples—he seemed to see her like a lovely rock-bound Andromeda, with the devouring monster Society careering up to make a mouthful of her; and himself whirling down on his winged horse—just Pegasus turned Rosinante for the nonce—to cut her bonds, snatch her up, and whirl ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... a wise man. But otherwise do fathers and otherwise do mothers handle their children. These soften them with kisses and imperfect noises, with the pap and breast-milk of soft endearments; they rescue them from tutors and snatch them from discipline; they desire to keep them fat and warm, and their feet dry, and their bellies full: and then the children govern, and cry, and prove fools and troublesome, so long as ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume III (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland I • Francis W. Halsey
... them out." The devil never destroys his own work. If the saloon is of the devil, the power that destroys it is the opposite. If a mother should see a gun pointed at her son would she break the law to snatch the gun and smash it? The gun was not hers. It may have been worth a thousand dollars. The saloon is worse than the gun which could ...
— The Use and Need of the Life of Carry A. Nation • Carry A. Nation
... doing" in a certain stock, it is the rule to send only the picked floor men into the crowd. There may be a fortune to make or to lose in a minute or a sliver of a minute. For instance, the man who that morning was able to snatch the first 5,000 shares sold at 140 could have resold them a few minutes afterward at 152 and secured $60,000 profit. And the man who was sent into the crowd by his client to sell 5,000 shares at the "opening" and ...
— Friday, the Thirteenth • Thomas W. Lawson
... Yolland. With these words, she appeared to lose all command over herself; and, making a sudden snatch at the heap of silver, put it back, holus-bolus, in her pocket. "It upsets one's temper, it does, to see it lying there, and nobody taking it," cries this unreasonable woman, sitting down with a thump, and looking at Sergeant Cuff, as much as to say, "It's in my pocket again now—get ...
— The Moonstone • Wilkie Collins
... that the Baron's doll was a real living animal, previously taught by him to repeat these responses, that he watched his opportunity at the close of the dialogue, and suddenly made an attempt to snatch it from his pocket. The little doll, as if in danger of being suffocated, during the struggle occasioned by this attempt, called out for help, and screamed incessantly from the pocket till the officer desisted. She then became silent; ...
— Apparitions; or, The Mystery of Ghosts, Hobgoblins, and Haunted Houses Developed • Joseph Taylor
... to earth," said Dona Rita. "One would bargain for peace against hard cash if these fellows weren't always ready to snatch at one's very soul with the ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... was desirous of concealing not only the amount of the cheque—since he had kept no note of the sum on the butt—but of hiding the fact that the cheque had been drawn at all. This conduct, coupled with the fact of Jentham's allusion to Tom Tiddler's ground, and his snatch of extempore song, confirmed Cargrim in his suspicions that Pendle had visited London for the purpose of drawing out a large sum of money, and intended to pay the same over to Jentham that very night on Southberry Heath. ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume
... said Hera, trying to snatch it; 'for I am the queen, and gods and men honor me as having no ...
— Hero Tales • James Baldwin
... and the rise and fall of characters either male or female, will hope to be gratified by this paper; for the Idler is always inquisitive and seldom retentive. He that delights in obloquy and satire, and wishes to see clouds gathering over any reputation that dazzles him with its brightness, will snatch up the Idler's essays with a beating heart. The Idler is naturally censorious; those who attempt nothing themselves, think every thing easily performed, and consider the unsuccessful always ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson
... this shadow-peopled cave And live among the Gods, and pass each day In high communion, sharing what they have Of profuse wealth and unexhausted prey; 225 And from the portion which my father gave To Phoebus, I will snatch my share away, Which if my father will not—natheless I, Who am the king ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... roaring forth a catch, ('Twas twelve o'clock) we wak'd the watch, I at his jazy made a snatch, [8] And try'd for to nab his rattle! [9] But I miss'd my aim and down I fell, And then he charg'd both me and Nell, And bundled us both to St. Martin's cell Where we sung fal de ...
— Musa Pedestris - Three Centuries of Canting Songs - and Slang Rhymes [1536 - 1896] • John S. Farmer
... with frightened eyes, her lips apart, her hands to her breast. The tableau was brief. He could not strike her down. With a curse he was turning to the man on the floor, eager to snatch the keys from his belt. A scream from her drawn lips held him; he whirled and looked into the now haggard face of the girl he had considered beautiful. The penalty for her crime was already written there. She was to die ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... stealing the armourer's tongs from the forge; for which he received a pretty severe flogging, and was sent out from the ship. Notwithstanding the example made of this man, in the afternoon another had the audacity to snatch the tongs and a chisel from the same place, with which he jumped overboard, and swam for the shore. The master and a midshipman were instantly dispatched after him in the small cutter. The Indian, seeing himself pursued, made for a canoe; his countrymen took him on board, and paddled ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... the elements and germs and insect destroyers, attack us every minute without cease, yet we murder one another as if we were out of our senses. Death is ever on the watch for us, and we think of nothing but to snatch a few patches of land! About 5,000,000,000 days of work go every year to the displacement of boundary lines. Think of what humanity could obtain if that prodigious effort were devoted to fighting our real enemies, the noxious species and our hostile ...
— Popular Science Monthly Volume 86
... with M'Queen, and said to me, 'This is a critical man, Sir. There must be great vigour of mind to make him cultivate learning so much in the isle of Sky, where he might do without it. It is wonderful how many of the new publications he has. There must be a snatch of every opportunity.' Mr. M'Queen told me that his brother (who is the fourth generation of the family following each other as ministers of the parish of Snizort,) and he joined together, and bought from time to time such books as had reputation. Soon after we came in, a black cock ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell
... first created shine, In never fading immortality! Like vice, from virtue's glance, yon clouds retire, Before the smile of one benignant ray, Sleepless and sad, my soul would fain aspire, Promethean like, to snatch ethereal fire, And draw relief from ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 371, May 23, 1829 • Various
... a false alarm after all, for, although a close lookout was kept everywhere between Paris and the frontier for the adventurous Zeppelin, and a hundred guns were craning up into the sky ready for her if she hove in sight, she never came, and the tired airmen turned in again to snatch a ...
— Paris War Days - Diary of an American • Charles Inman Barnard
... there for an hour in the dark. I heard the waiter coming and going in the scullery, listened to his heavy tramp, to his everlasting snatch of song, to the rattle of utensils, as he went about his work. Every minute of the time I was tortured by the apprehension that he would come to the cupboard ...
— The Man with the Clubfoot • Valentine Williams
... I have toiled day and night, I have money and power good store, But I'd give all my lamps of silver bright, For the one that is mine no more; Take, Fortune, whatever you choose,— You gave, and may snatch again; I have nothing 'twould pain me to lose, For I own ...
— The Golden Treasury of American Songs and Lyrics • Various
... woman looked such daggers at me that I nearly dropped the sketch, brushes and palette out of my hands. Oh, it was such a look! Brrr! how I shivered. Then, with another yell, tenfold more piercing than the first, she made a dash into the crowd, and tried to snatch the child away. I have heard people say that I am sensitive, and I believe that I really was on that occasion, for I involuntarily shuddered as I saw at a glance what was coming. The crowd had got so interested in the picture that they would not hear of letting the child go; so the mother, ...
— Corea or Cho-sen • A (Arnold) Henry Savage-Landor
... it, Prince? It is witchery; it is the wile of Beelzebub waiting to snatch your soul, and if you hearken to it you shall pass through the fire—through the fire to Moloch, if not in the flesh, then in the spirit, which is to all eternity. Oh! not in vain do I fear for you, my son, and ...
— Elissa • H. Rider Haggard
... would a trifling incident have sufficed to raise the question arising out of that principle between Her Majesty's Embassy and the Porte, but had the man been arrested after his recantation, I should perhaps have been reduced to the necessity of putting all to hazard in order to snatch him from ...
— Correspondence Relating to Executions in Turkey for Apostacy from Islamism • Various
... intellectual fibre than their fellows—men whose minds have, as it were, filaments to intercept, apprehend, conduct, translate home to us stray messages between these two mysteries, as modern telegraphy has learnt to search out, snatch, gather home human messages astray over waste waters of ...
— On the Art of Writing - Lectures delivered in the University of Cambridge 1913-1914 • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... manger, and made a resurrection day for the poor widow of Nain, and sprung the gate of heaven wide open, so that all the beggars, and thieves, and scoundrels of the universe may come in if they will only repent. I can snatch the knife from the murderer's hand while it is yet dripping with the blood of his victim, and tell him of the grace that is sufficient to pardon his soul. Do you say that I swing open the gate of heaven too far? I swing it open no wider than Christ, ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage
... is—hark ye, sirrah! what's your name? Ay, Jacob, yes! I recollect—the same; As I bethink me now, a tenant's son - I think a tenant,—is your father one?" There was an idle boy who ran about, And found his master's humble spirit out; He would at awful distance snatch a look, Then run away and hide him in some nook; "For oh!" quoth he, "I dare not fix my sight On him, his grandeur puts me in a fright; Oh! Mister Jacob, when you wait on him, Do you not quake and tremble every limb?" The Steward soon had orders—"Summers, ...
— The Borough • George Crabbe
... with shining eyes like so many schoolboys. Parcels are handed out first, but we throw these aside to be opened later, and snatch for the letters. But luck is not always good to all of us, and possibly it will be old Bill who has to turn away empty-handed and alone. No letter. Are they all ...
— Private Peat • Harold R. Peat
... the pleasant changes of scenery. The cottages became less frequent, and the bare, dusty commons gave place to green fields. Here and there a tree spread its branches to the breezes, and now and then a snatch of bird song broke the stillness. But Lovey Mary kept gloomily on her way, her eyes fixed on the cross-ties. The thoughts surging through her brain were dark enough to obscure even the sunshine. For three nights she had cried herself to sleep, and the "nervous sensations" were getting worse instead ...
— Lovey Mary • Alice Hegan Rice
... throw down a nickel, and snatch up the first copy of that week's issue sold that morning. It was virtually "fresh from the press"; indeed, the odor of printers' ink could easily be detected in ...
— The Chums of Scranton High Out for the Pennant • Donald Ferguson
... again. I could see her laboring over this game of "friendship, love, indifference, hate." I could see "Redney" Griggs, who sat between her and me, in the row of desks between and parallel to my row and hers,—could see him swoop and snatch the paper from her, look at it, grin maliciously, and toss it over to me. I was in grade A, was sixteen, and was beginning to take myself seriously. She was in grade D, was little more than half my age, ...
— The Plum Tree • David Graham Phillips
... hate and fear they still hunt from den to den, from disguise to disguise. Yet, my landlord, you have it in your power, if you be poor, to lay the basis of your fortune; if you be unknown, to capture honour at one snatch. You have hocussed an innocent widow; and I find you here in my apartment, for whose use I pay you in stamped money, searching my wardrobe, and your hand—shame, sir!—your hand in my very pocket. You can now complete the cycle ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 5 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... thin silk covering of the cushion and slit it. Helene Vauquier let her fall. She felt composedly in her pocket, and drew from it an aluminium flask—the same flask which Lemerre was afterward to snatch up in the bedroom in Geneva. Celia stared at her in dread. She saw the flask flashing in the light. She shrank from it. She wondered what new horror was to grip her. Helene unscrewed ...
— At the Villa Rose • A. E. W. Mason
... had passed. Both boys had been allowed a chance to secure some sleep, having been placed in an empty shanty; but as neither of them dared lie down on the straw that formed a rude couch on the board floor, they were compelled to "snatch a few winks," as Larry termed ...
— Chums in Dixie - or The Strange Cruise of a Motorboat • St. George Rathborne
... white dawn, looking into his weary white face through the shimmering window panes, is greeted by a smile that leaps from sleepless eyes. The passion of the creator is upon him. The man who invents a new sin is greater than the man who invents a new religion, Reggie. No Mrs. Humphrey Ward can snatch his glory from him. Religions are the Aunt Sallies that men provide for elderly female venturists to throw missiles at and to demolish. What sin that has ever been invented has ever been demolished? There are always new human ...
— The Green Carnation • Robert Smythe Hichens
... have seen that at Spachendorf, in Austrian Silesia, on the morning of Rupert's Day (Shrove Tuesday?), a straw-man, dressed in a fur coat and a fur cap, is laid in a hole outside the village and there burned, and that while it is blazing every one seeks to snatch a fragment of it, which he fastens to a branch of the highest tree in his garden or buries in his field, believing that this will make the crops to grow better. The ceremony is known as the "burying of Death."[298] Even when the straw-man is ...
— Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I. • Sir James George Frazer
... restrain his emotion. He chafed at having to wait whilst the man satisfied himself there were no others for him, and the quiet way he took the letter revealed little of his almost overmastering impulse to snatch at it as a wild beast might snatch at meat. Blessed writing on the envelope! Tears were streaming down his cheeks as he stepped again into the street! And when at last he began to read, all that he had suppressed surged up ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill
... why the Grand Fleet could not force on a battle round the German base. But the reason why the Germans could not try to snatch a victory out of some lucky chance at the beginning of the war, when the odds were least against them, was of quite a different kind. The fact was that thousands of their trained seamen were hopelessly cut off from Germany by the British Navy. Nearly every ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... story. I once had a dog trained so that he would lay down and roll over for a cracker, and would hold a piece of meat on his nose until his mouth would water and his eyes sparkle, but he would wait for me to snap my fingers before he would toss the meat in the air with his nose and snatch it in his mouth, and swallow it whole for fear I would get it away from him. He would stand on his hind legs and speak and beg for a bone to be thrown to him so he could catch it. Do you know, the people ...
— Peck's Bad Boy With the Cowboys • Hon. Geo. W. Peck
... spear," even if he were not my own son. This undesirable way of discussing matters showed itself the other day, when the gentlemen fought for "the poor man," as if they had to do with the body of Patroclus. Mr. Lasker took hold of him at one end, and I tried to snatch him away from Mr. Lasker as best I could. But where do imputed motives, and class-hatred, and the excitement of misery and suffering lead us? Such behavior comes too near being socialism in the sense in which Mr. von Puttkamer ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... expectations were especially heightened when Sister Soulsby ascended the pulpit stairs and took charge of the proceedings. She deferred to Paul's views about women preachers on Sundays, she said; but on weekdays she had just as much right to snatch brands from the burning as Paul, or Peter, or any other man. She went on like that, in a breezy, off-hand fashion which tickled the audience immensely, and led to the liveliest anticipations of what would happen when she began upon the ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... morning, after a snatch of sleep, we three friends walked up the Avenue des Champs Elysees and back again from the Arc de Triomphe. The autumn foliage was beginning to fall, and so wonderfully quiet was the scene that almost one might have heard a leaf rustle to the ground. Not a ...
— The Soul of the War • Philip Gibbs
... for the rich. As for the people, to get bread fit for dogs, they must stand in a line for hours. And here they fight for it; "they snatch food from one another." There is no more work to be had; "the work-rooms are deserted;" often, after waiting a whole day, the workman returns home empty-handed. When he does bring back a four-pound loaf it costs him 3 francs 12 sous; that is, 12 sous for the bread, and ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 2 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 1 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... mortals was enthroned in her heart. It was sweet to meet her laughing glance, dear fellow-conspirator. It was sweet every morning and night to have the intimate little talk through the telephone. And it was sweetest of all to snatch a precious hour with her alone. Of such vain and foolish things is made all that is most ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke
... which party is which, though my uncle says one consists of gentlemen, and the other of the common people. I suppose it is like in other countries, every one wanting to secure what some one above him has got, without being fitted for the administration of what he desires to snatch." ...
— The Reason Why • Elinor Glyn
... or less degree—fancied it would be adding unnecessary cruelty to bind heir delicate hands. Whatever the cause, matters but little; but the fact itself was of considerable importance to Ella; who took advantage of her freedom, in passing the bushes before noticed, to snatch a leaf unperceived, whereon, by great adroitness, she managed to trace with a pin a few almost illegible characters; and also, in ascending the bank, which she was allowed to do in her own way, to throw down with her foot the stone, break the twig at the same instant, and pin the leaf ...
— Ella Barnwell - A Historical Romance of Border Life • Emerson Bennett
... quarrell'd. Why? What cause of quarrel? None, she said, no cause; James had no cause: but when I prest the cause, I learnt that James had flickering jealousies Which anger'd her. Who anger'd James? I said. 100 But Katie snatch'd her eyes at once from mine, And sketching with her slender pointed foot Some figure like a wizard pentagram On garden gravel, let my query pass Unclaimed, in flushing silence, till I ask'd 105 If James were ...
— Selections from Wordsworth and Tennyson • William Wordsworth and Alfred Lord Tennyson
... of submarines, that snatch a man before his Maker like a snuff of a candle, while you can find no better way of employing your holidays than scatterin' other folks' glass to the danger o' my ducks! You just wait till I've wiped my arms, here, and I'll be round to tell your ...
— Nicky-Nan, Reservist • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... "if you don't like to go in and get it, I'll fetch it for you." And remembering well the position of my reading-table, which had been close to the door of the retiring-room, I darted in, hoping to snatch the manuscript without attracting the attention of the audience, with which the room was already nearly full. I had been used to deliver my reading seated, at a very low table, but my friend Thackeray gave ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... boy, aburst with joy, Or gawky, ill-at-ease, All hot and coy, a hobbledehoy With laces round his knees— But hers, her own, with eyes that trust Hers for his better part— Ah, tiger-lust of War that thrust A hand to snatch that heart! ...
— The Village Wife's Lament • Maurice Hewlett
... is this man you have with you? where does he come from? Are you such a fool as not to know he is a tool of the Adams, and that you are acting with him? I cannot be with you. If I had my liberty I would hurry to your side, snatch you from this villain, and plunge my knife so deep into him that he would never know he had received a blow!!! Why are you so foolish? Do you love me? You have often said you did. You know I have done all in my power to make you happy, and have placed entire confidence in you. Why ...
— The Expressman and the Detective • Allan Pinkerton
... sword, but the lord mayor's, and that "they were as good men as he, and no respect was to be given him there." A struggle then took place for the possession of the sword, in which the sword-bearer was slightly hurt and some of the pearls from the scabbard were lost. The students made a snatch at the "cap of maintenance" worn by the sword-bearer. The marshal's men who were in attendance suffered some rough treatment, and narrowly escaped being put under the pump. The mayor and aldermen in the meanwhile ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume II • Reginald R. Sharpe
... only slept till awakened by an all-sufficient call. "Let the tyrant Edward exult in the possession of our country's crown and sceptre—he may find we need not them to make a king; aye, and a king to snatch the regal diadem from the proud usurper's brow—the Scottish sceptre from ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... breeches-pockets, leaning back in his chair, and staring now up at the ceiling, now straight forward at his hostess (in a manner that made me strongly inclined to kick him out of the room), now whistling sotto voce to himself a snatch of a favourite air, now interrupting the conversation, or filling up a pause (as the case might be) with some most impertinent question or remark. At one time it was,—'It, amazes me, Mrs. Graham, how you could choose such a dilapidated, ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte
... the old horse was failing, came along in front of the Grand Stand, clipping the grass with that swift, rhythmical stroke of hers and little fretful snatch at the reins, neat and swift and strong as a ...
— Boy Woodburn - A Story of the Sussex Downs • Alfred Ollivant
... and actuated by that general desire of retaliation, which is the certain effect bullying produces upon a mean disposition, Mullins proceeded, con amore, to fulfil Lawless's injunction. With a sudden snatch he withdrew the centre chair, on which Oaklands' legs mainly rested, so violently as nearly to throw them to the ground, a catastrophe which was finally consummated by Lawless giving the other chair a push with his foot, so that it was only by great exertion and quickness that ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... and she longed to go down to her lover, whom she had greeted but briefly on his arrival; still, she could not bear to snatch the child from her bosom, to disturb her in her newly-found happiness and leave her at this very moment! And yet, she must—she must see him! Every impulse urged her towards him and, when Pulcheria came into the room, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... price, and I went into my warehouse to fetch the money to pay her, saying to myself, "I will present this curiosity to my wife, as it may please her." When I was going to pay the money, the damsel would not take it, but said, "My lord, I have a request to make, which is, that I may snatch one kiss from your cheek as the price of my jewelry, for I want nothing else." Upon this, I thought to myself, a single kiss of my cheek is an easy price for the value of a thousand deenars, and consented; ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 4 • Anon.
... grab to save them from going to the floor. Then blushing and embarrassed as the plate paused in front of her, she fumbled desperately in her purse to regain the dropped quarter. The instant the coin left her fingers she saw the mistake she had made, and reached out her hand as if to snatch it back. But it was too late, even if she had had the courage to reclaim it. She had dropped her English shilling into the plate instead of the quarter! Her precious talisman from the bride's cake, that she had carried as a pocket piece ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston
... cast down, muzafir, but snatch up a sword and stand alongside of me. No harm can come to you here. It is the ...
— Halil the Pedlar - A Tale of Old Stambul • Mr Jkai
... babel of voices filled the store, all talking at once, rapidly and loudly. Here and there we could distinguish a snatch of conversation, a word, a phrase, now and then even a whole sentence above the rest. There was a clink of glasses. I could hear the rattle of dice on a bare table, and an oath. A cork ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... Does that bird (of yours)[2] sing? 2. This bird (of mine)[2] sings both[3] in summer and in winter and has a beautiful voice. 3. Those birds (yonder)[2] in the country don't sing in winter. 4. Snatch a spear from the hands of that soldier (near you)[2] and come home with me. 5. With those very eyes (of yours)[2] you will see the tracks of the hateful enemy who burned my dwelling and made an attack on my brother. 6. For (propter) these deeds (res) we ought to ...
— Latin for Beginners • Benjamin Leonard D'Ooge
... an astonishing joiner of words; in Peacock Pie (1913) he surprises us again and again by transforming what began as a child's nonsense-rhyme into a suddenly thrilling snatch of music. A score of times he takes things as casual as the feeding of chickens or the swallowing of physic, berry-picking, eating, hair-cutting—and turns them into magic. These poems read like lyrics of William Shakespeare rendered by Mother Goose. The trick of revealing the ordinary in whimsical ...
— Modern British Poetry • Various
... the Great his empire was broken into fragments ruled by those of his generals who were able to snatch these smaller kingdoms for themselves. One of them named Ptolemy seized Egypt. His descendants, known as the Ptolemies, reigned there for centuries. Another, named Seleucus, gained control of the greater part of the old ...
— Hebrew Life and Times • Harold B. Hunting
... reader? Then will you feel your angling as well as your artistic heart warmed by No. 75 ("The Old Adam") and No. 6 ("Wet and Dry"), the former especially! What water, what Scotch boys, what a "prencipled" (but piscatorial) "Meenister"! Don't you feel your elbow twitch? Don't you want to snatch the rod from SANDY McDOUGAL's hand, and land that "fush" yourself, Sawbath or ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, March 21, 1891 • Various
... hand; then, striking an attitude, he extended his long arms: "Come, fair damsel, come, we'll fly to other climes,—the attic or the cellar, anywhere, so it be not to the Ervengs'." He made a sudden snatch at me, but I was prepared,—I know him of old!—and, dodging under his arm, darted round the table and soon put a wide ...
— We Ten - Or, The Story of the Roses • Lyda Farrington Kraus
... get safely away with his goods; and he did. But it seemed odd—to an absurdly sensitive, non-Teutonic mind it seemed somehow to lack justice— that the picture-framer, after having been ruined, must risk his life in order to snatch from the catastrophe the debris of his career. Further on, within the city itself, but near the edge of it, two men were removing uninjured planks from the upper floor of a house; the planks were all there was in the house to salve. I saw no other attempt to make the best of ...
— Over There • Arnold Bennett
... quoth Robin, "but, cousin, I tell thee plain, I would rather hear a stout fellow like thee sing some lusty ballad than a finicking song of flowers and birds, and what not. Yet, thou didst sing it fair, and 'tis none so bad a snatch of a song, for the matter of that. Now, Tanner, ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... Shall we not journey to London in company with Mary. This tournament needs much preparation; I did but snatch a few days to speak on our father's affairs and to breathe freely for a short space, and then I ...
— Penshurst Castle - In the Days of Sir Philip Sidney • Emma Marshall
... the pledge then, as now; but a force I could not withstand was invoked against me, and I was made to give up the ring, and with it the power and rights I strove to exert. But I will not again be thwarted: no force, no being shall snatch you from me; so be not deceived. Submit, ere you excite my fierce displeasure; submit now, since in ...
— The Tinted Venus - A Farcical Romance • F. Anstey
... official leader of systematic, organised opposition to the Government, yet he is on a large number of questions their most powerful ally. He must frequently have confidential relations with them, and one of his most useful functions is to prevent sections of his party from endeavouring to snatch party advantages by courses which might endanger public interests. If the country is to be well governed there must be a large amount of continuity in its policy; certain conditions and principles of administration must ...
— The Map of Life - Conduct and Character • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... deep in the animal being and released by any trifling accident, such as personal jealousy or lust, or one is relaxed by contentment into vanity. All these rebel forces of our ill-coordinated selves, all these "disharmonies," of the inner being, snatch us away from our devotion to God's service, carry us off to follies, offences, unkindness, waste, and leave us compromised, involved, and regretful, perplexed by a hundred difficulties we have put in our ...
— God The Invisible King • Herbert George Wells
... understand the psychological subtleties of suicide! How can one speak of reasons? To-day the reason makes one snatch up a revolver, while to-morrow the same reason seems not worth a rotten egg. It all depends most likely on the particular condition of the individual at the given moment. . . . Take me for instance. Half an hour ago, I had a passionate desire ...
— Love and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... furrows in the stone-work of the basin, whereon they were wont to support their bodies, so as to direct the cooling draught into the dry and dusty gullet. In Italian cities to-day we can frequently observe some exhausted labourer bend deftly downwards to snatch a drink of water from the mouth of some fantastic figure in a public fountain. Who has not paused, for instance, beside Tacca's famous bronze boar in the Florentine market-place without noting an incident of this kind? If we ourselves are too dainty ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... did he spend every possible hour at Mellor he could snatch from a conflict in which his party, his grandfather, and his own personal fortunes were all deeply interested. In vain—with a tardy instinct that it was to Mr. Boyce's dislike of himself, and to the wilful fancy for Wharton's society ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... miserable she was. Her childish soul was filled with bitterness, and her young life was being spoiled. Such of her pleasures as had not been taken from her were divested of all their charm. Almost her sole remaining joy was to snatch, now and then, a bit of clandestine love with her father, when, on some rare occasion, Aunt Jemima happened to ...
— The Golden Shoemaker - or 'Cobbler' Horn • J. W. Keyworth
... emphasize the excessive artificiality of the scene); but the Rhine overflows its banks to allow the three Rhine maidens to take the ring from Siegfried's finger, incidentally extinguishing the conflagration as it does so. Hagen attempts to snatch the ring from the maidens, who promptly drown him; and in the distant heavens the Gods and their castle are seen perishing in the fires of Loki ...
— The Perfect Wagnerite - A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring • George Bernard Shaw
... lilacs and is flanked by two rows of tall purple and white iris that stand in line ready for a Virginia reel with a delicate row of the poet's narcissus across the broad path. I love my flowers. I love them swaying on their stems in the wind, and I like to snatch them and crush the life out of them against my breast and face. I have been to bed every night this spring with a bunch of cool violets against my cheek and I feel that I am going to flirt with my tall row of hollyhocks as soon ...
— The Melting of Molly • Maria Thompson Daviess
... when religious faith expresses itself thus, in the language of the gaming-table, it is put to its last trumps. Surely Pascal's own personal belief in masses and holy water had far other springs; and this celebrated page of his is but an argument for others, a last desperate snatch at a weapon against the hardness of the unbelieving heart. We feel that a faith in masses and holy water adopted wilfully after such a mechanical calculation would lack the inner soul of faith's ...
— The Will to Believe - and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy • William James
... sake I ne'er desired it from thee. Who to the gods ascribe a thirst for blood Do misconceive their nature, and impute To them their own inhuman dark desires. Did not Diana snatch me from the priest, Holding my ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... a bit, but his fingers became spryer with buttons and hooks and very shortly he stood fully dressed and ready to go downstairs. Jerry had already made peace with Mrs. Thomas, so little time was lost in waiting for Dave to snatch a bite to eat and ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Air on Lost Island • Gordon Stuart
... up?" grumbled he. "If we start the engines and try to crawl up by the capstan, we couldn't pull her out of the mud. If we put on a donkey engine we'd snatch the bow out of here before we could lift the hook. And until we do, how are we going to move her? There's the channel, but it's as far as ever. We can't sweep her off, of course, and we can't ...
— The Lady and the Pirate - Being the Plain Tale of a Diligent Pirate and a Fair Captive • Emerson Hough
... undying love, and takes steps to be introduced at her home. Once having obtained a calling acquaintance, he calls at intervals, accompanied by seven or eight other young men, and, in the general hilarity of a large gathering, endeavors to snatch a moment in which to gaze into the star-like eyes of his innamorata, or to gloat over her "hairs which are the ...
— A Woman's Impression of the Philippines • Mary Helen Fee
... she wrong. Not only did Mrs. Halfpenny get the half- unconscious girl into bed, but she stayed till evening, and then came back to snatch a meal and say—- ...
— Beechcroft at Rockstone • Charlotte M. Yonge
... a great many speeches, sometimes five or six in a day. He could have had no preparation but the few minutes which he could snatch while waiting for dinner at some house where he was a guest, or late at night, after a hard day's work. But his speeches were gems. They were beautiful in substance and in manner. He was ready for every occasion. When the speaker who welcomed ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar
... well, tugging at ropes, while the sailors used levers to get the guns up steep places. Edgar was kept busy translating the first lieutenant's orders to the Turkish officers, and for the first three days had hardly time to snatch a meal until the sailors returned at nightfall to the ship. He got on very well with the lieutenant of the marines, who was a pleasant young fellow. On the day after they landed they heard heavy firing, and going up to the highest point of the rocky promontory on which ...
— At Aboukir and Acre - A Story of Napoleon's Invasion of Egypt • George Alfred Henty
... host. On tiptoe I stole into the kitchen, where my sweetheart was frying ham and eggs. I thought I might snatch a kiss. Above the noise of the sizzling frying-pan and the crackling wood, I plainly heard the voice of my—well, let us say it—bride, weeping and complaining to an old house servant: 'It's a shame and a sin to enter matrimony with a lie. I ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... up. "I warned you at the outset!" she cried. "I took nothing from you that you didn't force on me. And now, when you've made dress, and all that, a necessity for me, you are going to snatch ...
— The Fashionable Adventures of Joshua Craig • David Graham Phillips
... keep her nearer Rome at first. The air alone will restore her, if only we snatch her from the dungeon. Hast thou no manager in the mountains ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... the Indians broke into the church where a Jesuit (Padre Salazar) was officiating, and interrupted him during the Mass with the most bitter insults. One of the Indians menaced him with a lance, another with an arrow, whilst a third tried to snatch the chalice from his hands. He escaped, and ran, holding the chalice, out into the woods, followed by two little Indian boys. Wandering about, he fell in with the other Jesuits, all like himself outcasts, without a church, and almost deserted by ...
— A Vanished Arcadia, • R. B. Cunninghame Graham
... must not flatter themselves that their mere glimpse of country life—their mere snatch at its midsummer beauty, the one free-drawn breath of their wearied spirit—is acquaintance with it. As well might one who had seen Rosalind, the most versatile of Shakspeare's heroines, only in her court-dress at her uncle the duke's ball, guess at her infinite variety of charm ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... wary to sleep, suspecting that his enemy might return and try to snatch the girl from him under ...
— In the Morning of Time • Charles G. D. Roberts
... unobserved, and was there for some moments before his presence was discovered. Annunziata was the first to see him, sitting upon a rude wooden bench with his stout oaken staff in his hand on which he leaned heavily. She threw her arms about his neck with a cry of joy, endeavoring to snatch a kiss from his tightly-closed lips, but he sternly and silently repulsed her. Lorenzo, in his turn, met with no warmer reception at his father's hands. But his children were used to Pasquale's moods and were, ...
— Monte-Cristo's Daughter • Edmund Flagg
... powerful means of actively relieving their friend, and testifying their affectionate regret, by prayer and supplication. In the first moments of grief, this sentiment will often overpower religious prejudice, cast down the unbeliever on his knees beside the remains of his friend, and snatch from him an unconscious prayer for rest; it is an impulse of nature, which for the moment, aided by the analogies of revealed truth, seizes at once upon this consoling belief. But it is only like the flitting and melancholy light ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier
... offered any chance of working with the theodolite and plane-table. We managed to get a base-line measured, 1,000 metres long, and to lay out the greater part of the east side of the bay, as well as the most prominent points round the camp; but one had positively to snatch one's opportunities by stealth, and every excursion ended regularly in bringing the instruments ...
— The South Pole, Volumes 1 and 2 • Roald Amundsen
... was no trick of an imagination disordered. Some dreadful menace threatened my friend. Not delaying even to snatch my dressing-gown, I rushed out on to the landing, up the stairs, bare-footed as I was, threw open the door of Smith's room and ...
— The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer
... Alive! See him who doth our sex deride! Hunt him to death, the slave! Thou snatch the thyrsus! Thou this oak-tree rive! Cast down this doeskin and that hide! We'll wreak our fury on the knave! Yea, he shall feel our wrath, the knave! He shall yield up his hide Riven as woodmen fir-trees rive! No power ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... pleasant intercourse was banished. Night after night we sat up until eleven, twelve, and one o'clock, watching the long hours go by with heavy steps; waiting, waiting, waiting for the time at which he could take his first draught, and drop into his pillowed place and snatch a dreamless sleep of three ...
— Recollections of Dante Gabriel Rossetti - 1883 • T. Hall Caine
... is greatly incensed by your abrupt departure; he has taken back Augusta to Bedfordshire. Much as I wish to enjoy again your charming society, I cannot determine to snatch you from that, of such dear and deserving Freinds—When your Visit to them is terminated, I trust you will return to the ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... infuriated billows of a tempestuous sea, and sending against you his countless warriors, drowned in steel, and provided with every store and description of arms. What can you oppose to them? You have no other weapons than your swords, no provisions but those that you may snatch from the hands of your enemies; you must therefore attack them immediately, or otherwise your wants will increase; the gales of victory may no longer blow in your favor, and perchance the fear that lurks in the hearts of your enemies may ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... a movement, drawing herself together as if, in a spasm of dread at having lost her treasure, she were going to attempt the immense effort of rising to snatch it from me. I instantly placed it in her hand again, saying as I did so, "I should like to have it myself, but with your ideas ...
— The Aspern Papers • Henry James
... horses in a tumble-down shed, fed and watered them, and, as it was impossible to leave till they were rested, lay down to snatch a brief sleep on the ground. We were invited to use the floor of a hovel for a couch, but after glancing at it, declined with great politeness and ...
— At the Point of the Sword • Herbert Hayens
... "Snatch'd in thy prime! alas, the stroke were mild, Had my frail form obey'd the fate's decree! Blest were my lot, O Cynthio! O my child! Had Heaven so pleas'd, and I had died ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... time! In his cups learn king-craft from a king. Ay, ay, my lord, your royal order will endure, so long as men will fight. Break the spears, and free the nations. Kings reap the harvests that wave on battle-fields. And oft you kings do snatch the aloe-flower, whose slow blossoming mankind watches for a ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. II (of 2) • Herman Melville
... and dashed itself with fearful violence against some lofty, undermined cliffs which formed its southern limit. The whole region vibrated with the shock of the fiery surges. To stand there was "to snatch a fearful joy," out of a pain and terror which were unendurable. For two or three minutes we kept going to the edge, seeing the spectacle as with a flash, through half closed eyes, and going back again; but ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... he cried, with a huge chuckle, "you will have to save me after all. I will snatch all the food you put through the ...
— Jewish Fairy Tales and Legends • Gertrude Landa
... to see you. You may depend on them,—and Miss Mitford is in your keeping, mind,—and dear Mr. Kenyon, if there should be never so gentle a touch of 'garrulous God-innocence' about those kind lips of his. Come, let me snatch at that clue out of the maze, and say how perfect, absolutely perfect, are those three or four pages in the 'Vision' which present the Poets—a line, a few words, and the man there,—one twang of the bow and the arrowhead ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett
... would enter Eglosilyan on foot. He would wander down to the rocks at the mouth of the harbor on the chance of finding Wenna there. Might he not hear her humming to herself, as she sat and sewed, some snatch of "Your Polly has never been false, she declares"? or was that the very last ballad in the world she would now think of singing? Then the delight of regarding again the placid, bright face and earnest eyes, of securing once more a perfect understanding between ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, April 1875, Vol. XV., No. 88 • Various
... held in his hand. At that signal the chiefs should throw off the blankets that hid their weapons and war paint, and butcher the English before they could offer resistance. When the Indians outside heard the clamor within the council house they should snatch the guns and knives that the squaws carried, fall upon the surprised and half-armed soldiers, kill them and plunder and burn the fort, ...
— Four American Indians - King Philip, Pontiac, Tecumseh, Osceola • Edson L. Whitney
... the morris-dancers, and whirling his cudgel over his head instead of a kerchief. The gaiety of the day seemed infectious, and to have seized even him. People stared to see Black Jem, or Surly Jem, as he was indifferently called, so joyous, and wondered what it could mean. He then fell to singing a snatch of a local ballad at that time in vogue ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... safety, on which his serenity was founded. In his lap was a banjo which he thrummed vigorously, with rhythmic precision, if no greater musical art, and head and body and feet, all gave emphasis to the movement. At intervals, his raucous voice rumbled a snatch of song. It was evident that the moonshiner was mellow from draughts of ...
— Heart of the Blue Ridge • Waldron Baily
... for action. As Gerard turned his head, the heavy steel wrench struck him below the right temple. Even Rupert's swiftness was too slow; the driver fell forward across his steering-wheel before the mechanician could snatch it from the inert grasp. With a lurch the speeding Mercury caught in a rut, swerved from the road and, leaping a yard-high embankment, crashed through a row of trees to roll over and over like a broken toy, scattering splintered wreckage over ...
— From the Car Behind • Eleanor M. Ingram
... its bottom and removed the lid. I cannot tell what I expected; a million's worth of diamonds might perhaps have pleased me; my cheeks burned, my heart throbbed to bursting; and lo! there was disclosed but a trayful of papers, neatly taped, and a cheque-book of the customary pattern. I made a snatch at the tray to see what was beneath; but the captain's hand fell ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... you do, you will but make it blush, And glow with shame of your proceedings, Hubert: Nay, it, perchance, will sparkle in your eyes; And, like a dog that is compelled to fight, Snatch at his master that doth tarre him on. All things that you should use to do me wrong Deny their office; only you do lack That mercy which fierce fire and iron extends, Creatures ...
— The Canadian Elocutionist • Anna Kelsey Howard
... be pelted and pursued, like an owl which ventures into sunshine. Here he was safe, while his comrades could avail themselves of his talents; he is now squeezed and fleeced by them on every pretence. They consider him as a vessel on the strand, from which each may snatch a prey; and the very jealousy which they entertain respecting him as a common property, may perhaps induce them to guard him from ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... the path with a distracted air, like a man overwhelmed with business, only too pleased to snatch a moment's leisure between the parting and the coming client. He always loved to pass for being ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... practice, so that he could provide remedies or preventives. He had several cots placed in the adjoining building, and he and a few of his most strenuous assistants worked day and night, leaving the work only for hurried meals and a snatch of sleep. These crucial tests, aiming virtually to break the plant down if possible within predetermined conditions, lasted several weeks, and while most valuable in the information they afforded, did not hinder anything, for meantime customers' premises throughout the ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... remainder of the occupants of his traverse either sit on the fire step, with bayonets fixed, ready for any emergency, or if lucky, and a dugout happens to be in the near vicinity of the traverse, and if the night is quiet, they are permitted to go to same and try and snatch a few winks of sleep. Little sleeping is done; generally the men sit around, smoking fags and seeing who can tell the biggest lie. Some of them perhaps, with their feet in water, would write home sympathizing with the "governor" because he was laid ...
— Over The Top • Arthur Guy Empey
... that the men of the Old World were descended from African and Asiatic apes, while, similarly, the American apes were the progenitors of the human beings of the New World. The cause of this palpable error in a too eager disciple{13} one might hope was not anxiety to snatch up all or any arms available against Christianity, were it not for the tone unhappily adopted by this author. But it is unfortunately quite impossible to mistake his meaning and intention, for he is a writer whose offensiveness is gross, while it is sometimes almost surpassed by an ...
— On the Genesis of Species • St. George Mivart
... doubt not, is a tool in the hands of others, but he stands out as the head and centre of the conspiracy. There is a violent and a strong party, consisting chiefly of the disbanded soldiers, but of some drawn from every class of the inhabitants, whose object is by a sudden attack to snatch the city from the Roman garrison; and placing Antiochus on the throne, proclaim their independence again, and prepare themselves to maintain and defend it. They make use of Antiochus because of his connection with Zenobia, and the influence ...
— Zenobia - or, The Fall of Palmyra • William Ware
... prying warder at the grating of the peephole could not see him. Then he took off his wig, and hastily ungummed a piece of paper that did duty as lining. The side of the paper next his head was so greasy that it looked like the very texture of the wig. If it had occurred to Bibi-Lupin to snatch off the wig to establish the identity of the Spaniard with Jacques Collin, he would never have thought twice about the paper, it looked so exactly like part of the wigmaker's work. The other side was still ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... Smithsonian to house this satellite and other similar historic objects. In later testimony Mr. Orville Larkin, leader of the unnamed committee representing those in opposition to the CCSB stated that his group felt that to snatch Beta from orbit at this moment of its greatest glory would be contrary to natural law and that he and his supporters would never concede to any plan ...
— If at First You Don't... • John Brudy
... the horses' feet died in the distance. He even forgot his terror of the dark road which closed about him as he followed on Spitfire's track. It might be that Sir Shawn was catching up with the runaway horse, ready to snatch at the bridle if only he could be ...
— Love of Brothers • Katharine Tynan
... discipline and cleanliness go hand in hand on board our men-of-war. In fact the latter is carried to an absurd extreme. From four to six in the early morning, it is almost impossible watch below to snatch a little sleep, as immediately over their heads are men scrubbing, or holystoning the upper deck. I fail to see that "cleanliness is next ...
— From Lower Deck to Pulpit • Henry Cowling
... lamenting, as if he had been really and sorely afflicted. Mercury appeared as before, and, diving, brought him up a golden hatchet, asking if that was the one he had lost. Transported at the precious metal, he answered "Yes," and went to snatch it greedily. But the god, detesting his abominable impudence, not only refused to give him that, but would not so much as let him have his ...
— Favourite Fables in Prose and Verse • Various
... husband completely. On his part, he offered no great resistance, and was converted into a little lap dog for her. If he incommoded her she would not let him go out for a drive, and when she became really infuriated, she would snatch out his false teeth and leave him a horrible-looking man for one or more ...
— Friars and Filipinos - An Abridged Translation of Dr. Jose Rizal's Tagalog Novel, - 'Noli Me Tangere.' • Jose Rizal
... tearfully declared the woman to Rosa's grandmother. "I follow my husband. I tell him the Zanjero is the friend of the good panaderia that gives the bread! I tell him he shall not open the other gates! I snatch the key! I tell him 'No! No! The panaderia is my friend! The Zanjero is the panaderia's friend!' He shall not cheat the Zanjero! My husband say if he open other gates he get money for mescal. I say 'No!' I run away with key. ...
— Out of the Triangle • Mary E. Bamford
... superfluous words. (I rushed hurriedly into the burning house and hastily snatched my few possessions.) In this sentence, "rushed" and "snatched" lose rather than gain force by adding "hurriedly" and "hastily." Look up definitions of "rush" and "snatch." When we wish to express strong emotion or to describe action resulting from excitement, we only weaken the impression by using unnecessary words. Simple, direct sentences are most forceful. In aiming to secure sentence emphasis, then, we should avoid circumlocution, redundancy, tautology, ...
— Composition-Rhetoric • Stratton D. Brooks
... explain the place in his life that was filled by the little girl whom he had known for the two years that the building of the railroad had kept him with the Seer in Rubio City? How could she understand the poverty and grinding hardship of his boyhood struggle when the only time he could snatch from his work he must spend on his books, while she was growing up in the banker's home? He was more alone in the world than Barbara. Save for the Seer he had no one. Texas and Pat he had met at intervals when they came together on some construction work, and always they had talked about her; ...
— The Winning of Barbara Worth • Harold B Wright
... from over-kindness, or from having a tumble among the numerous candidates for the pleasure of dandling him when once they got him among them on the maindeck; and no set of schoolgirls could make a more eager rush to snatch up the little child left among them, than did the big-bearded, whiskered, and pig-tailed tars to catch hold of ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston
... wandering about in the great neglected garden, with his hands in the pockets of his knickerbockers and his cap on the back of his head, stopping here and there, and moving on again as the fancy took him. Sometimes he would hum a snatch of a song, and again fall to whistling; here he would pick up a twig and look at it, or again it might be a bird, or perhaps an old neglected apple-tree that seemed worth stopping to talk to. The best of it was that these were his own lands ...
— The Great Hunger • Johan Bojer
... charge; perhaps a recusant husband with Nettie mounting guard over him; perhaps a thrilling scene of family explanation and reconciliation. The day had been a specially long and hard one. He had been obliged to snatch a hurried lunch at one of his patients' houses, and to postpone his hard-earned dinner to the most fashionable of hours. It was indeed quite evening, almost twilight, when he made his way home at last. ...
— The Doctor's Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... descendants of those who perhaps knew my ancestors when they were rich and powerful, and in favour at court, could scarcely be expected to welcome a poverty-stricken Baron de Sigognac, who came swooping down from his ruined tower to try and snatch a share of any prey that chanced to lie within reach of his talons. And besides—I do not know why I should be ashamed to acknowledge it—I have not any of the appurtenances suitable to my rank, and could not present myself upon a footing ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... the case, your tenderness for me betrays you. Be assured that the decision of these persons has nothing to do with the question; they are altogether incompetent judges. These people, in the senseless hurry of their idle lives, do not read books, they merely snatch a glance at them, that they may talk about them. And even if this were not so, never forget what, I believe, was observed to you by Coleridge, that every great and original writer, in proportion as he is great or original, must himself create the taste by which he is ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... would be comin' home from school, we'd run to meet them. They would say, 'Whose nigger are you?' And we would say, 'Yor'n!' And they would say, 'No, you ain't.' They would open those lunch baskets and show us all that good stuff they'd brought back. Hold it out and snatch it back! Finally, they'd give it to us, after they ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume II, Arkansas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... After stating that he had arranged with Koberger for the printing, he points out details which might be improved: more stress might be laid on the connexion of the Germans with the Goths, 'which the dregs of the Goths and Lombards—by which I mean the Italians—try to snatch from us'; and the universal conquests of the Goths might be more fully treated. Finally he suggests that before publication the work should be submitted to Stabius: 'the book deserves learned readers, and I should wish it to be as ...
— The Age of Erasmus - Lectures Delivered in the Universities of Oxford and London • P. S. Allen
... and engage Croton; otherwise they will snatch Lygia from thee a second time. When Chilonides ceases to be needful, send him to me wherever I may be. Perhaps I shall make him a second Vatinius, and consuls and senators may tremble before him yet, as they ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... pillars. One of them was tying up the cue of an old-fashioned wig with a black ribbon; another was mending the gold lace on a velvet coat, and the others were busy with the various costumes which they were to wear in the tableaux. Now and then a gay trill or a snatch from some popular song floated out above their laughing chatter. Suddenly one of them looked up and saw John Jay standing in the ...
— Ole Mammy's Torment • Annie Fellows Johnston
... my hope deferred; For who, first in the bathroom, fit and young, Would, as he washed, refrain from giving tongue, Nor chant his challenge from the soapy deep, Inspired by triumph and renewed by sleep? Then how is this? Here have I waited long, Yet heard no crash of surf, no snatch of song. James, I am sad, forgetting to be cold; Does this decorum mean that we grow old? I knew you, James, as clamorous in your bath As porpoises that thresh the ocean-path; Oh! as you bathed when we were happy boys, You drowned the taps with inharmonious noise; Above the turmoil of the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, September 29th, 1920 • Various
... axe!" cried the master; "down with the main-mast!" and seizing a hatchet which lay at hand, Piero Quirini struck the first blow at the tall mast, whose weight was dragging down the vessel. Others with sword, or axe, or any tool which they could snatch at the moment, followed, and they were but just in time, for before another wave could wash over the vessel, the mast was floating free, and the ship had righted once more. The water was baled out with every vessel ...
— Famous Islands and Memorable Voyages • Anonymous
... mediocre fortune after a long time. He had gone to the new world to become rich like so many others. And at twenty-seven, he started forth again, a full-fledged adventurer, avoiding the cities, wishing to snatch money from untapped, natural sources. He worked farms in the forests of the North, but the locusts obliterated his crops in a few hours. He was a cattle-driver, with the aid of only two peons, driving a herd of oxen and mules over the snowy solitudes of the Andes to Bolivia and ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... indignant in view of the insulting manner in which our young men treated Pere Louis on the way. They were young warriors without sense, and perhaps knew no better. They robbed him and wanted to kill him. They acted like hungry dogs, who snatch a bit of meat from the bark dish, and run. They abused men who brought us iron and merchandise, which we never ...
— The Adventures of the Chevalier De La Salle and His Companions, in Their Explorations of the Prairies, Forests, Lakes, and Rivers, of the New World, and Their Interviews with the Savage Tribes, Two Hu • John S. C. Abbott
... always be an agile chap, who is especially quick both at decisions and throwing. Even though he snatch up the ball, and thus make a fine stop, if his judgment is poor or his throwing arm lame, he can often bungle his work, and prove of little help ...
— The Chums of Scranton High - Hugh Morgan's Uphill Fight • Donald Ferguson
... it with a sinking heart. Had he really hoped she would give him another answer? He would have given pretty much anything—But there, that did no good. He could give only what he had. Things were never complete in this world; you had to snatch at them as they came or go without. Nobody could look into her face and draw back, nobody who had any courage. She had courage enough for anything—look at her mouth and chin and eyes! Where did it come from, that light? How could a face, a familiar face, become so the picture of hope, ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather
... impaled upon the sharp point of an antler. As he rushed, it banged against trees and drove him to greater speed until it was left behind on a branch. As for the hunter, he could only gaze wrathfully upon his wrecked camp and bemoan the fate which had twice brought to him the coveted game, only to snatch it ...
— Followers of the Trail • Zoe Meyer
... summers,—and all the glad tears gushed over my eyes and darkened me from seeing. So, as I said, Mrs. Strathsay sat in her broad bower-window looking down the harbor, and a ship was coming up, and Effie and I stood on its deck, our hearts full of yearning. Mine was, at least, I know. And I could but snatch the glass up, every breathing, as we went, and look, and drop it, for it seemed as if I must fly to what it brought so near, must fly to fling my arms about the fair neck bending there, to feel the caressing finger, to have that kiss imprint my cheek ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... disorder, piles on piles in great wide-open cupboards, fine linen sheets and table-cloths crumpled up, the locks prevented from shutting by pieces of torn lace, which no one took the trouble to mend. And yet there were many servants about—negresses in yellow Madras muslin, who came to snatch here a towel, there a table-cloth, walking among the scattered domestic treasures, dragging with their great flat feet frills of fine lace from a petticoat which some lady's-maid had thrown down—thimble here, scissors there—ready to pick up again ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... others. They were tall men with somber faces, which he had never seen brightened with the light of a smile. Yet their eyes gleamed when the whistling lash fell upon their shoulders or when a passer-by threw them the chewed and broken stub of a cigar, which the nearest would snatch up and hide in his salakot, while the rest remained gazing at the ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... carcass of a lamb or goat, and setting off at full gallop, followed by the bridegroom and other young men of the party, also on horseback; she is always to strive, by adroit turns, etc., to avoid her pursuers, that no one approach near enough to snatch from her the burden on her lap. This game, called koekbueri (green wolf), is in use among all the nomads of central Asia." (A. Vambery, Travels in ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 3 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... stayed alone with the convict leader for two long hours. Glenarvan in a state of extreme nervous anxiety, remained outside the cabin, alternately resolved to exhaust completely this last chance of success, alternately resolved to rush in and snatch his wife ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne
... a man named McCaully, who owned me about a year. I fared dreadful bad under McCaully. One day in a rage he undertook to beat me with the limb of a cherry-tree; he began at me and tried in the first place to snatch my clothes off, but he did not succeed. After that he beat the cherry-tree limb all to pieces over me. The first blow struck me on the back of my neck and knocked me down; his wife was looking on, sitting on the side of the bed ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... English hot on our track—no rest for body or soul. The country being as flat as the part we had traversed the previous day, we had to march again the whole day under a burning sun. Now and then we dismounted for a few minutes, in order that our horses might snatch ...
— In the Shadow of Death • P. H. Kritzinger and R. D. McDonald
... was alone, and cubbing had begun. It was like him to veil his longings under such dry statements. But the thought of giving him pleasure, and of a gallop with hounds fortified intensely her feeling that she ought to go. Now that baby was so well, and Fiorsen still not drinking, she might surely snatch this little holiday and satisfy her conscience about the girl. Since the return from Cornwall, she had played for him in the music-room just as of old, and she chose the finish of a morning ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... followed Ibsen down the Danielian water-steps into the expectant gondola, my emotion was such that I was tempted to snatch from him his neatly-furled umbrella and spread it out over his head, like the umbrella beneath which the Doges of days gone by had made their appearances in public. It was perhaps a pity that I repressed this impulse. Ibsen seemed to be already regretting that he had unbent. ...
— A Christmas Garland • Max Beerbohm
... the men from eating every scrap they found, though they were well aware of the necessity there was of being economical in our present situation, and to save whatever they could for our journey; yet they could not resist the temptation, and whenever my back was turned they seldom failed to snatch at the nearest piece to ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 2 • John Franklin
... power and oppressing the good. In declaring that if their authority did not exist the more wicked would oppress the good, the ruling authorities only show their disinclination to let other oppressors come to power who would like to snatch it from them. ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy
... peep out once an age, Dull sullen pris'ners in the body's cage: Dim lights of life, that burn a length of years, Useless, unseen, as lamps in sepulchres; Like Eastern kings a lazy state they keep, And close confined to their own palace, sleep. From these perhaps (ere Nature bade her die) Fate snatch'd her early to the pitying sky. As into air the purer spirits flow, And sep'rate from their kindred dregs below, So flew the soul to its congenial place, Nor left one virtue to redeem her race. But thou, false guardian of a charge too good! Thou, mean deserter ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... said Nora wisely. "Don't plan too much, until you find out whether you can snatch her from ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower
... With bated breath and reverent gaze one follows that lonely figure among the trees; now kneeling, now falling upon His face, lying prostrate, "He prayed that if it were possible the hour might pass away from Him." One snatch of that prayer reaches our ears: "Abba, Father, all things are possible unto Thee—if it be possible let this cup pass away from Me; nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt." How long He remained ...
— Quiet Talks on Prayer • S. D. (Samuel Dickey) Gordon
... to this as a speckled trout snaps at a fly. Nothing so near a proposal had ever reached me before. But a New England woman is modest; she does not snatch at the first offer—far from it. I pretended not to understand the badly hidden meaning of his metaphor. A little art of this kind is feminine and excusable, even in a young girl dignified with Society membership ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens
... orchestra. A gentleman in the stalls, a head beneath her, bowed, and holding up a singular article, gravely said that he had been requested to pass it. She touched Mr. Pole's shoulder. "Eh? anything funny?" said he, and glanced around. He was in time to see Braintop lean hurriedly over the box, and snatch his pocket-mirror from the gentleman's hand. "Ha! ha!" he laughed, as if a comic gleam had illumined him. A portion of the pit and stalls laughed too. Emilia smiled merrily. "What was it?" said she; and perceiving many faces beneath her red among handkerchiefs, she was ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... was like a child's funeral, I am told, and all his American friends seem to have been there—Saint-Gaudens, Taber, etc. A poem about the dear fellow by Mr. Gilder has one very good line in which he says the grave 'might snatch a brightness from his presence there.' I thought that was very happy, the love of light and gladness being the most remarkable thing about him, the dear ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol 31, No 2, June 1908 • Various
... nothing of the joys of life. But suddenly Nature had asserted her own inexorable laws, which teach forgetfulness and inspire hope. The bitterest ears were dried—the heaviest sighs suppressed; people had learned to reconcile themselves to life, and to snatch eagerly at every ray of sunshine which could illumine the cold, hopeless desert, ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... situation: that his hours of restless longing seemed to have come to a final end. Always too sane to waste regrets upon futilities, he had come now to a point of passive acceptance of the immutable bad in his surroundings, an active effort only to snatch at whatever good remained. It did not affect his attitude in the very least that, nine days out of every ten, he had to take a spiritual microscope to hunt the good. One of the longest lessons is the learning to pick up the crumbs of comfort, when one has been used ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... second time, penetrated into England, as far as the ancient town of Newcastle, where he smiled at a facetious Northumbrian, who at dinner caused the beef to be eaten before the broth was served, in obedience to an ancient injunction, lest the hungry Scotch should come and snatch it. On his way back he saw, what proved to be prophetic of his own fortune—the roup of an unfortunate farmer's stock: he took out his journal, and wrote with a troubled brow, "Rigid economy, and decent industry, do you ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... for a wonder, that no man then shall be glad Of his fellow's fall and mishap to snatch ...
— Chants for Socialists • William Morris
... like swathes of grass under the scythe. Then was seen a marvellous sight. When the dead were falling their fastest, a band of about 150 Dervish horsemen formed near the Khalifa's dark-green standard in the centre and rushed across the fire zone, determined to snatch at triumph or gain the sensuous joys of the Moslem paradise. None ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose
... as any people we had yet met with. It was with some difficulty we could keep the hats on our heads; but hardly possible to keep any thing in our pockets, not even what themselves had sold us; for they would watch every opportunity to snatch it from us, so that we sometimes bought the same thing two or three times over, and after all ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr
... come to the waterside, which is called Deptford Creek. Here, having seen the others safe embarked we took boat also, and were soon rowing between the huge bulk of ships where dim lights burned and whence came, ever and anon, the sound of voices, the rattle of a hawser, a snatch of song and the like, as we paddled betwixt the vast hulls. Presently we were beneath the towering stern of a great ship, and glancing up at this lofty structure, brave with carved-work and ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... man a cloud-shadow is nothing but an eclipse; he cannot see its shape, its color, its approach, or its flight. It does but darken his window as it darkens the day, and is gone again; he does not see it pluck and snatch the sun. But the flying bird shows him wings. What flash of light could be more bright for him than ...
— Essays • Alice Meynell
... and, after waiting till she fancied she heard the Rabbit just under the window, she suddenly spread out her hand, and made a snatch in the air. She did not get hold of anything, but she heard a little shriek and a fall, and a crash of broken glass, from which she concluded that it was just possible it had fallen into a cucumber-frame, ...
— Alice's Adventures in Wonderland - Illustrated by Arthur Rackham. With a Proem by Austin Dobson • Lewis Carroll
... the soothing of Hope, I am not altogether without the consolation of Philosophy. The happy must substract from his happiness the frequent reflection, which comes like a cloud over him, that death will snatch him from all his blessings. The wretched finds relief in the certainty that death will end his misery; therefore, that state is not very enviable, nor this intolerable. Both will soon, very soon be past, and small, ...
— A Sketch of the Life of the late Henry Cooper - Barrister-at-Law, of the Norfolk Circuit; as also, of his Father • William Cooper
... sagacity. The sole important issue was the encouraging of the peace party at Paris, with a view to the revocation of the aggressive decrees of the Convention. In private, Fox had admitted that they were wholly indefensible; and yet, in order to snatch an oratorical triumph, he fired off a diatribe which could not but stiffen the necks of the French Jacobins. At such a crisis the true statesman merges the partisan in the patriot and says not a word to weaken his own Government and hearten its opponents. To this ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... to enable me to proceed in the manner of Laplace and of Say, I still cannot but believe that the mode adopted by me has also its modest usefulness. It appears to me likewise to be well suited to the wants of the age, and to the broken moments which it is now the habit to snatch for study. ...
— Sophisms of the Protectionists • Frederic Bastiat
... took it from this man perforce, And snatch'd it from his hand by rude constraint, Which proves him in this ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various
... thereto, when she for hours together, as it were, forgot herself in the subjects of the conversation, and then uttered words which gave evidence of a deeply feeling and thinking spirit. Susanna regarded her with joy and admiration. Yet often a painful thought seemed to snatch her away from the genial impression, some dark memory appeared spectre-like to step between her and gladness; the words then died on her pallid lips, the hand was laid on the heart, and she heard and saw no more of what was going on around her, till the interest of the conversation ...
— Strife and Peace • Fredrika Bremer
... remember how that loose tile from Ben Hur's roof—the one he tried to snatch back as he saw it fall—struck the Roman soldier on the head, and how Ben Hur went to prison for it? Well, what about those flower pots ...
— Sure Pop and the Safety Scouts • Roy Rutherford Bailey
... of unmixed pain to the bosom which harbors it? Has not your criminal, on the contrary, an excitement, an enjoyment within quite unknown to you and me who never did anything wrong in our lives? The housebreaker must snatch a fearful joy as he walks unchallenged by the policeman with his sack full of spoons and tankards. Do not cracksmen, when assembled together, entertain themselves with stories of glorious old burglaries which they or bygone heroes have ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... said the General, abruptly, "run and snatch one of those pretty girls from my officers. They're having more than ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... irresistibly attracted by the Orb of Day, the comet, at first pale, then ardent and incandescent, returned at the date assigned to it by calculation, three years after the death of the illustrious astronomer. Shining upon his grave it bore witness to the might of human thought, able to snatch the profoundest secrets from ...
— Astronomy for Amateurs • Camille Flammarion
... busy professional life, Herschel still retained that insatiable thirst for knowledge which he had when a boy. Every moment he could snatch from his musical engagements was eagerly devoted to study. In his desire to perfect his knowledge of the more abstruse parts of the theory of music he had occasion to learn mathematics; from mathematics ...
— The Story of the Heavens • Robert Stawell Ball
... campaign was, like so many others in the West Indies, a struggle for the temporary possession of this or that port or island, De Guichen's whole strategy being based on the idea of avoiding the risks of a close engagement that might imperil his fleet, and trying to snatch local advantages when ...
— Famous Sea Fights - From Salamis to Tsu-Shima • John Richard Hale
... ago a tragedy was enacted here of strange interest. At a religious festival held here in April, 1892, and attended by all the high officials and by a crowd of sightseers, a thief, taking advantage of the crush, tried to snatch a bracelet from the wrist of a young woman, and, when she resisted, he stabbed her. He was seized red-handed, dragged before the Titai, who happened to be present, and ordered to be beheaded there and then. An executioner was selected from among the soldiers; but so clumsily ...
— An Australian in China - Being the Narrative of a Quiet Journey Across China to Burma • George Ernest Morrison
... was a clever fellow. Between the putting up of the articles, he sang comic songs, and the funnier the song, the livelier the bidding that followed. The horses brought a decent price, and the machinery a disappointing one; and then, after a delicious snatch about Nell who rode the sway-backed mare at the county fair, he got down to the furniture,—the furniture which Jim had bought when ...
— A Mountain Woman and Others • (AKA Elia Wilkinson) Elia W. Peattie
... and sure; the second beset with hidden dangers, a perilous path, among muddy channels where conscience is inevitably bespattered. The bent of Lucien's character determined for the shorter way, and the apparently pleasanter way, and to snatch at the quickest and promptest means. At this moment he saw no difference between d'Arthez's noble friendship and Lousteau's easy comaraderie; his inconstant mind discerned a new weapon in journalism; he felt that he could wield it, so he ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... midnight; and when at eight bells Mr Briscoe came on deck to relieve Mr Kennedy I heard the latter instruct him to get the ship under canvas, and, as soon as she was under command, stop the engine and have the propeller feathered. Then I went below, very tired, to snatch four hours' sleep before turning out to keep ...
— The First Mate - The Story of a Strange Cruise • Harry Collingwood
... all thou art, In dusky breasts or breasts of whiter hue, To thy delicious touch the human heart Throbs with respondent transport ever true. On Love's swift wings, this Indian virgin flew, To snatch from hateful death the lovely chief, Love drew her tears, like showers of pearly dew, Love filled her passionate breast with tender grief And love still drinks her soul, and ...
— Lays of Ancient Virginia, and Other Poems • James Avis Bartley
... frontier,[27] wasting the country with tomahawk and brand up to the Seven-Mile Ford. The roads leading to the wooden forts were crowded with settlers, who, in their mortal need of hurry, had barely time to snatch up a few of the household goods, and, if especially lucky, to mount the women and children on horses; as usual in such a flight, there occurred many deeds of cowardly selfishness, offset by many feats of courage and self-sacrifice. Once in the fort, the backwoodsmen often banded into parties, ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt
... eyes twinkled. He liked jaunts as well as his master. One could snatch all manner of nice things ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... O pretty, pretty pledge! Thy master now lies thinking on his bed Of thee and me, and sighs, and takes my glove, And gives memorial dainty kisses to it, As I kiss thee. Nay, do not snatch it from me; He that takes that ...
— The History of Troilus and Cressida • William Shakespeare [Craig edition]
... magicians struck Aunt Sarah with a sublimity almost more than she could endure. As the flashes of light struck out about the pillar and the ball of fire fell as if dropped from some creating hand she screamed, "O my God, what blasphemy is this that men have achieved. Can they snatch the fire from heaven and ...
— The Adventures of Uncle Jeremiah and Family at the Great Fair - Their Observations and Triumphs • Charles McCellan Stevens (AKA 'Quondam')
... variance with the President, and on the other hand with competing interests to those of France and Belgium. The clearer it became that but little could be expected from Germany, the more necessary it was to exercise patriotic greed and "sacred egotism" and snatch the bone from the juster claims and greater need of France or the well-founded expectations of Belgium. Yet the financial problems which were about to exercise Europe could not be solved by greed. The possibility of ...
— The Economic Consequences of the Peace • John Maynard Keynes
... before them death, deprivation, long days of famine, long days of drought and thirst; parching sun-baked roads; bitter chilly nights; fiery furnace-blasts of sirocco; killing, pitiless, northern winds; hunger, only sharpened by a snatch of raw meat or a handful of maize; and the probabilities, ten to one, of being thrust under the sand to rot, or left to have their skeletons picked clean by the vultures. But what of that? There were also the wild delight of combat, the freedom of lawless warfare, the joy of deep strokes thrust ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... lose him, though we are as careful of him as of the apple of our eyes. And, at the same time, I came to say that you must not count on M. Schmucke, worthy man, for he is going to sit up with him at night. One cannot help doing as if there was hope still left, and trying one's best to snatch the dear, good soul from death. But the ...
— Cousin Pons • Honore de Balzac
... and wife should snatch, a moment's tete-a-tete was what could be understood and indulged; and the rest of the party left them in the rear till, re-entering the garden, they all paused in that cloistered court where, among the falling rose-petals ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... a cellar in an obscure retired alley—provided themselves with musical instruments, and, with paper decorations and patchwork, formed a little theatre, whither they resorted, every moment they could snatch by stealth or pretext, from their parents' and masters' control, in order privately to practise music and dancing, to spout and to perform (in their way) plays, operas and farces. At this time the whole amount of the schooling which the boy had received, barely enabled him to read ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol. I. No. 3. March 1810 • Various
... name and style retain, A right Katherine of Spain, And a seat, too, 'mongst the joys Of the blest Tobacco Boys; Where, though I, by sour physician, Am debarred the full fruition Of thy favors, I may catch, Some collateral sweets, and snatch, Sidelong odors, that give life Like glances from a neighbor's wife; And still live in the by-places, And the suburbs of thy graces; And in thy borders take delight, An ...
— Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce • E. R. Billings
... his hurry aloft to our assistance, had managed to snatch up on the way a coil of half-inch; and with this he now proceeded, breathing heavily the while from his exertions, to secure 'Ugly' temporarily to the ratlines until a whip could be rigged for sending down the still insensible ...
— Young Tom Bowling - The Boys of the British Navy • J.C. Hutcheson
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