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Crab   Listen
verb
Crab  v. t.  
1.
To make sour or morose; to embitter. (Obs.) "Sickness sours or crabs our nature."
2.
To beat with a crabstick. (Obs.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Crab" Quotes from Famous Books



... time to inquire what kind of patties were inviting the passer-by on Mr Altham's counter. They were a very large variety: oyster, crab, lobster, anchovy, and all kinds of fish; sausage-rolls, jelly, liver, galantine, and every sort of meat; ginger, honey, cream, fruit; cheese-cakes, almond and lemon; little open tarts called bry tarts, made of literal cheese, with a multitude of other articles—eggs, honey ...
— The White Lady of Hazelwood - A Tale of the Fourteenth Century • Emily Sarah Holt

... hunt up the men that carry the light. Maybe they are the ones that are killing off the horses. Any way, you can wash your own dishes from now on. It will do you good. If I had of known you were the crab you are I'll say I would never have come. You are welcome to my share of the outfit. I hope some one shoots me and puts me out of my misery quick if I ever show symptoms of wanting to camp out again. I am going now because if I stayed I'd change your map for you so your own looking glass wouldn't ...
— Casey Ryan • B. M. Bower

... I take up the book; and the cover nearly breaks off as I open it, though with tender, book-loving usage. The leather, though strong and honest, has rotted or disintegrated until it has almost fallen into dust. Across the yellow, ill-printed pages there runs, zig-zagging sideways and backwards crab-fashion on his crooked brown legs, one of those pigmy book-spiders,—those ugly little bibliophiles that seem flatter even than the close-pressed pages ...
— Sabbath in Puritan New England • Alice Morse Earle

... gentleman, and the correspondence was encouraging. "These scapegraces," said the artist in tuition, "are like crab-trees; abominable till you graft them, and then they ...
— A Terrible Temptation - A Story of To-Day • Charles Reade

... include the stars of the Greater Dog, and others close by, a well-shaped poop can be clearly seen. The head of the Lion of our maps is as the head of a dog, so far as stars are concerned; but if stars from the Crab on one side and from Virgo on the other be included in the figure, and especially Berenice's hair to form the tuft of the lion's tail, a very fine lion with waving mane can be discerned, with a slight effort of the imagination. ...
— Myths and Marvels of Astronomy • Richard A. Proctor

... the rim of the room, examining the wall frescoes foot by foot, seeing on them a strange depiction of semi-human forms, of crab-men and crab-women, of snake-men and snake-women, of men half-goat and half-man, of creatures hardly human with great jaws that looked like rock-cutters, with hands like moles on short powerful arms, fish people with finned legs and arms, their hands engaged in catching great fish ...
— Valley of the Croen • Lee Tarbell

... where he was apprenticed to Mr. Gordon, a surgeon. Gordon, again, was an excellent man, appreciated by Smollett himself in after days, and the odious Potion of "Roderick Random" must, like his rival, Crab, have been merely a fancy sketch of meanness, hypocrisy, and profligacy. Perhaps the good surgeon became the victim of that "one continued string of epigrammatic sarcasms," such as Mr. Colquhoun ...
— Adventures among Books • Andrew Lang

... on, and we were walking along gaily, whistling, knocking down crab-apples with stones, imitating the notes of birds, when the boy who was ahead suddenly stopped, and, coming back to us, declared that he was not going by the Gazeau Tower path, but would rather cut across ...
— Mauprat • George Sand

... intense, the sheriff tired. Then something occurred to revivify the scene. Across the market place and toward the steps of the court-house there suddenly came trundling along in breathless haste a huge old negress, carrying on one arm a large shallow basket containing apple-crab lanterns and fresh gingerbread. With a series of half-articulate grunts and snorts she approached the edge of the crowd and tried to force her way through. She coaxed, she begged, she elbowed and pushed and scolded, now ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner

... Tempest. Apple, crab, wheat, rye, barley, vetches, oats, peas, briar, furze, gorse, thorns, broom, cedar, corn, cowslip, nettle, docks, mallow, filbert, heath, ling, grass, nut, ivy, lily, piony, lime, mushrooms, oak, acorn, pignuts, pine, ...
— The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare • Henry Nicholson Ellacombe

... curious, blood red crabs that dwell in myriads along the shore. At a distance they look like a big red wave; but as they are approached, quickly disappear into holes in the sand, and on looking back, they are seen in countless thousands in the rear. Their habits are similar to the hermit crab. They are small and not edible, quick as rats and ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton

... This day, Mr Banks crossed to the other side of the harbour, where, as he walked along a sandy beach, he found innumerable fruits, and many of them such as no plants which he had discovered in this country produced: Among others were some cocoa-nuts, which Tupia said had been opened by a kind of crab, which from his description we judged to be the same that the Dutch call Beurs Krabbe, and which we had not seen in these seas. All the vegetable substances which he found in this place were encrusted with marine productions, and covered with barnacles; a sure ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr

... at me, the cowardly mongrel had been now crouching at my feet, instead of flying at my throat. But if I get through this action, as I have got through worse weather, I will pay off old scores, as far as tough crab-tree and cold iron ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott

... was last night, how full of weariness after heavy tramping through leagues of loose stones. I had been tramping from desolate Cape Pitsoonda over miles and miles of sea holly and scrub through a district where were no people. I had been living on crab-apples and sugar the whole day, for I could get no provisions. It is a comic diet. I should have liked to climb up inland to find a resting-place and seek out houses, but I was committed to the seashore, for the cliffs were sheer, and where the rivers made what might have ...
— A Tramp's Sketches • Stephen Graham

... I have but one fool, therefore I am thankful;—but then he is a thorough fool, a most unmitigated, and unmitigatable fool; the fool of fools, a finished fool, the pink of fools; a most preposterous, backwards-going, crab-like fool; a filthy fool; an idiot, sir, without either parts or particle of ambition; an ape, an owl that flits about by day; a bat, and a bad bat, that flits from tavern to sty; chief of the devil's nightingales; a raven that, roving to foul roosts, goes beating the bosom of the night; ...
— The Advocate • Charles Heavysege

... now allow my Fair Readers to return to their Romances and Chocolate, provided they make use of them with Moderation, till about the middle of the Month, when the Sun shall have made some Progress in the Crab. Nothing is more dangerous, than too much Confidence and Security. The Trojans, who stood upon their Guard all the while the Grecians lay before their City, when they fancied the Siege was raised, and the Danger past, were the very next Night burnt in their Beds: I must also observe, ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... those of the common oak, and their cups and outer rind had been removed, so that they had evidently been prepared to serve as food for, man; the apples were small and coriaceous, resembling the modern crab-apple; the Indian poppy cannot have grown without cultivation; but this was perhaps but an example of the same species already recognized in the Lake dwellings of Switzerland. It is difficult to say whether it was used for food or whether oil ...
— Manners and Monuments of Prehistoric Peoples • The Marquis de Nadaillac

... their flat, long snout, and slender, almost cylindrical body, as contrasted with the plump, compressed body and tapering tail of the Trout Family. Or compare, among Insects, the Hawk-Moths with the Diurnal Butterfly, or with the so-called Miller,—or, among Crustacea, the common Crab with the Sea-Spider, or the Lobsters with the Shrimps,—or, among Worms, the Leeches with the Earth-Worms,—or, among Mollusks, the Squids with the Cuttle-Fishes, or the Snails with the Slugs, or the Periwinkles with the Limpets and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, April, 1862 • Various

... already on the table when they went in, and it was followed by a chafing dish over which the General presided. Red-faced and rapturous, he seasoned and stirred, and as the result of his wizardry there was placed before them presently such plates of Creole crab as could not be equaled north of ...
— Contrary Mary • Temple Bailey

... dese little clams. Dey have oyster-stew. Dey have roast oysters, den de raw oysters. An' dey have dey fried oysters! Dat sure is good. Dey fish from de boat, dey fish from de log, an' dey fish 'long de edge of de water wid a net. When de tide go down you kin walk along an' jes pick up de crab. You could get a bucket full in no time. We'd like to go up an' down an' pick up de pretty shells. I got one here on de mantel now. It ain't sech a big one, but it's ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves • Works Projects Administration

... who carried the art of canonic imitation to a much finer point than had been reached before his time. He is generally credited with having composed a motette in thirty-six parts having almost all the devices later known as augmentation, diminution, inversion, retrograde, crab, etc. The thirty-six parts here mentioned, however, were not fully written out. Only six parts were written, the remainder being developed from these on the principle of a round, the successive choruses following each ...
— A Popular History of the Art of Music - From the Earliest Times Until the Present • W. S. B. Mathews

... daughter once held out when Virginia was a rich man's wife? Instead of improving, their situation grew steadily worse. Jim was making no progress. Instead of his salary being increased, it was always being reduced. He was the kind of man who made progress backwards, like a crab. He was not practical—that was the trouble. If only he had fewer ideas, perhaps he would make more money. It was very discouraging. But what good did grumbling ever do? The work had to be done and the quicker she ...
— Bought and Paid For - From the Play of George Broadhurst • Arthur Hornblow

... To aid his friend, began to fall on. Him RALPH encounter'd, and straight grew A dismal combat 'twixt them two: Th' one arm'd with metal, th' other with wood; 830 This fit for bruise, and that for blood. With many a stiff thwack, many a bang, Hard crab-tree and old iron rang; While none that saw them cou'd divine To which side conquest would incline, 835 Until MAGNANO, who did envy That two should with so many men vie, By subtle stratagem of brain, Perform'd what force could ne'er attain; For he, by foul hap, having found 840 Where thistles grew ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler

... Set the crab meat aside; put the under shell and the claws in a mortar with half a pound of butter and a cupful of cold boiled rice, and pound them as smooth as possible; then put this into a saucepan, and add a heaping teaspoonful of salt, ...
— Fifty Soups • Thomas J. Murrey

... hurt. Why didn't you girls stop me sooner—call to me to go round the other way? I was in a hurry and didn't see or hear you up there." Then she sat down on the crust beside Betty. "Forgive me for laughing," she said, "but you did look so exactly like a giant crab sidling along on that ridiculous dust-pan. Have you sprained your wrist? Then you must come straight over to my room and wait for ...
— Betty Wales Freshman • Edith K. Dunton

... all very well in the Doctor's prospectus, and Miss Zoe Birch—(a pretty blossom it is, fifty-five years old, during two score of which she has dosed herself with pills; with a nose as red and a face as sour as a crab-apple)—this is all mighty well in a prospectus. But I should like to know who would take Miss Zoe for a mother, or would have her ...
— The Christmas Books • William Makepeace Thackeray

... legs and shoulders preventing the steamer from shoving its hull ashore at that particular point. Seen under these circumstances the Ship of State might be said to have been converted from a tortoise into a crab every time any ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal

... fine legs or swimmers below. It burrows in the loose bottom, or lies in it with its large compound eyes peeping out in search of prey. It is the chief representative of the hard-cased group (Crustacea) which will later replace it with the lobster, the shrimp, the crab, and the water-flea. Its remains form from a third to a fourth of all the buried Cambrian skeletons. With it, swimming in the water, are smaller members of the same family, which come nearer to our familiar ...
— The Story of Evolution • Joseph McCabe

... Great-grace visibly "tumbles hills about with his words." Adam the First has his condemnation written visibly on his forehead, so that Faithful reads it. At the very instant the net closes round the pilgrims, "the white robe falls from the black man's body." Despair "getteth him a grievous crab-tree cudgel"; it was in "sunshiny weather" that he had his fits; and the birds in the grove about the House Beautiful, "our country birds," only sing their little pious verses "at the spring, when the flowers appear and the sun shines ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... left the beach and wandered inland to procure water and food, not sufficiently exerting themselves to advance southward. They had succeeded, he said, in procuring upon the whole about a dozen birds, a crab, and eighteen fish. On the 21st of April Mr. Walker, who had frequently exerted himself in procuring firewood and water for the weaker of the party, divided two dough cakes still remaining in his possession among them all. They were then upon the beach, ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 2 (of 2) • George Grey

... which lives only one year, is called an annual and is one of the easiest weeds to destroy. Mustard, plantain, chess, dodder, cockle, crab grass, and Jimson weed are a few of our ...
— Agriculture for Beginners - Revised Edition • Charles William Burkett

... have had to be carrying David long ago and resting on every seat like old Mr. Salford. That was what we called him, because he always talked to us of a lovely place called Salford where he had been born. He was a crab-apple of an old gentleman who wandered all day in the Gardens from seat to seat trying to fall in with somebody who was acquainted with the town of Salford, and when we had known him for a year or more we actually did ...
— The Little White Bird - or Adventures In Kensington Gardens • J. M. Barrie

... by the decorative motifs employed on the arcade surrounding the court, where on piers, arches, reeds and columns, in marvelously wrought sculptural ornament, is shown the transition from plant to animal life through kelp, crab, lobster and other ...
— The Architecture and Landscape Gardening of the Exposition • Louis Christian Mullgardt

... "You old crab, you," chirped Bill, cheerfully, when Courtland had gone out. "Can't you see you've got to humor him? He needs homeopathic treatment. 'Like cures like.' Give him a good dose of religion and he'll get good and tired of it. Church won't hurt him any, just ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz

... "My fine crab-tree walking-stick, with a gold head, curiously wrought in the form of a cap of liberty, I give to my friend, and the friend of mankind, George Washington. If it were a sceptre, he has merited it, ...
— From Boyhood to Manhood • William M. Thayer

... Singh's sword was half out, though, and he swore he'd cremate every Khye-Kheen and Malo't he killed. That made the Jemadar pretty wild, because he didn't mind fighting against his own creed, but he wasn't going to crab a fellow Mussulman's chances of Paradise. Then Stalky jabbered Pushtu and Punjabi in alternate streaks. Where the deuce did he pick up his Pushtu ...
— Stalky & Co. • Rudyard Kipling

... of the door with slipshod shoes. Under the pretence of admiring the flowers, he glanced, now towards the east; now towards the west. But upon raising his head, he descried, in the southwest corner, some one or other leaning by the side of the railing under the covered passage. A crab-apple tree, however, obstructed the view and he could not see distinctly who it was, so advancing a step further in, he stared with intent gaze. It was, in point of fact, the waiting-maid of the day before, tarrying about plunged in a reverie. His wish was to go forward and ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... mind drifting back to that crazy notion of an evil spirit wandering to seek a home; as the hermit-crab, dispossessed of one shell, goes in search of another. After a lull which had looked for a moment like coming sleep, she said with an astonishing calmness:—"But do you not see, Phoebe dear, do you not see how good his father must have been, to do no worse than he did? See what the devil that ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan

... like contrivance to this of Flies shall we find in most other Animals, such as all kinds of Flies and case-wing'd creatures; nay, in a Flea, an Animal abundantly smaller then this Fly. Other creatures, as Mites, the Land-Crab, &c. have onely one small very sharp Tallon at the end of each of their legs, which all drawing towards the center or middle of their body, inable these exceeding light bodies to suspend and fasten themselves ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke

... of what seemed a blank expense of panelling. She reached out her hand and, to George's extreme astonishment, a little door swung open, revealing the foot of a winding staircase. Turning sideways in order to get her tray through the narrow opening, the little maid darted in with a rapid crab-like motion. The door closed behind her with a click. A minute later it opened again and the maid, without her tray, hurried back across the hall and disappeared in the direction of the kitchen. George tried to recompose his thoughts, but ...
— Crome Yellow • Aldous Huxley

... galloping over the long miles of lonely country—his motherless girl, whom he had sent on a mission that might so easily spell disaster. Horrible thoughts came into the father's mind. He pictured Bobs putting his hoof into a hidden crab-hole—falling—Norah lying white and motionless, perhaps far from the track. That was not the only danger. Bad characters were to be met with in the bush and the pony was valuable enough to tempt a desperate man—such as the Winfield murderer, ...
— A Little Bush Maid • Mary Grant Bruce

... cloud of the centuries. Nature delivered them to us in the full vigor of the thing untamed, when their value as food was indifferent, as to-day she offers us the sloe, the bullace, the blackberry, the crab; she gave them to us in the state of imperfect sketches, for us to fill out and complete; it was for our skill and our labor patiently to induce the nourishing pulp which was the earliest form of capital, whose interest is always increasing in the ...
— A Book of Exposition • Homer Heath Nugent

... while, the heaven is spinning round, and the stars with it. By the horns of the Bull I have to drive, past the Archer whose bow is taut and ready to slay, close to where the Scorpion stretches out its arms and the great Crab's claws grope ...
— A Book of Myths • Jean Lang

... any more trees, played any more rubbers, propounded any more teasers to the players at the game of Yes and No? How is the old horse? How is the gray mare? How is Crab (to whom my respectful compliments)? Have you tried the punch yet; if yes, did it succeed; if no, why not? Is Mrs. Cerjat as happy and as well as I would have her, and all your house ditto ditto? Does Haldimand play whist with any ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 1 (of 3), 1833-1856 • Charles Dickens

... under the surface of this brilliant and versatile Robert Browning of twenty, we have a chaotic reflection in the famous fragment Pauline. The quite peculiar animosity with which its author in later life regarded this single "crab" of his youthful tree of knowledge only adds to its interest. He probably resented the frank expression of passion, nowhere else approached in his works. Yet passion only agitates the surface of Pauline. Whether Pauline herself ...
— Robert Browning • C. H. Herford

... of ovine vicera for the sacrifice—"the fat and the rump, and the fat that covereth the inwards and the caul above the liver, and the two kidneys"; and into careful dietetics, which would cut out from our food list the hare and rabbit, the lobster, the crab, the turtle, the clam, oyster and scallop, ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman

... also obtained permission to go out together and be gone the entire afternoon. We put Crab on a comfortable bed of rags in an old shoe-box, and then strolled hand-in-hand across that most delightful of New ...
— Humorous Masterpieces from American Literature • Various

... crab bled chip shot bump grab fled ship blot lump drab sled whip spot pump slab sped slip plot jump stab then drip trot hump brag bent spit clog bulk cram best crib frog just clan hemp gift plod drug clad vest king stop shut dash west ...
— McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book • W. H. McGuffey

... spell, the words fell upon the farmer-soldiers. Dropping every other topic, they began to argue over the crops; and after that they could not pass a harmless calf tethered to a crab-tree that they did not quarrel over the breed, nor start a drove of grunting swine out of the mast but they must lay wagers ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz

... light of the morning sun, elicited a simultaneous burst of admiration from our travelers. Then the prospective pleasures of the rural visit were discussed, the family and friendly reunions, the dinner parties, the fish feasts upon the river's banks, the oyster excursions and crab expeditions; and in such pleasant anticipations the cheerful hours of that delightful forenoon slipped away; and when, at last, the heat of the sun grew oppressive, and our sharpened appetites reminded us of the dinner-basket, we began to cast around ...
— The Rector of St. Mark's • Mary J. Holmes

... quit on me, you crab!" he muttered. "Don't you quit! Keep goin' if you don't want me to put the bee ...
— Old Man Curry - Race Track Stories • Charles E. (Charles Emmett) Van Loan

... he had best do further to them. So she asked him what they were, whence they came, and whither they were bound; and he told her. Then she counselled him that when he arose in the morning he should beat them without any mercy. So when he arose, he getteth him a grievous Crab-tree Cudgel, and goes down into the Dungeon to them, and there first falls to rating of them as if they were dogs, although they gave him never a word of distaste. Then he falls upon them, and beats them fearfully, in such sort, ...
— The Children's Hour, v 5. Stories From Seven Old Favorites • Eva March Tappan

... the rail where I'd been fond of smoking by starlight, and the corner where an old chap from Sydney used to flirt with a widow we had aboard. A comfortable couple they'd been, only a month ago, and now you couldn't have got a meal for a baby crab ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells

... Peggotty, to relieve it, took two prodigious lobsters, and an enormous crab, and a large canvas bag of shrimps, out of his pockets, and piled them up ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens

... Maids heard the goblins cry: "Come buy our orchard fruits, Come buy, come buy: Apples and quinces, Lemons and oranges, Plump unpecked cherries, Melons and raspberries, Bloom-down-cheeked peaches, Swart-headed mulberries, Wild free-born cranberries, Crab-apples, dewberries, Pine-apples, blackberries, Apricots, strawberries;— All ripe together In summer weather,— Morns that pass by, Fair eves that fly; Come buy, come buy: Our grapes fresh from the vine, Pomegranates full and fine, Dates and sharp bullaces, Rare pears and ...
— Poems • Christina G. Rossetti

... little less than miraculous, yet, instead of making the best use of this opportunity for escape, he commenced a sort of prying adventure on his own account—a temptation he could not resist—by walking, or rather shuffling, into the guard-room, where his own peculiar crab-like sinuosities were particularly available. A number of soldiers were jabbering some unintelligible jargon, too much occupied with their own clamour to ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby

... man who bears party per bend gules and or, a bezant and crab counterchanged," cried Rastignac, "display that ancient escutcheon of Picardy on the panels of a carriage? You have thirty thousand francs a year, and the proceeds of your pen; you have justified your motto: Ars thesaurusque virtus, that punning device our ancestors were always ...
— The Secrets of the Princesse de Cadignan • Honore de Balzac

... and bassoon, rose a silvery confusion of voices and laughter and the sound of a hundred footfalls in unison, while, from the open windows there issued a warm breath, heavily laden with the smell of scented fans, of rich fabrics, of dying roses, to mingle with the spicy perfume of a wild crab-tree in fullest blossom, which stood near enough to peer into the ball-room, and, like a brocaded belle herself, challenge the richest to show raiment as fine, the loveliest to look as fair and joyful ...
— The Two Vanrevels • Booth Tarkington

... contradiction to the feeding of the body through a tube, and proves that quite contradictory customs can exist simultaneously, without the natives noticing it. Half-way up the volcano sits a monster with two immense shears, like a crab. If no pigs have been sacrificed for the soul by the fifth day, the poor soul is alone and the monster swallows it; but if the sacrifice has been performed, the souls of the sacrificed pigs follow after the ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser

... In consequence of Scorpio being in the sign of Sagittarius. The crab will be very busy up ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens

... use the proper title—including sweet peach pickles dimpled with cloves and melting away in their own sweetness, and watermelon-rind pickles cut into cubes just big enough to make one bite—that is to say in cubes about three inches square—and the various kinds of jellies—crab-apple, currant, grape and quince—quivering in an ecstacy as though at their very goodness, and casting upon the white cloth where the light catches them all the reflected, dancing tints of beryl and amethyst, ruby and garnet—crown-jewels ...
— Cobb's Bill-of-Fare • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb

... who being but one, yet bestow all things on all men. For first, what is more sweet or more precious than life? And yet from whom can it more properly be said to come than from me? For neither the crab-favoured Pallas' spear nor the cloud-gathering Jupiter's shield either beget or propagate mankind; but even he himself, the father of gods and king of men at whose very beck the heavens shake, must lay by his forked thunder and those looks ...
— The Praise of Folly • Desiderius Erasmus

... peer, who had expended a large fortune, summoned his heir to his death-bed, and told him that he had a secret of great importance to impart to him, which might be some compensation for the injury he had done him. The secret was that crab sauce was ...
— Interludes - being Two Essays, a Story, and Some Verses • Horace Smith

... been told about and turned the boat. She would not float to the bank and he and his four men got out and lifted the coffin. They sank in treacherous mud, but reached a belt of sand riddled by land-crab's holes. All was very quiet except for the ripple of the tide and the noise made by the scuttling crabs. The sand, however, was dry and warm and they sat down to wait for morning when the boat ...
— The Buccaneer Farmer - Published In England Under The Title "Askew's Victory" • Harold Bindloss

... A favorite subject. Pan is piping his woodland notes and marching to his own music. Such expressive little hands are those that hold the pipes! The crab comes up to listen ...
— Sculpture of the Exposition Palaces and Courts • Juliet James

... there were great numbers in the Nieuw Nederlandts, taking advantage of his mysterious exit, have fabled that, like Romulus, he was translated to the skies, and forms a very fiery little star somewhere on the left claw of the Crab; while others, equally fanciful, declare that he had experienced a fate similar to that of the good King Arthur, who, we are assured by ancient bards, was carried away to the delicious abodes of fairy-land, where he still exists in pristine worth and vigor, and will one day or another ...
— Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor - Volume I • Various

... It is calculated that improvements now in progress will increase this to something more than a ton per day. Each bushel of fruit will produce from four to five pounds of jelly, fruit ripening late in the season being more productive than earlier varieties. Crab apples produce the finest jelly; sour, crabbed, natural fruit makes the best looking article, and a mixture of all varieties gives most satisfactory results as ...
— Scientific American Supplement No. 360, November 25, 1882 • Various

... knew that his villainous plans could not be carried out that night. A few minutes afterwards, the negro Jones, who had, since twelve o'clock, been waiting with his horse and cab near Mr. Goldworthy's house in Howard street, drove off—the sable genius muttering, as he urged his 'fast crab' onward— ...
— Venus in Boston; - A Romance of City Life • George Thompson

... it from me to play the giddy crab, then." Phinuit busied himself with the decanter, glasses and siphon. "Let's make it a regular party; we'll have all to-morrow to sleep it off in. If I try to hop on your shoulder and sing, call a steward and have him lead me to my innocent white cot; but take ...
— Alias The Lone Wolf • Louis Joseph Vance

... Livonian and Spanish, Graeco-Italian and miscellaneous German, English aristocratic and English plebeian. Here certainly was a striking admission of human equality. The white bejewelled fingers of an English countess were very near touching a bony, yellow, crab-like hand stretching a bared wrist to clutch a heap of coin—a hand easy to sort with the square, gaunt face, deep-set eyes, grizzled eyebrows, and ill-combed scanty hair which seemed a slight metamorphosis ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot

... a vast, hairy smile. Barbara could dress crab like no one else in the world. She herself disliked the taste of crab. I, a carefully trained gastronomist, adored it, but a Puckish digestion forbade my consuming one single shred of the ambrosial ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke

... that would suit the subject. The only one of Hawthorne's preparatory sketches given to the public—in which we see his genius in the "midmost heat of composition"—supposes a household in which an old man keeps a crab- spider for a pet, a deadly poisonous creature; and in the same family there is a boy whose fortunes will be mysteriously affected in some manner by this dangerous insect. He did not proceed sufficiently to indicate for us how this would turn out, but he closes the sketch with the significant ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns

... he said as loudly as he could, in the hope that the owner of the mysterious voice would hear him. Nobody answered him; but he wondered why an old crab, who was shuffling along the beach, chose that particular moment to ...
— All the Way to Fairyland - Fairy Stories • Evelyn Sharp

... had become fiercer than ever, when a big crab, who had come out of the water and had climbed slowly up on the shore, called out in a hoarse voice that sounded like a trumpet with ...
— Pinocchio - The Tale of a Puppet • C. Collodi

... and, having found us, was quite determined that we should never escape them alive. When presently we again began to move, it seemed impossible to take a single step without tripping over a land-crab's hole, or treading upon one of the creatures and hearing and feeling it crackle and writhe underfoot. Ugh! it ...
— A Middy of the Slave Squadron - A West African Story • Harry Collingwood

... bordered by very sharp points. The length of the tail-varies according to their size. With the end of it, these people point their arrows, and it contains also a row of prickles like the large shell in which are the eyes. There are eight small feet like those of the crab, and two behind longer and flatter, which they use in swimming. There are also in front two other very small ones with which they eat. When walking, all the feet are concealed excepting the two hindermost which are slightly visible. Under the small shell there are membranes which swell up, ...
— Voyages of Samuel de Champlain, Vol. 2 • Samuel de Champlain

... else;—thy journey lies, "Through ambushes, and savage monsters' forms. "Ev'n shouldst thou lucky not erratic stray, "Yet must thou pass the Bull's opposing horns; "The bow Haemonian, by the Centaur bent; "The Lion's countenance grim; the Scorpion's claws "Bent cruel in a circuit large; the Crab "In lesser compass curving. Hard the task "To rule the steeds with those fierce fires inflam'd, "Within their breasts, which through their nostrils glow. "Scarce bear they my control, when mad with heat "Their high necks spurn the rein. ...
— The Metamorphoses of Publius Ovidus Naso in English blank verse Vols. I & II • Ovid

... and let you know," said Mrs. Chillingworth, "what I want;" and she darted into the room past the servant. "I'll soon let you know, you great sea crab. I want my husband; and what with your vampyre, and one thing and another, I haven't had him at home an hour for the past three weeks. What am I to do? There is all his patients getting well as fast as they can without him; and, when they find that out, do you think they will take any more filthy ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest

... he led his men down towards the ford, and when the Romans saw that, their main body began to move forward, faring slant-wise, as a crab, down toward the ford; then Otter hastened somewhat, as he well might, since his men were well learned in war and did not break their array; but now by this time were those burners of the Romans come up with the main battle, and the Roman captain sent them at once against the Goths, ...
— The House of the Wolfings - A Tale of the House of the Wolfings and All the Kindreds of the Mark Written in Prose and in Verse • William Morris

... Horticultural Palace was comprehensive enough to include about all of the fruits produced in the State. Eighty-nine varieties of Wisconsin apples were shown. There were shown 18 kinds of Wisconsin grown strawberries; 5 varieties of crab apples; 47 kinds of plums; 4 kinds of pears; 5 kinds of gooseberries, and 4 ...
— Final Report of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission • Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission

... the only part of the state where almost simultaneously one may enjoy the rare combination of the unobstructed ocean, an inland sea, and trout streams lined with giant firs and cedars, which all but encroach upon the dominions of the waters. Here the oyster, the clam and the crab seemingly try to outdo one another and the mighty forest, in yielding splendid profits to the people, who lend every encouragement to ...
— The Beauties of the State of Washington - A Book for Tourists • Harry F. Giles

... supply the world with seven million horse-power. I do wish Gershom would get over trying to pat the world on the head, instead of shaking hands with it! I'm afraid I'm losing my lilt. I can't understand why I should keep feeling as blue as indigo. I am a well of acid and a little sister to the crab-apple. I think I'll make Susie come down so we can humanize ourselves with a little music. For I feel like a Marie Bashkirtseff with ...
— The Prairie Child • Arthur Stringer

... place of the garden?" asked George. "The boys down at the dock say they can make lots of money selling soft crabs. They get from sixty to seventy-five cents a dozen, and, oh, mother, if Bert and me could only have a net and a boat and a crab car, and roll up our pants like Nat Springer, we'd just bring you so much money that you needn't hardly sew at all!" and in his enthusiasm George's eyes sparkled, and he ruthlessly trampled upon every rule of ...
— Harper's Young People, July 13, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... still kept his back turned to her, but began sidling slowly toward the gate, with a clumsy, crab-like motion. "I'm a poor feller, lady!" he whined, in the same disagreeable tone. "I ain't had nothin' to eat for a week, and I've got the rheumatiz ...
— Hildegarde's Holiday - a story for girls • Laura E. Richards

... chromium, copper, gold, nickel, platinum and other minerals, and coal and hydrocarbons have been found in small uncommercial quantities; none presently exploited; krill, finfish, and crab have ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency

... tea-kettle was already surmounting the fire which Milka the ostler, as red in the face as a crab, was blowing with a pair of bellows. All was grey and misty in the courtyard, like steam from a smoking dunghill, but in the eastern sky the sun was diffusing a clear, cheerful radiance, and making the straw roofs ...
— Boyhood • Leo Tolstoy

... DIDN'T go! One frisky crab shot out a long claw and nearly grabbed Mona's finger, which so scared her that she dropped her side of the flat basket, and the crabs all slid out on the floor instead of ...
— Patty's Butterfly Days • Carolyn Wells

... was open, but the kitchen empty, and she surmised that Mrs. Birch had not finished milking; so Beth sat down on the rough bench beneath the crab-apple tree and began to dream of the olden days. There was the old chain swing where Arthur used to swing her, and the cherry-trees where he filled her apron. She was seven and he was ten—but such a man in her eyes, that sun-browned, dark-eyed boy. And what a hero he ...
— Beth Woodburn • Maud Petitt

... to the higher land, where by good luck we found in a rock a number of cavities, in which a quantity of rain-water had collected. It also seemed that a short time before there had been natives there, for we found some crab-shells lying about and here and there fire-ashes. Here we somewhat quenched our cruel thirst, which almost prevented us from dragging ourselves along, for since the loss of our ship we had had no more than one or two mutchkins ...
— The Part Borne by the Dutch in the Discovery of Australia 1606-1765 • J. E. Heeres

... I don't remember any of them. My mother wrote, offering me Dora for a companion; but somehow I preferred being without her. One great comfort was good news about Connie, who was getting on famously. But even this moved me so little that I began to think I was turning into a crab, utterly incased in the shell of my own selfishness. The thought made me cry. The fact that I could cry consoled me, for how could I be heartless so long as I could cry? But then came the thought it was for myself, my own hard-heartedness I was crying,—not certainly for joy that Connie ...
— The Vicar's Daughter • George MacDonald

... essence of that female, subterranean recklessness and mockery penetrated his blood. He could not forget Gudrun's lifted, offered, cleaving, reckless, yet withal mocking weight. And Birkin, watching like a hermit crab from its hole, had seen the brilliant frustration and helplessness of Ursula. She was rich, full of dangerous power. She was like a strange unconscious bud of powerful womanhood. He was unconsciously drawn to her. She ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence

... clove a devious course, Moved crab-like, in a strange diagonal, And, driving, crossed the frontiers. Thither came The bold Sir Referee, and shrilled abroad The tremulous, momentary 'touch.' But she, Heaving with unaccustomed exercise, Blinded and baffled, wild with all despair, Stood sweeping, as a churl that sweeps the scythe ...
— Rhymes of the East and Re-collected Verses • John Kendall (AKA Dum-Dum)

... its author, five years later, in a fantastic note appended to a copy of it, as 'the only remaining crab of the shapely Tree of Life in my Fool's Paradise.' This name is ill bestowed upon a work which, however wild a fruit of Mr. Browning's genius, contains, in its many lines of exquisite fancy and deep pathos, so much that is rich and ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr

... Torres Straits before this book is published. Here again I find interesting records of imitative dancing. One dance imitates the swimming movements of the large lizard (Varanus), another is an imitation of the movements of a crab, another imitates those of a pigeon, and another those of a pelican. At a dance which I witnessed in the Roro village of Seria a party from Delena danced the "Cassowary" dance; and Father Egedi says it is certainly so called because ...
— The Mafulu - Mountain People of British New Guinea • Robert W. Williamson

... they be up to? a gazer might say, As he watched their eccentric career from the banks. Three 'ARRIES at large on a Bank Holiday Could hardly indulge in more blundering pranks. Stroke "catches a crab" in the clumsiest style, (And they called him a fine finished oarsman, this chap!) At his "Catherine-wheeler" a Cockney might smile, As he tumbles so helplessly back in Bow's lap. And Bow!—well, he's snapped off the blade of his scull, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, July 5, 1890 • Various

... with the whispers of springtide, Maiden speech to hear, eloquent murmur and sigh Ah! but the joy of the Thames when, Cam with Isis contending, Up the Imperial stream flash the impetuous Eights! Sweeping and strong is the stroke, as they race from Putney to Mortlake, Shying the Crab Tree bight, shooting through Hammersmith Bridge; Onward elastic they strain to the deep low moan of the rowlock; Louder the cheer from the bank, swifter the ...
— By-ways in Book-land - Short Essays on Literary Subjects • William Davenport Adams

... yet, lest strange ill, From such conjuring skill, Should arise, and their souls be in danger,— He would have his crab-stick, And would show my lord Nick Some tricks to which he was ...
— The Baron's Yule Feast: A Christmas Rhyme • Thomas Cooper

... ash, and crab tree for cart and for plow, Save step for a stile of the crotch of a bough; Save hazel for forks, save sallow for rake: Save hulver and thorn, thereof flail for ...
— Home Life in Colonial Days • Alice Morse Earle

... it was overrun with heather and juniper- scrub, through which brambles and honeysuckle twined their way. Halfway up a perpendicular wall of rock hung the ash and the wild cherry, gripping the bare cliff with roots that looked like crippled hands. Crab-apple trees, sloe-bushes and wild rose-briars made an impenetrable jungle, which already bore traces of Lasse's exertions. And in the midst of this luxuriant growth the rocky subsoil protruded its grim features, or came so near the surface that ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo

... and find a steady chair. This stuff ought to be rather good; head waiter's suggestion. Smells all right." He bent over the chafing-dish and began to serve the contents. "Perfectly innocuous: mushrooms and truffles and a little crab-meat. And now, on the level, Archie, ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather

... the kitchen of Mrs. Owen's house on Waupegan. The August afternoon sun struck goldenly upon battalions of glasses and jars in the broad, screened veranda, an extension of the kitchen itself. The newly affixed labels announced peach, crab-apple, plum, and watermelon preserves (if the mention of this last item gives you no thrill, so much the worse for you!); jellies of many tints and flavors, and tiny cucumber pickles showing dark green amid the gayer colors. Only the most jaded appetite ...
— A Hoosier Chronicle • Meredith Nicholson

... metamorphosis which it actually undergoes—the young of the little animal having no feature to identify it with its final development. In its early stage (I quote from Carpenter's Physiology, vol. i. p. 52.) it has a form not unlike that of the crab, "possessing eyes and powers of free motion; but afterwards, becoming fixed to one spot for the remainder of its life, it loses its eyes and forms a shell, which, though composed of various pieces, has nothing in common with the jointed shell of ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 201, September 3, 1853 • Various

... from within. I have him! I have him! Curse your claws! Why do you fix them on me, you crab? You won't pick up the fiend-spawn so easily, I can tell you. Bring the light there, will you? (One runs out for the light.) A trap! a trap! and a stair, down in the wall! The hell-faggot's gone! After him, ...
— The Poetical Works of George MacDonald in Two Volumes, Volume I • George MacDonald

... shook his head and desired me to provide myself with another lodging; which I promptly did, and for a time I took service under a drunken surgeon named Crab. When I deemed myself sufficiently master of my business, I decided to go to London. "You may easily get on board of a King's ship in quality of a surgeon's mate," said Crab; "where you will certainly see a great deal of practise, and stand a good ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.

... suspicions. You have said that certain objects drawn from the sea have a certain value for gross purposes on account of the similarity of their names. On this analogy why should not a stone be good for diseases of the bladder, a shell for the making of a will, a crab for a cancer, seaweed for an ague? Really, Claudius Maximus, in listening to these appallingly long-winded accusations to their very close you have shown a patience that is excessive and a kindness which ...
— The Apologia and Florida of Apuleius of Madaura • Lucius Apuleius

... deliberated, and disbanded, but the tidings announced in Lilienthal's epistle did not prove to be good. In one of the fables of Kryloff, the Russian AEsop, we are told that once a swan, a pike, and a crab, decided to make a trip together. No sooner had they started than, in accordance with their nature, the swan began to fly, the pike to shuffle along, the crab to crawl backward. It was so with the delegation of 1843. Rabbi Isaac, the rabid Mitnagged, could find ...
— The Haskalah Movement in Russia • Jacob S. Raisin

... fringe to fringe, Lured by the twinkling prey 'twas born to reach In its own pool, by many an elfin beach Of jewels, adventuring far Through the last mirrored cloud and sunset-tinge And past the rainbow-dripping cave where lies The dark green pirate-crab ...
— Collected Poems - Volume Two (of 2) • Alfred Noyes

... Melford would call depraved, at any rate they are first-hand. He does not waste his time in futile politeness." Suddenly he paused, and seized me by the shoulder and shook me, as he had often done before. "Creep out of that shell of gentility, you little hermit-crab," he cried, "and tell me how you would like to live in Melford for the ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke

... poor groping old land-crab, with his skull full of pulp, had pride. Isn't it wonderful? And more—he had conscience; he had a sense of right and wrong, such as it was; he was able to find remorse. It looks impossible, it looks incredible, but it is not. I believe that some ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... administer toco to the wretched fags nearest at hand. They may well be angry, for it is all Lombard Street to a china orange that the School-house kick a goal with the ball touched in such a good place. Old Brooke, of course, will kick it out, but who shall catch and place it? Call Crab Jones. Here he comes, sauntering along with a straw in his mouth, the queerest, coolest fish in Rugby. If he were tumbled into the moon this minute, he would just pick himself up without taking his hands out of his pockets or turning a hair. But ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes

... to the Topic of Modern Music. All agreed that the Music which seemed to catch on with the low-browed Public was exceedingly punk. They rather fancied "Parsifal" and were willing to concede that Vogner made good in Spots, but Mascagni they branded as a Crab. As for Victor Herbert and J.P. ...
— People You Know • George Ade

... warning. Written by one that dares call a dog a dog, and made to prevent Martin's dog-days. Imprinted by John-a-noke and John-a-stile for the baylive [sic] of Withernam, cum privilegio perennitatis; and are to be sold at the sign of the crab-tree-cudgel in Thwackcoat Lane. A sentence. Martin hangs ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury

... poplars. There were on that knoll three snowy, bridal birches, the rough trunks of horse-chestnuts and a few solemn pines. As if that were not enough, in the very heart of this woody temple were two shaggy old crab-apple trees and ...
— Green Valley • Katharine Reynolds

... thoroughly sick of the food provided, but the German officers and crew had just the same. The Hitachi had been carrying ten thousand cases of Japanese canned crab to England. A great part of this was saved, and divided between the Wolf and her prize. None of us ever want to see or hear of this commodity again; we were fed on it till most of us loathed it, but as there ...
— Five Months on a German Raider - Being the Adventures of an Englishman Captured by the 'Wolf' • Frederic George Trayes

... floating weed. No darkness, except the darkness of night. No nearer the sunset, and always at sunset-time that golden western path across the water. Weeds, weeds—vast stretches of weeds; they must betoken land; and a live crab discovered among them would surely seem to indicate it. The sea is smooth, the air clear. It is like "Andalusia in April, all but the nightingales," exclaims the admiral. What would you give to hear a nightingale just now, brave-hearted admiral, ...
— Ten Great Events in History • James Johonnot

... respect to master," Conseil replied, "as comfortable as a hermit crab inside the shell ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne

... feet away was a crab of fair size, perhaps six inches across the shell. Half-way between where they stood and the crab, right on the edge of the water, was a small octopus with its large, glaring, green eyes fixed on the crab. This was at first ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries • Francis Rolt-Wheeler

... to bed when your day's work is done, you run off to picnics at Sulzer's Park, or go to the Eldorado or Coney Island, and when you come down here next morning you are fagged out. There was no real hearse. There was a soft-shell crab dream." ...
— The King In Yellow • Robert W. Chambers

... best food was cooked for poor Haensel, but Grethel got nothing but crab-shells. Every morning the woman crept to the little stable, and cried, "Haensel, stretch out thy finger that I may feel if thou wilt soon be fat." Haensel, however, stretched out a little bone to her, and the old woman, who had dim eyes, could not ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various

... fibroma. The only exception to this is in the naming of the two large classes of malignant neoplasms. There the names were formed from the fleshlike appearance of the one and the crablike proliferations of the other—namely, Sarcoma (sarksflesh), carcinoma (karkinoscrab). ...
— Special Report on Diseases of Cattle • U.S. Department of Agriculture

... feet. The supply of air for filling these is taken from the propeller draught by a slanting aluminium tube to the underside of the envelope, where it meets a longitudinal fabric hose which connects the two ballonet air inlets. Non-return fabric valves known as crab-pots are fitted in this fabric hose on either side of their junction with the air scoop. Two automatic air valves are fitted to the underside of the envelope, one for each ballonet. The air pressure tends to open the valve ...
— British Airships, Past, Present, and Future • George Whale



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