"Forefoot" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... group was seated right on the forefoot or "over-hang" of the polar ship, their legs dangling over the bow above the water. Beneath their feet they could see the bright phosphorous gleam as the ship ploughed onward. They were rather silent. ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... it was soon clear that she was too much for her antagonist. At two bells in the forenoon watch she was about a mile abreast of the chase, which had not yet shown her colors. The flag of the United States floated at the peak, and the commander ordered a shot to be fired across the forefoot of the Dornoch. ...
— Fighting for the Right • Oliver Optic
... development of the fish form of structure. Venice was an important port to call at. The channel was difficult to navigate, and the Venetian class (270 feet long) was supposed to be the extreme length that could be handled here. But what with the straight stem,—by cutting the forefoot away, and by the introduction of powerful steering-gear, worked amidships,—the captain was able to navigate the Persian, 90 feet longer than the Venetian, with much ...
— Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles
... cries that came from "The Nursery" den, where six yearling cubs were kept, I quickly caught sight of the trouble. One of our park-born brown bear cubs was hanging fast by one forefoot from the top of the barred partition. He had climbed to the top of the ironwork, thrust one front paw through between two of the bars (for bears are the greatest busybodies on earth), and when he sought ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... sung out, as the cable appearing up and down showed that the anchor was under the forefoot. As the wind blew out of the harbour, the jib and fore-topmast-staysail were now hoisted to cast her. With renewed exertions the crew hove round, and the shout they uttered gave the signal that they had dragged the anchor from the bottom. ...
— The Pirate of the Mediterranean - A Tale of the Sea • W.H.G. Kingston
... did not know what to say, and an oppressive silence, broken only by the churn of the Dazzler's forefoot, ...
— The Cruise of the Dazzler • Jack London
... was towards joy. Round she came, till she was broadside on to me—round still till she had covered a half, and then two-thirds, and then three-quarters of the distance that separated us. I could see the waves boiling white under her forefoot. Immensely tall she looked to me from my low station in ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... even keel, her forefoot deep-buried in the shifting sand that had silted about her with the tide, and beholding her paint and gilding blackened and scorched by fire, her timbers rent and scarred by shot, I knew this fire-blackened, shattered wreck would never sail again. And now as I viewed this dismal ruin, ...
— Martin Conisby's Vengeance • Jeffery Farnol
... topsails and courses, were then set, and the brig began to walk the water like a thing of life, her forefoot discoursing music, the birds flying and crying over her spars. Bit by bit the passage began to open and the blue sea to show between the flanking breakers on the reef; bit by bit, on the starboard bow, the low land of the islet began to heave closer aboard. The yards were braced up, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... warmth of the tropics is in the air. Nor are the sea and sky now leaden. The first is turned into liquid gold by the phosphorescence, and the full moon silvers everything else. Neither is Peter pacing the deck with lines of pain and endurance on his face. He is up in the bow, where the vessel's forefoot throws up the white foam in silver drops in the moonlight. And he does not look miserable. Anything but that. He is sitting on an anchor stock, with his back comfortably braced against the rail. Another person is not far distant. What that person sits upon ...
— The Honorable Peter Stirling and What People Thought of Him • Paul Leicester Ford
... is, sir, away off on the port beam. She made more sail a few minutes ago, and now she appears to be edging off the wind, and steering across our forefoot. I s'pose she's enjoying of herself, sir, and exercisin' the crowds of chaps they has ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... looking when Hollister gave his last backward glance, then turned his attention to the reddish-yellow gleam of new-riven timber which marked his own dwelling. Twenty minutes later he slid the gray canoe's forefoot up on a patch ...
— The Hidden Places • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... that it would not be safe to lighten her much more in her present insecure situation. One of our bergs also shifted its position by this pressure, so as to weaken our confidence in the pier-heads of our intended basin; and a long “tongue” of one of them forcing itself under the Hecla’s forefoot, while the drift-ice was also pressing her forcibly from astern, she once more sewed three or four feet forward at low water, and continued to do so, notwithstanding repeated endeavours to haul her off, for four successive tides the ice remaining so close ...
— Journal of the Third Voyage for the Discovery of a North-West Passage • William Edward Parry
... of a near-by rock detached itself, drew up into a hunched thing of armor-plated scales and heavy wide-jawed head. A tail cracked into the air; a double tail split into equal forks for half-way down its length. A leg lifted as a forefoot, webbed, clawed for a new hold. This sea beast was the most formidable native thing he had sighted on Warlock, approaching in its ugliness the hound ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... escape to windward; the weather conditions, however, were ideal for the frigate, and we overhauled the brig so rapidly that by ten o'clock in the forenoon we were within gunshot of her; whereupon we hoisted our colours and fired a shot across her forefoot as a polite hint to her to heave-to. Her reply to this was to pour in her broadside of seven 8-pounders, the shot from which flew over and between our masts, doing us no damage whatever. Upon perceiving which, ...
— A Middy of the King - A Romance of the Old British Navy • Harry Collingwood
... speech or an instrument like the hand by which to place himself in closer relation to the outer world, he would doubtless be on a footing of mental equality with man, according to Mr. Laing. [69] The elephant's trunk accounts for his superior sagacity, and the horse suffers by his hoof-enclosed forefoot. [70] "Given a being with man's brain, man's hand, and erect stature, it is easy to see how intelligence must have been gradually evolved." [71] Now honestly it seems to us that many animals ...
— The Faith of the Millions (2nd series) • George Tyrrell
... engines as they have never been rushed before,' I said to him. He went below, and soon we began to burn coal and pile up the feathers in our forefoot. ...
— The San Francisco Calamity • Various
... that she had ridden from Quesnay, his head outstretched above his mistress to paddle at the vine leaves with a tremulous upper lip. She checked his desire with a slight movement of her hand upon the bridle-rein; and he arched his neck prettily, pawing the gravel with a neat forefoot. Miss Elizabeth is one of the few large women I have known to whom a riding- habit is entirely becoming, and this group of two—a handsome woman and her handsome horse—has had a charm for all men ever since horses were tamed and women began to be beautiful. I thought of my work, of the canvases ...
— The Guest of Quesnay • Booth Tarkington
... always the same," answered David Brown. "They show that three toes have been lost from the left forefoot." ...
— Fifty Famous People • James Baldwin
... neck were thrust forward and drawn back again at every step with the daintiest gesture imaginable; and his tiny pointed hoofs touched the ground so lightly, and were away again so quickly, that you hardly knew what they had done. If anything startled him, he stamped with his forefoot on the hard sand, and tossed his head in the air with an expression that was not fear, but alertness, and even defiance. And when he leaped and ran—but there's no use in trying ...
— Forest Neighbors - Life Stories of Wild Animals • William Davenport Hulbert
... fearfully together, had Just risen from the marble-The elephant started, dropped his delicate burden heavily on the slab, looked down, raised his forefoot, and throwing his trunk into the air, gave a shrill scream ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley
... the ship ended in a shock as if she had landed her forefoot upon something solid. After a moment of stillness a lofty flight of sprays drove hard with ...
— Typhoon • Joseph Conrad
... cried Newton, as he sprang aft to the wheel, and put up the helm; "man the flying jib-halyards (the jib was under the forefoot); let go the maintop bowling; square the main-yard. That will do; she's paying off. Man your guns; half-a-dozen broadsides, and ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... morning I went forth, eager to know the result. I soon came on the fresh trail of the robbers, with Lobo in the lead—his track was always easily distinguished. An ordinary wolf's forefoot is 4-1/2 inches long, that of a large wolf 4-3/4 inches, but Lobo's, as measured a number of times, was 5-1/2 inches from claw to heel; I afterward found that his other proportions were commensurate, for he stood three feet high at the shoulder, and weighed 150 pounds. His trail, therefore, though ...
— Lobo, Rag and Vixen - Being The Personal Histories Of Lobo, Redruff, Raggylug & Vixen • Ernest Seton-Thompson
... various and diverse than imagination, before the fact, could conceive. Yet, throughout this astonishing, inconceivable variety, science walks in steady perception of a unity extending far toward details of structure. The boor laughs, when told that the forefoot of his horse and his own hand are essentially the same member. A "Positive Philosopher" laughs, when told that through Fetichism and Lutheranism there runs a thread of unity,—that human belief has its law, and may be studied ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... reaching one of his paws in at the door, as a cat does when she plays with a mouse, although I often shifted place to avoid him, he at length seized the lappet of my coat (which being made of that country silk, was very thick and strong), and dragged me out. He took me up in his right forefoot, and held me as a nurse does a child; and when I offered to struggle, he squeezed me so hard, that I thought it more prudent to submit. I have good reason to believe that he took me for a young one of his own species, by his ...
— The Junior Classics, V5 • Edited by William Patten
... at the slender, soldierly figure which stood in the prow of the liner, like a figurehead, peering into the storm under the vessel's forefoot. ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science April 1930 • Various
... the buckskin's forefoot sink. The brute stumbled and rolled over—fortunately for the pony away ...
— The Girl from Sunset Ranch - Alone in a Great City • Amy Bell Marlowe
... noises, and the timidity and panic exhibited at trivial objects and incidents which, imperfectly discerned, excite suspicions for its safety.[1] In 1841 an officer[2] was chased by an elephant that he had slightly wounded. Seizing him near the dry bed of a river, the animal had its forefoot already raised to crush him; but its forehead being caught at the instant by the tendrils of a climbing plant which had suspended itself from the branches above, it suddenly turned and fled; leaving ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent
... No. 10 Reillys* were wonderfully powerful rifles, and exceedingly handy; they weighed fourteen pounds, and were admirably adapted for dangerous game. I measured both the elephants accurately with a tape: that killed by the "Baby" was nine feet six inches from the forefoot to the shoulder, the other was eight feet three inches. It is a common mistake that twice the circumference of the foot is the height of an elephant; there is no such rule that can be depended upon, as their feet vary in size ...
— The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia • Samuel W. Baker
... had been bucked from the pack-saddle. The Mexicans were still laughing when he strode back to the store. The dog, scenting trouble, bristled and snarled, baring his long fangs and standing with one forefoot raised. Before the assembly realized what had happened, Pete had whipped out his gun. With the crash of the shot the dog doubled up and dropped in his tracks. The boys scattered and ran. Pete cut loose ...
— The Ridin' Kid from Powder River • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... replenish the fire; "here's the Dutch-clock a working himself up to being equal to strike Eight of 'em, and she's not come home yet! I hope Uncle Pumblechook's mare mayn't have set a forefoot on a piece o' ice, ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... to be Good Indian, who had found it necessary to stop and inspect carefully the left forefoot of his horse, without appearing aware of the girl's approach. She ambled up at Huckleberry's favorite shuffling gait, struck him with her whip—a blow which would not have perturbed a mosquito—when he showed a disposition to stop beside ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower
... I wake every night and see in my room, intently watching me, a big black Newfoundland dog with a white forefoot." ...
— Can Such Things Be? • Ambrose Bierce
... the old gun had gone off, and he chuckled as he thought of the wreck it made of the old Grizzly. In the morning he started out to take a look at his dead bear, and found his tracks leading from the meadow right up the trail. He knew the sign, because the Grizzly put only the heel of his off forefoot to the ground and there was a round mark in the track that looked as though it were made by the end of ...
— Bears I Have Met—and Others • Allen Kelly
... only uniformity"; and he describes a misadventure which befell Zadig when he was living in the kingdom of Babylon. One day the chief eunuch asked if he had seen the queen's dog. "It's a female, isn't it?" returned Zadig; "a spaniel, and very small; she littered not long ago; she is lame of the left forefoot; and she has very long ears." "So you have seen her?" cried the eunuch. "No," Zadig answered; "I have never seen her; and I never even knew that the queen had ...
— Inquiries and Opinions • Brander Matthews
... sail that stretches wide, A sea that's running strong, A boat that dips its laving side, The forefoot's rippling song. A flaming sky, a crimson flood, Here's joy for body and mind, As in our canting crafts we scud With ...
— In Court and Kampong - Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula • Hugh Clifford
... top-sails of the old, square style, and her long main boom and immense spread of jib gave her a tremendous sail area for her tonnage. The breeze had held steadily since sundown and was, if anything, rising a little. Short seas slapped and gurgled at the forefoot with a pleasant sound. Jeremy, desperately tired, had dropped by the mast, scarcely caring what happened to him. The sloop slid out past the dark headlands, and heeled to leeward with a satisfied grunt of her cordage that came gently to the boy's ears. His ...
— The Black Buccaneer • Stephen W. Meader
... my heel; but as he limped much, I turned to examine him; and found one cause of his lameness to be, that the loose shoe, which was a hind one, was broken at the toe; and that one half, held only at the toe, had turned round and was sticking right out, striking his forefoot every time he moved. I soon remedied this, ...
— The Portent & Other Stories • George MacDonald
... her bows, the high, clumsy bows pointed toward us, the water turning from her forefoot. She came on; she was near at hand. We saw her plainly—saw the rotted planks, the crumbling rigging, the rust-corroded metal-work, the broken rail, the gaping deck, and I could imagine that the clean water broke away from her sides in refluent wavelets ...
— A Deal in Wheat - And Other Stories of the New and Old West • Frank Norris
... with me and soon I saw them all, and told them to him one by one, their colour, their age—everything. I told him, too, where they were, and how one of them had fallen into a stream and lay there on its back drowned, with its forefoot caught in a forked root. As my Ehlose told me so I ...
— Nada the Lily • H. Rider Haggard
... thy right forefoot," he said, "and swear by all thou holdest sacred never to divulge what thou hast learnt"—which oath the Professor, in the vilest of tempers, took, ...
— The Brass Bottle • F. Anstey
... of the words. The white Higuerota soared out of the shadows of rock and earth like a frozen bubble under the moon. All was still, till near by, behind the wall of a corral for the camp animals, built roughly of loose stones in the form of a circle, a pack mule stamped his forefoot ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... The schooner shuddered from forefoot to sternpost; the big hawser slipped in through the lead with gathering speed; the groaning masts imparted an impulse to her that drove her astern like an arrow, and ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... makes pairs of footmarks, each hind foot being close to the impression of the forefoot. At a trot the tracks are similar, but the pairs of footmarks are farther apart and deeper, the toe especially being more deeply indented than at the walk. At a canter there are two single footmarks and then a pair. At a gallop the ...
— Manual of Military Training - Second, Revised Edition • James A. Moss
... beautiful in the glorious moonlight, and stood out like a picture looked at through a stereoscope. From my perch among the branches I watched first a water-buck come to drink in the river; then a bush-buck; later, a tiny paa emerged from the bushes and paused at every step with one graceful forefoot poised in the air—thoroughly on the alert and looking round carefully and nervously for any trace of a possible enemy. At length it reached the brink of the river in safety, and stooped to drink. Just then I saw a jackal come up ...
— The Man-eaters of Tsavo and Other East African Adventures • J. H. Patterson
... in the pits like a honeycomb, They sift and soften it, bake it and burn it— Whether they weld you, for instance, a snaffle 365 With side-bars never a brute can baffle; Or a lock that's a puzzle of wards within wards; Or, if your colt's forefoot inclines to curve inwards, Horseshoes they hammer which turn on a swivel And won't allow the hoof to shrivel. 370 Then they cast bells like the shell of the winkle That keep a stout heart in the ram with their tinkle; But the sand—they pinch and pound it like otters; Commend me ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning
... divine, Strong yet delicately knit, For ten thousand uses fit, Overlaid with so clear skin You may see the blood within,— Who this hand would choose to cover With a crust of dirt all over, Till it looked in hue and shape Like the forefoot of an ape! Man or boy that works or plays In the fields or the highways, May, without offence or hurt, From the soil contract a dirt Which the next clear spring or river Washes out and out for ever. But to cherish stains impure, Soil ...
— Rhymes Old and New • M.E.S. Wright
... cinnamon sails of small ones. Little fishing-craft prowled near the shore. And afar off, in fancy, he could see the troops of swans, and the stalking herons. The pilot's cutter plowed toward him, her deep forefoot dividing the water like a knife. Immense, vibrant beauty. And he felt, as always, that Claire-Anne was by him, her dark understanding presence, her clear ...
— The Wind Bloweth • Brian Oswald Donn-Byrne
... lower his canvas, and then see what cargo he carries," said the commander. "Send a shot across his forefoot, and if that doesn't stop him we'll try to knock away that big yard of his. ...
— Ned Garth - Made Prisoner in Africa. A Tale of the Slave Trade • W. H. G. Kingston
... Claude found old Molly, the grey mare with the stiff leg, who had grown a second hoof on her off forefoot, an achievement not many horses could boast of. He was sure she recognized him; she nosed his hand and arm and turned back her upper lip, showing ...
— One of Ours • Willa Cather
... one hind leg. The young bull whirled and aimed a sweeping slash of his polished spears, intent upon impaling his foe; and as he turned a second coyote flashed from behind a tree and slashed him. The bull whirled again and struck wickedly with a smashing forefoot. The rest of the elk had stopped to gaze in amazement at this strange scene,—at ...
— The Yellow Horde • Hal G. Evarts
... had to be deftly performed, for the ship was forging through the sea, and plunging her bowsprit under water as she rose and fell in her progress, one minute describing a half-circle through the air with her forefoot as she yawed to the heavy rolling waves, the next diving deep down into the billows and tossing up tons of water over her forecastle, where the skipper stood, watching his opportunity, as the broken spars, ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson
... Mr. Harry; "Dutchman sometimes does, and we have two cures for him, both equally good. We take up a forefoot and strike his shoe two or three times with a stone. The operation always interests him greatly, and he usually starts. If he doesn't go for that, we pass a line round his forelegs, at the knee joint, then go in front of him and draw on the line. Father ...
— Beautiful Joe - An Autobiography of a Dog • by Marshall Saunders
... Then our troubles began, for she left us to catch a lamb, and never came back. We heard all about it afterward. Some ranchers had seen her, and rode out on horseback to enjoy the cruel sport of 'roping a bear'. As they rode around her, one threw his lariat about her neck; another caught her forefoot as she stood up, another her hind leg; and then they dragged her away to the ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf; a Practical Plan of Character Building, Volume I (of 17) - Fun and Thought for Little Folk • Various
... I am going home, and you must take me. I told them that you were coming to do so. You have your horse, have you not, the black horse with the white forefoot? Well, we will start at once—no, you must eat first, and there are things to arrange. Now stand at a distance from me and look as respectful as you can, for I fill a strange ...
— The Ghost Kings • H. Rider Haggard
... them with suspicion. His head was high, his nostrils were dilated, his tail swished slowly, like a tiger's. One forefoot was raised a little, resting on the toe, and the muscles of his shoulders quivered under the glossy hide. He had fully recovered from the effects of his rough treatment on the road, and his skin shone with a satin-like luster in ...
— The Heart of Thunder Mountain • Edfrid A. Bingham
... habits of the ape tribe lead us to the conclusion that the ancestral animal may have soon begun to seek support from upper limbs. The plantigrade foot is one capable of readily curving into an organ of support, and in the case of the forefoot the toes would tend to spread and gain flexibility of motion, and the first toe to become opposable to the others and yield a more complete grasping power. It does not seem difficult to comprehend, from this point of view, how ...
— Man And His Ancestor - A Study In Evolution • Charles Morris
... were the days of waiting, And the long, blind search was gone; With a cheer we swung to meet them On the forefoot of the dawn. ...
— Carolina Chansons - Legends of the Low Country • DuBose Heyward and Hervey Allen
... the scolding and loud talking were about. When they got there, they found the elephant had broken down a little bridge that crossed the narrow stream and there was no way to get the wagons over. The elephant, before crossing, had put his forefoot out to try the strength of the bridge and with a little shake the bridge had collapsed and dropped into the water. Had he stepped on it without trying it, he would most likely have been killed for it surely would have gone down with ...
— Billy Whiskers - The Autobiography of a Goat • Frances Trego Montgomery
... said, "that bear walks on its hind-legs; there is not the sign of a forefoot anywhere along the trail. Now this could not be caused by the hind feet obliterating the tracks of the front feet, because in many places the pass is so steep that the forefeet in reaching out for support would make tracks not overlapped ...
— The Black Wolf Pack • Dan Beard
... King contrived a shoe so much superior to any he had yet made that the Lad, examining it, was compelled to say, "It is better than the other." Then Pepper, who always stood in a noose beside the door awaiting her moment, lifted up her near forefoot of her own accord, and the King took it in ...
— Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard • Eleanor Farjeon
... accordingly to the door. There, to be sure, was Thomas before it holding a pony bridled and saddled. He was certainly a very pretty little creature; brown all over except one white forefoot; his coat shone, it was so glossy; his limbs were fine; his eye gentle and bright; his tail long enough to please the children. He stood as quiet as a lamb, whether Thomas held ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... broadside to bear at long musket shot, killed a midshipman by Dodd's side, cut away two of the Agra's mizzen shrouds, wounded the gaff: and cut the jib stay; down fell the powerful sail into the water, and dragged across the ship's forefoot, stopping her way to the open sea she panted for, the mates groaned; the crew cheered stoutly, as British tars do in any great disaster; the pirates yelled with ferocious triumph, like the ...
— Great Sea Stories • Various
... gaze into the distance, occasionally stamping an impatient forefoot, as though anxious to be off. Lorry lowered his glass and raised it again. In the circle of the binoculars he saw a tiny, distant figure dismount from a black horse and walk back and forth across the road directly below the Notch. Lorry wiped his glasses and ...
— Jim Waring of Sonora-Town - Tang of Life • Knibbs, Henry Herbert
... turned about for the next order, he cast his glance out upon the bay, and there, not a hundred and fifty yards away, her spotless sails tense, her cordage humming, her immaculate flanks slipping easily through the waves, the water hissing and churning under her forefoot, clean, gleaming, dainty, and aristocratic, the Ridgeways' yacht "Petrel" passed like a thing of life. Wilbur saw Nat Ridgeway himself at the wheel. Girls in smart gowns and young fellows in white ducks and yachting caps—all ...
— Moran of the Lady Letty • Frank Norris
... range of the cattle. Gregory Thorne's blood leaped as he saw the noble quarry, with their wide-spread horns, sniffing the air, in which they had detected something unusual. Their leader, a colossal beast, stamped with his forefoot, and threw back his head ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... our bedding in the bows, among the sleeping Lascars, to catch any breeze that the pace of the ship might give us. The sea was like smoky oil, except where it turned to fire under our forefoot and whirled back into the dark in smears of dull flame. There was a thunderstorm some miles away: we could see the glimmer of the lightning. The ship's cow, distressed by the heat and the smell of the ape-beast in the cage, lowed unhappily from time ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... light in Kazan's eyes softened. He put a forefoot on the sill, and stood there, while the girl urged him again. Suddenly his legs seemed to sink a little under him, his tail drooped and he slunk in with that doggish air of having committed a crime. The creatures he loved were in the cabin, but the cabin itself he hated. He hated ...
— Kazan • James Oliver Curwood
... became a more interested spectator. He began to revolve again, and at the very end of his rope, slipping around with tigerish gracefulness; or, the rope taut, he halted as near as possible to the two in the corn, stamped one forefoot angrily and shook his curly head. There, a bold affront, was that blot of glaring scarlet. It awoke in him ...
— The Plow-Woman • Eleanor Gates
... against my lips The finger lifted. If, O reader! now Thou be not apt to credit what I tell, No marvel; for myself do scarce allow The witness of mine eyes. But as I looked Toward them, lo! a serpent with six feet Springs forth on one, and fastens full upon him: His midmost grasp'd the belly, a forefoot Seiz'd on each arm (while deep in either cheek He flesh'd his fangs); the hinder on the thighs Were spread, 'twixt which the tail inserted curl'd Upon the reins behind. Ivy ne'er clasp'd A dodder'd oak, as round the other's limbs The ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... why Miss Dolly Darling had watched in vain at the Monday morning tide for the bold issue of the fishing fleet. The weariless tide came up and lifted the bedded keel and the plunged forefoot, and gurgled with a quiet wash among the straky bends, then lurched the boats to this side and to that, to get their heft correctly, and dandled them at last with their bowsprits dipped and their little mast-heads nodding. Every brave smack then was mounted, and riding, and ready for a canter ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... limb the muscles are heavy, tapering inferiorly, and terminating in the region of the foot in long tendons. Each limb is divided into four regions. The regions of the fore-limb are the shoulder, arm, forearm and forefoot. In the hind limb are the regions of the pelvis, haunch, thigh, leg and hind-foot. The feet in turn are divided into three sub-regions each. The forefoot is formed by the knee, cannon and toe, and the hindfoot by the ...
— Common Diseases of Farm Animals • R. A. Craig, D. V. M.
... down athwart our forefoot, and nearing us fast, sir," returned the midshipman. "The York is close on our weather-beam, edging in to her station; but I can make out nothing ahead of us, though I was ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... and night for more than three weeks. Aided by the Snark, it was great hunting; for they cut a swath of destruction through the ocean half a mile wide and fifteen hundred miles in length. They ranged along abreast of the Snark on either side, pouncing upon the flying- fish her forefoot scared up. Since they were continually pursuing astern the flying-fish that survived for several flights, they were always overtaking the Snark, and at any time one could glance astern and on the front of a breaking wave see scores of their silvery forms coasting down just under the surface. When ...
— The Cruise of the Snark • Jack London
... the intense pain—and cats feel pain badly—of sharp spines digging into her soft and tender forefoot-pads, she stopped, about two yards away, and glared at the hedgehog as if he had played off a foul upon her, and she was surprised to see that he was no longer egg-shaped, but rolled up into himself like a ball, so to speak, and utterly quiescent. (I wonder if she remembered the little wood-lice ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... vessel was plunging along athwart our course as if she meant to give us the go-by, the sea foaming up at her bows in a big wave that curled up in front of her forefoot and broke over her figurehead as she dipped, sending the surf high in the air in a sheet of foam over ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... and all adroop as though its weight had become to him suddenly burdensome, and his legs spraddled widely apart to hold him upright, he benignantly contemplated the sea of expectant and eager faces that stretched before him. Slowly he lifted a broad forefoot and with its padded undersurface made a fumbling gesture which might have been interpreted as an attempt on his part ...
— Sundry Accounts • Irvin S. Cobb
... for it was under the window of my grandfather's room, that her shoes mightn't make a noise and wake him. And that's one of the shoes,' she said, holding it up to me. 'When the mare died, my mother begged my father for the one off her near forefoot, where she had so often stood and patted her neck when my father was mounted to ...
— The Seaboard Parish Volume 1 • George MacDonald
... Humphries again hailed the Chesapeake, and receiving unsatisfactory answers, observing also indications of intended resistance on board the American frigate, he ordered a shot to be fired across her forefoot. At intervals of two minutes he fired others, but evasive answers only being returned, and it being evident that the object of Commodore Barron was only to gain time, the Leopard opened her fire in earnest. After she had discharged three broadsides at the American frigate the latter ...
— How Britannia Came to Rule the Waves - Updated to 1900 • W.H.G. Kingston
... spring up from astern; whereupon the whole business of raising the mast was gone through with again. Little by little it freshened, and the Loseis began to forge ahead, making a pleasant little murmur under her forefoot. The hearts of the three passengers rose ...
— Two on the Trail - A Story of the Far Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... One of our bergs also shifted its position by this pressure, so as to weaken our confidence in the pier-heads of our intended basin; and a long "tongue" of one of them forcing itself under the Hecla's forefoot, while the drifting ice was also pressing her forcibly from astern, she once more sewed three or four feet forward at low water, and continued to do so, notwithstanding repeated endeavours to haul her off, for four ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... horsemen were galloping. There were three of them, and there was one figure that seemed familiar to Ralph. But he could not tell who it was. Neither could he remember having seen the horse, which was a sorrel with a white left forefoot and a white nose. The men noticed him and reined up a little. Why he should have been startled by the presence of these men he could not tell, but an indefinable dread seized him. They galloped on, and he stood still shivering with a nervous fear. The cold seemed ...
— The Hoosier Schoolmaster - A Story of Backwoods Life in Indiana • Edward Eggleston
... with a back view, stamped her forefoot impatiently, and ran round in front, and out into the sun. Her lambs followed, and the three, ranging themselves abreast, stared at Daphne, with a ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... do, my lad. He knows just where his orf forefoot ought to be at one o'clock, and his near hind-foot at two. Why, he goes like clockwork. I just winds him up once with a bit o' corn and a drink o' water, starts him, and there's his old legs go tick-tack, tick-tack, and his head swinging like a pendulow. Use 'is secon' natur', and all I've got ...
— Brownsmith's Boy - A Romance in a Garden • George Manville Fenn
... you," said the cat. "When he asks you to marry him, say to him you will if his dwarfs will wind for you three balls from the fairy dew that lies on the bushes on a misty morning as big as these," said the cat, putting his right forefoot into his ear and taking out three balls—one yellow, one red, and ...
— Irish Fairy Tales • Edmund Leamy
... soon as he could check his momentum, and turned and stood blinking. Twice he rapped the ground hard with his forefoot. Tinker again drew to within ten yards of him; again Billy charged; and again he was prodded behind the shoulder. It was a beautiful game, and Tinker's lightness of foot, quickness of eye, and coolness of head ...
— The Admirable Tinker - Child of the World • Edgar Jepson
... a shot across the forefoot, and make her heave to," cried the captain, who was more animated than I had ever yet ...
— Paddy Finn • W. H. G. Kingston
... it in the direction from which the wind was coming (windward), and to 'put the helm down' was to turn it in the direction the wind was going (leeward). I found out still further, that a ship has a 'waist,' like a woman, a 'forefoot,' like a beast, besides 'bull's eyes' (which are small holes with glass in them to admit light), and 'cat-heads,' and 'monkey-rails,' and 'cross-trees,' as well as 'saddles' and 'bridles' and 'harness,' and many other things which I thought I should never hear anything more of after I left ...
— Cast Away in the Cold - An Old Man's Story of a Young Man's Adventures, as Related by Captain John Hardy, Mariner • Isaac I. Hayes
... was making heavy weather of it, and every now and again she would ram her nose clear out of sight in the high-rolling sea. Then she would rise heavily, with the white water pouring from her dripping forefoot and wallow dismally, until her weather rail would appear to ...
— Mr. Trunnell • T. Jenkins Hains
... yellow and black, first a hair of one and then a hair of the other, so that, unless one is very close to him it looks like a rich brown. And then his feet!" She gave him a loving little poke with one forefoot and turned him onto his back. This made him wave his tiny paws in the air. The thick cushions of skin on each were as black as black could be, and that is very uncommon. They are usually pink, like those ...
— Among the Farmyard People • Clara Dillingham Pierson
... paper, much information concerning the elephant in freedom and captivity. He does not claim a high order of intelligence, but rather of extraordinary obedience and docility for this animal Very large elephants are exceptional. Twice round the forefoot gives the height at the shoulder; few females attain the height of eight feet; "tuskers," or male elephants, vary from eight to nine feet; the Maharajah of Nahur, Sirmoor, possesses one standing ten feet five and one half inches. The age varies from 80 to 150 ...
— Afghanistan and the Anglo-Russian Dispute • Theo. F. Rodenbough
... almost at the same moment, with a terrible noise. It took about eight hours to clear the wreck, all hands working all night; and a very forlorn appearance the deck presented in the morning, lumbered up with broken spars, ropes, &c. The jibboom fell right across the forefoot of the yacht, and now looks as if it had been cut at for weeks with ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... ooze, in order that an anchor might hold, and to make soundings sartin. I have lost many a deep-sea, besides hand leads by the dozen, on rocky bottoms; but give me the roadstead where a lead comes up light and an anchor heavy. There's a boat pulling athwart our forefoot, Captain Barnstable; shall I run her aboard or give her a ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... which lived in that region in the earlier part of the Age of Reptiles, and much has been learned from them as to the habits of the animals that made them. The tracks ascribed to carnivorous dinosaurs run in series with narrow tread, short or long steps, here and there a light impression of tail or forefoot and occasionally the mark of the shank and pelvis when the animal settled back and squatted down to rest a moment. The modern crocodiles when they lift the body off the ground, waddle forward with the short limbs wide apart, and even the lizards which run on their hind legs have a rather ...
— Dinosaurs - With Special Reference to the American Museum Collections • William Diller Matthew
... interlock. There was an instant when Mr. Leach had his hand on the main-brace to let it go; but the Foam started away on a sea, like a horse that feels the spur, and disobeying her helm, shot forward, as if about to cross the Montauk's forefoot. ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper
... see her fore and main courses, and presently the black dot of her hull, and at last the white curl at her forefoot, as she came pressing gallantly on, just as though she knew my need and was speeding her ...
— Carette of Sark • John Oxenham
... while on the other the great ocean highway was dotted with every variety of vessel, from the Portland ketch or the Sunderland brig, with its cargo of coals, to the majestic four-masted liner which swept past, with the green waves swirling round her forefoot and breaking away into a fork of eddying waters ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... unscathed. The progress of the parade, however, was halted by the behavior of the Bishop's horse, for which no mask had been provided. The noble animal, under this sudden and extraordinary stimulus, was almost human in its actions. At first it stood, whinneying sharply, and pawing the air with one forefoot—as though feeling for the brass rail, as one of Bleak's companions said. It raised its head proudly, with open mouth and expanded nostrils. Then, dashing off across the broad street, it seemed eager to climb a lamp-post, and only the fierce restraint of the Bishop held it in. One of ...
— In the Sweet Dry and Dry • Christopher Morley
... loose from the forefoot of the thill horse at the beginning of the ascent of Mount Taurira, the postilion dismounted, twisted the shoe off, and put it in his pocket; as the ascent was of five or six miles, and that horse our main ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... lifted and rolled slowly, majestically on the ground swell of the Pacific, the water hissing and boiling under her forefoot, her cordage vibrating and droning in the steady rush of the trade winds. It was drawing towards evening and her lights had just been set. The master passed Presley, who was leaning over the rail smoking a cigarette, and paused ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris
... sister, a stranger chanced to be riding at dusk through the deep shades of the Bois du Nord, in Brittany. The path was overhung with spreading boughs; it was tumbled with the wood-litter of a decade. His horse went slowly, lifting each forefoot daintily and placing it carefully. And the stranger permitted the animal to ...
— A Fool There Was • Porter Emerson Browne
... got lighter and they could see better where they were going, the matter was settled for them, in a very unexpected manner, by the ship running on to a sunken ridge of rock immediately under her forefoot; and, in a moment, there she stuck hard and fast, bumping and scraping her bottom, with a harsh, grating sound and a quivering and rending of her timbers, as if every plank below the water-line was being torn out ...
— The Wreck of the Nancy Bell - Cast Away on Kerguelen Land • J. C. Hutcheson
... chase for probably thousands of years. Sometimes when one is encountered in the forest it will stand within twenty yards stupidly gazing at a man, or perhaps striking the ground impatiently with its forefoot, and often waiting long enough for an unloaded gun to be charged. The woman of the house came in before we left and we paid her for the use of her fire. She did not know how old her children were, and Velasquez told me that very few of the lower classes ...
— The Naturalist in Nicaragua • Thomas Belt
... years we had seen ships from afar, but this was the first to come to the beach of Akatan. The feast was broken, and the women and children fled to the houses, while we men strung our bows and waited with spears in hand. But when the ship's forefoot smelled the beach the strange men took no notice of us, being busy with their own work. With the falling of the tide they careened the schooner and patched a great hole in her bottom. So the women crept back, ...
— The Son of the Wolf • Jack London
... each stroke, made the most of it. The most prominent noise perhaps was the hum of the fans. Standing forward, the deck seems to slope away downward aft, as indeed it does, for it is to be noted that at these high speeds the forefoot of the boat is always thrown up clean out of the water—and the whole aspect of the boat: the funnels vomiting thin brown smoke, and occasionally, when a fire door is opened, a lurid pillar of flame for a moment; the whirr in the engine room; the dull ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 595, May 28, 1887 • Various
... Herne whooped joyfully, placed his bugle to his lips, and blew the dead mot. He then shouted to Fenwolf to call away and couple the hounds, and, striking off the deer's right forefoot with his knife, presented it to Wyat. Several large leafy branches being gathered and laid upon the ground, the hart was placed upon them, and Herne commenced breaking him up, as the process of dismembering the deer is termed in the language of woodcraft. His first step was to cut off ...
— Windsor Castle • William Harrison Ainsworth
... her wedge-like bows caused the water to ripple before them like a swift current meeting a sharp obstacle in the stream. It was only as she sank into the water, in stemming a swell, that anything like foam could be seen under her forefoot. A long line of swift-receding bubbles, however, marked her track, and she no sooner came abreast of any given group of spectators than she was past it—resembling the progress of a porpoise as he sports along ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... and trough; Lets down his feet, strikes at the breaking water, Draws up his golden feet, beats wings, and rises Over the mast.... Light from a crimson cloud Crimsons the sluggishly creeping foams of waves; The seaman, poised in the bow, rises and falls As the deep forefoot finds a way through waves; And there below him, steadily gazing westward, Facing the wind, the sunset, the long cloud, The goddess of the ship, proud figurehead, Smiles inscrutably, plunges to crying waters, Emerges streaming, gleaming, with jewels falling Fierily from carved ...
— American Poetry, 1922 - A Miscellany • Edna St. Vincent Millay
... morning hours, when there were few people in the park, Skipper's education progressed. He learned to pace around in a circle, lifting each forefoot with a sway of the body and a pawing movement which was quite rhythmical. He learned to box with his nose. He learned to walk sedately behind Reddy and to pick up a glove, dropped apparently by accident. There was always a sugar-plum or a sweet cracker in the glove, ...
— Horses Nine - Stories of Harness and Saddle • Sewell Ford
... that a horse has a lightning knowledge as to whether his rider be afraid of him or not, and acts accordingly. In branding my method was to simply tie up one forefoot and blindfold the colt, when a small and properly-hot stamp-iron can be quickly and effectively applied before he quite ...
— Ranching, Sport and Travel • Thomas Carson
... Schlegel mention a variety that I have not seen, and of which they state that the red colour of the under parts extends to the heel, the forefoot and the toes, while the colour of the upper parts passes into a uniform lustrous black. They also remark, however, that the back not unfrequently assumes a pale yellowish brown tint" ('Anat. and ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... they checked him as he rose, and brought him right down on his head in the broad ditch, on the far side. Old Blossomnose, who was following close behind, not making any allowance for falls, was in the air before I was well down, and his horse came with a forefoot, into my pocket, and tore the lap clean off by the skirt'; his lordship exhibiting ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... ignoring the interruption. "Well, just at daybreak one morning, all of a sudden there was a rakish-looking craft on our weather-bow. Lets fly a nine-pounder across our forefoot, and was alongside before my men could tumble up from below. I got knocked into the sea by the boom and fell between the ships; and the pirate he got hold of me and poured hot grog down my throat to bring me to ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade
... almost perishing for want of subsistence." Going into Long Harbour, 23rd July, the Grenville ran on a rock and remained so fast that she had to be unloaded before she could be floated off the next day, when she was found to have suffered considerable damage to her forefoot. ...
— The Life of Captain James Cook • Arthur Kitson
... was something the matter with the animal's left forefoot. As the doctor lifted it, the manager came up. He agreed with the doctor. I could not make the descent to Santa Fe on that horse that night. Did I feel elated? Rather. I had no wish to descend. Yet I was far from foreseeing what the night was ...
— The Woman in the Alcove • Anna Katharine Green
... dancing, and neither had appeared again. So little Jason went swiftly through the dark, over the ridge and up the big creek to the old circuit rider's house, where the stream forked. All the way he had seen the tracks of a horse which he knew to be Steve's, for the right forefoot, he knew, had cast a shoe only ...
— The Heart Of The Hills • John Fox, Jr.
... it is really noble! it is a true Prince!' exclaimed Miss Sibley. She translated several exclamations of the ladies and gentlemen in German: they were entirely to the same effect. The horse gave us a gleam of his neck as he pawed a forefoot, just reined in. We knew him; he was a gallant horse; but it was the figure of the Prince Albrecht that was so fine. I had always laughed at sculptured figures on horseback. This one overawed me. The Marshal was acknowledging the salute of his army ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... forth, eager to know the result. I soon came on the fresh trail of the robbers, with Lobo in the lead—his track was always easily distinguished. An ordinary wolf's forefoot is 4 1/2 inches long, that of a large wolf 4 3/4 inches, but Lobo's, as measured a number of times, was 5 1/2 inches from claw to heel; I afterward found that his other proportions were commensurate, for he stood three feet high at the shoulder, and weighed 150 pounds. His trail, therefore, though ...
— Wild Animals I Have Known • Ernest Thompson Seton
... been driven over the inner edge of the reef to the comparatively deep water of the lagoon, she would assuredly have gone down, taking us with her. As it was, there was a space of only about a fathom between our forefoot and the inner edge of the reef, as I ascertained later. The great wall of surf, fifty feet high, breaking perpetually upon the outer face of the reef, and stretching mile after mile to north and ...
— The Strange Adventures of Eric Blackburn • Harry Collingwood
... the path is already occupied by a skunk, invisible in the darkness, that, in obedience to the promptings of its insane instinct, refuses to get out of it, until the flying hoofs hit it and sand it like a well-kicked football into the thistles. But the forefoot of the horse, up as high as his knees perhaps, have been sprinkled, and the rider, after coming out into the open, dismounts and walks away twenty yards from his animal, and literally smells himself all over, and ...
— The Naturalist in La Plata • W. H. Hudson
... the best trained war horses in the world; many of them actually understand the complicated commands of their masters. These horse soldiers have the insignia, U. S., branded on the hoof of the left forefoot, and the other animals ...
— The Human Side of Animals • Royal Dixon
... boulder that gave with him and went down the slope in a flurry of shifting stones. He made a gallant effort to recover himself, stumbling to his knees as Cecil left the saddle and landed in the ferns—but just as he struck out for firmer footing his forefoot sank into a wombat hole, and he turned a complete somersault, rolling over and over. He brought up against a big boulder, struggled to ...
— Mates at Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... they had lost of great value. "Young man," said the first eunuch, "hast thou seen the queen's dog?" "It is a female," replied Zadig. "Thou art in the right," returned the first eunuch. "It is a very small she spaniel," added Zadig; "she has lately whelped; she limps on the left forefoot, and has very long ears." "Thou hast seen her," said the first eunuch, quite out of breath. "No," replied Zadig, "I have not seen her, nor did I so much as know that the queen ...
— International Short Stories: French • Various
... Lonesome Pine the traces of the fugitive's horse swerved along the mountain top—the shoe of the right forefoot being broken in half. That swerve was a blind and the sheriff knew it, but he knew where Rufe Tolliver would go and that there would be plenty of time to get him. Moreover, he had a purpose of his own and a secret fear that it might be thwarted, so, without a word, he followed ...
— The Trail of the Lonesome Pine • John Fox, Jr.
... The left forefoot, which was entangled, suddenly came loose and unhurt. Never did Henry see a transformation more rapid and complete. The stag, before pathetic and depressed, a beaten beast, expanded in the twinkling of an eye into a mighty monarch of the forest. He stood erect, threw back ...
— The Eyes of the Woods - A story of the Ancient Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... veiled her forward when the bows plunged into a comber's hollow side, and then as they swung up until her forefoot was clear, foam and green water poured aft in cataracts. Sometimes much of her hull before the bridge sank into the crest of a half-mile sea and lower decks and alleyways looked like rivers. The gale held ...
— Brandon of the Engineers • Harold Bindloss
... with sugar, and he began with "Clairette," feeding the sweet morsels to all his quadruped friends. "Clairette" lifted her forefoot, begging for one more piece. He laid his head against the velvety neck of the animal, stroking caressingly the silky nostrils and around the fine eyes, then kissing her on the white spot just below. The mare seemed to understand ...
— A Little Garrison - A Realistic Novel of German Army Life of To-day • Fritz von der Kyrburg
... gone for ten days, oh delectable one! Hold up your near forefoot and I'll impress the fact upon it, warty toad of a dried mud-puddle." Deesa took a tent-peg and banged Moti Guj ten times on the nails. Moti Guj grunted and shuffled from foot ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... was for more than two-thirds of her length high and dry ashore on a sandy beach, that looked of a brownish yellow in the moonlight, with her forefoot resting between two hillocks covered with some sort of scrub. This prevented her from falling over broadside on, as she was shored up just as if she had been put into dry dock for caulking purposes; although, unfortunately, she was by no means in such a comfortable position, ...
— The Island Treasure • John Conroy Hutcheson |
