"Peck" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... snake is feared, but because it is incomprehensible. The talk of its upas-like influence, its deadly fascination, is chiefly picturesque humbug. Ducks will approach a snake curiously, inwardly debating the possibility of digesting so big a worm at one meal; the moving tail-tip they will peck at cheerfully. This was the sort of thing that one might have observed for himself years ago, here at the Zoo; at the time when the snakes lived in the old house in blankets, because of the unsteadiness of the thermometer, and were fed in public. Now the snakes are fed in strict ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 28, April 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... or Vellas; But with this difference, the Warracha is hard, but the Vellas as soft as pap, both looking alike to the eye no difference; but they are distinct Trees. These are a great help to the People, and a great part of their Food. They grow upon a large Tree, the Fruit is as big as a good Peck loaf, the outside prickly like an Hedg-hog, and of a greenish colour; there are in them Seeds or Kernels, or Eggs as the Chingulayes call them, which lie dispersed in the Fruit like Seeds in a Cucumber. They usually gather them before they be full ripe, boreing an hole in them, and feeling of the ...
— An Historical Relation Of The Island Ceylon In The East Indies • Robert Knox
... Yacht; Or, A Young Millionaire and the Kidnappers," Dick got into a "peck of trouble," to quote his chum, Innis Beeby. But the rich youth finally triumphed over the designs of Uncle Ezra, and was able to ...
— Dick Hamilton's Airship - or, A Young Millionaire in the Clouds • Howard R. Garis
... form of intelligent action in the animal world and that from which most of the higher forms have arisen is illustrated in the following example: a chick will peck at a strange worm, and, finding it unpalatable, will then in the future refuse to peck at worms of that sort. This refusal to do a second time what has once had a disagreeable result is intelligent. We now say that the ...
— The Story of the Mind • James Mark Baldwin
... His stature was but medium, not exceeding five feet four inches, I think; and to make the most of it, he flung his head far back, and gave himself a little strut in walking. He had a thin face with a sharp nose that looked as if it would peck you, and grey eyes that could pierce a millstone if there was a guinea on the far side of it. His hair, for he wore his own, had been red, though it was now grizzled; and the colour of it was set down in Moonfleet to his being ...
— Moonfleet • J. Meade Falkner
... great battle he fought with the Samnites wherein that nation was finally broken and overthrown. For Papirius being encamped over against the Samnites, and perceiving that he fought, victory was certain, and consequently being eager to engage, desired the omens to be taken. The fowls refused to peck; but the chief soothsayer observing the eagerness of the soldiers to fight and the confidence felt both by them and by their captain, not to deprive the army of such an opportunity of glory, reported to the consul that ...
— Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius • Niccolo Machiavelli
... peck of pickled peppers, Now if Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers, Where is that peck of pickled ...
— Games For All Occasions • Mary E. Blain
... which during the breeding season seek hollows in trees; there the female lays eggs and sits upon them, while the male pastes the opening with clay so that only her head is visible, and not until the young are hatched does the male begin to peck with his long beak and free ...
— In Desert and Wilderness • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... friend to me. I will know to-day about whether I can go back to the French front. If not I will try the Belgians and then London, and home. I spent Christmas day in Rome in the catacombs. I could not wear my heart upon my sleeve for duchesses to peck at. It is just as you say, Dad and Mother made the day so dear and beautiful. I did not know how glad I would be to be back here for while the trip East led to no news value, to me personally it was interesting. But I am terribly tired after the last ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... and prick them with a fork—lay them in a deep dish, and to each layer put a layer of salt. Let them remain in it four or five days, then take them out of the salt, and put them in vinegar and water for one night. Drain off the vinegar, and to each peck of tomatos put half a pint of mustard seed, half an ounce of cloves, and the same quantity of pepper. The tomatos should be put in a jar, with a layer of sliced onions to each layer of the tomatos, and the spices ...
— The American Housewife • Anonymous
... 26th Currt was soe short and soe abrupt that I fear you can peck butt little satisfaction ...
— The Lock and Key Library/Real Life #2 • Julian Hawthorne
... the entire monthly allowance of a full grown slave, working constantly in the open field, from morning until night, every day in the month except Sunday, and living on a fraction more than a quarter of a pound of meat per day, and less than a peck of corn-meal per week. There is no kind of work that a man can do which requires a better supply of food to prevent physical exhaustion, than the field-work of a slave. So much for the slave's allowance of food; now for his raiment. The yearly allowance of clothing for the slaves on ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass
... only one's amusements. I pass my lighter hours with them. They interest me in the same manner as a chess problem. We do not care, we in the mighty East, which of you holds your head highest this side of Suez. All you western nations are to us a peck of dust outside our palace gates. Listen, dear one. We can leave, if you will, to-night, and top the clouds before sunrise. And I promise you this," he went on, "when you pass from the greyness of these sordid lands into the everlasting ...
— The Great Prince Shan • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... an exceedingly dull person who made the remark, Ex pede Herculem. He might as well have said, "From a peck of apples you may judge of the barrel." Ex PEDE, to be sure! Read, instead, Ex ungue minimi digiti pedis, Herculem, ejusque patrem, matrem, avos et proavos, filios, nepotes et pronepotes! Talk to me about your [Greek text which cannot ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... pleasantly, and yielded a very good crop; but having part of the seed left only, and not daring to sow all that I had yet, I had but a small quantity at last, my whole crop not amounting to above half a peck of each kind. ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808) • Daniel Defoe
... Quimbo throwing down a coarse bag containing a peck of corn, "thar, nigger, grab, you won't get no more dis ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... 29th of June was duly received. I did not answer it because it plagued me. This morning I received another from Judd and Peck, written by consultation with you. Now let me tell you why I ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... a people who certainly do not wear their hearts on their sleeves for daws to peck at. In the eyes of the more volatile southern Celts they seem a "dour" people. They are naturally reserved, laconic of speech, without "gush," far from lavish in compliment, slow to commit themselves or to give their confidence without ...
— Ulster's Stand For Union • Ronald McNeill
... want some flowers; please hang about my neck A dozen lais; and give me half a peck Of nice bouquets; then I will hire a band And celebrate my entrance to your land. I'll dance the Hula, up and down the street And cry Aloha, to each girl I meet; And if she frowns, and calls me cad, and churl, I'll shout, Long ...
— Poems of Experience • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... Mr Monke were married when the summer came. John Avery and Isoult were invited to the wedding; and Philippa sent a special message requesting that their little Kate might be included; for, said she, "Arthur shall be a peck of trouble, and an' he had one that he might play withal he should be ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt
... one peck of small potatoes and a pound and a half of salt pork; arrange the fish, pork, and potatoes into mounds; divide each equally into four parts; add one quarter of the fish to the stock, next a quarter ...
— Fifty Soups • Thomas J. Murrey
... he wer, a-prowlen roun' Upon the green; an' I look'd down An' told en that I hoped he voun' He mussen think to peck Upon a body zoo, nor whip The meaere to drow me off, nor tip Me out o' cart ageaen, nor slip Cut ...
— Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect • William Barnes
... me, Elphinstone. A week's cruise somewhere away out there to the eastward would set the little darling up far more effectively than all the professor's drugs. Try it, man; it can do no harm; and I'll bet you a— a—well, let us say a peck of rubies, that you'll ...
— With Airship and Submarine - A Tale of Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... old Blinkie will look?" said Bob, trying to picture the jackdaw as he would appear when conscious of his owner's return; and then, deciding in his own mind that the only tribute of affection which he might expect would, most probably, be a sharp peck from Blinkie's beak, he added, "I dare say he ...
— Bob Strong's Holidays - Adrift in the Channel • John Conroy Hutcheson
... minutes Gahogan, of the Tenth; Gildersleeve, of the Fourteenth; Peck, of the First; Thomas, of the Seventh; Taylor, of the Eighth, and Colburn, of the Fifth, were gathered around their commander. There, too, was Bradley, the boyish, red-cheeked chief of the artillery; and Stilton, the rough, ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 8 • Various
... said: 'Friend, he that labours for the sparrow-hawk Has little time for idle questioners.' Whereat Geraint flashed into sudden spleen: 'A thousand pips eat up your sparrow-hawk! Tits, wrens, and all winged nothings peck him dead! Ye think the rustic cackle of your bourg The murmur of the world! What is it to me? O wretched set of sparrows, one and all, Who pipe of nothing but of sparrow-hawks! Speak, if ye be not like the rest, hawk-mad, Where can ...
— Idylls of the King • Alfred, Lord Tennyson
... it. Sufficient provocation having been given, they are allowed to go at each other in their own fashion, and their attacks and breathing-spells are not very unlike a bout of fencing. They flap, fly at each other, fly over, peck, seize by the neck, let go, rest a moment, and begin again, getting more and more excited with each round. The negro separates them, when about to draw blood. And as for Don Manuel, he goes mad over them, like an Italian maestro over his favorite pupil. "Hombre, hombre!" ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... morning. Two-and-a-half pounds of meat, a quantity of syrup, and a peck of meal were given each adult for the week. A special ration for Sunday alone was potatoes, buttermilk, and material for biscuits. Each family had its own garden from which a supply of vegetables could always be obtained in season. The smaller children had additional delicacies, for ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Georgia Narratives, Part 3 • Works Projects Administration
... and in something of a troubled fashion at Anderson, then at Carroll. His mind was in the throes of displacing a barrel of sugar and a half-peck of pease by a little boy. Then his face brightened. He spoke ...
— The Debtor - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... peck the weeds That wave above this bed Where my dear Love lies dead: They flutter and burst the globed seeds, And beat the downy pride Of dandelions, wide: From speargrass, bowed with watery beads, The wet uniting, drips In sparkles off the tips: In mallow ...
— My Beautiful Lady. Nelly Dale • Thomas Woolner
... it. Here and there among the trees a yellow leaf or so still hangs, but the birches are full of catkins set with pearly drops. Now and again half, a dozen small birds swoop down on one of these birches, to peck at the catkins, and then look about for a stone or a rough tree trunk to rub the gum from their beaks. Each is jealous of the rest; they watch and chase and drive one another away, though there are millions of catkins for them to take all they will. And ...
— Wanderers • Knut Hamsun
... there, Peck! where are you?" roared a stern voice from the stable department of the circus, just as the clown's wife seemed about ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins
... has achieved a greater national reputation for books of genuine humor and mirth than GEORGE W. PECK, author of "Peck's ...
— The Soldier Boy; or, Tom Somers in the Army - A Story of the Great Rebellion • Oliver Optic
... of the external air. I have made the scale for one barrel, in order to make it more generally useful to the community at large; however, the same proportions will answer for a greater or less quantity, only proportioning the materials and utensils. Take one peck of good malt ground, one pound of hops, put them in twenty gallons of water, and boil them for half an hour, then run them into a hair cloth bag, or sieve, so as to keep back the hops and malt from the wort, which, when cooled down to 65 degrees by Fahrenheit's thermometer, add to ...
— The American Practical Brewer and Tanner • Joseph Coppinger
... old Mr. Crow loved to look on while others wrangled. And though he had no taste himself for actual fighting, he liked to see his neighbors pummel and peck and buffet and bounce ...
— The Tale of Nimble Deer - Sleepy-Time Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... eyes on the strange bird. But he did not like to admit it. "He's a great credit to the neighborhood," said old Mr. Crow. "And you'd better let him alone, if you should happen to find him, because he's solid gold, you know. And if you flew at him and tried to peck him, just as likely as not you'd break your bill on ...
— The Tale of Jolly Robin • Arthur Scott Bailey
... alive," he mutters. "I mustn't, shan't leave him here. The wolves would soon make bare bones of him, and the carrion crows peck that handsome face of his. They shan't either get at him. No. He's did me a kindness more'n once, it's my turn now. Slave, mulatto, nigger, as they call me, I'll show them that under a coloured skin there can be gratitude, as much as under a white one—may be more. Show them! What ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... remembered the book she was reading. He come back with a copy he'd bought at Spokane and kept it on his bureau. Not that he read it much. It was harder to get into than 'Peck's Bad Boy,' which was ...
— Somewhere in Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... they leave the place in a day or two, and I shall go home; though I dare say not for long. Your wife seems nearly right again; I saw her To-day. Your Father has engaged to sell his Shrimps to Levi, for this season and next, at 4s. a Peck. Your old Gazelle came in on Saturday with all her Nets gone to pieces; the Lugger Monitor came in here yesterday to alter her Nets—from Sunk to Swum, I believe. So here is a Lowestoft Reporter for you: and you may never have it after all. But, if ...
— Edward FitzGerald and "Posh" - "Herring Merchants" • James Blyth
... with much of a like nature, and the use of these test-phrases and sentences has not yet entirely departed from the schools. Familiar are: "Up the high hill he heaved a huge round stone; around the rugged riven rock the ragged rascal rapid ran; Peter Piper picked a peck of prickly pears from the prickly-pear trees on the pleasant prairies," and many others still in use traditionally among the school-children of to-day, together with linguistic exercises of nonsense-syllables and the ...
— The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought • Alexander F. Chamberlain
... "Don't peck at one another, children. Don't you wish we had the money Papa lost when we were little, Jo? Dear me! How happy and good we'd be, if we had no worries!" said Meg, who could remember ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott
... always be money. A foot is always twelve inches, but when is a dollar a dollar? If ton weights changed in the coal yard, and peck measures changed in the grocery, and yard sticks were to-day 42 inches and to-morrow 33 inches (by some occult process called "exchange") the people would mighty soon remedy that. When a dollar is ...
— My Life and Work • Henry Ford
... beak broke through the shell. "Peck!" more beak. "Crack!" a funny little head, a long, bare neck, and then "Pick! Peck! Crack!" before them stood the funniest, fluffiest brown ball resting ...
— Southern Stories - Retold from St. Nicholas • Various
... called them outcasts, so they threw stones and mud at him, and went their way. Then the wolves gathered at the foot of the cross, and the birds flew lower and lower. And presently the birds lighted all at once upon his head and arms and shoulders, and began to peck at him, and the wolves began to eat his feet. 'Outcasts,' he moaned, 'have you also ...
— The Secret Rose • W. B. Yeats
... George W. Peck's hand is of the free and independent order of chirography. It is easy and natural, but not handsome. He writes very voluminously, doing his editorial writing in two days of the week, generally Friday and Saturday. Then he takes a rapid horse, a zealous bird dog and an improved ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye
... raising her head, she first of all perceived before her a large tablet with blue ground, upon which figured nine dragons of reddish gold. The inscription on this tablet consisted of three characters as large as a peck-measure, and declared that this was ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... do," he was saying. "A runabout, perhaps." He came forward rubbing his hands, followed by a thin man in overalls. "Mr. Peck says," he began,—"this is Mr. Peck of Peck and Peck,—says that the place we are looking for is about seven miles from the town. It's ...
— The Man in Lower Ten • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... at all: their suffering is most unchristian, and 'tis evident thereupon to me, that a French post-horse would not know what in the world to do, was it not for the two words...... and...... in which there is as much sustenance, as if you give him a peck of corn: now as these words cost nothing, I long from my soul to tell the reader what they are; but here is the question—they must be told him plainly, and with the most distinct articulation, or it will answer no end—and yet to do it in that plain way—though their reverences may laugh at ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... furnace, and a bathroom in front of the cabin and use it with some fixing over for a dining-room and kitchen. Then we will deepen and widen Singing Water, stick a bushel of bulbs and roots and sow a peck of flower seeds in the marsh, plant a hedge along the drive, and straighten the lake shore a little. I can make a beautiful wild-flower garden and arrange so that with one season's work this will appear very well. We will express this stuff and then select and fell some ...
— The Harvester • Gene Stratton Porter
... came running across the lawn to meet his father, seizing him warmly by the hand, and having administered a dutiful peck to his aunt, turned to introduce the little group of ...
— His Lordship's Leopard - A Truthful Narration of Some Impossible Facts • David Dwight Wells
... of my trees are now 7 years old from seed. These trees had about 1/2 bushel of hulled walnuts last summer and I expect to have about 2 bushels this summer. Last summer I also had about a peck of hard shell almonds from my two trees that were planted in 1927. In 1931 my 6 filberts had about 1/2 peck of nuts. These trees are now big enough to have at least a bushel or two of nuts if the catkins had not frozen ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Twenty-Fourth Annual Meeting • Northern Nut Growers Association
... or propriety of the measure, especially when he was assured in his own mind that the Legislature had not transcended their constitutional powers; and this opinion was sustained as correct by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Fletcher vs. Peck. ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... meet with a great noise of some that endeavor to peck out the crows' eyes; that is, to blind the doctors of our times and smoke out their eyes with new annotations; among whom my friend Erasmus, whom for honor's sake I often mention, deserves if not the first place yet certainly the second. O most foolish instance, ...
— The Praise of Folly • Desiderius Erasmus
... hours without a quaver. At Calais we had the same good luck as at London—a compartment of the car all to ourselves. Here we were to be settled without change for that night and the next day, so with bags and shawl-straps, bundles, lunch-baskets and a peck of oranges, we adjusted ourselves. We breakfasted at Basle, after having pillowed on each other for the night as best we could. Now we were in the midst of the Jura mountains, and all day long we wound up and down their snowy sides and around the beautiful lakes nestling at their feet—through ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 2 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... that, instead, you don't get us into a peck of it," chuckled Grace, tucking herself in under the blankets. "Thank you for getting the bed so nice and ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders Among the Kentucky Mountaineers • Jessie Graham Flower
... and Rimini, beside Ravenna, now remained to Odovacar, and for the next two years and a half (from the autumn of 490 to the spring of 493) Ravenna was straitly besieged. Corn rose to a terrible famine price (seventy-two shillings a peck), and before the end of the siege the inhabitants had to feed on the hides of animals, and all sorts of foul and fearful aliments, and many of them perished of hunger. A sortie made in 491 by a number of barbarian recruits whom Odovacar had by some means ...
— Theodoric the Goth - Barbarian Champion of Civilisation • Thomas Hodgkin
... down, the disturbed sea birds fluttered and screamed around our heads, the boldest even offering to peck at our hands, but fearing to do so for all the clatter they ...
— The Pilots of Pomona • Robert Leighton
... crow again. Dermot halted Badshah in cover and waited. Presently there was a patter over the dry leaves lying on the ground, and a jungle cock, a bird similar to an English bantam, stalked across the glade twenty yards away. It stopped and began to peck. Dermot quietly raised his rifle and took careful aim at its head. He fired, and the body of the cock fell to ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... distance is the dark mass of forests, the glitter of ponds, yellow patches of village; larks in hundreds are soaring, singing, falling headlong with outstretched necks, hopping about the clods; the crows on the highroad stand still, look at you, peck at the earth, let you drive close up, and with two hops lazily move aside. On a hill beyond a ravine a peasant is ploughing; a piebald colt, with a cropped tail and ruffled mane, is running on unsteady legs after its mother; its shrill whinnying reaches us. We drive on into the birch wood, ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Volume II • Ivan Turgenev
... make the captive more secure, and then let his legs drop over the edge of the lantern, intending to get on the rounds of the ladder, but his foot missed the first one. In his effort to regain it he slipped. At that instant the bird freed his head, and with a triumphant "caw!" gave Billy an awful peck on the nose. The result was that the poor boy fell back. He could not restrain a shriek as he did so, but he still kept hold of the raven, and made a wild grasp with his disengaged hand. Fortunately he caught the ladder, ...
— The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands • R.M. Ballantyne
... hedge-sparrow. For days a sparrow has been watched while it fed a hungry complaining intruder. It used to fly on the cuckoo's back and then, standing on its head and leaning downwards, give it a caterpillar. The tit-bit having been greedily snatched and devoured, the cuckoo would peck fiercely at its tiny attendant—bidding it, as it were, fetch more food and not be long about it. Wordsworth tells us in a famous line that "the child is father of the man," and no apter illustration of this truth could be ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... see good days. No: lying is so deeply rooted in nature that we may expel it with a fork, and yet it will always come back again: it is like the poor, we must have it always with us; we must all eat a peck of moral dirt before ...
— Alps and Sanctuaries of Piedmont and the Canton Ticino • Samuel Butler
... with a dark stain and waxed, or, as it is small, it can be easily fumed. If stain is used, stain and wax the pieces before putting them together. The fuming process is more easily done after the clock is assembled. Secure a bucket, a peck measure, or any receptacle large enough, when inverted, to put over the clock. Pour about 2 oz. of strong ammonia into a saucer or small pan. Support the clock above the saucer and cover both with the inverted bucket. Allow it to stand for three or ...
— Mission Furniture - How to Make It, Part 2 • H. H. Windsor
... Peck, an old and valued friend of mine, had several experiences with the Apaches, which culminated in the Peck raid of April 27, 1886, when Apaches jumped his ranch, killed his wife and a man named Charles Owens and carried off Peck's niece. Apparently satisfied ...
— Arizona's Yesterday - Being the Narrative of John H. Cady, Pioneer • John H. Cady
... he said, very gently holding up a bit of bread to the canary to peck at, "if I were in your place I would seize every master in Chancery by the throat to-morrow morning and shake him until his money rolled out of his pockets and his bones rattled in his skin. I would have a settlement out of somebody, by fair means or by foul. ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... know Sam—was afraid to go up. He said he should fall, and that the old birds would peck his eyes. So I went by myself one morning quite early, with a bag tied round my neck, and got up. It was hard work, and I nearly tumbled once; but I got on the bough beneath the hole at last. It shook very much; it is so rotten, you have no idea. There were three ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... use it, if not, take 1 peck of barley, and put it into a stove oven, and steam the moisture from them, grind coarsely, and pour into them 3-1/2 gallons of water, at 170 or 172 degrees. (If you use malt it does not need quite so much water, as it does ...
— Young's Demonstrative Translation of Scientific Secrets • Daniel Young
... (dimensions) 192; multitude &c (number) 102; immensity; enormity; infinity &c 105; might, strength, intensity, fullness; importance &c 642. great quantity, quantity, deal, power, sight, pot, volume, world; mass, heap &c (assemblage) 72; stock &c (store) 636; peck, bushel, load, cargo; cartload^, wagonload, shipload; flood, spring tide; abundance &c (sufficiency) 639. principal part, chief part, main part, greater part, major part, best part, essential part; bulk, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... Logan had called him out to the lobby. There was a letter for him, she said, with three stamps on it. Three stamps! Did anyone ever hear the like of that? And he was to go into the lobby and give her three kisses, one after the other ... peck, peck, peck ... and then it would be his turn to call for someone, and Aggie would expect him to call for her! ... Willie Logan had called for a girl. He had a letter for her with fifty stamps on it ... A great roar of laughter had gone ...
— The Foolish Lovers • St. John G. Ervine
... burst out Steve; "I tell you, fellows, we're going to have a peck of trouble with this ...
— With Trapper Jim in the North Woods • Lawrence J. Leslie
... mid-air. The glossy threads with which it is knitted are stout, and the structure is not likely therefore to be torn by the beaks of insectivorous birds; while its pendulous position makes it doubly secure against their attacks, as the apparatus gives way when they peck at it. There is a small orifice at each end of the egg-shaped bag, to admit of the escape of the moth when it changes from the little chrysalis which sleeps tranquilly in its ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... never did mother-sheep love her lamb as the pelican loves its young. When the young are born, the parent bird devotes all his care and thought to nourishing them. But the young birds are ungrateful, and when they have grown strong and self-reliant they peck at their father's face, and he, enraged at their ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 4 • Charles Dudley Warner
... Authorities, and raises the "Black Flag" upon White Officers commanding Negro Soldiers.—The New York Press calls upon the Government to protect its Negro Soldiers.—Secretary Stanton's Action.—The President's Order.—Correspondence between Gen. Peck and Gen. Pickett in Regard to the Killing of a Colored Man after he had surrendered at the Battle of Newbern.—Southern Press on the Capture and Treatment of Negro Soldiers.—The Rebels refuse to exchange Negro Soldiers captured on Morris and James Islands on Account of the Order of the Confederate ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams
... with a speckled coat and a comb the color of red coral: very small, but lively and vigorous, and exhibiting in all her movements both grace and stateliness. She would nestle in my lap, take a ride on my shoulder, and walk the length of my arm to peck at a bit of cake in my hand, regarding me all the while with a queer sidelong glance, and croaking out her satisfaction and content. When she was ready to go she walked to the kitchen door, and asked in a very shrill voice to be let out. She ...
— Miss Elliot's Girls • Mrs Mary Spring Corning
... Skinner'll have to buy them four nickel-plated fire-extinguishers that Miss Briggs owns, at twenty-five dollars each, I'll give you four bushels of Benoni apples, two bushels of Early Rose potatoes, four bunches of celery, a peck of peas, and one spring chicken. And if you won't" he added, raising his hand threateningly, "I'll go to them six councilmen, an' I'll graft 'em one at a time, an' THEN where 'll your boss grafter ...
— Kilo - Being the Love Story of Eliph' Hewlitt Book Agent • Ellis Parker Butler
... enlivened by grunts and whistles, and the occasional asseveration of the singers that their paternal parent was a man of less than ordinary stature. This insensibly changes into "Willy brewed a Peck of Malt," and finally settles down into "Nix my Dolly," appropriately danced and chorussed, until a policeman, who has no music in his soul, stops their harmony, but threatens to take them into charge if they do not bring their ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, November 27, 1841 • Various
... imposition of whose hands, I, and several other brethren in Canada, have been set apart to the Holy Ministry. After my return to Kingston, brother Healy and I received from the Black River Conference a complimentary resolution in regard to our visit. In enclosing it to me, Rev. Jesse T. Peck, the Secretary [afterwards Bishop], said:—Allow me humbly, but earnestly, to beg a continuance of that friendship with you, which in its commencement has afforded ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... powers were useful to fill up the time, she shone with singular brilliance. The West End is too often in debt to the City, but, in the matter of chaff, it was not so this day; for whenever she took a peck she returned a bushel; and so she rattled to the door of Solomon Oldfield, ...
— A Terrible Temptation - A Story of To-Day • Charles Reade
... Ask for oatmeal at breakfast and they send to the livery stable for a peck of oats and ask you please to be so kind as to show them ...
— A Book of Burlesques • H. L. Mencken
... He turned to Dufrenne, excitement showing in every line of his face. As he hurried toward the door he spoke over his shoulder to Monsieur Perrier. "Don't open your mouth to a soul—do you hear? If you do, you'll get yourself into a peck of trouble." The last thing they heard as they left the shop was the ...
— The Ivory Snuff Box • Arnold Fredericks
... which the corn-spirit often assumes is that of a cock. In Austria children are warned against straying in the corn-fields, because the Corn-cock sits there, and will peck their eyes out. In North Germany they say that "the Cock sits in the last sheaf"; and at cutting the last corn the reapers cry, "Now we will chase out the Cock." When it is cut they say, "We have caught the Cock." At Braller, in Transylvania, when the reapers come to the last patch of ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... many little cubs, as well as a few ole Bears, have been gobbled up by your confounded efforts at runnin' up gold, while you grin and chuckle like the laffin' hyena, when ransackin' Navy Yards and whisky distilleries. But, if you insist on goin' ahead and earnin' your daily peck by smashin' things and layin' out the onsofisticated, all I have got to say is, that next time you've got a sure thing to make a speck, by telegrafin' me at Skeensboro, I won't mind comin' down and takin' a hand in, if my pocketin' ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 26, September 24, 1870 • Various
... number of snakes, evenly laid side by side, so as to take up as little room as possible. The majority of these creatures were rattlesnakes; but there were black snakes among them, and one large spotted snake. Besides these, there were, as the narrator expressed it, at least a peck of spring frogs; these having probably crawled in to fill up all corners and vacant places. All these reptiles were of course dormant and ...
— Stories of New Jersey • Frank Richard Stockton
... Come up, now, prithee, Bridewell Bird! You will drink, will you? I saw no dust or cobwebs come out of your mouth. Go hang, you moon-calf, false faucet, you roaring horse-courser, you ranger of Turnbull, you dull malt-house with a mouth of a peck and the sign of the ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 1 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... the discomfort of fatuous conversation, Daniel played a number of old motetts for Herr Carovius. Herr Carovius was so pleased that he ran into his pantry, and got a half dozen Boxdorf apples and put them in Daniel's pockets. He bought these apples every autumn by the peck, and cherished them ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... me extremely about my "World," but it has brought me into a peck of troubles. In short, the good-natured town have been pleased to lend me a meaning, and call my Lord Bute Sir Eustace. I need not say how ill the story tallies to what they apply it; but I do vow to you, that so far from once entering into ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... chirp and a twitter, and when she looked at the bare flower-bed at her left side there he was hopping about and pretending to peck things out of the earth to persuade her that he had not followed her. But she knew he had followed her and the surprise so filled her with delight that ...
— The Secret Garden • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... trustingness as imbecility, while he hates him as a man because his nature is the perpetual opposite and perpetual reproach of his own. Now, Reineke would not have hurt a creature, not even Scharfenebbe, the crow's wife, when she came to peck his eyes out, if he had not been hungry; and that [Greek: gastros ananke], that craving of the stomach, makes a difference quite infinite. It is true that, like Iago, Reineke rejoices in the exercise of his intellect: the sense of his power and the ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude
... The hens peck the cock. They must be keeping Lent, or perhaps the virtuous widows don't care for their ...
— Letters of Anton Chekhov • Anton Chekhov
... and spake the fair Whitefoord, As she sat by the Bishop's knee, 'A peck o' white pennies, my good lord, If ye'll grant Hughie the ...
— Lyra Heroica - A Book of Verse for Boys • Various
... life of Priest Sander began in 1901. Then Jos. C. Peck, racer and raiser of trotting horses, met this priest in Albany, who wore the ordinary garb of a citizen. They met at the race track, which was not a very good recommendation to say the least of it, for the Rev. Father Sander. Peck found that this priest was a keen judge ...
— Thirty Years In Hell - Or, From Darkness to Light • Bernard Fresenborg
... gentle airs of eve. His straw-decked thatch, where doves bask in the sun, And play, and hop, invites to sweeter rest Than golden halls of state Or beds of down afford. To him the plumy people Chatter and whistle on his And from his quiet hand Peck crumbs ...
— The Development of the Feeling for Nature in the Middle Ages and - Modern Times • Alfred Biese
... again, sprang toward her friend, dabbed a little kiss, like the peck of a bird, on each cheek, cried: "Well, I must be off, or mother will have to tie up the professor to keep him," and was off accordingly with the speed and lightness of a ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr
... lived these ten years in a graveyard, so to speak, under a canopy of funereal gloom, and he thrives on it. He and Clarice are the most superior persons I know; and they have gone and got themselves into a peck, or rather several bushels, of trouble, about nothing at all. They must like it, or why should they do it? I doubt if I can ever be educated up to that point. I have the rude and simple tastes of a child: sunshine seems to me better than shade (except during the heated term), and pleasure ...
— A Pessimist - In Theory and Practice • Robert Timsol
... have instantly my Vulture, Crow, Raven, come flying hither, on the news, To peck for carrion, my she-wolfe, and all, Greedy, ...
— Volpone; Or, The Fox • Ben Jonson
... You're a good American, eh? And yet some spy might fool you with a cute story and get your help and maybe play you for a sucker on the other side. I saw that happen once. It was a nice young chap, and a pretty girl fooled him—got him into a peck of trouble. What you want to remember is that good spies never seem ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... a peck o' maut, And Rob and Allan cam to pree; Three blither hearts that lee-lang night, Ye wad na find ...
— English Songs and Ballads • Various
... he said aloud: "be ye bird, or be ye beast, ye are safe from these old hands. I have eaten and I have drunk: why should I take life, when my wants call for no sacrifice? It will not be long afore the birds will peck at eyes that shall not see them, and perhaps light on my very bones; for if things like these are only made to perish, why am I to expect to live for ever? Come forth, come forth; you are safe from harm at these ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper
... children flies to the back-door when school lets out. "Don't you come in here with all that mud!" she squalls excitedly. "Look at you! A peck o' dirt on each foot. Right in my nice clean kitchen that I just scrubbed. Go 'long now and clean your shoes. Go 'long, I tell you. Slave and slave for you and that's all the thanks I get. You'd keep the place looking like a hogpen, if I ...
— Back Home • Eugene Wood
... liked and many could not eat. It was boiled cracked wheat with a little meat chopped in, no sauce or other relish upon it. I mentioned the case to the doctor, who said, "They purchased a quantity of potatoes, half a peck of which I took to my house and cooked, finding only one or two, among the whole, fit to put into the human stomach. Hence, I looked over my army dietary, found the cracked wheat answered a good purpose, and proposed it here." The ...
— The Prison Chaplaincy, And Its Experiences • Hosea Quinby
... She has had two strokes and can't talk any more. We have no boys but two girls, Matilda and Emma Maye Smith. Matilda Parker my daughter lives in Pittsburg, Pa. Emma Maye works to support us. She works as nurse for Mrs. J.H. Hunter but right now is out of work. Charity helps us a little. One half peck meal, 1 pound powdered milk, two cans grape fruit juice, one half pound coffee per week. This amounts to about eighty cents worth rations per week. The charity don't ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves, North Carolina Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... notes, and in another week of ten hours a day labor I had results which astonished myself and satisfied him. Still there was no trace of praise in words or manner. He signified that it would do by placing before me about a half a peck of bones, telling me to see what I could make of them, with no further directions to guide me. I soon found that they were the skeletons of half a dozen fishes of different species; the jaws told ...
— Louis Agassiz as a Teacher • Lane Cooper
... de slaves wuz 'lowed ter stay on de plantation en 'lowed ter farm en gib half dey made. Atter slavery I useter wuk fer fifty cents en git a peck ob meal, three pounds ob bacon en a quart ob syrup which would ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Tennessee Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... Democrat, has any use for a turncoat. I take it all in all, he is the most onpopular man in Illinoy to-day. His conduct is as hard to swaller as a dose of them old Greek twins, Castor Oil and Politics, we use to wrastle with at school. Of course in political life, like in ordinary life, you have to eat a peck o' dirt before you die, but you don't have to eat it all at oncst like he's a doin'! Why, old war-horses, Republicans all their lives, were turned down for this here upstart! It's done the party a deal of harm. And then, as ...
— The Statesmen Snowbound • Robert Fitzgerald
... perhaps the original bold explorer, seeking vainly for another crumb, hopped upon his bare hand as it lay in the grass, but feeling its warmth flew away a foot, hung hovering a moment or two, then came back and took a peck. ...
— The Keepers of the Trail - A Story of the Great Woods • Joseph A. Altsheler
... furnished directly, although in recent years banks are beginning to loan on crop-liens. The food supplied is often based on the number of working hands, irrespective of the number of children in the family. This is occasionally a hardship. The customary ration is a peck of corn meal and three pounds of pork per week. Usually a crop-lien together with a bill of sale of any personal property is given as security, but in some states landlords have a first lien upon all crops for rent and advances. In all districts the tenant is allowed to cut wood for ...
— The Negro Farmer • Carl Kelsey
... to belong, has sent many a good man to the gallows. One of the best of Rosecrans's scouts—a native of East Kentucky—lost his life because he would "bounce" (mount) his nag, "pack" (carry) his gun, eat his bread "dry so," (without butter,) and "guzzle his peck o' whiskey," in the midst of Bragg's camp, when no such things were done there, nor in the mountains of Alabama, whence he professed to come. Acquainted only with a narrow region, the poor fellow did not know that every Southern district has its ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 96, October 1865 • Various
... beast, or bird, it has been said, can put himself into such a posture as to make an Ionic volute. When the volutes are made by the heads of eagles, well and good; but it is certainly strange to make them out of the heads of cranes, who are holding down their long necks to peck each one at a human skull which he firmly holds down with one of his feet. And on the other side of Laval will also be found the church of Price, an almost untouched Romanesque building the masonry of which seems to carry it back to days before the growth of either Angevin or Norman ...
— Sketches of Travel in Normandy and Maine • Edward A. Freeman
... old hen led forth her brood To scratch and glean and peck for food; A chick, to give her wings a spell, Fluttered and tumbled in a well. The mother wept till day was done, When she met with a grown-up son, And thus addressed him:—"My dear boy, Your years and vigour give me joy: You thrash all cocks around, I'm told; ...
— Fables of John Gay - (Somewhat Altered) • John Gay
... cast our grappling over the bow, and begun to tow the boat to the ship, than the abominable bird that we had scared settled down into it again, notwithstanding our proximity, and began to peck at the face of the dead boy. At this moment we heard a gibbering noise, and saw something like a bundle of old rags roll out from beneath the stem—sheets, and whatever it was, apparently make a fruitless attempt to drive ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... one it hath; its blood is eath and quick of flow, Wide-mouthed, though all the rest be black, its ears are white as snow. It hath an idol like a cock, that doth its belly peck, And half a dirhem is its worth, if thou its ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume IV • Anonymous
... silent during the drive. But they kissed each other in parting, not with the peck which women so often give each other, but with a true kiss. And when Leonore, in crossing the porch, encountered the mastiff which Peter had given her, she stopped and kissed him too, very tenderly. What is more, she brought him inside, which was against the rules, and ...
— The Honorable Peter Stirling and What People Thought of Him • Paul Leicester Ford
... dried German yeast in about three tablespoonfuls of cold water, add to this one pint and a half of water a little warm, and pour the whole into the flour; knead it well immediately, and let it stand as before directed for one hour: then bake at pleasure. It will not hurt if you make up a peck of flour at once, and bake three or four loaves in succession, provided you do not keep the dough too warm. German yeast may be obtained at almost any corn-chandler's in the metropolis and suburbs. In winter it will keep good for a week in a dry place, and in summer it should ...
— Enquire Within Upon Everything - The Great Victorian Domestic Standby • Anonymous
... had been shipped, the boat had steamed down the river, and the place, lately so full of busy life, had returned to its accustomed quiet seclusion, the redbirds came to peck up the corn left upon the ground. I remember how once, upon a cold, gray afternoon, I put on my wraps and ran down to the Sycamore Barn, on purpose to watch the shy, beautiful things. Snowflakes were beginning to fall and whisper about the great bamboo vines; twisted around the trees upon the ...
— Plantation Sketches • Margaret Devereux
... he saw the last of his friend. I saw that, and set down the anxiety he expressed that I should write to him at its proper value. I have quite got over my weakness for him at last. No man who really loved me would have put what he owed to a peck of newspaper people before what he owed to his wife. I hate him for letting me convince him! I believe he was glad to get rid of me. I believe he has seen some woman whom he likes at Turin. Well, let him follow his new fancy, if he pleases! ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... you, Mrs. Meadowsweet," she said, running up to the good lady and giving her a kiss, which resembled the peck of an eager bird, on her cheek. "I ran on first, and Martha is following. I came to know how you are, and how you're bearing up—and ...
— The Honorable Miss - A Story of an Old-Fashioned Town • L. T. Meade
... writer's zoological knowledge is at fault. Animals, which never or very rarely see man, have no fear of him whatever. This is well-known to those who visit the Gull-fairs at Ascension Island, Santos and many other isolated rocks; the hen birds will peck at the intruder's ankles but they do not rise from off their eggs. For details concerning the "Gull-fair" of the Summer Islands consult p. 4 "The History of the Bermudas," edited by Sir J. H. Lefroy for the Hakluyt Society, 1882. I have seen birds on Fernando ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 9 • Richard F. Burton
... interesting story of English political and social life, making no demands upon one's credulity, but satisfying the requirements in the way of a thoroughly good novel. The characters are all drawn with real fidelity to life.—HARRY THURSTON PECK, ...
— The Slave of Silence • Fred M. White
... almost burst myself with eating and drinking, and all of the very best, but she has gone and filled my portmanteau too, filled it up chock full, sir! A fine ham of bacon, sir, and a pair of roasted fowls, with two bottles of brandy, and a matter of a peck ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... each horse, for the twenty-four hours. His steam mill in London consumes one hundred and twenty bushels of coal in twenty-four hours, turns ten pair of stones, which grind eight bushels of flour an hour each, which is nineteen hundred and twenty bushels in the twenty-four hours. This makes a peck and a half of coal perform exactly as much as a horse, in one day, ...
— The Writings of Thomas Jefferson - Library Edition - Vol. 6 (of 20) • Thomas Jefferson
... peck, and a hug around the neck. (She embraces JIM playfully. He hands her the gum, patting his shoulder as he sits on box.) Oh, thank you. Youse a ...
— The Mule-Bone: - A Comedy of Negro Life in Three Acts • Zora Hurston and Langston Hughes
... at a bound, and was met by a peck between the eyes that would have turned most dogs; but Crusoe only winked, and the next moment ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... strongest in the State!" denied the stranger. "I know a man who can lift a barrel of flour as easily as I can a peck of potatoes." ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... changed his tactics. His axe was six or eight inches longer in the haft than that of Rezu, and therefore he could reach where Rezu could not, for the giant was short-armed. He twisted it round in his hand so that the moon-shaped blade was uppermost, and keeping it almost at full length, began to peck with the gouge-shaped point on the back at the head and arms of Rezu, that as I knew was a favourite trick of his in fight from which he won his name of "Woodpecker." Rezu defended his head with his shield as best he ...
— She and Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... "table," with mountains of rice, scow-loads of apricots cooked in various ways, and a good sized flock of chickens spitted and smeared with peppery sauce. At a guess, I should say there were several pounds of meat, about two chickens, and a peck of rice per man, with apricots and raisins added; but they ...
— Jimgrim and Allah's Peace • Talbot Mundy
... to apprehend the least danger from them, and the people in the fort wandered about as freely as if no foe had ever excited their fears. An accident occurred which sent a tremor of dismay through the whole colony, and which we will describe as related to the intelligent historian, Peck, from the lips of one of the parties, who experienced all the terrors ...
— Daniel Boone - The Pioneer of Kentucky • John S. C. Abbott
... explain one of my failures a few years ago in planting some Persian walnuts. I went to another tree in western New York, and got a peck or more. They were planted the same day, in the same ground, and all came up. Those I got from another tree resembled a hill of beans, and stayed that way for three years. Why wouldn't those grow? In soil three feet from those, there were ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Second Annual Meeting - Ithaca, New York, December 14 and 15, 1911 • Northern Nut Growers Association
... Paddy-bird felt hungry, she flew to a cocoa-nut and began to peck at it. But she did not know the secret of the three little holes at the top of the cocoa-nut; so she pecked, and pecked, and got no further. At last she gathered all her strength, and gave a tremendous ...
— The Talking Thrush - and Other Tales from India • William Crooke
... you half as much as I do now, I shall always come to see you, I think; and, as I shall be a very old man by that time, perhaps you will still sit on a stool at my knee and give me a kiss now and then—oh, a mere bird's peck, just for kindness.... The Via de' Bardi is grey, and you are there in yellow. You are like a young daffodil dancing in the winter grass. But soon you will have strained to your full flower-time, and I see you in your summering, ...
— Earthwork Out Of Tuscany • Maurice Hewlett
... slaughter was so great that, according to Livy, when Mago, a brother of Hannibal, carried the news of the victory to Carthage, he, in confirmation of the intelligence, poured down in the porch of the Senate- house, nearly a peck of gold rings taken from the fingers of ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers
... in this country upon marine Protozoa. A few observations have been made by Kellicott, Stokes, and Peck, but these have not been at all complete. With the exception of Miss Stevens's excellent description of species of Lichnophora I am aware of no single papers on individual forms. Peck ('93 and '95) ...
— Marine Protozoa from Woods Hole - Bulletin of the United States Fish Commission 21:415-468, 1901 • Gary N. Galkins
... sea-water thread Below them. Ah, the autumn day I, passing, saw you overhead! First, out a cloud of curtain blew, Then a sweet cry, and last came you— 140 To catch your lory that must needs Escape just then, of all times then, To peck a tall plant's fleecy seeds, And make me happiest of men. I scarce could breathe to see you reach So far back o'er the balcony To catch him ere he climbed too high Above you in the Smyrna peach That quick the round smooth cord of gold, This coiled hair on your head, unrolled, ...
— Dramatic Romances • Robert Browning
... boiled, (p.73, 75.) Mass is ordered to be said at six o'clock, in order, says the household book that all my lord's servants may rise early, (p.170.) Only twenty-four fires are allowed, beside the kitchen and hall, and most of these have only a peck of coals a day allowed them. (p.99.) After Lady-day, no fires permitted in the rooms, except half-fires in my lord's and lady's, and lord Piercy's and the nursery, (p.101.) It is to be observed, that ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume |
