"Perch" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... once, her brother decided. Stubbornness or no stubbornness, she must go this time. Why he didn't think of going himself Val never afterwards knew. Perhaps he possessed a spark of the family love of danger, after all, but mostly he clung to his perch because of that last threat. Whoever Jeems was or whatever he had done, he was one and alone. And he might relish another player on his side. But ...
— Ralestone Luck • Andre Norton
... doorway of the room, and slightly cocked up his evil eye at the goldfinch. Instantly a raging thirst beset the bird, and when it was appeased he still drew several unnecessary buckets of water, leaping about the perch and sharpening his ...
— My Father as I Recall Him • Mamie Dickens
... conclusion, by this time, that the hungry soldier boy was not a recruiting officer, or even the corporal of a guard sent to apprehend him, and he was returning with confidence to partake of his noonday meal. Tom, from his perch at the top of the chimney, watched him as he ambled along over the rough path with his eyes fixed upon the ground. There was something rather exciting in the situation of affairs, and he soon found himself ...
— The Soldier Boy; or, Tom Somers in the Army - A Story of the Great Rebellion • Oliver Optic
... a perch when the click of a pistol was heard, but no report; the fact having been, that the pistol missed fire, and ...
— The Tithe-Proctor - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... when they had reached the farmyard—"now I'll hide in this oak here and you can hide in that one there." He pointed to a tree a little further from the chicken house than the one where he intended to perch. Naturally, it was not like Jasper Jay to give the best ...
— The Tale of Jasper Jay - Tuck-Me-In Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... even numbers will take the starboard side of the ship," said Mr. Lowington from his perch on the hatch. "All who have drawn odd numbers will take ...
— Outward Bound - Or, Young America Afloat • Oliver Optic
... the tormenting pin Stills in his awful glance its dizzy din; Beneath that stern regard the chewing-gum Which writhed and squeaked between the teeth is dumb; Obedient to his will the dunce-cap flies To perch upon the brows of the unwise; The supple switch forsakes the parent wood To settle where 'twill do the greatest good, Puissant still, as when of old it strove With Solomon for spitting on the stove Learned Professor, variously great, Guide, ...
— Black Beetles in Amber • Ambrose Bierce
... perch for a colony of gray parrots, prattling, quarrelsome, ferocious birds, which set upon living birds, and those who would judge them from their congeners which Europe keeps in cages, would ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... for the imagined spot close by, followed by the rest, evidently to Mak's delight, for he began to grin hugely and raised up suspicion in the boys that their sympathy was being wasted, for all at once Pig hopped back on to the top of the wall, baboon fashion, to perch there like one of the hideous little beasts, none the worse for his leap down into the tree top ...
— Dead Man's Land - Being the Voyage to Zimbambangwe of certain and uncertain • George Manville Fenn
... present) 186; domesticate, colonize; take root, strike root; anchor; cast anchor, come to an anchor; sit down, settle down; settle; take up one's abode, take up one's quarters; plant oneself, establish oneself, locate oneself; squat, perch, hive, se nicher[Fr], bivouac, burrow, get a footing; encamp, pitch one's tent; put up at, put up one's horses at; keep house. endenizen[obs3], naturalize, adopt. put back, replace &c. (restore) 660. Adj. placed &c. v.; situate, posited, ensconced, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... top of the morning to you, my pretty Miss chattering Mag, up on your perch there,' responded ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... band goes by; For your perch, the lamp post high; For your pleasure, on the street Dogs are fighting, drums are beat; For your sake, the boyish fray, Organ grinder, run-away; Trucks for your convenience are; For your ease, the bob-tail ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume X (of X) • Various
... satisfied to live and die there. Rather than live elsewhere, they will walk, as some of them do, twelve miles in the early morning, to their work down in the valley of the Durance, and twelve miles home again, in the evenings, to their perch on ...
— The Huguenots in France • Samuel Smiles
... didn't say that," explained Jack, as he landed a good-sized perch in the bottom of the boat, "there's one for luck. That was a comment of my own. Wait until I put a fresh bait on and I will tell you what he did ...
— The Boy Scouts Patrol • Ralph Victor
... the leading horse could barely stagger another fifty yards, notwithstanding the inhuman efforts of the cocchiere to make the most of the poor brute's failing energies. At last the animal stumbled and fell, nearly pulling the driver off his perch. It was sad, but he had more than earned his price, ...
— The Albert Gate Mystery - Being Further Adventures of Reginald Brett, Barrister Detective • Louis Tracy
... Seated on his perch above the abyss, the officer lowered his field glasses and turned his face. Then he rose and moved over to where she was sitting. She ...
— Special Messenger • Robert W. Chambers
... and find another calling. This was precisely what Will himself had in mind, and persuasion was not needed. In his reply he asked that the wedding-day be set, and then he handed Trotter his resignation from the lofty perch ...
— Last of the Great Scouts - The Life Story of William F. Cody ["Buffalo Bill"] • Helen Cody Wetmore
... Lamb to Manning, written probably at Margate, where this year's holidays were spent. It is deeply interesting and I wish 1 could print it even with its imperfections. There are references to White, Dyer, Coleridge ("Pity that such human frailties should perch upon the margin of Ulswater Lake") and the Lloyds. Also to politics and the riddle of life. "What we came here for I know ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas
... Pyramids forty centuries look down upon you. The sun of Austerlitz has risen once more. The Guard dies, but never surrenders. My eagles, flying from steeple to steeple, never shall droop till they perch on the towers ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... the prisoners were huddled, it became evident that all must go unless the old tower could be torn away. Up the uneven, rickety wall went Jim, nimble as a squirrel. Crack! crack! fell the dead boards, then with a clang and clamor, down rolled the old bell from its perch, carrying with it the last of ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 23, October, 1891 • Various
... is only rough work; we will first put up a perch or two for them, and then close in the side, and thatch the roof with cocoa-nut branches; but there's Juno taking in the dinner, so ...
— Masterman Ready • Captain Marryat
... rarely disturb the person of a traveler, but their chief amusement is to cut away outside packages. As a precaution we mounted our Cossack on the trunk, but before we went a mile he fell from his perch in spite of his utmost efforts to cling to the vehicle. After that event he rode by the ...
— Overland through Asia; Pictures of Siberian, Chinese, and Tartar - Life • Thomas Wallace Knox
... accept of a jack[53], which is the best I have caught this season. I intend to come and stay with you a week, and see how the perch bite in the Black River. I observed with some concern, the last time I saw you upon the bowling-green, that your whip wanted a lash to it; I will bring half a dozen with me that I twisted last week, which I hope will serve you all the time you are in the ...
— The De Coverley Papers - From 'The Spectator' • Joseph Addison and Others
... was over Jerrie made her grandmother sit still while she washed up and put away the dishes, singing as she worked, and whistling, too—loud, dear, ringing strains, which made a robin in the grass fly up to the perch, where, with his head turned on one side he listened, as if in wonder, to this new songster, whose notes were ...
— Tracy Park • Mary Jane Holmes
... apparently aniconic. The divinity was not embodied in any graven image, but was inherent in such objects as the rude natural concretions found in the House of the Fetish Shrine, or was supposed to dwell in sacred trees, on which sometimes perch the doves which indicate that the goddess is present as ruler of the air, or which are twined with serpents, showing her presence as goddess of the earth and underworld. In the place of sacred trees we have often sacred pillars, which seem to have been objects of worship down ...
— The Sea-Kings of Crete • James Baikie
... Plant-lice and Ants caught in it, as well as tufted seeds which have blown from the capitula of the Cichoriaceae. A Gad-fly, as big as a Blue bottle, falls into the trap before my eyes. She has barely alighted on the perilous perch when lo, she is held by the hinder tarsi! The Fly makes violent efforts to take wing; she shakes the slender plant from top to bottom. If she frees her hinder tarsi she remains snared by the front tarsi and has to begin all over again. I was ...
— More Hunting Wasps • J. Henri Fabre
... memories woke in him, and he knew what it was. It was the stand of a rocket. The confused, incongruous memories still possessed him up to the very moment of a fierce but familiar sound; and an instant after the rocket left its perch and went up into endless space like a starry arrow aimed at the stars. March thought suddenly of the signs of the last days and knew he was looking at the apocalyptic meteor of something ...
— The Man Who Knew Too Much • G.K. Chesterton
... it was the custom in Europe to hunt various birds, such as the wild duck and partridge, with falcons. The falcons were long-winged birds of prey, resembling hawks. They were trained to perch on their master's wrist and wait patiently until they were told to fly. Then they would swiftly dart at their prey and bear it to the ground. Henry was very fond of falconry and hence was known as ...
— Famous Men of The Middle Ages • John H. Haaren, LL.D. and A. B. Poland, Ph.D.
... haste, all eagerness, all desire for his mate seemed to have left Thor; and if Iskwao had been eager and yearning she was profoundly indifferent now. For two or three minutes Thor stood looking casually about, and this gave Muskwa time to come up and perch himself ...
— The Grizzly King • James Oliver Curwood
... Mistis," announced the negro driver, descending from his perch, and at the same instant the door of the house flew open and Eugenia ran out, bareheaded, ...
— The Voice of the People • Ellen Glasgow
... from his perch, but his meal was not at all disturbed, for he began eating again with apparent relish. Indeed, I was soon furnished with another of these unconscious protectors. This one came from the opposite direction to a point ...
— Indian Boyhood • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... all was well. It was for this reason that I sat upon the Shrubbery gate towards nine o'clock of a certain evening, swinging my legs and listening for the sound of her step along the path. In the fulness of time she came, and getting off my perch, I took the heavy basket from her ...
— My Lady Caprice • Jeffrey Farnol
... those too of the finest kinds. I once saw Mr. Scott secure a Murray cod, floating on the top of the water, that weighed 72lbs. This beautiful and excellent fish is figured in Mitchell's first work. It is a species of perch, and is very abundant, as well as several others of its own genus, that are richer but smaller; the general size of the cod varying from ...
— Expedition into Central Australia • Charles Sturt
... last it became necessary, as the time of being called to the bar approached, to provide a dwelling in London. In his latter days, he pointed out a house in Cursitor Street. "There," said he, "was my first perch. Many a time have I run down from that house to Fleet Market, to get sixpennyworth of sprats for supper." At this period, in mentioning to his brother the kindness of a great conveyancer, Mr Duane, whom he attended as a gratuitous pupil, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844 • Various
... From scenes of art which chase That thought away, turn, and with watchful eyes Feed it 'mid Nature's old felicities, Rocks, rivers, and smooth lakes more clear than glass Untouched, unbreathed upon. Thrice happy guest, If from a golden perch of aspen spray (October's workmanship to rival May) The pensive warbler of the ruddy breast That moral teaches by a heaven-taught lay, Lulling the year, with all its cares, ...
— English Critical Essays - Nineteenth Century • Various
... time each day drew us closer to each other. He began to perch on twigs only a few inches from my face and listen while I whispered to him—yes, he LISTENED and made answer with chirps. Nothing else would describe it. As I wrote he would alight on my manuscript paper and try to read. Sometimes ...
— My Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... beautiful birds in a large cage, taking their morning bath. They would jump down into their little bath-tub, dip their heads in the water, and then plunge in all over; then they would perch on the side of the tub, shake the bright drops from their feathers, and seem to be enjoying themselves as much as Birdie herself does when mamma ...
— The Nursery, May 1873, Vol. XIII. - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest People • Various
... delicate roots; the storms will batter and tear the frail creepers. No doubt. But at this present moment all is fair and fragrant. And when the storms have done their wicked worst, and the sun and the frosts—nay, when that roof on which we perch is pulled to pieces, tiles and bricks, and the whole block goes—may there not be, for those caring enough, the chance of growing another garden, there ...
— Hortus Vitae - Essays on the Gardening of Life • Violet Paget, AKA Vernon Lee
... statue of the Rev. Thomas Charles, the distinguished theological writer, to whom was largely due the foundation of the British and Foreign Bible Society. Bala Lake, the largest in Wales (4 m. long by some 3/4 m. wide), is subject to sudden and dangerous floods, deep and clear, and full of pike, perch, trout, eel and gwyniad. The gwyniad (Caregonus) is peculiar to certain waters, as those of Bala Lake, and is fully described by Thomas ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various
... and animals and lies at the mercy of rivers that overflow or skies that withhold the rain. To such people nature-myths and sacred animals appeal with a force that Europeans rarely understand. The parrots that perch on the pinnacles of the temple and the oxen that rest in the shade of its courts are not intruders but humble brothers of mankind, who may also be the messengers of ...
— Hinduism and Buddhism, Vol I. (of 3) - An Historical Sketch • Charles Eliot
... rider attempted to abandon his high perch upon the hump, his chances would have been good for getting dashed against one of the big boulders, or trodden under the huge hoofs of the ...
— The Boy Slaves • Mayne Reid
... whom 1676 were foreign-born; (1904) 6893; (1910) 8375. It is served by the Ann Arbor and the Grand Rapids & Indiana railways. Cadillac overlooks picturesque lake scenery, and the good fishing for pike, pickerel and perch in the lake, and for brook trout in streams near by, attracts many visitors. Among the city's chief manufactures are hardwood lumber, iron, tables, crates and woodenware, veneer, flooring and flour. Cadillac was settled in 1871, was incorporated as a village under the name of ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... air with fragrance! "Master of Life!" he cried, desponding, 40 "Must our lives depend on these things?" On the third day of his fasting By the lake he sat and pondered, By the still, transparent water; Saw the sturgeon, Nahma, leaping, 45 Scattering drops like beads of wampum, Saw the yellow perch, the Sahwa, Like a sunbeam in the water, Saw the pike, the Maskenozha, And the herring, Okahahwis, 50 And the Shawgashee, the craw-fish! "Master of Life!" he cried, desponding, "Must our lives depend on these things?" On the ...
— The Song of Hiawatha - An Epic Poem • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... waving; suddenly the ropes that still held it gave way, and it disappeared in the darkness of the night like a vast sea-bird. At the same moment a violent crash was heard, and cries of distress. Dantes from his rocky perch saw the shattered vessel, and among the fragments the floating forms of the hapless sailors. Then ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... his perch, took to the steep trail, and descended as fast as he could without making noise. It did not take him long to reach the valley floor. It was almost level, with deep grass, and here and there clumps of ...
— The Lone Star Ranger • Zane Grey
... of them perch and chatter on the rocks and fly screaming in the air, amongst them being guillemots, kittiwakes, gulls, terns, cormorants, puffins, and eider-ducks, for which latter St. Cuthbert is said to have had great affection; certainly they are the gentlest of these ...
— Northumberland Yesterday and To-day • Jean F. Terry
... with a sword, from all the dear little safe things that have made up your life in the past. She glanced from the helmet which the airman held toward her to the monoplane spread-eagling on the ground. I saw her big eyes dilate as they fixed themselves anxiously on the passenger's perch, to which the honoured guest must climb, above the conductor's seat, crawling through the wire stays, or whatever you call them, which were like a spider's web inviting a fly. Diana turned pale. Even her lips were white. The shadows ...
— Secret History Revealed By Lady Peggy O'Malley • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... eloquent gesture, and dismounting from his perch made his way along the passage to a door which opened into the shed. Thence he looked out on the quay, and along the ...
— Scarhaven Keep • J. S. Fletcher
... of holding on with their feet, otherwise they would be liable to continual falls, and they are able to do this by means of their long finger-like toes and large opposable thumbs, which grasp a branch almost as securely as a bird grasps its perch. The true hands, on the contrary, are used chiefly to climb with, and to swing the whole weight of the body from one branch or one tree to another, and for this purpose the fingers are very long and strong, and in many species they are further ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 344, August 5, 1882 • Various
... obeyed, and, stationing herself in the middle of the room, surveyed the whole effect with much approval. Annis, her fair face flushed with the exertion, balanced herself on her lofty perch and gazed complacently upon her handiwork; while even Mistress Vane, who had been seated quietly on a deep chair by the fireplace, roused herself as from a reverie, and looked half-wistfully around the cheerful room. "What bell was that I ...
— In the Yule-Log Glow, Book I - Christmas Tales from 'Round the World • Various
... amusement here, and shared by both sexes. What the Marne and the Morin contain in the way of booty, we hardly know; but it is certain that more cunning fish, whether perch, tench, or bream, never existed, and are not, "by hook or by crook," to be caught. Wherever we go, we find anglers sitting patiently by these lovely green banks, and certainly the mere prospect they have before them—clear water ...
— Holidays in Eastern France • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... every passer-by, they fancy they are in the upper-ten of womanhood. Vain! The peacock, whose little heart is one beating pulse of vanity, is not half so vain as they. Giddy, trifling, empty, vapid, cold, moonshine women, whose souls can perch on a plume, and whose only ambition is to be a traveling advertisement for the men and women who traffic in what they wear, are many who flaunt in satins and glitter in diamonds. How many such there are we would not say. But I doubt not, that not ...
— Aims and Aids for Girls and Young Women • George Sumner Weaver
... trout was found here, and shad and herring were among the annual visitors; but the lake is now filled with the black or Oswego bass, pickerel, muscalonge and perch. ...
— Saratoga and How to See It • R. F. Dearborn
... of anything better, he handed the astonished driver his tobacco-pouch, and waved him to the house. The lad descended from his perch and ran to the door just as Dick Tipping, giving vent to a sharp cry, was rushing out. The cry acted on the skipper like magic, and, snatching up the whip, he gave the horse a cut in which was concentrated ...
— A Master Of Craft • W. W. Jacobs
... "Let's see them!" "Oh, don't go!" they chorused in an equally histrionic alarm, and the shoeman got down from his perch to show ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... and pa beat them all going up crab apple trees. The senator's son saw pa up a tree, and he said: "Old gentleman, if these are your animals, or insects, or whatever they are, you ought to come down off your perch and take them to a Keeley cure, ...
— Peck's Bad Boy at the Circus • George W. Peck
... down from his perch and said, "Cock-a-doodle-do" three times and a half, and after that the owl flew away. "That was very kind of you," said the little rabbit. "Oh, don't mention it," said the red rooster, "but there is one thing you can do for me." "What's that?" asked Billy Bunny. "Take ...
— Billy Bunny and Uncle Bull Frog • David Magie Cory
... her ears from hearing and her eyes from seeing all the pleasant sights and sounds around her. But the birds were so busy singing, and the fish kept springing up from the stream, and every now and then a bright butterfly would flit across, or a little bird perch on a spray close to her, and everything around seemed trying so mischievously to take her attention from her book, so that they had reached the gate at the end of the wood before Kitty had learned two verses of ...
— Amy Harrison - or Heavenly Seed and Heavenly Dew • Amy Harrison
... coal-box, hung the newspaper to air upon the fender, put the chair ready, and the screen in its place, and was round upon his heel on the instant of Mr Dombey's entrance, to take his great-coat and hat, and hang them up. Then Perch took the newspaper, and gave it a turn or two in his hands before the fire, and laid it, deferentially, at Mr Dombey's elbow. And so little objection had Perch to being deferential in the last degree, that if he might ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... scanned the stretch of river which he could see from his high perch he suddenly observed something which almost caused him to lose his hold upon the tree and fall, like the bear, to the ground. Coming up the stream were two canoes, each paddled by a couple of Indians, and with three white men in each craft. Even at that distance Enoch knew them to be strangers, ...
— With Ethan Allen at Ticonderoga • W. Bert Foster
... grass and tussocks, and weighing anything from a pound to half a hundredweight. He scarred his hands and broke his fingernails to pieces over them, but, on the whole, considered it not a bad employment, except when old Joe took it into his head to perch on the fence and spur him on to greater efforts by disparaging remarks about England. Whatever his work, there was never any certainty that old Joe would not appear, to sit down, light his short, black pipe, and make caustic remarks about his methods or his ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... and which was filled with great stones. As the torrent swept his brother past him and under the bridge, the drowning youth gave a spring from the ice on which he still stood, and the other bending at the instant from his perch above, caught him by the collar, and lifted him bodily from his perilous situation. All was the work of a moment; yet the spectators held their breath, and wondered as they saw. It was an act of bold daring on the ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... once more returned to the glade, and, after lifting Cibolo down from his perch, he approached the fire, and gazed for a moment at the corpse of the yellow hunter. The fires were blazing more brightly than ever. These ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid
... spectacles, turn up its nose, and cry, "That a man of genius, indeed! Pelt him!—pelt him!" Then of course there is a clatter, what the vulgar call "a shindy," round the pedestal. Squeezed by his believers, shied at by his scoffers, the poor man gets horribly mauled about, and drops from the perch in the midst of the row. Then they shovel him over, clap a great stone on his relics, wipe their foreheads, shake hands, compromise the dispute, the one half the world admitting that though he ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... frightened. He clutched the side of it, and looked out at me. My own mind supplied his words: "Help! I'm caught! Take me out! You promised!" When I transferred him to the cage, for a moment his confidence lasted still. He mounted the perch, shook his plumage, and spoke out bravely and cheerily. Then all at ...
— A Kentucky Cardinal • James Lane Allen
... lark, sweet and incessant as it balanced on a rosin-weed, of the lark bunting and lark finch, poured forth melodiously; twittering blue-birds looked into the air and back to their perch atop the dead cottonwood as they gathered luckless insects; the brown thrush, which sings the night through in the bright starlight, rivaled the robin and grosbeak as Philip gazed over the blue-skyed, ...
— A Man of Two Countries • Alice Harriman
... Who knows whether you will not soon be my widow? I am about to enter into another war, and it will be a desperate, obstinate struggle, in which old Austria will try to wrest the palm of victory from young France. Victory will perch on my banners. I have no doubt of that, but who knows whether I shall not have to pay for it with my blood! for I must not spare myself—I shall always be at the head of my troops, and, like my private soldiers, with them bare my own breast to the hail of bullets. In so decisive a struggle ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach
... him up the main street, past the rows of shops that had been there four years ago, past the Saskatchewan Hotel and the little Board of Trade building which, like the old barber shop, still hung to its original perch at the edge of the high bank which ran precipitously down to the river. And there, as sure as fate, was Percival Clary, the little English Secretary! But what ...
— The River's End • James Oliver Curwood
... She left her perch on the railings, and stood erect, in an unconscious attitude of defiance; and Garth watched her speculatively through narrowed lids. He was wondering whether Mrs Desmond's remark that she had persuaded Captain Lenox to go shooting beyond ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver
... There was a running to and fro and a great draught, but that is just what made the bells ring, and one could not hear oneself speak. In the middle of the great hall where the Emperor sat, a golden rod had been set up on which the Nightingale was to perch. The whole Court was present, and the little kitchen-maid was allowed to stand behind the door, for she had now the actual title of Court Kitchen-Maid. All were there in their smartest clothes, and they all looked toward ...
— The Art of the Story-Teller • Marie L. Shedlock
... had leaped down from her high perch, and was now taking a drink from a little sparkling mountain rill which ...
— The Swiss Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins
... was dwarfed, by a dull and thunderous detonation of cannon from a terrace of the palace. The tonga ponies, reared and plunged, Ram Nath mastering them with much difficulty. Sophia was startled, and Amber himself stirred uneasily on his perch. ...
— The Bronze Bell • Louis Joseph Vance
... according to its different significations, often has a different origin; as, to bear a burden, from fero; but to bear, whence birth, born, bairn, comes from pario; and a bear, at least if it be of Latin original, from fera. Thus perch, a fish, from perca; but perch, a measure, from pertica, and likewise to perch. To spell is from syllaba; but spell, an inchantment, by which it is believed that the boundaries are so fixed in lands that none can pass them against the master's ...
— A Grammar of the English Tongue • Samuel Johnson
... morning an inspiration came to him—he would try the pump! So he rose softly and fixed the handle of the pump high in the air, so that it stuck out like a gallows, and tied a rope with a noose to the end of it. Then he got Tricky to perch on the top of the pump, tied the rope round his neck, and all was ready. The shepherd had heard that the object of hanging was to break the neck of the criminal by a sudden 'drop,' but as he could not give Tricky a long enough drop he determined to make up for it in another way. So he gathered all ...
— The Monkey That Would Not Kill • Henry Drummond
... about the island till evening, as its appearance was very inviting. Its FAUNA and FLORA, however, were poor in the extreme. The only specimens of quadrupeds, birds, fish and cetacea were a few wild boars, stormy petrels, albatrosses, perch and seals. Here and there thermal springs and chalybeate waters escaped from the black lava, and thin dark vapors rose above the volcanic soil. Some of these springs were very hot. John Mangles held his thermometer in one of them, and found the temperature ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne
... ap' fer ter come up wid um. No matter 'bout dat, de 'simmon patch 'uz dar des like I tell you, en ole Brer Possum mouf 'gun ter water soon's he year talk un um, en mos' 'fo' Brer Rabbit done tellin' 'im de news, Brer Possum, he put out, he did, en 'twa'n't long 'fo' he wuz perch up in de highes' tree in Brer B'ar 'simmon patch. But Brer Rabbit, he done 'termin' fer ter see some fun, en w'iles all dis 'uz gwine on, he run 'roun' ter Brer B'ar house, en holler en tell 'im w'ich dey wuz somebody 'stroyin' un ...
— Uncle Remus • Joel Chandler Harris
... the most wonderful person I have ever known?" he said to Margery, on the first of the sunning days when she had come to perch in ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... For some reason or other this courtyard was a favorite playground for a large company of rats. I don't know what the attraction was for them, except that they may have liked nibbling the paint off the canvas. Out they used to troop in swarms, and I, from my perch on the window-seat, would watch and wonder. Once a terrible storm came on, and years after, at the Lyceum, the Brocken Scene in "Faust" brought back the scene to my mind—the thunder and lightning and the creatures crawling on every side, ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry
... patience we tame the wild creatures. We learn to know the calls of the wildwood warblers, which I am credibly informed are many and varied in character; and by imitating those calls we charm the feathered minstrels to leave their accustomed haunts on the sheltering bough and to come and perch on our outstretched hands. ...
— Fibble, D. D. • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... few steps into the loft and waited. From this elevated perch his eyes could sweep the roofs round about, the upper parts of the luxurious chestnut trees, now delicate in leaves of a week's age, and the drooping boughs of the lines; Farfrae's garden and the green door leading therefrom. In course of ...
— The Mayor of Casterbridge • Thomas Hardy
... wings; and so they let this morning lark rise above their theological mists, and sing to them at heaven's gate, until he had softened all their hearts and might nestle in their bosoms and find his perch on "the big ha' bible," if he would,—and as he did. So did the music of Emerson's words and life steal into the hearts of our stern New England theologians, and soften them to a temper which would have seemed treasonable weakness to their ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... unremarkable. One, indeed, whom I found plying his spade in the red evening, high above Allan Water and in the shadow of Dunblane Cathedral, told me of his acquaintance with the birds that still attended on his labours; how some would even perch about him, waiting for their prey; and, in a true Sexton's Calendar, how the species varied with the season of the year. But this was the very poetry of the profession. The others whom I knew were somewhat dry. A faint flavour of the gardener ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... declare myself the slave of that masculine soul Which ties and alliance on earth once for ever renounces. Told I thee yester-morn how the Iris of heaven Brought to me in my cup a gospel of joy? O high-flying falcon! the Tree of Life is thy perch; This nook of grief fits thee ill for a nest. Hearken! they call to thee down from the ramparts of heaven; I cannot divine what holds thee here in a net. I, too, have a counsel for thee; O mark it and keep it. Since I received ...
— Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam and Salaman and Absal • Omar Khayyam and Ralph Waldo Emerson
... lighted his banquet, and the faces of the two girls, rosy in the blaze and mysterious in the shadow, were piquant inspiration. Even the sharp features of Don Anastasio stirred him into a phase of whimsical benevolence. He knocked two chickens from their perch in a tree and baked them in a mould of clay. There was an armadilla too, which a Culebra boy and the dogs had run down during the day. Its dark flesh was rich and luscious, and the Missourian fondly called it 'possum. Crisply ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... we have no servants; We must see to things ourselves. We can't all perch like eagles, therefore, I beg you to be more careful. Kirill ...
— Tales of the Wilderness • Boris Pilniak
... cooing ground-dove creeps close to her mate At this sound of alarm, which all living things hate; The snake-bird is startled, and drops from her bough To dive in the stream that runs swiftly below. Whilst perch'd on a tree the wood-pelican's dreams Are disturb'd by the crane's and the crying-bird's screams. The tortoise made off at the mention of rain, And troops of ...
— The Quadrupeds' Pic-Nic • F. B. C.
... in. A Fringillina, with curious Flycatcher habits, I have only seen two individuals, they perch towards the top of trees, and thence sally out after winged insects. I examined the contents of its stomach, and found only seeds, gravel, ...
— Journals of Travels in Assam, Burma, Bhootan, Afghanistan and The - Neighbouring Countries • William Griffith
... ships of his flight tucked in and circled. Soon they picked up the flight of Liberators and Fortresses. At twenty-five thousand feet the big bombers left broad vapor trails behind them. Stan looked down upon the killers from his perch in the sky. Dawn was breaking and the ...
— A Yankee Flier Over Berlin • Al Avery
... groove in which a corpse can be laid. There are three concentric circles, the outermost for men, the next inner for women, the innermost for children. The structure has no roof, but is open to the air. Great flocks of vultures perch upon the top of the outermost enclosing wall, waiting in silence and expectation for the time when they can descend upon their prey. Only a half-hour elapses after a body is laid on its stony bed, before these ravenous birds have torn every morsel of flesh ...
— A Tour of the Missions - Observations and Conclusions • Augustus Hopkins Strong
... Grouse Lodge and ran acrass the road; so I gev the whilloo, and knowing that she'd take the rise of the hill, I made over the ditch, and up through Mullaghcashel as hard as I could pelt, still keeping her in view, but afore I had gone a perch, Spring seen her, and away the two went like the wind, up Drumrewy, and down Clooneen, and over the river, widout his being able onc't to turn her. Well, I run on till I come to the Diffagher, and through it I went, ...
— Stories of Comedy • Various
... into kindling wood; chips and markers flew! A chair banged against the lookout's high perch, just as he was bringing his sawed-off shotgun ...
— Kid Wolf of Texas - A Western Story • Ward M. Stevens
... items on her fingers. "I did have a good time, I did remember to take my tonic, and this heavenly coat has kept me as warm as pie—Nina Atherton taught me that. That nice family considerably enlarged my vocabulary," she added with enjoyment, slipping out of a heavy fur coat and coming back to perch on the arm ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull
... those navigators who have little experience in those seas, that on the edge of soundings in all parts of the West Indies, and particularly on the edges of the Bahamas and Salt Key Bank, abundance of fish of excellent quality, as black perch, kingfish, barracooter, and Spanish mackerel, may be taken by trailing during a ...
— Jack in the Forecastle • John Sherburne Sleeper
... thought of the terrible duty-calls flashed through her mind Toni slipped down from her perch on the balustrade and made her way down to the towing path beneath. She often walked beside the river in these quiet morning hours, alone unless her dog Jock, an Airedale terrier of unimpeachable ancestry and cheerful disposition, was at hand to ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes
... by the crossing of any lesser number: how, for instance, could a pouter be produced by crossing two breeds unless one of the parent-stocks possessed the characteristic enormous crop? The supposed aboriginal stocks must all have been rock-pigeons, that is, they did not breed or willingly perch on trees. But besides C. livia, with its geographical sub-species, only two or three other species of rock-pigeons are known; and these have not any of the characters of the domestic breeds. Hence the supposed aboriginal stocks must ...
— On the Origin of Species - 6th Edition • Charles Darwin
... in my eyes to hear this avowal of his dependence; just as if a royal eagle, chained to a perch, should be forced to entreat a sparrow to become its purveyor. But I would not be lachrymose: I dashed off the salt drops, and busied myself with ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... rouses himself from time to time with a testy twitch and noisy chirrup that urge the poor beast into a faster gait. All the while the little wife sits beside him, as if a twittering sparrow had nestled itself upon the same perch with some grave owl, and sat with him side by side, watching for the big eyes to turn upon her, and chirping some pretty response for every solemn utterance of the wise old ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... varieties, are caught in this huge family net. Beef, veal, mutton and venison, of the most select kinds and quality, roll bounteously to this grand consumer. The teeming riches of the Chesapeake bay, its rock, perch, drums, crocus, trout, oysters, crabs, and terrapin, are drawn hither to adorn the glittering table of the great house. The dairy, too, probably the finest on the Eastern Shore of Maryland—supplied ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass
... nor The boding raven, nor chough hoar, Nor chattering pye, May on our bride-house perch or sing, Or with them any discord ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... made in December 1844, must be a second-hand job. But some years afterwards (Sept. 10, 1850), the reviews, etc. having been just placed at the disposal of readers in the old reading-room of the Museum, I made a tour of inspection, came upon my critic on his perch, and took a look at him. I was very glad to remember this, for, though expecting only second-hand, yet even of this there is good and bad; and I expected to find some hints in the good second-hand of a respectable clerical publication. I read on, ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan
... rapids, he would watch, till the immensity and the solitude would creep in upon his spirit and oppress him. Then, at last, a shrill yelp, far off and faint, but sinister, would come from the pine-top; and the eagle, launching himself on open wings from his perch, would either wheel upward into the blue, or flap away over the serried fir-tops to some ravine in the cliffs ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... the Cat spit; White Owl cried, "Who-oo-o," and flew down from his perch. In a twinkling Hortense was running down the hall, hand in hand with Highboy and ...
— The Cat in Grandfather's House • Carl Henry Grabo
... fixed tranquillity. The rivulet Sends forth glad sounds, and tripping o'er its bed Of pebbly sands, or leaping down the rocks, Seems, with continuous laughter, to rejoice In its own being. Softly tread the marge, Lest from her midway perch thou scare the wren That dips her bill in water. The cool wind, That stirs the stream in play, shall come to thee, Like one that loves thee nor will let thee pass Ungreeted, and shall give its ...
— Poems • William Cullen Bryant
... she had once found her way, and been welcomed to his little bare room, where an old piano, a violin, and heaps of dusty folios of music, were the principal furniture, a day seldom passed without her paying him a visit. She would perch herself at his window, which commanded a wide view over the city, with its countless roofs, and domes, and towers, and beyond the encircling hills, with their scattered villas, and slopes of terraced gardens, and pines, ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter
... who was versed in book-lore, but, worse luck to him, he could not bind a wheat-sheaf or weed a perch of parsnips, and the result—bankruptcy; failure. That's what ...
— The Silver Lining - A Guernsey Story • John Roussel
... said the scout leader, nodding his head approvingly. "Making a little fireplace where he can perch his kettle, and have the hottest part of his fire under it. Note also that the opening is in the direction of the breeze. That allows the flame to be fanned. Wallace will never have to blow out his cheeks and puff to keep his ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts - Or, The Struggle for Leadership • George A. Warren
... that it swarms with fish, such as pike, trout, perch, barbel, and other kinds not easily identified. Apparently there is also a form of gar-pike found here (see p. 74); this is described as having scales of a very large and stiff kind, and being a beautiful bright silver in colour. The size of these gar-pike range from two feet to four feet in length. ...
— Pioneers in Canada • Sir Harry Johnston
... bench in the sun. The Pere Michel, who was my predecessor, had some doves, and had left them behind in a little house by my bench. I took care of and fed them. They were tame, and used to flutter to my shoulders and perch on my hands. To birds and animals I was always a friend. At El-Largani there are all sorts of beasts, and, at one time or another, it had been my duty to look after most of them. I loved all living things. Sitting in the cemetery ...
— The Garden Of Allah • Robert Hichens
... marry," he would say, "instead of spending the summer in Sarrio, where the etiquette is as strict as in Lancia, I shall go to Rodillero to breathe the fresh air and fish for perch. Listen to me, Micaela; don't be so sharp, woman. You will find a husband won't put up with those frivolous ways; he will expect to be answered in ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... of mounting that horse, I had occasion to cross King's Market Square at midnight. I had been out to a little social gathering, and was on my way home alone. I saw the great horse and rider gleaming in the pale moonlight. I recalled vividly how I had occupied that elevated perch and been hauled down by the scandalized and indignant officers. I remembered the warning of the judge as to what would happen if I ever did it again. Hastily I removed my coat and hat and clambered ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard
... domesticate, colonize; take root, strike root; anchor; cast anchor, come to an anchor; sit down, settle down; settle; take up one's abode, take up one's quarters; plant oneself, establish oneself, locate oneself; squat, perch, hive, se nicher [Fr.], bivouac, burrow, get a footing; encamp, pitch one's tent; put up at, put up one's horses at; keep house. endenizen^, naturalize, adopt. put back, replace &c (restore) 660. Adj. placed &c v.; situate, posited, ensconced, imbedded, embosomed^, rooted; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... honourable father, for whose sake I pray you pardon the young man's transgression." But Angelo replied, "We must not make a scare-crow of the law, setting it up to frighten birds of prey, till custom, finding it harmless, makes it their perch, and not their ...
— Books for Children - The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 3 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... drum more promiscuously than does downy. He utters his long, loud spring call, whick—whick—whick—whick, and then begins to rap with his beak upon his perch before the last note has reached your ear. I have seen him drum sitting upon the ridge of the barn. The log-cock, or pileated woodpecker, the largest and wildest of our Northern species, I have never heard drum. His blows should ...
— A Year in the Fields • John Burroughs
... once, above the exquisite valley spanned by the Natural Bridge, a valley far too little known or praised. I had noticed an old log house, as I learned to know the outlook from the picturesque hotel, and was sure that it must give a charming view from its perch on the summit of ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... rushing out of their respective forges, to examine every part of the carriage. "A nail had started here: a screw was wanting there: and a fracture had taken place in another direction: even the perch was given way in the centre!" "Alas, for my voiture de voyage!" exclaimed I to my companion. Meanwhile, a man came forward with a red-hot piece of iron, in the shape of a cramp, to fix round the perch—which hissed ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Two • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... nevertheless be deemed heresy to doubt the fact. At this season, therefore, the sportsman provides himself with tame pigeon, which he fastens by a string to the cimeaux, in such a manner that the poor bird is obliged to keep perpetually on the wing, not being allowed rope enough to reach a perch. After three or four Sundays passed in this manner, the unfortunate decoy dies of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various
... of little fish swarmed out of the pads and ran riot in the pool. Chub, shiners, "punkin-seeds," perch, boiled up at your flies, or chased each other in savage warfare through the forbidden water, which seemed to intoxicate them by its cool freshness. You had only to swing your canoe up near the shadowy edge of the pool ...
— Wood Folk at School • William J. Long
... asking you, general," said the commodore, as he began to masticate a perch, "whether you are an aristocrat or a democrat. We have had the government pretty much upside-down, too, this morning, but this ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... noise and bustle came Miss Easton and Jack. The groom scrambled down from his perch, and the two got out. In an instant she was surrounded by three or four men, all talking at the same time and upon the same subject: "Was not the day superb?" "Did she know which way the hounds were to run?" "Was she going to ride Midnight?" "What ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... your perch, Eugene," he said, "and tell us how you came to drive Count Vassilan's taxi, and ...
— One Wonderful Night - A Romance of New York • Louis Tracy
... morning and shows the most lively interest in their work while beds are being made or tables dusted. It has the most perfect trustfulness, not merely allowing itself to be handled, but coming to perch on a wrist or shoulder as if it had belonged there from, time immemorial. It really is a pretty thing to have about the house, an embodiment of gentleness and kindness, and, so far as a mere human being can judge, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, April 5, 1916 • Various
... Mona. "It was awful for you to perch on one toe for a hundred million mile ride! And I reclined at ease on a Roman trident, or whatever you call it!" "Tripod, you mean," said Adele, laughing, "or is ...
— Patty's Butterfly Days • Carolyn Wells
... down to a frame that I contrived, straightened its little leg, warmed the injured bone by sucking it, and strapped it to little wooden splints. And behold it really set: the bird got quite well and fluttered about the workshops again as sound as before, and whenever it saw me it would perch upon my shoulder and peck very gently at my hair with its ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... and soon, for the rooms were quickly counted in Redman's Farm, he found her chamber small, neat, simplex munditiis. Bright and natty were the chintz curtains, and the little toilet set out, not inelegantly, and her pet piping-goldfinch asleep on his perch, with his bit of sugar between the wires of his cage; her pillow so white and unpressed, with its little edging of lace. Were slumbers sweet as of old ever to know it more? What dreams were henceforward to haunt it? Shadows ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... looked truly to a man who had paddled two days in a hot sticky fog, as, clad in white, she sat still and placid on her airy perch. Her hair, of the very light fleecy gold seldom seen after babyhood, hung over her shoulders unconfined by comb or ribbon, felling around her like a veil and glittering in the horizontal sunbeams; her face, throat and hands were white as the petals of ...
— Castle Nowhere • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... those perch that they let loose in the ponds to chase the great fish and prevent them growing too fat; but suppose that the great fish ...
— The Forty-Five Guardsmen • Alexandre Dumas
... that of a bachelor, for a man who feels instinctively that he will never own a "house and home" constructs the materiality of his life in chambers upon a fuller basis than the man who feels instinctively that he will, sooner or later, exchange the perch-like existence of his chambers for the nest-like completeness of a home ...
— Mike Fletcher - A Novel • George (George Augustus) Moore
... be caught in any such trap, and so the report of his shot had scarcely died away before the ape-man was on the ground and racing for another tree a hundred yards away. Here he again found a suitable perch from which he could watch the preparations of the raiders. It occurred to him that he might have considerable more fun with them, so again he called to them through ...
— The Return of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... the three kingdoms. Last year there were five fishing Colonels at the Greville Arms all at once. Brown-faced people who live in the open air, and who are deeply versed in the mysteries of tackle, cunning in the ways of trout, pike, perch, and salmon, walk the streets clad in tweed suits, with strong shoes and knickerbockers. The Mullingar folks despise the dictum of the American economist who said that every town without a river should buy one, as they are handy things ...
— Ireland as It Is - And as It Would be Under Home Rule • Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)
... the hill, with its spreading wings, its stuccoed offices, its massive white columns at the rear, which presided solemnly over the terraced hill-side. A moment later he led me up to the high, spiked wall, and swung me from the ground to a secure perch on his shoulder. With my hands clinging to the iron nails that studded the wall, I looked over, and then caught my breath sharply at the thought that I was gazing upon an enchanted garden. Through the interlacing elm boughs the rosy light of the afterglow fell on the ...
— The Romance of a Plain Man • Ellen Glasgow
... FROM my perch over the bay window of the library, I had heard Tom Thornton express his savage determination to crush out of me the information he wanted. Being forewarned, I was in a measure forearmed, and I did not intend to be caught in a vulnerable position. I ...
— Seek and Find - or The Adventures of a Smart Boy • Oliver Optic
... from those opprobrious wrongs That press me now, and bend my spirit downward; All Venice free, and every growing merit Succeed to its just right: fools shall be pull'd From wisdom's seat; those baleful, unclean birds, Those lazy owls, who, perch'd near fortune's top, Sit only watchful with their heavy wings To cuff down new-fledg'd virtues, that would rise To nobler heights, and make ...
— Venice Preserved - A Tragedy • Thomas Otway
... the window. "A cracker to such a bird as that! Ask it another." I actually, though with a timid air, opened the door of the cage and invited Polly to perch on my finger. She came, looking at me intensely all the while. I petted her little, which she took resignedly and with a faint show of wonder, then in answer to De Kock's summons put ...
— Crowded Out! and Other Sketches • Susie F. Harrison
... by Arthur Wilson as "monstrous satires against the king's own person, that haunted both court and country," when, in the wantonness of the times, "every little miscarriage, exuberantly branched, so that evil report did often perch on them." Fuller has designated these suspicious scribes as "a generation of the people who, like moths, have lurked under the carpets of the council-table, and even like fleas, have leaped into pillows of the prince's bed-chamber; and, to enhance the reputation of their ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli
... lost way as it backed its sails and Jason fell from his precarious perch into the stinking bilge. "The descent of man," he muttered ...
— The Ethical Engineer • Henry Maxwell Dempsey
... squadron just then, that the camel might have brought all three into safety. But the Arab bent his head, and urged the swaying beast into a faster trot. Von Kerber fired at him, and the unhappy tribesman tumbled from his perch like a dummy figure. Snatching at the camel's head-rope, the Austrian lifted, almost threw Mrs. Haxton up to the saddle. Owing to its height from the ground, it was impossible to place her there securely, but she helped him bravely, scrambled somehow to the awkward seat, and stooped ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy
... Select fresh perch of medium size. Clean, bone and wipe dry as possible. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, dip in flour, egg, and crumbs (be sure fish are well coated with crumbs). Lay three at a time in a croquette basket and fry a golden brown in deep hot Cottolene. Cottolene should not be so hot as to brown fish ...
— Fifty-Two Sunday Dinners - A Book of Recipes • Elizabeth O. Hiller
... Grace had halted in their walk. It was full tide and the miniature breakers plashed amid the seaweed on the beach. The mist was drifting in over the bay and the gulls were calling sleepily from their perch along the breakwater. A night hawk swooped and circled above the tall "feather grass" by the margin of the creek. The minister's face was pale, but set and determined, and he was ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... else done. On the 19th and 22d, when the assaults were made on the lines, I watched the soldiers cooking on the green opposite. The half-spent balls, coming all the way from those lines, were flying so thick that they were obliged to dodge at every turn. At all the caves I could see from my high perch, people were sitting, eating their poor suppers at the cave doors, ready to plunge in again. As the first shell again flew, they dived; and not a human being was visible. The sharp crackle of the musketry-firing was a strong contrast to the scream of the ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot |
