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Rap   Listen
noun
Rap  n.  
1.
Conversation; also, rapping.
2.
(ca. 1985) A type of rhythmic talking, often with accompanying rhythm instruments; rap music.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Rap" Quotes from Famous Books



... to drive me forth, I stumbled from the room, thinking only how I should quickest rid me of myself. Hastening to my garret sleeping-place I buckled on my sword, found my shako, and went straight to my Lord's bed-chamber. My rap at the door went unanswered, and a broad-shouldered young fellow in a lieutenant's uniform, lounging on a settle in the clock landing of the stair, told me Lord Cornwallis was ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde

... new clothes!" grumbled Mrs. Rooney. "And then luck tumbles into your way such as man never had; without a place, or a rap to bless yourself with, you get a rich man's daughter for your wife, and you let her slip through ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover

... though it was present in her mind always, and occasioned her inexpressible anxiety and disquiet. She had caused the brass knocker to be screwed off the inner door of the chambers, whereupon the postman's startling double rap would, as she justly argued, disturb the rest of her patient, and she did not allow him to see any letter which arrived, whether from boot-makers who importuned him, or hatters who had a heavy account to make ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray

... that we mock, Though he may be a blockhead, he's no real block. He can eat, drink, and sleep; now and then for a friend He'll not be too proud an old kettle to mend; He can lie like a courtier, and think it no scorn, When gold's to be got, to forswear and suborn. He can rap his own raps[1] and has the true sapience, To turn a good penny to twenty bad halfpence. Then in spite of your sophistry, honest Will Wood Is a man of this world, all true flesh and blood; So you are but in jest, and you will not, I hope, Unman the poor knave for the sake of a trope. ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift

... quite enough to make me feel that I'd like to be a spy once just for pure spite!" declared Jimmie. "You and your spy business make me tired! We Boy Scouts don't care a rap ...
— Boy Scouts Mysterious Signal - or Perils of the Black Bear Patrol • G. Harvey Ralphson

... wanted her for his wife. Both her beauty and her personality pleased him. He knew that she was not the kind of woman to whom men usually give their names, but he had never been conventional. He ridiculed and scoffed at the conventions. He made his own social laws and cared not a rap for the good or bad opinion of the world. If there had been opportunities to meet decent women, of good social standing, he had always thrown them aside with the exclamation that such women bored him to death, and in all his ...
— The Easiest Way - A Story of Metropolitan Life • Eugene Walter and Arthur Hornblow

... sofa.] So far as I'm concerned, my money now doesn't count a rap. Dick has plenty and doesn't want mine. So now it's only Louise and mother you must think of, and you can take care of them well, you know you can, if they'll only accept the different conditions. And Dick and ...
— Her Own Way - A Play in Four Acts • Clyde Fitch

... hour elapsed, and then his well-known rap was heard at the door. Miss Jane did not answer, and Salome was in no mood to welcome him home; but he waited for neither, and came in, gently closing ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson

... Evershed calmly. 'Though I mayn't care a rap about him personally, I prefer that a man on my own front bench shouldn't make a public ass of himself if he can help it—not for his sake, ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... but she rose as if to go. Ellis was in a quandary. If she went through the hall, the chances were at least even that she would see Delamere. He did not care a rap for Delamere,—if he chose to make a public exhibition of himself, it was his own affair; but to see him would surely spoil Miss Pemberton's evening, and, in her frame of mind, might lead to the suspicion ...
— The Marrow of Tradition • Charles W. Chesnutt

... any call-down for a little humanity, I don't give a rap. You go get some dry clothes. I know Cap. Sawyer won't mind. You can be back here in five minutes. You've done enough to-day to deserve a little ...
— Traffic in Souls - A Novel of Crime and Its Cure • Eustace Hale Ball

... the Bishop hath spread the King's banner, And to battle he busks him boun.' 'I swear by St. Andrew's bones,' says the King, 'I'll rap that ...
— Ballads of Scottish Tradition and Romance - Popular Ballads of the Olden Times - Third Series • Various

... saw," I groaned, with the justifiable annoyance of a martyr who has failed to convert a pagan hero. "As if you hadn't made things difficult enough already by 'Mistering' yourself. At any moment you may be found out—though, on second thoughts, it won't matter a rap if you are. If you're a mere Mister, you are often obliged to appear before an unsympathetic police magistrate for pretending to be a Lord. But I never heard of a Lord's falling foul of the law for pretending to ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... is from bad to worse; And, what were once superfluous to advise, Don't tell, I beg you, such, egregious lies!— Or if perchance your agents are to blame, Don't let them trifle with your honest fame; Let chairs and tables rest, and "rap" instead, Ay, "knock" your slippery "Mediums" ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin

... a rap, Nor a crust, nor a handful o' mail; An unless we can get it o'th' strap, We mun pine, or mun beg, or ...
— Yorkshire Lyrics • John Hartley

... him with their counsels. They all repaired to the house wherein Humbert continued his importunity; for nothing that he had requested had as yet been executed. A great number of those who lived near were assembled in the house. The master of it told Humbert to rap against the wall; he knocked very gently: then the master desired him to go and fetch a stone and knock louder; he deferred a little, as if he had been to pick up a stone, and gave a stronger blow upon the wall: the master whispered in his neighbor's ear as softly as he could that ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet

... hour after we had parted from Pakenham, and before we had recovered sense, came a great rap at the door. "Will you see anybody, ma'am?" I was going to say, "No, nobody," but I bid Smith ask the name, when behind him, as I spoke, enter Mrs. Lushington. "I have forced my way up—forgive me, it is for Pakenham; I hope I am not too late; I've brought him good letters ...
— The Life and Letters of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth

... after Lieutenant Davies and the recruits in question had gone to the front and were lost to all communication. The officer who went in command from Omaha was an expert. He established a sergeant's guard in each recruit car, with orders to flatten out the first man who left his seat, rap every head that showed outside a window when the train stopped, and so turned over the one hundred and seventy-two that were turned over to him a sick and subdued lot by the time they reached Fort Sanders the following afternoon. "This is Mr. Davies,—Lieutenant Davies,—just ...
— Under Fire • Charles King

... better off for this cheerful argument? There was nothing to prove that she cared for him, notwithstanding this agreeable conclusion by contrast. As a matter of fact, he came earthward with a rush, weighted down by the conviction that she did not care a rap for him except as a conveniently moral brother-in-law. He was further distressed by Edith's comfortless, though perhaps well-qualified, announcement that she believed her sister to be in love; she could not imagine with whom; she only knew she ...
— The Husbands of Edith • George Barr McCutcheon

... won't get in; for my lord bid them let none in for their life. It's necessary for us to be very particular about the street-door now; and I advise a double chain for it, and to have the footmen well tutored to look before they run to a double rap; for a double rap might be a ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. 6 • Maria Edgeworth

... respectability! What you brought me up on. What you've rammed down my throat all along. What you're thinking of now. You're not thinking of me; you're thinking of yourself, and how respectable you are, and how I've dished you. You don't want me to take my wife back because you care a rap about me and my children. It's because you're afraid. That's what it is, you're afraid. You're afraid of the rotten scandal; you're afraid of what people'll say; you're afraid of not looking respectable any more. You know what my wife's ...
— The Combined Maze • May Sinclair

... that other chap Congratulate himself because He gave "some time"—I'd like to rap Him once across his selfish paws! (Because I have met him— I want to ...
— With the Colors - Songs of the American Service • Everard Jack Appleton

... no more idea what he meant than if he had addressed him in Hindoo, and he gave the matter little or no further thought. He was in his room poring over his books the second day after the interview, when there came a rap at ...
— Sustained honor - The Age of Liberty Established • John R. Musick,

... next player up, and by hard work he managed to rap out a single between short and second, which carried him to first in safety. But the next two players failed to connect with the sphere, and the goose egg went up on ...
— The Rover Boys in the Land of Luck - Stirring Adventures in the Oil Fields • Edward Stratemeyer

... again now, sent out a flash such as Basil knew. "You're not going to fail me, are you?" she exclaimed. Her impulse was to add shrilly, "Now that you've made your own market, and don't care a rap what happens to any one else!" As she was Mrs. Bal's guest still, and had been royally entertained, she sacrificed the momentary satisfaction. Besides, this was the last moment in which it would be safe to offend ...
— The Heather-Moon • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... the dream which caused it. He was dreaming of killing McTee, and McTee sat by and understood, and smiled with deep content. He, also, was tasting his thoughts of the battle-to-be when, without any warning rap, the door swung open and the burly ...
— Harrigan • Max Brand

... at once seek and smell him out; I shall rap thee on the lying knave's snout: I woll not be deluded with such a glossing lie, Nor give credence, till I see it with ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Robert Dodsley

... shouldst not know More happiness then this thy present lot. Enjoy your deer Wit, and gay Rhetorick 790 That hath so well been taught her dazling fence, Thou art not fit to hear thy self convinc't; Yet should I try, the uncontrouled worth Of this pure cause would kindle my rap't spirits To such a flame of sacred vehemence That dumb things would be mov'd to sympathize, And the brute Earth would lend her nerves, and shake, Till all thy magick structures rear'd so high, Were shatter'd into heaps ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton

... darkly. "I know the trick. Regan doesn't care a rap for Kitty. It is part of the game, ...
— The Desired Woman • Will N. Harben

... a rap sounded at the door. Mr. Humphrey rose and opened it, but stood speechless, when he beheld Ernest supported by two or three of his companions. At the first he supposed him either hurt or seriously ill. But upon going near to him what was his amazement when he discovered that he was too much intoxicated ...
— The Path of Duty, and Other Stories • H. S. Caswell

... to the Mahlmanns', where she gave the twins their music lesson. Very often the finger exercises, to which she had to listen there, were positively painful to her, and she would rap the children on the knuckles when they struck a false note. On the present occasion, however, she was not in the least strict. When Frau Mahlmann, fat and friendly as ever, came into the room and inquired whether Bertha was satisfied, the latter praised ...
— Bertha Garlan • Arthur Schnitzler

... the doctor's door, She lifts the knocker, rap, rap, rap, The doctor at the casement shews, His glimmering eyes that peep and doze; And one ...
— Lyrical Ballads 1798 • Wordsworth and Coleridge

... sensible woman, however, and quickly recovering herself, she ran across the road, with her spectacles on, and rapped at Mrs. Caldwell's door. Beth, hacking away at the lead with the carving-knife, did not heed the rap. Presently, however, she heard hurried footsteps on the stairs, and climbed back into the attic incontinently, putting her spoils in her pocket. When Mrs. Davy, her mother, and Harriet, all agitated, burst ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand

... box a final rap with my knuckles and a final shake, replaced it on the table, put out the gas, and returned ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various

... of the day begins about ten o'clock. The rap of the President's gavel opens the session, and as there is but one thing dealt in—gold—the bids follow the sound of the mallet. The noise and confusion are greater here than in the Stock Board or the Long Room, and it seems impossible to a stranger ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe

... I suggested theft about the watch and got such a rap, I went and examined my room, and the pencil case was missing, but it was only mislaid, and I ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... Eleanor would make up the fire, when—when I was far enough along to come regularly every Sunday night. With that thought my courage revived. I heard voices in the next room, the pounding of a flat-iron, and a frequent step across the floor. I gave a loud rap. The door opened, and Eleanor herself appeared. She had on a spotted calico gown, with a string of gold beads around her neck. She held in her hand a piece of fan coral. I felt myself turning all colors, stammered, hesitated, and believed in my ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 43, May, 1861 • Various

... everywhere; "but your face betrays the truth, my dear. Don't worry," she added in a tone of sympathy. "No doubt he'll write as soon as he is back in England. Personally, I don't believe he really cares a rap for the Ranscomb girl. It's only a matter of money—and Dorise ...
— Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo • William Le Queux

... here," he said. There was never a day that the King did not devoutly read his Bible, and he was determined that everybody should read it the same way. The result was a kind of Puritanism that filled the churches and compelled the employment of men to go around with long sticks to rap the people on the head when they fell asleep. Christian the Fourth was not the first ruler who has tried to herd men into heaven by battalions. But his people would have gladly gone in the fire for him. He was their friend. When on his tramps, as likely as not he would come ...
— Hero Tales of the Far North • Jacob A. Riis

... was about to rap again, when, to his amazement, the door slowly and noiselessly swung inward, as though ...
— The Film of Fear • Arnold Fredericks

... the door, carrying my boat-hook with him. I rushed after him to try and get it back, for it was a new ash one I had bought but a few days before, and I did not want to lose it, but I only knocked my head a hard rap against the door, and though I looked about everywhere I never could find it from that day to this; and that, mates, mind you, is the circumstantial and voracious way Jerry Vincent lost his boat-hook." And the old man gave one of his comical ...
— Will Weatherhelm - The Yarn of an Old Sailor • W.H.G. Kingston

... shepherded them back to their tasks. Davidge took up the telephone to ask for more steel. Mamise renewed the cheerful rap-rap-rap of ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes

... been fast skating into the good graces of his companion. Perhaps the rap on his head had deranged him. He certainly tossed himself about in a reckless and insane way. Still he justified his conduct by never tumbling again, and by inventing new devices with ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various

... a little. I was gentle, you know, and I took a black eye which I carried for a week, and he afterward apologized. Yes, he was very grateful because I was so gentle and let him punch me. I spared him, but when I looked in the glass I told him that next time I'd have to rap back ...
— Oscar the Detective - Or, Dudie Dunne, The Exquisite Detective • Harlan Page Halsey

... Miss Mauger's green front door at last and gave a valiant rap of the knocker, and hung on to it by sheer force of will to keep myself from running away when I had done it. And when a maid in a prim white cap opened the door, I had lost my tongue, and stood staring at her till she smiled encouragingly, as though she thought I might have come ...
— Carette of Sark • John Oxenham

... with her through the rest of the wood and nearly to the end of the path through the shrubbery. She spared no effort to set his mind at ease, protesting that she did not care a rap how furiously her husband abused her. A few yards from the edge of the East lawn they stopped, but they lingered over their parting. She promised to meet him in the East wood ...
— The Loudwater Mystery • Edgar Jepson

... interruption which brought on another and another until the speaker was drowned in a storm of contending yells. Their struggles to get the floor with bawlings, bellowings, and contortions, and the senseless rap of the Speaker's gavel, were ...
— The Clansman - An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan • Thomas Dixon

... disaster, misfortune, stripe, buffet, cuff, knock, rap, stroke, calamity, cut, lash, ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald

... done for themselves; serve them right for seeking to get a catch from a friend like Missus, as is that kind to her boarders, which you can testify, Miss; they might be her own flesh and blood. Bless you! she'll never make a rap by keeping boarders. She never grudges them anythink, and would sooner deny herself than that they should go without their fancies. But there, now, that fine young gentleman you brought," went on Susan with the slightest ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler

... heard in the outer apartment, in earnest conversation, and very soon a rap was heard on the door. Eliza started ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... relieve them of difficulty by forthwith resigning. Mr. P. doesn't take that view; thinks it would be rude, after having been unanimously elected, to appear to undervalue such remarkable, spontaneous act of confidence; doesn't care a rap for ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., December 6, 1890 • Various

... that is his civic establishment in Medical-School Street; thither and not elsewhither has his road led him. Not to the reign of Brotherhood and Perfect Felicity; yet surely on the way towards that?—Hark, a rap again! A musical woman's-voice, refusing to be rejected: it is the Citoyenne who would do France a service. Marat, recognising from within, cries, Admit her. Charlotte ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle

... the landlord, talking to the Eurasian doctor in the passage outside the coffee-room, and before I had time to open the door, there came a peremptory rap, the door was opened from the outside and ...
— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer

... just as the first cold rays of the chilly spring dawn cast a ghastly blue light on the dormant figures around me, deadening the yellow flame of the lamp which was burning itself out, I was roused from my torpor by a light rap at the outside door. In the office all was quiet, but for the heavy and rhythmic snores of the weary comrades, and wondering who could claim admittance at such an unearthly hour, I rose with a shiver and opened the door. To my surprise ...
— A Girl Among the Anarchists • Isabel Meredith

... a heavy step on the stairs, a rap that sounded much as if an elephant had knocked against the jamb in passing, and there in the door stood a six-foot giant, calmly surveying me, as if I were a specimen bug stuck on a pin for inspection, instead of an ordinary man-person with ...
— The Making of an American • Jacob A. Riis

... rap at the door of Shirley's shop brought the four girls on the run from the back room, where they had been doing the last of the ...
— The Merriweather Girls and the Mystery of the Queen's Fan • Lizette M. Edholm

... the point of his curved nose at the speaker, who checked himself, and, giving an emphatic rap with his crutch on the ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise

... avow to God," said Little JOHN "I had lever to crack thy crown!" The Butler was full uncourteous, There he stood on floor; He started to the buttery, and shut fast the door. Little JOHN gave the Butler such a rap His back went nigh in two Though he lived an hundred winters, the worse he should go. He spurned the door with his foot, it went up well and fine! And there he made a large 'livery Both of ale and wine. "Sir, if ye will not dine," said Little JOHN, "I ...
— Fifteenth Century Prose and Verse • Various

... sharp rap at the door, and a man entered to announce that the principals of the great company desired the presence of Ingleborough ...
— A Dash from Diamond City • George Manville Fenn

... intercourse, he never shows a trace of what he once was. He is excessively given to mystifying his friends, and is never so delighted as when he has persuaded some one into a belief in one of his grave inventions.... There was a rap at the door at last, and enter a gentleman in black small clothes and gaiters, short and very slight in his person, his hair just sprinkled with grey, a beautiful, deep-set, grey eye, aquiline nose, and a very indescribable mouth. His sister, whose literary reputation is very closely ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston

... as it did when I saw it first," said Noll,—"the sea getting dark and shadowy and making that lonesome sound on the pebbles, and oh, how I had to rap and search before I could find my way in! But ...
— Culm Rock - The Story of a Year: What it Brought and What it Taught • Glance Gaylord

... brought her a book and brief note of kind words. One Saturday morning she sat quite alone in her small room; the week had been specially painful, and, wearied in soul, the girl laid her head down on her folded arms, and thought of her home in the far South. A loud rap startled her from this painful reverie, and ere she could utter the stereotyped "come in," ...
— Macaria • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson

... cram it in— Children's heads are hollow; Rap it in, tap it in— Bang it in, slam it in Ancient archaeology, Aryan philology, Prosody, zoology, Physics, climatology, Calculus and mathematics, Rhetoric and hydrostatics. Stuff the school children, fill up the heads of them, Send them all lesson-full home to the beds of them; When they are ...
— The Gentleman from Everywhere • James Henry Foss

... pulpit the hardest hits he can; and the Jews sit spitting, coughing, and making faces in return; while a person armed with a long pole stalks through the congregation, and admonishes the noisiest with a firm sharp rap on the head. The scene closes with a baptism, in which, it is affirmed, the same Jew sometimes plays the same part twice, ...
— Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber - Or The Influence of Romanism on Trade, Justice, and Knowledge • James Aitken Wylie

... want to tell you something. Swear that you will never tell my father or mother. I don't give a rap for music; I hate it, but I like the young men here in Balak, no, not the citizens. They are slow, but the soldiers, the regiment attached to the Royal Household. I've met a Lieutenant Fustics—oh, he's lovely, belongs to the oldest family in Serbia, is young, handsome and so fine in his uniform. ...
— Melomaniacs • James Huneker

... "We found their headquarters. One of their members cracked. Ben Ruthenberg of the F.B.I. found he had a morals rap against him some years ago and scared him into talking by threats of exposure. At any rate, you're right. They had established themselves in some government buildings going back to Spanish-American War days. We've arrested eight or ten officials ...
— Status Quo • Dallas McCord Reynolds

... scent," he said, drawing away from her hands. "Lost it utterly. And why do you want to come and live here? You're not fond of me. You don't care a rap for me. Are ...
— Sally Bishop - A Romance • E. Temple Thurston

... was a light rap at the library door, followed by the entrance of a footman who placed a small, twisted note in the hands of Miss Levison. She opened ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth

... many hearers who did not usually go much to church, and they were accustomed—then as later—to say that here was a Christian who knew enough about the problems of thought to make his testimony worth hearing. Others, who cared not a rap for Personality or Causation, Realism or Nominalism, were attracted by his grace, his eloquence, his literary charm. His style was entirely his own. He played strange tricks with the English language, heaped ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell

... horses, and learn the condition of Hawley's outfit," he announced in a low voice. "I may be gone for fifteen or twenty minutes, and, meanwhile, Miss Hope, get ready for a long ride. Neb, stand here close beside the door, and if any one tries to come in brain him with your gun-stock. I'll rap three ...
— Keith of the Border • Randall Parrish

... But he ventured to rap upon the door. It was one of those old-fashioned doors which opens in two parts. The upper half swung outward, ...
— Ruth Fielding and the Gypsies - The Missing Pearl Necklace • Alice B. Emerson

... as she answered my rap at the cottage door. "Oh, Master Percy, how you have grown, and how's your Mamma—I ...
— Forbidden Fruit • Anonymous

... But, hark! a rap comes gently to the door; Jenny, wha kens the meaning o' the same, Tells how a neibor lad came o'er the moor, To do some errands, and convoy her hame. The wily mother sees the conscious flame Sparkle in Jenny's ...
— Six Centuries of English Poetry - Tennyson to Chaucer • James Baldwin

... have drawn back again, if it had been possible; but the usher led her forward, and Robin Hood and the foresters having bent the knee before her, the hobby-horse began to curvet anew among the spectators, and tread on their toes, the fool to rap their knuckles with his bauble, the piper to play, the taborer to beat his tambourine, and the morris-dancers to toss their kerchiefs over their heads. Thus the pageant being put in motion, the rush-cart began to roll on, its horses' bells jingling ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth

... Rap, rap, rap, at the little third story room. "Come in," called Clemence, listlessly. Mrs. Mann's cheery face ...
— Clemence - The Schoolmistress of Waveland • Retta Babcock

... remark with which Laurence had scant patience, the more so that it met him at every turn. What concern was it of the Rand collectively who he chose to be friendly with, that every third person he met should rap out such kind ...
— The Sign of the Spider • Bertram Mitford

... play are just as enthusiastic, preoccupied, and noisy as white children, and the popularity of a game is subject, likewise, to spasmodic exclusiveness. While the particular inclination lasts no other game is held to be worth a rap for rational black boys to play, but the relish the more speedily degenerates. In the ordinary concerns of life a black boy is incapable of self-denial. His intensity for the time is almost pathetic; his revulsion comic. Hence the cycle of the games ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield

... tell you that disembodied spirits never become so undignified as to upset furniture or rap on tables. Neither do they write letters in pen and ink and put them under doors. Spiritual beings are purely spiritual; they cannot touch anything human, much less deal in such vulgar display as the throwing ...
— A Romance of Two Worlds • Marie Corelli

... Japan smokes, both men and women. The universal pipe of the country is a small brass tube about six inches long, with the end turned up and widened to form the bowl. This bowl holds the merest pinch of tobacco; a couple of whiffs, a smart rap on the edge of the brazier to knock out the residue, and the pipe is filled again and again, until the smoker feels satisfied. The girls that wait on one at the yadoyas and tea-houses carry their tobacco in the capacious sleeve-pockets of their dress, and ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens

... a rap for family," he said, "but at the same time I suppose every man would like his daughter—" Here he stopped abruptly. "I mean to say," he said, "would like to have for his son-in-law a man of good family. I grant that it is a very stupid prejudice, still I suppose it is a general ...
— By Conduct and Courage • G. A. Henty

... five minutes of the Colonel's receipt of the order. It may sound a long time, but only a smart and efficient Battalion can do it. The Adjutant has to open and acquaint the C.O. of the order. He has to rap out his own orders. Sleeping men have to be roused, equipment thrown on, arms taken up. The men have to "fall in" in their right sections; have to be numbered, have to form fours. If there is any muddle whatever, a Battalion cannot move off ...
— "Contemptible" • "Casualty"

... with their master under such unusual relations of guest and host, as a girl does of her first party. Each rather drew back from the decided step of knocking at the door; but with a rebuffing shake at his own folly, Philip was the one to give a loud single rap. As if they had been waited for, the door flew open, and a middle-aged servant stood behind, as spotless and neat as the house itself; and smiled a welcome to the ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. I • Elizabeth Gaskell

... just as they were going to bed, they heard a rap on the door. It was Nana, who came to ask as coolly as possible if she could sleep there. What a state she was in! All rags and dirt. She devoured a crust of dried bread and fell asleep with a part of it in her hand. This continued for some time, the girl coming and going like a will-o'-the-wisp. ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola

... tumours for the sake of obtaining credit for different qualities. Thus a terrific crack at the back of the ear might produce so great an elevation of the organ of combativeness as might obtain for the greatest coward a reputation for the greatest courage; and a thundering rap on the centre of the head might raise on the skull of the veriest brute a bump of, and name ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various

... a rap about you. I do care about my friend. You've got to stand by Cosgrave till he's ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie

... piano, and the rest of the audience sitting on their desks. Ingred wisely did not venture on anything too classical, but tried a bright "Spanish Ballade," and managed to get successfully to the end of it without any breakdown. In the midst of the clapping that followed came a loud rap-tap-tap at the door, which immediately opened to admit—much to the astonishment of the Fifth—two of the prefects, and a consignment of ...
— A Popular Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil

... opportunity to send Benny in a vessel coming directly to New York. He was put on board with a letter to a friend, who was requested to see him off to Boston. Early one morning, there was a loud rap at my door, and in rushed Benjamin, all out of breath. "O mother!" he exclaimed, "here I am! I run all the way; and I come all ...
— Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl - Written by Herself • Harriet Jacobs (AKA Linda Brent)

... dear, if I haven't forgotten, I'm not interested. You see, I know so much more about it than my lovers do. I can't take their point of view any longer. To tell you the truth, I don't care a rap whether they get married or not. In that story there, that you've been reading, I got awfully tired of the girl. She was such a fool, and the fellow was a ...
— Imaginary Interviews • W. D. Howells

... and lithe, Chiff-chaff whetting his airy scythe, Woodpecker whirrs his rattling rap, Ringdove ...
— Poems: New and Old • Henry Newbolt

... gave two or three taps, which seemed to echo through an immense number of empty rooms. "Take care," said Harry, "or you'll frighten Miss Mary into something or other." "There's no fear of that," replied Karl; "she's not so nervous as you." Harry was proceeding to rap back; but he was interrupted by hearing some one coming to the door, which was the next moment thrown open, and Ashburner saw a fine-looking, plainly-dressed old man, or thought he saw such an one, for it was too dark to distinguish clearly. "How are you, Judge?" said Karl, stepping forward, and ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 3, March, 1852 • Various

... know nothing about it, my pretty dear! You would rap at the door of the future; I pull the cord, and ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac

... Pinnegar, in a sudden changed voice. She had gone a livid yellow colour. And she gave a queer, sharp little rap on the table ...
— The Lost Girl • D. H. Lawrence

... doubtless, but I value him as a neighbor. It is a satisfaction during the cold or stormy winter nights to know he is warm and cozy there in his retreat. When the day is bad and unfit to be abroad in, he is there too. When I wish to know if he is at home, I go and rap upon his tree, and, if he is not too lazy or indifferent, after some delay he shows his head in his round doorway about ten feet above, and looks down inquiringly upon me—sometimes latterly I think half resentfully, as much as to say, "I would thank ...
— Bird Stories from Burroughs - Sketches of Bird Life Taken from the Works of John Burroughs • John Burroughs

... emphasised each staccato summons by a sharp rap of his stick against the highest point of the tree ...
— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland

... engrossing than that of the formation of the skull of neolithic man. The strictly evidential demonstration of communion between the living and the dead might be almost negligible in quantity, and yet the importance of one rap from the world of discarnate spirits, scientifically demonstrated, would outweigh ...
— Mountain Meditations - and some subjects of the day and the war • L. Lind-af-Hageby

... saying to his company, "Have patience with me, for some of my family are come to visit me: wherefore excuse belongeth first to Allah Almighty, and then to you."[FN407] So they farewelled him and fared their ways, whilst he rapped another light rap at the door. When the young man heard this, he changed colour and the woman said to him, "Methinks thy lad hath returned." He answered, "Yes;" and she arose and opening the door to the master of the house, said to him, "Where hast thou been? Indeed, thy master is angry ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... critical attention. No explanation of the strange phenomenon suggested itself in spite of endless theories and speculations. Could it be mice? But mice only gnawed and scuttled about; they did not rap. It was more like crackling than anything else; the noise produced by thousands of faint discharges. No, it was inexplicable, and he ...
— Austin and His Friends • Frederic H. Balfour

... which is held in the right hand. The hand is then placed on the board over the magnet. When the performer wishes the hand to move he pushes the plug in, which turns on the current and causes the magnet to attract the iron in the wrist, and will, therefore, make the hand rap. The switch can be made similar to an ordinary push button so the rapping may be easily controlled without detection ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics

... Queen's wrath burst out; they heard a swift movement, and the rap of her high heels as she sprang ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson

... His selfishness is suggested with much more psychological tact and truth than that of any other of the villains that Dickens described about this time. But his daughter is merely the young woman with whom Nicholas is in love. We do not care a rap about Madeline Bray. Personally I should have preferred Cecilia Bobster. Here is one real point where the Victorian romance falls below the Elizabethan romantic drama. Shakespeare always made his heroines heroic as ...
— Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens • G. K. Chesterton

... explained to me in terms of HO(2) or such like formulas, learned, but so hopelessly unsatisfying. I do not want my butterfly stuck on a pin and put in a glass case. I want to see the sunlight on its wings as it flits from flower to flower, and I don't care a rap what its Latin name may be. Anyway, it is not its name. The sun and the flower and the butterfly know that. The man who sticks a pin in it does not, and never will, for he knows not its language. Only the poet does among men. So, you see, I am disqualified ...
— The Making of an American • Jacob A. Riis

... bone were equally childish things: Let me alone, he seemed to say, I have my grief, and it is company enough. There was the very superior cat who sat on every window-ledge, winking at life. He (for in France all cats are masculine by order of philology), he did not care a rap for man or dog, but he liked women and permitted them to observe him. There was the man who insinuated himself between the tables at the Cafe, holding out postcard-representations of the Pantheon, the Louvre, ...
— Here are Ladies • James Stephens

... like the flopping of a freshly caught roach in a punt, even to the beating of the tail, which was here represented by the man's legs. By degrees this grew more slow; then there was a flap at intervals, finishing with one heavy rap, and he lay quite still as ...
— King o' the Beach - A Tropic Tale • George Manville Fenn

... he'd better be," cried Dyke. "If he gives me any of his nonsense, he'll have a rap over the head with the ...
— Diamond Dyke - The Lone Farm on the Veldt - Story of South African Adventure • George Manville Fenn

... decorating of Mary Burton's apartments had engrossed her brother's interest for some weeks prior to her arrival and when in answer to his rap a silvery voice said, "Come in," he stood on the threshold of a boudoir as richly and tastefully detailed as a princess of the ...
— Destiny • Charles Neville Buck

... rides upon my breath! Whoop! whoop! whoopee! I'm the Purple Blossom of Gingham Mountain, an' where is that son of thunder who'll try an' nip me in the bud! Whoop! whoopee! I'm yere to fight or drink with any sport; any one or both! Whoopee! Where is the stately stag to stamp his hoof or rap his antlers to my proclamations! Where is that boundin' ...
— Wolfville Days • Alfred Henry Lewis

... stout oak stick. 'Here he is,' said he; 'take this in your hand, and it will carry you to your mother's with more safety than such a horse as you ride.' I was in doubt, when I got it into my hand, whether I should not in the first place apply it to his pate; but a rap at the street-door made the wretch fly to it, and when I returned to the parlour, he introduced me, as if nothing of the kind had happened, to the gentleman who entered, as Mr. Goldsmith, his most ingenious and worthy friend, of whom he had so often heard him speak with rapture. I could ...
— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various

... counsel, was not debarred by etiquette from taking instructions direct from his clients. One day, following a rap on the door of his chambers in Middle Temple Lane, a thick-set man, with cropped poll of unmistakably Newgate cut, slunk into the room, when the ...
— Law and Laughter • George Alexander Morton

... an Irishman, which made me feel that these gaudy colours I have burst into are not so famous as I supposed; and on the eighth day I find myself insulted in twenty-seven places by an angry mosquito, whom in the small hours of the morning I had occasion to rap over the knuckles and turn out of my billet. And I've got a nasty cold, and nobody loves me or cleans my buttons, and if I want to go anywhere there are no more motor cars and they make me pay a penny ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, July 25, 1917 • Various

... To take a false oath; also to curse. He rapped out a volley; i.e. he swore a whole volley of oaths. To rap, means also to exchange or barter: a rap is likewise an Irish halfpenny. Rap on the ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.

... the least forewarning, there came a smart rap on the door. The sound smote the company of whispering, laughing girls into a company of frightened, trembling culprits. They hardly dared breathe, and when the commanding rap came for a second time neither Ruth nor Helen had strength enough ...
— Ruth Fielding at Briarwood Hall - or Solving the Campus Mystery • Alice B. Emerson

... You're blossoming out. That's repartee, that is. With the accent on the rap, too. Never you mind; I think old 1812 and I will get on all right after this. It doesn't seem to bother him any, so I don't see why it should worry me. Nice motherly ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr

... there's not much in it after all. No designing, no calculations, and in a great many instances no real scale even. In fact, so long as the drawing is done quickly and immaculately got up, it does not matter a rap whether a man is as big as a monkey or not, so long as they are both good-looking. You see the main object is to make the principle of the invention clear at a glance in one view, that is why they generally are perspective. ...
— Canada for Gentlemen • James Seton Cockburn

... the drift of time, Hadleyburg had the ill luck to offend a passing stranger—possibly without knowing it, certainly without caring, for Hadleyburg was sufficient unto itself, and cared not a rap for strangers or their opinions. Still, it would have been well to make an exception in this one's case, for he was a bitter man, and revengeful. All through his wanderings during a whole year he kept his injury ...
— The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg • Mark Twain

... clearing a wholly unnecessary thirty feet. Again the hurricane of cheers broke out. "Don't he fly 'em," said one man, waving his hat. At the last fence he made his spring yards too soon; his forelegs got over all right, but his hind legs dropped on the rail with a sounding rap, and he left a little tuft of ...
— Three Elephant Power • Andrew Barton 'Banjo' Paterson

... Queenstown is one of the experiences. May I send the steward to rap at your door when the ...
— In a Steamer Chair And Other Stories • Robert Barr

... came to the floor with a sharp rap. "No, sir!" he replied, with much indignation; "I have never harbored thieves, nor sold stolen goods to my ...
— Burnham Breaker • Homer Greene

... to these viragoes; but what would you say, should you see the Sparkler shaking her elbow for a whole night together, and thumping the table with a dice-box? Or how would you like to hear good widow lady herself returning to her house at midnight and alarming the whole street with a most enormous rap, after having sat up till that time at crimp or ombre? Sir, I am the husband of one of these female gamesters, and a great loser by it both in rest my and pocket. As my wife reads your papers, one upon this subject might be of ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore

... about it, and I don't care a rap," he answered. "Mon General, or rather, Monsieur le Directeur, you may consider yourself appointed, Jesuit or no Jesuit. We need men of your stamp to train up officers ...
— Boys' Book of Famous Soldiers • J. Walker McSpadden

... Marie-Anne heard someone rap at her door. It was the kind-hearted old man who had come ...
— The Honor of the Name • Emile Gaboriau

... porch had no knocker, and she looked in vain for a bell. All she could do was to rap sharply with the ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. I. • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... moment. She could hear the click of her father's typewriter. She pressed the button that lighted her bed lamp, found her slippers and stole noiselessly downstairs. Never in her whole life had she disturbed her Daddy when he was writing, but now she did not even rap—she pushed the door open and ...
— Keineth • Jane D. Abbott

... represented by its Effects upon a Country Life.... In Pastoral, as in other Writings, Chastity of sentiment ought doubtless to be observed, and Purity of Manners to be represented; not because the Poet is confined to the Images of the golden Age'—this is a rap at Pope—'but because, having the subject in his own Choice, he ought always to consult the Interest of Virtue.' The one fixed idea which runs throughout these criticisms is that pastoral in its nature somehow is, or should be, other than ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg

... broke down utterly, and said such things of himself as other men do not like to hear. Presently there was a light rap of knuckles at the door. Austin opened it and ...
— Viviette • William J. Locke

... followed by a peremptory rap on the door, startled the girl back to a realisation of the flight of time. The sun had set, and a grey light filled the room. Without a passing thought of the tears upon her face, she lowered the ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver

... "that I don't care a rap for the life of a single man in the regiment. You know that I would send the 748 of you men and horses galloping into the pit of perdition with no more compunction than I would kill ...
— The Point Of Honor - A Military Tale • Joseph Conrad

... was a new mystery. Was this man lying? Had he been in collusion with the Orientals, and was he trying to hide that fact; or had the rap on his head caused a lapse of memory, which blotted out all recollections of the affair in the case ...
— Panther Eye • Roy J. Snell

... of Will with hysteria, for it amounted to that. I remembered that to cure a bevy of school-girls of it one should rap out something sharply, with a cane if need be. Yet Will was not like a school-girl, and his hysteria took the pseudo-manly form of refusal to retreat. I yearned for Fred's camp-fires, and Fred's laugh, hot supper, or ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy

... threw himself upon his guard. Then the Tinker spat upon his hands and, grasping his staff, came straight at the other. He struck two or three blows, but soon found that he had met his match, for Robin warded and parried all of them, and, before the Tinker thought, he gave him a rap upon the ribs in return. At this Robin laughed aloud, and the Tinker grew more angry than ever, and smote again with all his might and main. Again Robin warded two of the strokes, but at the third, his staff broke beneath the ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle

... a horse clattered on the stony pavement, and stopped suddenly at the door. A light step and the clink of a scabbard rang on the steps. A familiar rap followed. Angelique, with the infallible intuition of a woman who recognizes the knock and footstep of her lover from ten thousand others, sprang up and met Le Gardeur de Repentigny as he entered the boudoir. She received him with warmth, ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby

... rush of French infantry up the slopes, the feathery drift of French gun-smoke lower down, and, high up, on the wooded crest along the sky, the red lightnings and white puffs of the German artillery. Rap, rap, rap, went the answering guns, as the troops swept up and disappeared into the fire-tongued wood; and we stood there dumbfounded at the accident of having stumbled on this visible episode of the ...
— Fighting France - From Dunkerque to Belport • Edith Wharton

... Temistocle found them in Rome, and I may as well tell you how it happened. When he reached the head of the staircase, he took the key from the one side to the other, locked the door, as agreed, and sat down to wait for Hedwig's rap. He indeed suspected that it would never come, for he had only pretended not to see the mules; but the prospect of further bribes made him anxious not to lose sight of his mistress, and certainly not to disobey her, in case she really returned. The staircase opened ...
— A Roman Singer • F. Marion Crawford

... liberation from the boarding house. On one of these last days, a quarter of an hour after she had retired from the dining room, planning to enjoy a rest on a sea grass sofa covered with some large-figured woolen material, there was a gentle rap ...
— The German Classics Of The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries, Volume 12 • Various

... step in the corridor. Ruth had been mistaken so many times that she did not raise her head or look up. A rap on the door, and before she could say "Herein!" the ...
— Ruth Fielding at the War Front - or, The Hunt for the Lost Soldier • Alice B. Emerson

... to be influenced by Mrs. Whaling's statements), and he determined on a diversion. He felt morally certain that the only "confidential" communication the veteran post commander had received from any superior in a week was the stinging rap from division headquarters anent the bungle he had made in Ray's affair, and on general principles he felt that he couldn't let an ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King

... say," replied Redhead, "that he'd have the spunk in him to run away with Bodagh Buie's daughter? Be the contents o' the book, if I thought he'd thry it, I stick to him like a Throjan; the dirty Bodagh, that, as Larry Lawdher said tonight, never backed or supported us, or gev a single rap to help us, if a penny 'ud save us from the gallis. To hell's delights wid him an' all belongin' to him, I say too; an' I'll tell you What it is, boys, if Flanagan has the manliness to take away his daughter, I'll be the first to ...
— Fardorougha, The Miser - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton

... was only the door-bell. But who could it be? Some one from the office, from her lawyer? She could see nobody. In two minutes there was a rap at her door. It was only the servant with a despatch. She took it and opened ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... A rap came then at the door, and master Joe, springing up, ushered the subject of our conversation into the room. He held his hat in his hand, and had under his arm a couple of ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3 No 2, February 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... He gave a mighty rap at the door with the fire tongs, and stood expectant. Certainly he was right; some ...
— The Man in Lower Ten • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... time later for conversations in which future practicalities should take precedence over romantic fancies and protestations. Just now the Butterfly did not care a rap what should happen when winter came; for the present the world was filled with flowers—all his, and all ...
— We Three • Gouverneur Morris

... of feet outside the door, a clinking of glass and crockery, and a jarring sort of blow, as if some one were trying to rap on the panel with the edge of a heavy-laden waiter. Bartley threw the door open and found the landlord there, red and smiling, with the waiter ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells

... rap what they are," answered the mate, who was sufficiently warmed up to welcome any problem. "They'll get fight enough. We'll overhaul their dunnage first for whisky and knives, then turn them to. Come ...
— "Where Angels Fear to Tread" and Other Stories of the Sea • Morgan Robertson

... fell thick, At the fairs on the Devon and Cornwall downs, In their bouts with the single-stick. You may read a moral, not far amiss, If you care to moralise, In the crossing-guard, where the ash-plants kiss, To the words "God spare our eyes". No game was ever yet worth a rap For a rational man to play, Into which no accident, no mishap, ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon

... Rap, tap, tap!—more guests arrived: three dainty little roadside Fairies with these funny names, Sun-Flower-Seed, Thistle-Whistle, and Ragged Sailor. (Fairies and Mice are usually very good friends; in ...
— Grasshopper Green and the Meadow Mice • John Rae

... Bristles, who was surely in his element, as he dearly loved action of any sort; "three hits for every one we've taken, and then some. Put your muscle into every throw, fellows! Rap 'em hard. They started it, and we'll do the winding up, and make the peace terms. It's a surrender, or run ...
— Fred Fenton Marathon Runner - The Great Race at Riverport School • Allen Chapman

... and gave the bottom of the package a smart rap with my knuckles. Ha! it was a pleasant sound that answered to the blow. It was not a bale of linen, then, but a box, covered, like many others, with several folds of coarse cheap canvas. It could not be cloth, either; for instead ...
— The Boy Tar • Mayne Reid

... not feel any despondency about it because I know it is good and worth doing. It is extraordinary how much more moral one is than one imagines. At school I never minded getting into a row if it were really not my fault. Similarly, I have never cared a rap for rejections or criticisms, since I had got a point of view to express which I was certain held water. Some people think it holds water—on the brain. But I don't ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward



Words linked to "Rap" :   knock, blame, talk, music, tap, perform, rap sheet, whack, pink, African-American music, sound, rap group, black music, bump, blow



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