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Rub   Listen
verb
Rub  v. t.  (past & past part. rubbed; pres. part. rubbing)  
1.
To subject (a body) to the action of something moving over its surface with pressure and friction, especially to the action of something moving back and forth; as, to rub the flesh with the hand; to rub wood with sandpaper. "It shall be expedient, after that body is cleaned, to rub the body with a coarse linen cloth."
2.
To move over the surface of (a body) with pressure and friction; to graze; to chafe; as, the boat rubs the ground.
3.
To cause (a body) to move with pressure and friction along a surface; as, to rub the hand over the body. "Two bones rubbed hard against one another."
4.
To spread a substance thinly over; to smear. "The smoothed plank,... New rubbed with balm."
5.
To scour; to burnish; to polish; to brighten; to cleanse; often with up or over; as, to rub up silver. "The whole business of our redemption is to rub over the defaced copy of the creation."
6.
To hinder; to cross; to thwart. (R.) "'T is the duke's pleasure, Whose disposition, all the world well knows, Will not be rubbed nor stopped."
To rub down.
(a)
To clean by rubbing; to comb or curry; as, to down a horse.
(b)
To reduce or remove by rubbing; as, to rub down the rough points.
To rub off, to clean anything by rubbing; to separate by friction; as, to rub off rust.
To rub out, to remove or separate by friction; to erase; to obliterate; as, to rub out a mark or letter; to rub out a stain.
To rub up.
(a)
To burnish; to polish; to clean.
(b)
To excite; to awaken; to rouse to action; as, to rub up the memory.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Rub" Quotes from Famous Books



... to get it away, Mas'r Harry?" he said, giving his head a rub, not that it itched, but so as to clear ...
— The Golden Magnet • George Manville Fenn

... which they were born, fearing to abandon it, as if that would be equivalent to a degradation, remaining during the day in a fourth-floor apartment, furnished with the remnants of their past opulence, making unheard-of sacrifices in order to be able in the evening to rub elbows worthily with those who ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... strip off some of his wet clothes and rub him down!" cried Andy. "And can you get something hot to drink, ...
— The Mystery at Putnam Hall - The School Chums' Strange Discovery • Arthur M. Winfield

... gently rub my clitoris with her finger, while she kissed my breasts and lips passionately. I soon began again to experience the delicious sensation I have spoken of before; rivers of pleasure permeated through my system. ...
— The Life and Amours of the Beautiful, Gay and Dashing Kate Percival - The Belle of the Delaware • Kate Percival

... entertainment, or simple familiarity, he must either become like them, or change them to his own fashion. A live coal placed next a dead one will either kindle that or be quenched by it. Such being the risk, it is well to be cautious in admitting intimacies of this sort, remembering that one cannot rub shoulders with a soot-stained man without sharing the soot oneself. What will you do, supposing the talk turns on gladiators, or horses, or prize-fighters, or (what is worse) on persons, condemning this and that, approving ...
— The Golden Sayings of Epictetus • Epictetus

... "Then jest rub out the picter of the little feller in front of the stoop, an' put in Turk. If so be as somethin' happens to-night, I sh'd want to show her the plans in the mornin'; an' if she should ax me whose little feller it was, ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland

... dare the deeds of men; they talk freely, and take their swing in broad day. Others are shy, reserved, bashful, and are afraid to do what they love quite as much as the others. Agellius never could rub off this shame, and it has taken this turn. He's sure to outgrow it in a year or two. I should not wonder if, when once he had got over it, he went into the opposite fault. You'll find him a drinker and a swaggerer and a spendthrift ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman

... spirit of Rupert's dragoons—'as we say, blood up to the ears.'[38] 'What can be the meaning of this (trumpeters), they neither sound boot and saddle, nor horse and away, nor a charge?'[39] In his allegories when he alludes to fighting, it is with the sword and not with the musket;[40] 'rub up man, put on thy harness.'[41] 'The father's sword in the hand of the sucking child is not able to ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... vast flat-topped mass of granite unique among the natural elevations of the world. She is another melting pot. Here mingle Kaffir and Boer, Basuto and Britisher, East Indian and Zulu. The hardy rancher and fortune-hunter from the North Country rub shoulders with the globe-trotter. In the bustling streets modern taxicabs vie for space with antiquated hansoms bearing names like "Never Say Die," "Home Sweet Home," or "Honeysuckle." All the horse-drawn public ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson

... our author observes, with great good sense, though in terms somewhat homely,—addressing, it is to be noticed, his remarks to gentlemen,—"the inconvenience of riding on the left of the lady, is, that if you ride near, to give her any assistance, you are liable to rub, or incommode, the lady's legs, and alarm her; and the spur is liable to catch, or tear, the lady's habit: if the roads are dirty, your horse, likewise, bespatters the lady's habit. On the right hand of the lady, ...
— The Young Lady's Equestrian Manual • Anonymous

... woods, he tells her, are full of hogs. They shall fall an easy prey to his unfailing gun, and after them, when further south, the golden orange shall delight her thirsty soul, while all the sugar-cane she can chew shall be gathered for her. Add to these the luxury of plenty of snuff with which to rub her dainty gums, with the promise of tobacco enough to keep her pipe always full, and it will be hard to find among this class a fair one with sufficient strength of mind to resist such an offer; so she promises to keep house ...
— Four Months in a Sneak-Box • Nathaniel H. Bishop

... their hind quarters up during this process, and they close their eyes, which does not take place when they have congress with mares. The same informant observed that bulls and goats produce emissions by using their forelegs as a stimulus, bringing up their hind quarters, and mares rub themselves against objects. I am informed by a gentleman who is a recognized authority on goats, that they sometimes take the penis into the mouth and produce actual orgasm, thus practicing auto-fellatio. As regards ferrets, the Rev. H. Northcote states: "I ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... Gottingen, Berlin, and was long enough at Jena to rub the blot off the 'scutcheon. A stay at Weimar, in the Goethe country, completed the ...
— Little Journeys To The Homes Of Great Teachers • Elbert Hubbard

... wish left, to rejoin the flock, rub himself against the human animals, his brothers, feel with them, act with them.... Though exhausted by sleeplessness, he started, in spite of his wife, to take the train for Paris with Maxime. They had to wait a long time at the station, and also in the train, for the tracks were blocked, ...
— Clerambault - The Story Of An Independent Spirit During The War • Rolland, Romain

... The truth you speak doth lack some gentleness, And time to speak it in: you rub the sore, When you should bring the ...
— Queechy, Volume I • Elizabeth Wetherell

... that on every traveling man's head should rest a dunce cap will some fine day get badly fooled if he continues to rub up against the drummer. The road is the biggest college in the world. Its classrooms are not confined within a few gray stone buildings with red slate roofs; they are the nooks and corners of the earth. Its teachers are not a few half starved silk worms feeding ...
— Tales of the Road • Charles N. Crewdson

... the house, and she got him her husband's Sunday trousers, which she had just washed and ironed, and insisted on his putting them on, while she dried his own. She hung his stockings and his coat before the fire, and made one of the boys rub his shoes with a cloth so as to dry them as much as possible before putting ...
— What Might Have Been Expected • Frank R. Stockton

... years, there is a fair chance of his getting his promotion when he returns home.' The rest is private," observed the admiral, when he had concluded this somewhat laconic epistle. "And now, Jack, I congratulate you, my lad," he continued. "You have been quite long enough on shore to rub up your shore manners, and that is as long as a midshipman ought to remain at home. How ...
— The Three Midshipmen • W.H.G. Kingston

... But here I do not scruple to say that I prefer the society of distinguished people, and that even the distinction of wealth confers many advantages. The best education is to be had at a price as well as the best broadcloth. The son of a peer is more likely to rub his shoulders against well-informed men than the son of a tradesman. The graces come easier to the wife of him who has had great-grandfathers than they do to her whose husband has been less,—or more fortunate, as he may think it. The discerning man will recognise the information ...
— Autobiography of Anthony Trollope • Anthony Trollope

... as soon as the mother begins to regain her strength. A vinegar rub administered on going to bed may often prevent ...
— The Mother and Her Child • William S. Sadler

... in their efforts to rub the burning oil from their bodies, twined around the cane, twisted from stem to stem, and set the fields on fire in ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1, No. 59, December 23, 1897 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various

... retire to our bedchambers. In the morning, again, the dull monotonous double note of the whee-whee, (so named from the sound of its calls,) chiming in at as regular intervals as the tick of a clock, warns us to rub our eyes and con over the tasks of the impending day, as it is but half an hour to dawn; till again the loud laughter of the jackass summons us to turn out, and take a peep at the appearance of the morning, which just begins ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume 10, No. 271, Saturday, September 1, 1827. • Various

... Specialty, the poor Gink who calls loudly for English Mustard and thinks he is a Genius because he can rub a Bowl with a sprig of Garlic, may have his brief Hour of Triumph, but no man ever really got anywhere by doping Salad, when you stop to ...
— Ade's Fables • George Ade

... Rub the nutter or butter lightly into the flour. Add enough cold water to make a fairly stiff paste. Roll it out to a 1/4 inch thickness. It is now ready ...
— The Healthy Life Cook Book, 2d ed. • Florence Daniel

... are soiled with the stain of labour, I don't care how refined or how honest it is, never by any chance find themselves at the mahogany board of aristocracy. Coat-sleeves bearing the finger-marks of honourable industry could not safely rub against the sleek broadcloth of high-life unless by sacrificing some of their beautiful (?) hieroglyphics and forfeiting to some extent the reputations they have earned ...
— The Doctor's Daughter • "Vera"

... rub this up some and put in another lining. This is too good a piece to hide away up here," and he put it carefully aside at ...
— Ralestone Luck • Andre Norton

... rub my knees together and make a 'crick,' you know, so I had to wait until you came to. I'd have pushed you overboard if it hadn't happened to-day. I'm so full of unused pep, ...
— The Cricket • Marjorie Cooke

... Nat's slave, an Porter Scales wuz his slave too. Ole Marse Jimmie Scale's sons was Nat Pitcher and John Durham, and John Durham went to wah. He took Richmond Scales long wiff him to wait on him! Cook fuh him! Make his pallet! Clean his clothes! Rub down his horse! Marse John Durum'd sleep with Richmond in de wintuh to keep him warm. Richmond'd carry him watuh in his canteen during a battle. Marse John Durum had on a ring that wuz carved and he tole Richmond take a good look at this ring sose he'd know him by it, if he didn't ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves, North Carolina Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration

... would advise the very finest plaster of Paris to be used. When the plaster is worked up to the proper consistency, it is necessary to rub a fine oil into the hand before bringing it into contact with the plaster, as otherwise the hair may stick and ...
— Palmistry for All • Cheiro

... clown, beginning to rub Andy's back vigorously. "You've got quite a bruise, and I suppose it pains. Just lay down. When I get through, if the Nine Oils don't fix you up, ...
— Andy the Acrobat • Peter T. Harkness

... didn't he say. Nothing special—the old kind of story. I never thought much of plaguing a doctor for a common sort of thing like this. I'm to rub the hand with liniment three times a day. There's the bottle on that shelf. I 'spect I'll be all right in a week or a fortnight. Now, children, hurry up with your dinner; you'll have to be off to school in less than ten minutes, so there's no time ...
— Good Luck • L. T. Meade

... fray, rub; gnaw, corrode; roughen, ruffle, agitate; worry, harass, tease, irritate, vex, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming

... life, and not a bit spoiled. Hang it all, I'm an ass to act like this! But I can't help it. A man is never too old to learn or to love. I'll play hob with some of these young dandies before I get through. Hamshaw, you've got to win one of these girls. But which one? There's the rub! It's awfully annoying!" ...
— Her Weight in Gold • George Barr McCutcheon

... first time, I noticed, tottered, I went across the room to the great pier-glass, and looked in. It was too covered with grime, to give back any reflection, and, with trembling hands, I began to rub off the dirt. Presently, I could see myself. The thought that had come to me, was confirmed. Instead of the great, hale man, who scarcely looked fifty, I was looking at a bent, decrepit man, whose shoulders stooped, and whose face was wrinkled with the years of a century. The hair—which a ...
— The House on the Borderland • William Hope Hodgson

... where it can combine with oxygen. The burning phosphorus kindles the wood of the match, and from the burning match the fire is kindled. If you want to convince yourself that friction produces heat, rub a cent vigorously against your coat and note that the cent becomes warm. Matches have been in use less than a hundred years. Primitive man kindled his camp fire by rubbing pieces of dry wood together until they took fire, and this method is said ...
— General Science • Bertha M. Clark

... did not disturb us again till five A.M. on the 8th, when another floe-piece came in and gave the ship a heavy rub, and then went past, after which it continued slack about us for several hours. Everything was so quiet at nine o'clock as to induce me to venture up the hill abreast of us, in order to have a view of the newly-discovered land to the southwest, which, indeed, I had seen indistinctly and much ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry

... the way in which the decision was arrived at Lauder proceeds, 'the Chancelor's [Rothes] faint trinqueting and tergiversation for fear of displeasing Halton (who agented passionately for Francis) has abated much of his reputation. The 2d rub in Abbotshall's way was a largesse and donation of L5000 sterling to be given to Halton and other persons forth of the town's revenue for their many good services done to the toune. By this they outshot Sir Androw in his oune bow, turned the canon ...
— Publications of the Scottish History Society, Vol. 36 • Sir John Lauder

... you from Kansas, wavin' the tail o' friendship to all an' sundry, an' in the name of the uncounted millions o' pure-minded, high-toned horses now strugglin' towards the light o' freedom, I say to you, Rub noses with us in our sacred an' holy cause. The power is yourn. Without you, I say, Man the Oppressor cannot move himself from place to place. Without you he cannot reap, he cannot sow, he ...
— The Day's Work, Volume 1 • Rudyard Kipling

... she cried, shaking the flounces into place over her enormous crinoline. "Now 'serve she never wore dis sumptious dress more en once, but sent it down here good as new; 'sides de turban, jes see it shine. Yes, Vic, I forgives yer, so don't rub dem knuckles ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens

... room, Rebecca," Miss Miranda said. "Shut the mosquito nettin' door tight behind you, so 's to keep the flies out; it ain't flytime yet, but I want you to start right; take your passel along with ye and then you won't have to come down for it; always make your head save your heels. Rub your feet on that braided rug; hang your hat and cape in the entry there ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... she, 'he is. We've been married 'most six months now. My prophecy's all come true. And DIDN'T I rub it in on that Susannah Debs and her scamp of a ...
— The Depot Master • Joseph C. Lincoln

... of a right mind knows not this, and who with a wrong one will heed it? The only point is that the commonest truisms come upon utterance sometimes, and take didactic form too late; even as we shout to our comrade prone, and beginning to rub his poor nose, "Look out!" And this is what everybody did with one accord, when he was down upon his luck—which is far more momentous than his nose to any man—in the case ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore

... like this, come to look at it: who should work for 'e same as what I would? Who should think for my wife's faither wi' more of his heart than me? I'd glory to do a bit of work for 'e—aye, I would so, high or low; an' do it in a way to make you rub your eyes!" ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts

... good word even for the Dock. They say that a Dock leaf wrapped round the part stung by a nettle will lessen the pain; others advise us to rub the part with Dock seed. I do not think myself that either remedy has much effect; but the leaves of the Sorrel, which is a relative of the Dock, will lessen the pain of nettle stings. Mrs. Hammond always uses Dock leaves to wrap round the ...
— Wildflowers of the Farm • Arthur Owens Cooke

... But here's the rub. You will never do anything with that brilliant efficiency save what you LIKE TO DO. Efficiency does not come from duty, or necessity, or goading, or lashing, or anything under heaven save ENJOYMENT OF THE ...
— How to Analyze People on Sight - Through the Science of Human Analysis: The Five Human Types • Elsie Lincoln Benedict and Ralph Paine Benedict

... on knapsacks, shouldered their rifles, and fell into line. Muffled in darkness there was an odd silence in the great caravan forming rapidly and waiting for the word to move. At each command to move forward I could hear only the rub of leather, the click, click of rifle rings, the stir of the stubble, the snorting of horses. When we had marched an hour or so I could hear the faint rumble of wagons far in the rear. As I came high ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller

... to Whatcom was the rub. All space on the steamers was taken from week to week for freight and passengers, and no room was left for cattle. In fact, the run on provisions for the gold rush was so great that at one time we were almost threatened with famine. Finally our cattle, ...
— Ox-Team Days on the Oregon Trail • Ezra Meeker

... seen! There could be no mistake. I was in too idle a mood to imagine such a gratuitous barbarity. It may have been playfulness, yet the girl jumped up as if she had been stung by a wasp. It may have been playfulness. Yet I saw plainly poor "dreamy innocence" rub gently the affected place as she filed off with the other performers down the middle aisle between the marble tables in the uproar of voices, the rattling of dominoes through a blue atmosphere of tobacco smoke. I believe that those people ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad

... care of my horse! Rub him well down; feed him. I shall know if you don't!" she cried, as she entered the passage and knocked ...
— The Hot Swamp • R.M. Ballantyne

... spilt his pint all over me. From 'ead to foot I was dripping with beer, and I was in such a temper I wonder I didn't murder 'im; but afore I could move they both pulled out their pocket-'ankerchers and started to rub me down. ...
— Deep Waters, The Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs

... across her lap, and spread a plaster, and told me not to tear it off as soon as it began to tickle me, but to rub my back against the door. And there were doors enough, I thought, set round that big kitchen. Nine poor boys, with dreadful ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 108, October, 1866 • Various

... and gives things to chillern,—boys like me. Puts 'em in their butes! Thet's what she tried to play upon me. Easy, now, pop, whar are you rubbin' to,—thet's a mile from the place. She jest made that up, didn't she, jest to aggrewate me and you? Don't rub thar—Why, dad!" ...
— Christmas - Its Origin, Celebration and Significance as Related in Prose and Verse • Various

... with, they did not know a thing of the duties of the position, or the tenue which is required to keep up the dignity of an old title, so when it came to the scratch they were found wanting. "Which of 'em's got prestige, I ask you, Ma'am, in your country? They may rub along all right, and when it is a question of society I guess they're queens, but which of 'em acts like the real thing in the country, or is ...
— Elizabeth Visits America • Elinor Glyn

... records on many of them are effaced. I saw none very old. A quarter of a century is sufficient to obliterate the letters, and make all smooth, where the direct pathway from gate to gate lies over the stones. The climate and casual footsteps rub out any inscription in less than a hundred years. Some of the monuments are cracked. On many is merely cut "The burial place of" so and so; on others there is a long list of half-readable names; on some few a laudatory epitaph, out ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... did was done with a neatness and delicacy which gave an involuntary sense of grace and harmony. She was, in brief, one of those people who are best described by the word "harmonious;" people who never set your teeth on edge, or rub you up the wrong way, as very excellent people occasionally do. Yet she was not over-meek or unpleasantly amiable; there was a liveliness and even briskness about her, as if the every day wine of her life had a spice ...
— Mistress and Maid • Dinah Craik (aka: Miss Mulock)

... the flower is fertilised. Now at last we see the full use of every part of the flower, of the water-secreting horns of the bucket half-full of water, which prevents the bees from flying away, and forces them to crawl out through the spout, and rub against the properly placed viscid pollen-masses ...
— On the Origin of Species - 6th Edition • Charles Darwin

... with Follansbee, and had sewed his bandages so that he could not rub or drag them off, he said he felt a hundred per cent ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor

... this day. By bathing in those hoof-prints, O foremost of monarchs, whatever sin a man may have incurred is, O Bharata, washed away. Then should one go to Gridhravata, the spot consecrated to the trident-bearing god. Approaching the deity having the bull for his mark one should rub himself with ashes. If a Brahmana, he obtains the merit of observing the twelve year's vow and if belonging to any of the other orders, he is freed from all his sins. One should next proceed to the ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... who, with very fine files, rub off the edges and any protuberances which may be there. Every letter is subject to this operation, and all are turned out smooth and ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 841, February 13, 1892 • Various

... to sleep so soothingly as a negro nurse. After I left Texas and went to Medicine Lodge, Kansas, when I had a headache or was otherwise sick, I would wish for the attendance around my bed of one of the old-fashioned colored women, who would rub me with their rough plump hands and call me "Honey Chile," would bathe my feet and tuck the cover around me and sit by me, holding my hand, waiting until I fell asleep. I owe much to the colored people and never want ...
— The Use and Need of the Life of Carry A. Nation • Carry A. Nation

... These they roll about between the two palms of the hands until they form a small ball, and that they place in the hollow of the half-bamboo. The latter they place on the ground, with the shavings below. Then with the other half bamboo, they rub (while singing) across the one which has the shavings below it, upon the same point where the shavings are placed, and in a few seconds they begin to smoke. Thereupon they rub faster and blow, and a blaze starts. All this is the work of ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55 • Francisco Colin

... don't I know it? Ain't that just where the rub comes? Don't I know it? If you wasn't a good girl ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1915 - And the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... it be done with a soft sponge and with care. If there be any difficulty in removing the substance, gently rub it, by means of a flannel, [Footnote: Mrs Baines (who has written so much and so well on the Management of Children), in a Letter to the Author, recommends flannel to be used in the first washing of an infant, ...
— Advice to a Mother on the Management of her Children • Pye Henry Chavasse

... as long as you don't overdo it. Don't rub it in that he's just left prison, and—don't ...
— First Plays • A. A. Milne

... but he is asking for a process of purifying which will be long and hard. 'I am ready,' says he, in effect, 'to submit to any sort of discipline, if only I may be clean. Wash me, beat me, tread me down, hammer me with mallets, dash me against stones, rub me with smarting soap and caustic nitre—do anything, anything with me, if only those foul spots melt away from the texture of my soul!' A solemn prayer, my brethren! if we pray it aright, which will be answered by many a sharp application ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... young man,' said he, sidling up to me, as a cat does when it is about to rub itself against you. 'This is all among friends, you understand, and goes no farther than these four walls. Besides, the Emperor never meant to include ...
— The Exploits Of Brigadier Gerard • Arthur Conan Doyle

... cauliflower, remove the stalk and outside leaves, half cook it in water and then cut it into small pieces. Salt them and put them to brown with a little piece of butter and then complete the cooking with a cup of milk. Then rub them through a sieve. Prepare a Balsamella (No. 54) and add it to the cauliflower with 3 beaten eggs and a tablespoonful of ...
— The Italian Cook Book - The Art of Eating Well • Maria Gentile

... finished Faber. How queer he is with his 3's and 5's and 6's and 7's! I feel all done up into little sums in addition, and that's about all I know of myself—he's bewildered me so. There are fine things in it, and I took the liberty of making a wee cross against some of them, which you can rub out. Miss L. sent me another of his books, which I am reading now—"All ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss

... looking through the volumes as they come in from the readers. But if detected, as they may be after a few trials of suspected parties, by giving them out books known to be clean and free from pencil marks when issued to them, the reader should be required always to rub out his own marks, as a wholesome object-lesson for the future. The same course should be pursued with any reader detected in scribbling on the margin of any book which is being read within the library. Incorrigible cases, ...
— A Book for All Readers • Ainsworth Rand Spofford

... [Footnote: Lame beggar.] lost in you, Murphy. Wait; let me rub a handful of mud on your face—there—you have a very upset look, 'pon my soul," said Dick, as he flashed the light of his lantern on him for a moment, and laughed at Murphy scooping the mud out of his eye, where Dick had purposely ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover

... is the best for this soup. Slice up the apple, onion, and carrot, and fry them in the butter; sprinkle over the curry powder and flour and brown that too; pour over the boiling stock and stir until it boils up, simmer gently for one hour, then rub through a sieve and return to the saucepan. Bring to the boil, flavour with salt and lemon juice. Pour into a warm tureen and serve. Send well-boiled rice to the ...
— The Art of Living in Australia • Philip E. Muskett (?-1909)

... realize, Jeeves," I said, for though one dislikes to rub it in, these things have to be pointed out, "that ...
— Right Ho, Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse

... a handful of the nettles that were there in the place of flowers, and put his nose to them before Shahpesh, till his nose was reddened; and desire to rub it waxed in him, and possessed him, and became a passion, so that he could scarce refrain from rubbing it even in the King's presence. And the King encouraged him to sniff and enjoy their fragrance, ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... curls in her two plump little hands, and drew her face down until she could rub her own soft ...
— Anxious Audrey • Mabel Quiller-Couch

... down again, with a couple of letters in her hand. It seemed almost as if she had been upstairs to rub a little life and colour into her face, for her cheeks were carnation when she returned, and her eyes ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant

... fiercer gust of rain, and Berta stirred uneasily, tossing her head as if striving subconsciously to shake off a vague irritation of hearing. Another heavier sound was mingling with the steady patter. Rub-a-dub-dub, rub-a-dub-dub! Robbie Belle glanced up ...
— Beatrice Leigh at College - A Story for Girls • Julia Augusta Schwartz

... got quite bewildered; and then, just when he was in despair, a policeman caught hold of him and looked for his collar. Now, the silly little dog had not got his collar on. Ethel had taken it off that morning to rub up his name and address, and make them look nice and bright, and when she wanted to put it on again, he had raced round the room and played, and would not let her catch him until the governess had called out that it was lesson-time; so Ethel had gone down, leaving ...
— The Children's Book of London • Geraldine Edith Mitton

... on which they love to enlarge. Faith is their panacea for all human ills: but their faith is worse than useless if it be not true faith. And how can we so test conflicting faiths as to distinguish the true from the false? Aye, there's the rub! Undoubtedly faith is to religion what the root is to the tree; and men in search of 'saving faith' are naturally anxious to find it. No one desires to be eternally punished; and therefore, if any one embrace a false faith it is because he makes the mistake of supposing it the true ...
— An Apology for Atheism - Addressed to Religious Investigators of Every Denomination - by One of Its Apostles • Charles Southwell

... enough to depend on unless one draws a great prize of popularity. I have not imagination enough to write a novel. Have you forgotten the disasters of your heroes the poets, Bessie? No—I cannot give up after a year of difficulty. I would rather rub out than rust out, ...
— The Vicissitudes of Bessie Fairfax • Harriet Parr

... fat, and remove the bone. Replace the pan on the fire and throw into it two pounds of Brussels sprouts. Do not add onions to this soup but leeks, and the hearts of cabbage. Pepper and spice to taste. Rub it through a sieve and let it be thick enough to ...
— The Belgian Cookbook • various various

... over him he was all hot and cloyed. Then he rose and looked at himself and laughed. The water was swaying reproachfully against the steep pebbles below, murmuring like a child that it was not fair—it was not fair he should abandon his playmate. Siegmund laughed, and began to rub himself free of the clogging sand. He found himself strangely dry and smooth. He tossed more dry sand, and more, over himself, busy and intent like a child playing some absorbing game with itself. Soon his ...
— The Trespasser • D.H. Lawrence

... the worst of it now," shouted the skipper, trying to rub his hands together, in token of his satisfaction, but having to leave off and grasp the poop rail to steady himself again from the ship pitching so much, as she met the big waves tumbling in on her bows, and rose to them buoyantly. "The gale is ...
— The Island Treasure • John Conroy Hutcheson

... here; for it is to be observed that in the intervals of these things I had my new harvest and husbandry to manage; for I reaped my corn in its season, and carried it home as well as I could, and laid it up in the ear, in my large baskets, till I had time to rub it out, for I had no floor to thrash it on, or instrument to ...
— Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe

... of our Kroomen, hearing what I said, exclaimed, "Massa, me got light, nebber fear!" Groping about, he soon found two pieces of dry wood, and fashioning them with his knife, he began to rub one against the other in a way which at length produced a bright spark. I had a handful of leaves ready, and we had quickly a capital fire blazing up just inside the cave. How grateful we ...
— The Two Whalers - Adventures in the Pacific • W.H.G. Kingston

... I thought it was Bart when I grabbed him fust; but he looks kind o' different from what I expected to see him. If it's him he'll know me when he comes to. I ain't changed so much maybe. I'll rub his feet now," and he kept on with his work ...
— The Tides of Barnegat • F. Hopkinson Smith

... to talk wildly; he would stand up, pointing and shouting out, "There she is, there!" Then he began to make queer noises, and became very quiet. There was the canvas boat cover lying in the bottom of the boat. The bo'sun put this round him, and I was ordered aft to rub him down. ...
— The Brassbounder - A Tale of the Sea • David W. Bone

... I los' my shoe in an old canoe, Johnio! come Winum so! Oh! I los' my boot in a pilot-boat, Johnio! come Winum so! Den rub-a-dub de copper, ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville

... in fresh water in the willow-patterned basin in her big attic bedroom. Then she washed her hands. And as she began to rub the soap ...
— Oswald Bastable and Others • Edith Nesbit

... one. Betty sent me a night telegram at bedtime last night (telephoned it, I suppose, when you thought she was in bed) asking me to come home for the day and help her get her own way. Living out of doors all summer, mother, and learning to look after herself and to rub up against other girls may be the best thing in the world for Betty. I am afraid she has been growing up to be more ...
— The Camp Fire Girls at Sunrise Hill • Margaret Vandercook

... whom the cottage belong have brought me in some little "remedes," which Tim refuses to let me have. One is what the old man (an ex-chemist) calls "salicite de metal," and the other is what the old lady calls a "remede de bonne femme." You rub yourself with it all over every ...
— Letters to Helen - Impressions of an Artist on the Western Front • Keith Henderson

... little just before a meal it is often very beneficial. Neither during the bath nor immediately after it should cold water be drunk, and if there is an inappeasable thirst a little wine and water or water and honey should be taken. In winter it is beneficial to rub the body with oil after ...
— Old-Time Makers of Medicine • James J. Walsh

... on through marshy fields, skirting high hills and bounding down through dry watercourses, over shelving stones and accumulated barriers of driftwood; now panting up a steep ascent, and now resting for a moment to rub our shoes with the resinous needles of the pine; always within hearing of the dogs, whose fitful cries varied in volume in accordance with the broken conformation of the intervening country. Knowing ...
— Famous Adventures And Prison Escapes of the Civil War • Various

... there, and caught up Ward's waggons. The women at Oakville were most anxious to buy snuff. It appears that the Texan females are in the habit of dipping snuff—which means, putting it into their mouths instead of their noses. They rub it against their teeth ...
— Three Months in the Southern States, April-June 1863 • Arthur J. L. (Lieut.-Col.) Fremantle

... may be sure that Iris is here on her annual visit to the home of her childhood and that excellent lady whose only fault was, that Nature had written out her list of virtues an ruled paper, and forgotten to rub out ...
— The Professor at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes (Sr.)

... knee; if trouble came he'd quickly shin up the nearest tree. No hale man ever loves him; he stirs the sportsman's wrath; the whole world kicks and shoves him and shoos him from the path. For who can love a duffer so pallid, weak and thin, who seems resigned to suffer and let folks rub it in? Yet though he's down to zero in fellow-men's esteem, this fellow is a hero and that's no winter dream. Year after year he's toiling, as toiled the slaves of Rome, to keep the pot a-boiling in ...
— Rippling Rhymes • Walt Mason

... replied, commencing a dissertation on the style and beauty of the young girl, all of which was lost upon the doctor, who, in a kind of maze, quitted the room, and returning to Jessie, said to her carelessly: "He hasn't it. You know they rub out those they do not use. So you'll have to do without; and, Jessie, I wouldn't tell Guy I tried to get ...
— Aikenside • Mary J. Holmes

... a very happy child, at least." Then she laughs. "Fancy me with a dear little baby!" she says,—"a thing all my own, that would rub its soft cheek against mine and love me ...
— Rossmoyne • Unknown

... so! Hrumph! hrumph! What a pest! Sure that big brute has his eye on my ladder. Has ARTHUR loosed him? He thinks he knows best, But a nasty spill now!—nothing well could be sadder Brutes always rub their broad backs and stiff bristles Against—anything that comes handy. Oh lor! How the brute shoulders, and snorts, grunts and whistles! Off to the gutter, you big ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, January 16, 1892 • Various

... told Joe when he left, "and some day possibly we'll hang you or electrocute you; but it's refreshing to rub one's mind against a going dynamo. I'm coming again. And don't forget that your mother is the First ...
— The Nine-Tenths • James Oppenheim

... the rub! Chester was no longer so sure that he wanted to marry Sylvia. She had become a different woman—she seemed to be another Sylvia to the ...
— The Chink in the Armour • Marie Belloc Lowndes

... own hand. We know that our Navy have now come clean down on the AEgean side of the fence, and have determined once for all to make no attack on their own. We have the feel of the situation in our bones and it was up to us—I think it was—to rub it in that although the British War Direction may decree that the Dardanelles are to hang on without further help, indefinitely, yet sickness is not yet under their high command, nor ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume 2 • Ian Hamilton

... back, so as to induce an artificial respiration. At the same time, Toby and one of the other fellows worked the unconscious boy's arms back and forth like a pair of pistons; while the third fellow started to rub ...
— Jack Winters' Baseball Team - Or, The Rivals of the Diamond • Mark Overton

... probation. It was a tremulous time. I bade Henry tread softly and not to forget to rub his feet on the mat. I gave all my orders to Elizabeth in a voice which blended deference with supplication. I strove hard to live up to what I thought must be her conception of the Perfect Mistress. And when, the ...
— Our Elizabeth - A Humour Novel • Florence A. Kilpatrick

... Pierre said, looking at him; "but your hands and face are too white. But I was tanning my sails yesterday, and there is some of the stuff left in the boiler; if you rub your hands and face with ...
— In the Reign of Terror - The Adventures of a Westminster Boy • G. A. Henty

... to gather up a handful of snow with which to rub the native's brow, when he caught ...
— The Blue Envelope • Roy J. Snell

... business-like. Before grasping his sword, he bent to rub his palms on the grit of the pavement. While he was stooping, young Foresto unsheathed his dagger, made a catlike step, and stabbed at his master's neck. But quicker than Foresto was Madonna Gemma, who, with a deer's leap, ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various

... coughing—and I was cold and hungry, and down in the mouth, and was about ninety years of age, and had spent two hundred and twenty of them on Papeete beach. And I was thinking I wished I had a ring to rub, or had a fairy godmother, or could raise Beelzebub. And I was trying to remember how you did it. I knew you made a ring of skulls, for I had seen that in the Freischutz: and that you took off your coat and turned up your ...
— The Ebb-Tide - A Trio And Quartette • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne

... "Well! you needn't rub yourself against the door, if you are! Don't you see you are smearing it? What are you roaming about in this way for, ...
— Atlantic Monthly,Volume 14, No. 82, August, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... Grizzel, holding out her hand with the stone in it, "I have rubbed a bit off one side at last. If I rub long enough it ...
— The Happy Adventurers • Lydia Miller Middleton

... there is no getting out of it. Don't rub it in too thick, though. I mean to have a talk with the boy afterwards, and if I am satisfied with what he says, the ...
— Peter Ruff and the Double Four • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... were so, indeed!" I cried. "I would be a fine man if I had such a sister. But the rub is that you ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... Miss Becky, smiling grimly, "an' you can't rub it out; yit I lay I've seed a heap of white people lots meaner'n Free Joe. He grins—an' that's nigger—but I've ketched his under jaw a-tremblin' when Lucindy's name uz brung up. An' I tell you," she went on, bridling up a little, and speaking with almost fierce emphasis, "the ...
— Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches • Joel Chandler Harris

... Goat's Rue, or Devil's Shoestrings: Decoction drunk for lassitude. Women wash their hair in decoction of its roots to prevent its breaking or falling out, because these roots are very tough and hard to break; from the same idea ball-players rub the decoction on their limbs after scratching, to toughen them. Dispensatory: Described as a cathartic with roots ...
— The Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees • James Mooney



Words linked to "Rub" :   Rub al-Khali, abrade, pumice, rub up, gauge, fray, obstruction, irritate, puree, scour, rub down, hitch, scrape, run, obstacle, guide, smudge, hang-up, rub out, physical contact, blur, itch, chafe, sponge off, meet, rubbing, wipe, fret, scratch, rub along, adjoin, draw, scrub, snag, contact, touch, smutch, pass



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