"Slack" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... stern of the cutter when he re-ascended on the deck, he would have discovered Smallbones hanging on by the rudder chains; for had the fog not been so thick, Mr Vanslyperken would have perceived that at the time that he cut Smallbones adrift it was slack water, and the cutter was lying across the harbour. Smallbones was not, therefore, carried away by the tide, but being a very fair swimmer, had gained the rudder chains without difficulty; but at the time that Smallbones was climbing up again by the rope, he had perceived ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... the arm itself, all unprotected, in that task, it may well be that it had served me better. As it was, my preparations were far from complete when already he was upon me, with the result that the waving slack of my cloak was in my way to hamper and retard the ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini
... on, doctor. Work's been pretty slack for two weeks now, but yesterday I got work for two days. I guess it will be ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... to come a slack in the storm. The ship rode more easily, and Bob began to take heart. A little later Mr. Carr came down into the cabin. He breathed a sigh ...
— Bob the Castaway • Frank V. Webster
... had a slack day before them on the morrow, there being a temporary lull in the form-work which occurred about once a week, when there was no composition of any kind to be done. The Sixth did four compositions a week, two ...
— Tales of St. Austin's • P. G. Wodehouse
... call vulgarisms think they may safely go on to accuse Dickens of bad grammar. The truth is that his grammar is not only good but strong; it is far better in construction than Thackeray's, the ease of whose phrase sometimes exceeds and is slack. Lately, during the recent centenary time, a writer averred that Dickens "might not always be parsed," but that we loved him for his, etc., etc. Dickens's page is to be parsed as strictly as any man's. It ...
— Hearts of Controversy • Alice Meynell
... Mendocino has a rock-bound coast, with no harbors, but she has fine forests. Here the lumber steamer secures its cargo by means of suspended wire chutes as trolleys. The outer end of the trolley wire is anchored in the ocean, the wire crosses the deck of the moored steamer, the slack being taken up to the ship's gaff, thus making a tight wire up and down which the trolley car with ...
— History of California • Helen Elliott Bandini
... seraphically illuminated; companions of the holy company of unbodied souls and immortal angels; turning themselves, Proteus-like, into any shape, and having the power of working miracles. The most pious and abstracted brethren could slack the plague in cities, silence the violent winds and tempests, calm the rage of the sea and rivers, walk in the air, frustrate the malicious aspect of witches, cure all diseases, and turn all metals into gold. He had known ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... may earn 9 d. as easily as 6 d. without it; But how can that be? since every Spinner now, may have a wheel to turn with her foot, and so have both hands at liberty, as well as with your Engins: And again, its a more usual fault to over-twist the thred, than to do it too slack; therefore no need of ...
— Proposals For Building, In Every County, A Working-Alms-House or Hospital • Richard Haines
... The dewy drops which glisten on his brow; His dark cropt pate that erst at church or fair, So smooth and silky, shew'd his morning's care, Which all uncouth in matted locks combin'd, Now, ends erect, defies the ruffling wind; His neck-band loose, and hosen rumpled low, A careful lad, nor slack at labour shew. Nor scraping chickens chirping 'mongst the straw, Nor croaking rook o'er-head, nor chatt'ring daw; Loud-breathing cow amongst the rampy weeds, Nor grunting sow that in the furrow feeds; Nor sudden breeze that shakes the quaking leaves, ...
— Poems, &c. (1790) • Joanna Baillie
... is very probable; most of the small holders who were successful before the Act had something to fall back upon: they were dealers, hawkers, butchers, small tradesmen, &c. There is no doubt, too, that an allotment helps both the town artisan and the country labourer to tide over slack times. Whether it will succeed in planting a rural population on English soil is another matter. It is a consummation devoutly to be wished, for a country without a sound reserve of healthy country-people is bound to deteriorate. The small holder, pure and simple, without any by-industry, ...
— A Short History of English Agriculture • W. H. R. Curtler
... covered with oilcloth, was not of the sort to arouse the delayed and now gone appetite of a Reformer, and yet it did not lack variety: cornpone (Indian meal stirred up with water and heated through), hot biscuit, slack-baked and livid, fried salt-pork swimming in grease, apple-butter, pickled beets, onions and cucumbers raw, coffee (so-called), buttermilk, and sweet milk when specially asked for (the correct taste, however, is for buttermilk), and pie. This was ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... commanded. The arms, eight muskets, and as many horse-pistols, were in good condition, and all loaded. There were additional oars, in case of accident, and that little sail called trinquet, which assists the speed of the canoe at the same time the boatmen row, and is so useful when the breeze is slack. When Aramis had seen to all these things, and appeared satisfied with the result of his inspection, "Let us consult Porthos," said he, "to know if we must endeavor to get the boat out by the unknown extremity ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... thinking. If the rope snapped when it was taut, those on board would feel the spring of it, and I should be without doubt discovered before I could sever the other: whereas, if the severance was made when the rope was slack, there would be no shock, and the men would be aware of nothing until the vessel swung round on the tide. I so timed my knife work, therefore, that the last strand was cut through when the bow was dipping. The moment it was done I sank ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang
... "Yes, but this morning it was the same thing; and after drill the deputy sergeant-major said that slack fellows like me should be given a lesson by the ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein
... lightly adventure the pestilential perils of a tropic stream, or fever-haunted water-way or canal, who would yet shrink from being caught—owing to want of care, and cautious calculation as to the exact hours of slack and safety—by the hideous, irresistible, all-engulfing, all-wrecking whirl of the terrifying Stroem! Once drawn within the down-draught of that hideous vortex, a whole army might be destroyed more certainly than even by the manifold death-dealing contrivances of modern science, a whole ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, January 28, 1893 • Various
... for different ranks so that the officer of the deck may know how to receive the people that are coming aboard. It would make him awful mad if you gave such an answer that he would extend wardroom honors to a steerage officer. Now, stand by to slack away and haul in." ...
— Marcy The Blockade Runner • Harry Castlemon
... lo' thou, when our Lord Himself did heal one that had leprosy, what quoth He? 'Show thyself to the priest,' saith He: not, 'I am the true Priest, and therefore thou mayest slack to show thee to yon other priest, which is ...
— The White Rose of Langley - A Story of the Olden Time • Emily Sarah Holt
... soil, very favourable to the growth of cedar-trees. Having arrived at such an island, the men went ashore to cut timber. They were generally good lumbermen, for many buccaneers would go to cut logwood in Campeachy when trade was slack. As soon as a cedar had been felled, the limbs were lopped away, and the outside rudely fashioned to the likeness of a boat. If they were making a periagua, they left the stern "flat"—that is, cut off sharply without modelling; if they were making a canoa, they ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... contrary, if the tide is ebbing, will recede from the shore; from which it would follow that the motion is only propagated in the water, like sound in air, and not the mass of water protruded. A similar species of motion is observed on shaking at one end a long cord held moderately slack, which is expressed by the word undulation. I have sometimes remarked however that a body which sinks deep and takes hold of the water appears to move towards shore with the course of the surf, as is perceptible in a boat ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden
... the timely arrival of such unexpected assistance, the men roused the hawser on board, threw the eye over the bitts, passed two or three turns of the slack round the barrel of the windlass, and adjusted the rope in a "fair-lead" with lightning rapidity. Mildmay, who was intently watching their movements, waved his hand as a signal to the baronet the instant he saw that the hawser was properly ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... to a wagon, if he be wild or vicious, keep the lariat the same as I have described until you get him hitched up, then slack it gently, as nearly all mules will buck or jump stiff-legged as soon as you ease up the lariat; and be careful not to pull the rope too tight when first put on, as by so doing you might split the mule's mouth. Let me say here that I have broken thousands ...
— The Mule - A Treatise On The Breeding, Training, - And Uses To Which He May Be Put • Harvey Riley
... work and yet do it justice; to give it all the strength and endurance necessary, requires one of skillful acquirements. A mechanic may persuade a proprietor into many a long day's work, as it pays well to nurse good jobs when other work is slack, but an architect who understands such things would save ...
— Woodward's Country Homes • George E. Woodward
... round-cheeked, blue-eyed rogue who takes my thumb in all his fingers when we go walking. His jumpers are slack behind and they wag from side to side in an inexpressibly funny manner, but this I am led to believe springs not from any special genius but is common to all children. It is only recently that he learned to walk, for although he was forward ...
— Chimney-Pot Papers • Charles S. Brooks
... all times, and under all circumstances. But these very qualities are valueless, unless they are regulated by justice. Without this, a man-of-war would very soon become worse than useless to the country, besides being what a "slack ship" has been emphatically termed, "a perfect ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... their compasses and rules? From me that helm shall conduct learn. And man his ignorance discern.' So saying, with audacious pride, He gains the boat, and climbs the side. 110 The beasts astonished, lined the strand, The anchor's weighed, he drives from land: The slack sail shifts from side to side; The boat untrimmed admits the tide, Borne down, adrift, at random toss'd, His oar breaks short, the rudder's lost. The bear, presuming in his skill, Is here and there officious still; Till striking on the dangerous sands, Aground the shattered ...
— The Poetical Works of Addison; Gay's Fables; and Somerville's Chase • Joseph Addison, John Gay, William Sommerville
... I have now," he went on as he led the way toward the men's quarters. "Not a trouble maker in the bunch, except a half breed that I'm not particularly stuck on, and that I'm going to get rid of as soon as work gets slack. But take them all together I haven't ...
— Bert Wilson in the Rockies • J. W. Duffield
... Weldon, anyhow?" another of the group queried, as dispassionately as if the subject of discussion had been absent in Rhodesia. "His face is a yard long, and his lips hang down in the slack of the corners." ...
— On the Firing Line • Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller
... regard to the face and the hands and the feet. Georgie had been conscious of walking a little lamely lately; he had been even more conscious of the need of hot towels on his face and the "tap-tap" of Mr Holroyd's fingers, and the stretchings of Mr Holroyd's thumb across rather slack surfaces of cheek and chin. In the interval between the hair and the face, Mr Holroyd should have a good supper downstairs with Foljambe and the cook. And tomorrow morning, when he met Hermy and Ursy, Georgie would be just as spick and span and ...
— Queen Lucia • E. F. Benson
... boiler, made of wrought iron, with brass tap and steam-pipe. In other respects it resembles Fig. 4, with which it possesses similar advantages of construction. Either maybe had at varying prices, according to size, from L5. 15s. up to L23. 10s. They are supplied by Messrs. Richard & John Slack 336, Strand, London. ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... with the cleared fields in one or two spots, began to shew in more distinct forms and colours. The sun was very hot! So hot, that it seemed to kill the breeze. As they drew near their place of disembarkation, the motion of the vessel grew slack; the sail fluttered now and then; the propelling force just lasted till they got to shore, and then nobody said anything more of any air felt to ...
— Melbourne House, Volume 2 • Susan Warner
... the boulders melted into the distance. Then he began wriggling his body and twisting his arms to see if there were any possibility of loosening the rope. It would give just enough everywhere to allow a very slight movement of limbs and body, but it was impossible to work this small slack from any two of the loops into one. Wellesly pulled and worked and wriggled for a long time without making any change in his bonds. Then he put all his attention upon his right arm, which he could move up and down a very little. ...
— With Hoops of Steel • Florence Finch Kelly
... at all know why when we have 2 or 3 Generals to dinner you can give us nice white table cloths but at other times it is only bare boards", "Well Sir," he hesitatingly replied, "they were two of Stewart's sheets." Sundays were usually fairly slack days. I sometimes thought that they could have been even slacker, it being so absolutely necessary to have one day's rest a week. Church Parade would be held in the early morning, and another service at 6 in the evening after the sun had set. ...
— With a Highland Regiment in Mesopotamia - 1916—1917 • Anonymous
... iron-bound master wedge, driven home with a heavy beetle weighing some twenty-five or thirty pounds. The lines of wedges were tightened in succession, the loosened line receiving an additional wedge to take up the slack after drawing back the master wedge, which was then driven home. To keep good the supply of wedges which are often crushed under the pressure a second boy, older than the one at the furnace, was working on the floor, shaping new ones, ...
— Farmers of Forty Centuries - or, Permanent Agriculture in China, Korea and Japan • F. H. King
... desire for a "steady job'' and so generally recognized as an essential of the labor problem that several large industries have developed "side lines'' to which they can turn their organization during their slack seasons; while others in periods of depression pile up huge stocks of standard products, making heavy investments of capital, for the primary purpose of keeping ...
— Increasing Efficiency In Business • Walter Dill Scott
... a thing as slack tide in the affairs of men, when a crisis seems as if it would never come, and all things stagnate. The Law Courts had as yet not concerned themselves about the will, vacation time had come and all was at a standstill, nor could any ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge
... work became slack in the district, Telford undertook to do small jobs on his own account such as the hewing of grave-stones and ornamental doorheads. He prided himself especially upon his hewing, and from the specimens of his workmanship ...
— The Life of Thomas Telford by Smiles • Samuel Smiles
... sailors were hauling in the slack hawsers, and the bearded stevedores on the floating quay tugged at the gangway. Many of our presumed passengers had only come to say good-bye, which they were now waving and shouting from the shore. The rain fell dismally, and a black, hopeless sky settled ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 79, May, 1864 • Various
... ashamed of it—with the natural contempt of strength for weakness, with the sense of physical security which makes the savage merciless. Nobody could die while they felt like that inside. The springs there were wound so tight that it would be a long while before there was any slack in them. The life in there was rooted deep. She was going to have a few things before she died. She realized that there were a great many trains dashing east and west on the face of the continent that night, and that they all carried young people who meant to ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather
... a man thought well of. You have great provisions upon your cart. This man has nothing but the unwashed shirt which hangs on his slack back. It will not become you to march handcuffed with his like, going between two policemen to ...
— Waysiders • Seumas O'Kelly
... as it were reached a climax, when, instead of the line breaking or Mark going over the side, the strong cord, which had been hissing here and there through the water, suddenly grew slack, and the tension was taken off Mark's muscles and mind to give place ...
— Mother Carey's Chicken - Her Voyage to the Unknown Isle • George Manville Fenn
... slack this evening nobody in the store but Hadds, Keno Jim and me, throwin' poker dice for cigars, when the door opens and here come Major Pumpey and his wife from the army post. We were not glad to ...
— Mr. Scraggs • Henry Wallace Phillips
... sitting by Fitzgibbon's side, heard a deep groan, and before he could even look up the master's mate fell forward, shot through the head. His boat took the lead. "Now's your time," cried Dick Rogers; "we'll be the first aboard, lads." The crew were not slack to follow the suggestion. In another moment they were up to the schooner, and, leaping on her deck, led by Pearce, laid on them so fiercely with their cutlasses that the Frenchmen, deserting their guns, sprang over the ...
— The Grateful Indian - And other Stories • W.H.G. Kingston
... friends hesitated. Milo, without haste, without change of countenance, dropped his irons and reached Venner with great deliberate strides. And in that momentary hesitation Tomlin and Pearse were lost with their host; for the giant stretched out one tremendous arm, seized Venner by the slack breast of his shirt, and lifted him from the ground, flailing with both hands like some puny child in the grip of ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... yonner! joost t' slack,* [*Slack—Yorkshire. Anglice, Moist hollow] see thee, there!" pointing with the stout black-thorn; ...
— Warwick Woodlands - Things as they Were There Twenty Years Ago • Henry William Herbert (AKA Frank Forester)
... bite on one side he could hobble around the post to the opposite side. As the flames spread he would become very active, but each revolution around the post would shorten the slack of the wrist-cord. With the entire circle of fuel ablaze he would slowly roast. Black Hoof muttered some ...
— A Virginia Scout • Hugh Pendexter
... tightly into the slack of the man's coat and the torn shirt, the ex-sergeant forced the prisoner up the short stairs that conducted ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day
... with cinematograph and camera. In the angle at the corner near the cliffs Rennick got a sounding of 140 fathoms and Nelson some temperatures and samples. When lowering the water bottle on one occasion the line suddenly became slack at 100 metres, then after a moment's pause began to run out again. We are curious to know the cause, and imagine the bottle struck ...
— Scott's Last Expedition Volume I • Captain R. F. Scott
... Philip III., a prince, no doubt, of some personal valor, since he has retained in history the nickname of The Bold, but not otherwise beyond mediocrity. His reign had an unfortunate beginning. After having passed several months before Tunis, in slack and unsuccessful continuation of his father's crusade, he gave it up, and re-embarked in November, 1270, with the remnants of an army anxious to quit "that accursed land," wrote one of the crusaders, "where we languish rather than live, exposed to torments of dust, fury of winds, corruption ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... to come. For the first few days, whenever there was any running aloft to be done, I noticed that Harry was indefatigable in coiling away the slack of the rigging about decks; ignoring the fact that his shipmates were springing into the shrouds. And when all hands of the watch would be engaged clewing up a t'-gallant-sail, that is, pulling the proper ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... ADDRESS TO A LOUSE. Yet Burns, like most great artists, proceeded from a school and continued a tradition; only the school and tradition were Scotch, and not English. While the English language was becoming daily more pedantic and inflexible, and English letters more colourless and slack, there was another dialect in the sister country, and a different school of poetry tracing its descent, through King James I., from Chaucer. The dialect alone accounts for much; for it was then written colloquially, which kept it fresh and supple; and, although not ...
— Familiar Studies of Men & Books • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of the pious make-believe, and itched to escape over here. But the fools had let me sell indulgences, and I had a goodly stock on hand, and trade was slack"—here he interrupted himself with a fervent "Amen!" conceded to the service—"in Spain just then. It's no use carrying 'em over to the Netherlands, thinks I; they're too clever over there. I must get rid of 'em in some country free for Jews, and yet containing ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... on the unfathomable distance, he observed that the fingers held a sheet of printed paper; and he remembered Florence. Instead of pressing his brow he unfolded the journal she had thrust upon him. As he began to read, his eye was lustreless, his gait slack and dreary; but soon his whole demeanour changed, it cannot be said ...
— Gentle Julia • Booth Tarkington
... weakness, after a fashion. He knew that he would work violently for a month or two at a time, giving the vigorous hired man a decent test in holding his physical own, and he knew that after that he would become what the people called "slack," and a little listless; and it was in his slack times that the squirrel and grouse most suffered. Between him and the wife of his bosom had grown nothing, so grave as to be described as an armed neutrality; ...
— The Wolf's Long Howl • Stanley Waterloo
... hauled once a day, but sometimes twice a day in good weather. As the tide along the Maine coast is quite strong, the fishermen usually haul their pots at or about slack water, low tide generally being preferred when they are worked once a day. The number used by a fisherman varies greatly on different sections of the coast. According to the investigations of this Commission, ...
— The Lobster Fishery of Maine - Bulletin of the United States Fish Commission, Vol. 19, Pages 241-265, 1899 • John N. Cobb
... spite of all my resistance, and all we could do was to follow. But I soon lost track of him and control of him: sometimes he was ahead, and I could feel him; sometimes he was alongside, and the line was slack and dragging on the water, most dangerous of positions; sometimes the canoe went fastest, and the salmon was behind me. My men handled the canoe admirably, and brought me through safe, fish and all; ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Volume 11, No. 26, May, 1873 • Various
... from the court? No notice? shall I not know the cause Of these my secret and suspitious ils? Accursed brother! vnkinde murderer! Why bends thou thus thy minde to martir me? Hieronimo, why writ I of they wrongs, Or why art thou so slack in thy reuenge? Andrea! O Andrea, that thou sawest Me for thy freend Horatio handled thus, And him for me thus causeles murdered! Well, force perforce, I must constraine my-selfe To patience, and apply me to the time, Till Heauen, as I haue hoped, shall ...
— The Spanish Tragedie • Thomas Kyd
... the long lengths of heavy rope unloaded from the waggon, then deft hands tied a bowline at one end of the hawser and quickly passed it round the lock-up, which was thus securely noosed, and two or three hundred diggers took hold of the slack of the rope. ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... so heavily that I had to slack away the painter of the 'Stancomb Wills' and put her astern. Much ice was coming round the floe and had to be poled off. Then the 'Dudley Docker', being the heavier boat, began to damage the 'James Caird', and I slacked the 'Dudley Docker' away. The 'James Caird' remained moored to the ice, ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... of the Heavens had not revealed himself to me. To one of my friends he had appeared as an eagle, which meant that he was to be a warrior, keen and victorious; and to another as a fox, so that he studied cunning; but without any vision I did not know what to make of myself. My heart was slack as a wetted bowstring. My father ...
— The Trail Book • Mary Austin et al
... carrying the end of his rope with him. He did not make the mistake of making the end fast to his own body as he might have done in some circumstances. Instead he threw the rope over the rock, taking one quick turn about it. He had no more than taken that turn when the slack on the rope was suddenly taken up and the rope ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Alaska - The Gold Diggers of Taku Pass • Frank Gee Patchin
... the brake, McGonnigle went on humorously, gesticulating spaciously while the slack of the lines swung on ...
— The Dude Wrangler • Caroline Lockhart
... for rain when A slack rope tightens. Smoke beats downward. Sun is red in the morning. There is a ...
— Boy Scouts Handbook - The First Edition, 1911 • Boy Scouts of America
... purely physical. A love affair is always a thousand times swifter under the Southern Cross than under the Great Bear. And it's a million times swifter on board ship than anywhere else because people are thrown into such close contact. They've nothing to do and their bodies get slack and pampered, and they eat heaps too much. It's like the Romans in the dying days of Pompeii—eating, drinking and physical love-making. One day I heard Kraill say in a lecture that men and women can't work together, in offices or anything, ...
— Captivity • M. Leonora Eyles
... the things that are Of moment. Few indeed! When I can make Of ten small words a rope to hang the world! "I had you and I have you now no more." There, there it dangles,—where's the little truth That can for long keep footing under that When its slack syllables tighten to a thought? Here, let me write it down! I wish to see Just how a thing like ...
— Renascence and Other Poems • Edna St. Vincent Millay
... gracefully up as it were to reward the near side horse; the thong—the thong after three twists, which appears in his hand to have been placed by the maker never to be altered or improved ...... and if the off-side horse becomes slack, to see the turn of his arm to reduce a twist, or to reverse, if necessary, is exquisite: after being placed under the rib, or upon the shoulder point, up comes the arm, and with it the thong returns to the elegant position upon the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 366 - Vol. XIII, No. 366., Saturday, April 18, 1829 • Various
... sure that she would thrust her matrimonial happiness with Oliver unsparingly upon his attention; while he, on the other hand, being provided with no corresponding Olivette, would be left, a sort of emotional celibate, with his slack times and his afternoons and his general need for flattery and amusement dreadfully upon his own hands. He would be tormented by jealousy. In which case—and here he came to verities—his work would suffer. It wouldn't grip him while all these vague ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... you how I used to sneak out to buckle the horses on; an' w'en Jack Clay, a great chum of me father's, used to be driving the 'Up' coach, me father, w'en he'd be slack of passengers,—which wasn't often, there being more life and people moving in the colony then,—an' w'en I'd be good, would put me up on the box an' take me on to the next stage, an' I'd come back with Jack Clay—that was ...
— Some Everyday Folk and Dawn • Miles Franklin
... my youth I had learnt, by sedulously imitating the pantaloons in the harlequinades, to drop flat on my face instinctively, and to produce the illusion of being picked up neatly by the slack of my trousers and set on my feet again."—Mr. Bernard ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, March 14, 1917 • Various
... mysterious sounds, all of them musical. There were swift actions, too: a Kanaka crawled out upon the bowsprit to make taut a slack stay, while two others with pulley-blocks swarmed aloft. Occasionally the canvas snapped as the wind veered slightly. The sea was no longer rolling brass; it was bluer than anything he had ever seen. Every so often a wall of water, thin and jade-coloured, would rise ...
— The Ragged Edge • Harold MacGrath
... "Thursday is a slack day with him," she said rather gravely. "I assure you he works harder than most clergymen, and is very conscientious and painstaking. He is not at all strong, but ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... schoolmistress simplifies the day's itinerary, which begins with the thatched palace or kedaton of the Sultan. The tiered roofs of the royal Messighit rise above the atap dwellings of the rustic Court, still professing a slack Mohammedanism. The Dutch territory includes the Chinese and Oriental campongs divided by Fort Orange, but though the palmy days of Ternate's hereditary Ruler have long since passed away, he retains a shadowy authority over a limited area. Sir Francis ...
— Through the Malay Archipelago • Emily Richings
... things without ceasing to ply his paddle. His objective lay some six miles up-stream. But when he came at last to the upper limit of the tidal reach he found in this deep, slack water new-driven piling and freshly strung boom-sticks and acres of logs confined therein; also a squat motor tugboat and certain lesser craft moored to these timbers. A little back from the bank he could ...
— The Hidden Places • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... of flame; The window seemed a furnace door That gave upon a bed of ore; The thunder rumbled out the muttered Words that his failing tongue had uttered— Another flash, a rending crack— The old man crumpled like a sack; I felt his stringy arms go slack. How could he sit so dead, so still! While wind ...
— Carolina Chansons - Legends of the Low Country • DuBose Heyward and Hervey Allen
... on the ground, I took hold of the rope and shook it. I am not generally nervous, but I was a little nervous then. I did not shake the grapnel loose. Then I let the rope go slack, for a foot or two, and gave it a big sweep to one side. To my great delight, over came the grapnel, nearly falling on our heads. I think I saw Maiden's Heart make a grab at it as it came over, but ...
— A Jolly Fellowship • Frank R. Stockton
... call a bird in the hand," he chuckled, hugging his slack frame, "an' it ain't fur you to be givin' orders—it's fur me. An', anyway, I guess we ain't a-goin' to be able to make a trade—leastwise not on yore terms. But we'll do business all ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... having drawn down more than a thousand fathoms of rope, the whale slackened its speed, and Parr, taking another coil round the loggerhead, held on until the boat was almost dragged under water. Then the line became loose, and the slack was hauled in rapidly. Meanwhile Grim's boat had reached the spot and the men now lay on their oars at some distance ahead, ready to pull the instant the whale should show itself. Up it came, not twenty yards ahead. One short, energetic pull, and the second boat sent a harpoon deep ...
— The World of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... "slack" Beowulf, like the sluggish Brutus, ultimately reveals his true character, and is presented with a historic sword of honor. It is "laid on his breast" (l. 2195) as Hun laid Lfing ...
— Beowulf • James A. Harrison and Robert Sharp, eds.
... is!' said Monsieur Rigaud, breaking a long pause. 'Look at the light of day. Day? the light of yesterday week, the light of six months ago, the light of six years ago. So slack and dead!' ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... wall in compas to compile About Caermerdin, and did it commend Unto these sprites to bring to perfect end; During which work the Lady of the Lake, Whom long he loved, for him in haste did send; Who, thereby forced his workmen to forsake, Them bound till his return their labor not to slack. ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... more on a certain native tone or temper in the pupil's psychological constitution than on anything else. Some persons appear to have a naturally poor focalization of the field of consciousness; and in such persons actions hang slack, and inhibitions seem ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James
... otherwise, I appeal to the common sense of mankind. One late writer defines it thus: "LANGUAGE is any means by which one person communicates his ideas to another."—Sanders's Spelling-Book, p. 7. The following is the explanation of an other slack thinker: "One may, by speaking or by writing, (and sometimes by motions,) communicate his thoughts to others. The process by which this is done, is called LANGUAGE.—Language is the expression of thought and feeling."—S. W. Clark's Practical ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... broke up. The bicycles were brought round, and the four went gaily out of the front door to light lamps and see to suspiciously slack tyres. ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes
... now, chaps, before another sea comes! I can't slack away these halliards. Bob, out knife, and up in the rings; cut ...
— A Dream of the North Sea • James Runciman
... very different business from the navigation in the slack waters of the bayous. The current of muddy water ran with great swiftness, and great swirls, as of a whirlpool, sometimes almost turned the ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls - Volume XIII, No. 51: November 12, 1892 • Various
... paddle in self-defense. The trout left the water about ten feet from the boat, and came directly at me with fiery eyes, his speckled sides flashing like a meteor. I dodged as he whisked by with a vicious slap of his bifurcated tail, and nearly upset the boat. The line was of course slack, and the danger was that he would entangle it about me, and carry away a leg. This was evidently his game; but I untangled it, and only lost a breast button or two by the swiftly-moving string. The ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... vaguely that there was no depending upon these two men and the woman. They did not know how to do anything, and as the days went by it became apparent that they could not learn. They were slack in all things, without order or discipline. It took them half the night to pitch a slovenly camp, and half the morning to break that camp and get the sled loaded in fashion so slovenly that for the rest of the day they ...
— The Call of the Wild • Jack London
... way on the parched Paroo and the Warrego tracks once more, And lived like a dog, as the swagmen do, till the Western stations shore; But men were many, and sheds were full, for work in the town was slack — The traveller never got hands in wool, though he tramped for a year ...
— An Anthology of Australian Verse • Bertram Stevens
... strong that he dared not express his discontent. He himself had twice been engaged with pirates, but had gained no particular credit, and indeed had, in the opinion of his comrades, been somewhat slack in the fray. He was no favourite in the auberge, though he spared no pains to ingratiate himself with the senior knights, and had a short time before been very severely reprimanded by the bailiff for striking one ...
— A Knight of the White Cross • G.A. Henty
... as a drag. Click reels are an abomination. I never jerk the rod, but hook with a twist of the wrist, remembering the golden rule that from the moment a bass takes the bait until he is landed the line must be kept tight, as one second of slack line will lose him. The point of the rod I keep bent by the pull of the fish, which is made to fight for every inch of line. I reel in whenever practicable and kill the ...
— Black Bass - Where to catch them in quantity within an hour's ride from New York • Charles Barker Bradford
... the major was not noted by Joel and his set, in the excitement of receiving so many guests, and in the movement of the wedding. But, as soon as the fact was ascertained, the overseer and miller made the pretence of a 'slack-time' in their work, and obtained permission to go to the Mohawk, on private concerns of their own. Such journeys were sufficiently common to obviate suspicion; and, the leave had, the two conspirators started off, in ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper
... came, there they were in a long disorderly line, never looking back, with canvas set, and still running. Some of our ships hung close on their heels, like dogs at a flying ox; but scarce a shot boomed, and never a tack did the Dons slack off their northward course. ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed
... does not employ in purchasing labor, but keeps idle in his hands, is the same thing to the laborers, for the time being, as if it did not exist. All capital is, from the variations of trade, occasionally in this state. A manufacturer, finding a slack demand for his commodity, forbears to employ laborers in increasing a stock which he finds it difficult to dispose of; or if he goes on until all his capital is locked up in unsold goods, then at least he must of necessity pause until he can get ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • John Stuart Mill
... "Things are slack here to-day, old fellow. Let's go out to the Country Club and have a few sets of tennis or a game of golf, whichever you prefer," he suggested. "I've done my little ...
— The Pawns Count • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... have made themselves your foes, and they have wasted from over against the abode of their camp (or fortress); and now behold—O Sun God of my fathers—the King of the Hittites makes them march. And know of them, my Lord—may the gods make slack their hand. As has been said there is fear. And lo! perchance the Sun God of my fathers will turn his heart toward me. My Lord's word is sure, and let the (increase or tithe of gold?) be given him, as we have purposed for the Sun ...
— Egyptian Literature
... a drawin' of tea and a couple of nut-cakes: mebby she'll relish 'em, for I shouldn't wonder ef she hadn't had a mouthful this blessed day. She's dreadful slack at the best of times, but no one can much wonder, seein' she's got nine children, and is jest up from a rheumatic fever. I'm sure I never grudge a meal of vittles or a hand's turn to such as she is, though she does beat all for dependin' on her neighbors. ...
— Work: A Story of Experience • Louisa May Alcott
... presumably to greater advantage, labor and materials which, but for it, would have been employed for other purposes. Meanwhile the causes making for unemployment will be unaffected. Miscalculations will still be made, the building trades will still become slack in the winter, the casual methods of engaging dock laborers will still continue, trade cycles will still recur, while beneath them, and concealed by them, some industries will expand and others will decay. Thus, like the armies at Salonika, the new business would in effect divert resources ...
— Supply and Demand • Hubert D. Henderson
... patriarch of 'correctness.' Walsh, who was a sublime old blockhead, suggested to Pope that 'correctness' was the only tight-rope upon which a fresh literary performer in England could henceforth dance with any advantage of novelty; all other tight-ropes and slack-ropes of every description having been preoccupied by elder funambulists. Both Walsh and Pope forgot ever once to ask themselves what it was that they meant by 'correctness;' an idea that, in its application to France, Akenside afterwards sternly ridiculed. Neither ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey
... that as the spar parted and fell it would be held hanging by my tackle until I could get down to the deck again and lower it away; and that really was what did happen—only as it fell there was a bit of slack line to take up, and this gave such a tremendous jerk to the cross-trees that I was within an ace of being shaken out of them and of going down to the deck with a bang. But I didn't—which is the main thing—and I did get my mast. It ...
— In the Sargasso Sea - A Novel • Thomas A. Janvier
... I know, four years ago, Against those Panama projectors. The law seemed slack, inquiry slow; How I denounced them, the Directors, Including him—in some vague fashion; But then—BONHOMME was ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, VOL. 103, November 26, 1892 • Various
... bow must have been shot from a slack string, for Rosalind could remember how quickly she forgot Arthur Fenwick as she took a good look at Gerry Palliser, his great friend, whom he had so often raved about to her, and who was to be brought to play lawn-tennis next ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... visitor bends and slides its slender fore part, a blade of exquisite suppleness, between the wall and the inhabitant, whose slack rotundity yields to the pressure of this animated wedge. It plunges into the cell, leaving no part of itself outside but its wide hind quarters, with the red dots ...
— The Life of the Fly - With Which are Interspersed Some Chapters of Autobiography • J. Henri Fabre
... answer. Her thoughts were all on the tip of her own rod. About eleven o'clock a fine, drizzling rain set in. The fishing was very slack. All the other boats gave it up in despair; but Cornelia said she wanted to stay out a little longer, they might as well ...
— Fisherman's Luck • Henry van Dyke
... Goody Slack Jaw," says Captain Night. "I shall be thirstier anon from listening to your prate. Will you hurry now, Gadfly, or is the sun to sink before ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 1 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... not believed, and even the wisdom of the Jupiter sometimes falls on deaf ears. Though other plans did not put themselves forward in the columns of the Jupiter, reformers of church charities were not slack to make known in various places their different nostrums for setting Hiram's Hospital on its feet again. A learned bishop took occasion, in the Upper House, to allude to the matter, intimating that he had communicated on the subject with his right reverend brother of Barchester. The radical member ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... after, Neewak sent greeting and invitation to his igloo. Moosu went, but I sat alone, with the song of the still in my ears, and the air thick with the shaman's tobacco; for trade was slack that night, and no one dropped in but Angeit, a young hunter that had faith in me. Later, Moosu came back, his speech thick with chuckling and ...
— The Faith of Men • Jack London
... score. When he dammed water in his mountains he dammed it by the hundreds of millions of gallons. When he ditched his tule-swamps, instead of contracting the excavation, he bought the huge dredgers outright, and, when there was slack work on his own marshes, he contracted for the draining of the marshes of neighboring big farmers, land companies, and corporations for a hundred miles up and down the ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London |
