"Spur" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... towards the meridian of 65 degrees; it gives birth to the great river known by the name of Desaguadero de Mendoza and extends from San Juan de la Frontera and San Juan de la Punta to the town of Cordova. The second spur, called the Sierra de Salta and the Jujui, of which the greatest breadth is 25 degrees of latitude, widens from the valley of Catamarca and San Miguel del Tucuman, in the direction of the Rio Vermejo (longitude 64 degrees). Finally, ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V3 • Alexander von Humboldt
... her riding jacket; boots and skirt were clotted with it; so was the single army spur. Her horse stretched a glossy, sweating neck and rolled wisely-suspicious eyes at the dazzling light. On the gray saddle cloth glimmered three ...
— Special Messenger • Robert W. Chambers
... bear out the statements of Duperrey and other navigators, that Strong's Island was once inhabited by over twenty thousand people. At the present time the population does not reach five hundred. One of these places was situated on the summit of a spur of the great mountain range that traverses the island. The top of the mountain had been levelled as flat as a table, and a space of about an acre was covered with what appeared to be a floor of huge basaltic ...
— Concerning "Bully" Hayes - From "The Strange Adventure Of James Shervinton and Other - Stories" - 1902 • Louis Becke
... drove it into the ground at his feet as others stirred his hair and cut the buckle off his pretty sombrero. Tex, dazed, but wise enough to stand quiet, felt his belt tear loose and drop to his feet, felt a spur rip from its strap and saw his cigarette leap from his lips. Throwing the guns to Red, Hopalong laughed and abruptly turned and was lost in ...
— Hopalong Cassidy's Rustler Round-Up - Bar-20 • Clarence Edward Mulford
... contrived to give her precaution the slip, for, as he was on horseback, he lingered behind the carriages until they had fairly turned the corner in the road to Knockwinnock, and then, wheeling his horse's head round, gave him the spur in the ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... but what the people need is the good, homely, honest stuff—something that'll stick to their ribs—make them laugh and tremble and feel sick to think of the littleness of this popcorn ball spinning in space without ever even getting a hot-box! And something that'll spur 'em on to keep the hearth well swept and the wood pile split into kindling and the dishes washed and dried and put away. Any one who can get the country people to read something worth while is doing his nation a real service. And that's what this caravan of culture ...
— Parnassus on Wheels • Christopher Morley
... steadily gained on the little mare, who was not disposed to do her utmost even under whip and spur, ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor
... growing oil exports. Azerbaijan's oil production declined through 1997, but has registered an increase every year since. Negotiation of production-sharing arrangements (PSAs) with foreign firms, which have committed $60 billion to long-term oilfield development, should generate the funds needed to spur future industrial development. Oil production under the first of these PSAs, with the Azerbaijan International Operating Company, began in November 1997. A consortium of Western oil companies began pumping 1 million barrels a day from a large offshore ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... a place where the ground was ploughed up, as if a drove of hogs had been rooting it. Here there had been a terrible fight among the bulls—it was the rutting season, when such conflicts occur. This augured well. Perhaps they are still in the neighbourhood, reasoned I, as I gave the spur to my horse, and galloped forward ...
— The Hunters' Feast - Conversations Around the Camp Fire • Mayne Reid
... he was doing or intended to do. Very seldom did he do the thing which his enemy thought he would do; which seemed most likely and proper according to military science. He thought and acted quickly in crises, relied constantly on the element of surprise and invented new strategy on the spur of the moment. ...
— History of the American Negro in the Great World War • W. Allison Sweeney
... of the spur: "However, preserve me your friendship, which I think of with a great deal of pleasure. If ever you see me married, I flatter myself you'll see a conduct you would not be sorry your wife ...
— Lady Mary Wortley Montague - Her Life and Letters (1689-1762) • Lewis Melville
... commendable in a writer, nor profitable to the reader. But howsoever it be done, I have had an especial eye unto the truth of things, and for the rest, I hope that this foule frizeled Treatise of mine will prove a spur to others better learned to handle the self-same argument, if in my life-time I doo not ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XI. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... though they had been bursting snowballs. If the boy ahead noted anything, Grafton could not tell. Basil turned his head neither to right nor left, and at the foot of the muddy hill, the black horse that he rode, without touch of spur, seemed suddenly to leave the earth and pass on out of sight with the swift silence of a shadow. At the foot of a hill walked the first wounded man—a Colonel limping between two soldiers. The Colonel looked up smiling—he had a ...
— Crittenden - A Kentucky Story of Love and War • John Fox, Jr.
... effort of spur and whip, Or the hoarse, hot cry of the pallid lip, When once we have fallen back. It is better to keep on stirrup and rein, The steady poise and the careful strain, In speeding ...
— Poems of Sentiment • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... had, in fact, enumerated them when proclaiming the impossibility of establishing a durable peace or a solid League of Nations as long as Russia continued to be a prey to anarchy. But even with the prizes and penalties before their eyes to entice and spur them, they proved unequal to the task of devising an intelligent policy. Fitful and incoherent, their efforts were either incapable of being realized or, when feasible, were mischievous. Thus, by degrees, they hardened the great ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... of their guest, were gone; and a mild and playful image of herself, who bore her name no less than most of those features which had rendered her own youth more than usually attractive, sought, without success, a massive silver spur, of curious and antique workmanship, which she had been permitted to handle until the moment when the family had been commanded ...
— The Wept of Wish-Ton-Wish • James Fenimore Cooper
... of which the chief features are a pair of high peaks joined by a nek to a plateau, from which a spur, ending in a kopje called Conical Hill, juts out at right angles to the nek, which becomes a spur of the plateau at a Little Knoll east of the summit. Its tactical importance was derived from its height, as the summit, though not the peaks, ...
— A Handbook of the Boer War • Gale and Polden, Limited
... the Birth of the Messiah Shoemaker Shops under Covered Market, Fifteenth Century Shout and blow Horns, How to Simon, Martyrdom of, at Trent Slaves or Serfs, Sixth to Twelfth Century Somersaults Sport with Dogs, Fourteenth Century Spring-board, The Spur-maker Squirrels, Way to catch Stag, How to kill and cut up a, Fifteenth Century Staircase of the Office of the Goldsmiths of Rouen, Fifteenth Century Stall of Carved Wood, Fifteenth Century Standards of the Church and the Empire State Banquet, Sixteenth Century Stoertebeck, Execution of Styli, ...
— Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period • Paul Lacroix
... stood watching while the general hurried to the waiting motor-car. When the car whirled away in a din of dust he returned leisurely to the train that had been shortened to three coaches. Then be gave the signal to start up the spur-track, that leads to Jamrud, where a fort cowers in the very throat of the dreadfulest gorge in ...
— King—of the Khyber Rifles • Talbot Mundy
... it pity, was it sympathy for him in his long deferred happiness, that prompted me to act as I did? Even at this day I myself cannot answer the question. Perhaps it was just unthinkingly on the spur of the moment that I did what I did. Without a word I thrust into Mirza Shah's hand the roughly completed horoscope. There was no note in it of the flaming star that at the last had ...
— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell
... Sister Martha? You know what we Hawaiians are. You know what we were half a hundred years ago. Lilolilo was wonderful. I was reckless. Lilolilo of himself could make any woman reckless. I was twice reckless, for I had cold, grey Nahala to spur me on. I knew. I had never a doubt. Never a hope. Divorces in those days were undreamed. The wife of George Castner could never be queen of Hawaii, even if Uncle Robert's prophesied revolutions were ...
— On the Makaloa Mat/Island Tales • Jack London
... Protestant? No; I have not been converted, but, I repeat, advised. I have seen Christianity working, not only in churches, but, which is much more edifying, in individuals. Yes, I have seen it in turns the inspirer of language, the spring of actions, the spur and the discipline, rule and support of the future, impregnating, so to speak, the flesh and the spirit. Such a spectacle excites one to reflection. We have been in too great haste to exclaim, Christianity ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst
... hollyhocks made a gorgeous splash of color against the wall of the house beneath the end window. Four-o'clocks, ragged-robins and blue lark-spur struggled up through the cabbages and long grass of the little garden, to bid them welcome, and at the door they were met by the mistress of the house, who had heard ...
— Peggy-Alone • Mary Agnes Byrne
... seen his winter quarters; we had seen his lookout posts, and the trail of his explorations. They all said, Onward! To be sure, we did not at once know by which route he had gone onward. The uncertainty, however, gave a spur to those about to be engaged in the searching parties, and each man thought there were especial reasons for believing one particular route to be the true one. The majority—indeed all those who gave the subject any consideration—believed ...
— Stray Leaves from an Arctic Journal; • Sherard Osborn
... There, asking short questions, moving for witnesses to be called in, and all that kind of small ware, will soon fit you to set up for yourself. I am told that you are much mortified at your accident, but without reason; pray, let it rather be a spur than a curb to you. Persevere, and, depend upon it, it will do well at last. When I say persevere, I do not mean that you should speak every day, nor in every debate. Moreover, I would not advise you to speak again upon public matters ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... trust to what I can say on the spur of the moment. If you notice I'm breaking down, please begin to clap, and then everybody will suppose I have finished. Here comes Miss Russell. I believe she wants me to act umpire too. Greatness is being thrust upon me. I hope I shan't disgrace ...
— The Manor House School • Angela Brazil
... came surprise and relief in that there was no hurt. And, finally, her face was proudly happy with a smile of triumph. She even smiled to Billikens her pride at making good her love to him. And Billikens relaxed and looked love and pride back, until, on the spur of the second, Harris ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London
... The Indian camp was pitched on an open plain of several miles in extent, which took a sudden bend half a mile distant, where a spur of the mountains shut out the further end of the valley from view. From beyond this point the dull rumbling sound proceeded. Suddenly there was a roar as if a mighty cataract had been let loose upon the scene. At the same moment a countless herd of wild horses came thundering round the base ...
— The Dog Crusoe and his Master • R.M. Ballantyne
... sweet to hear the tales the troopers tell, To dance with blowzy housemaids at the regimental hops And thrash the cad who says you waltz too well. Yes, it makes you cock-a-hoop to be "Rider" to your troop, And branded with a blasted worsted spur, When you envy, O how keenly, one poor Tommy being cleanly Who blacks your boots and sometimes ...
— Verses 1889-1896 • Rudyard Kipling
... on the spur of the moment, during the play, tries something else, is taking a course sure to deceive an intelligent partner, and one which will probably reduce the number ...
— Auction of To-day • Milton C. Work
... ravishingly pretty girl sitting on the same rock with him, and he was looking at the sunset. The plane behind him was an official Watch plane, which civilians are never supposed to catch a glimpse of. It had brought Thorn Hard and Sylva West to this spot. It waited now, half-hidden by a spur of age-eroded rock, to take them back to civilization again. Its G.C. (General Communication) phone muttered occasionally like ...
— Invasion • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... Camilla's troop, their mistress slain, Then, routed, the Rutulian ranks give way, And fierce Atinas gallops from the plain, And scattered chiefs and squadrons in dismay Spur towards the town for shelter from the fray. None dares that murderous onset of the foe To stem with javelins, nor their charge to stay. Slack from their fainting shoulders hangs the bow, The clattering horse-hoofs ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil
... guide? A thousand horse—and none to ride! With flowing tail, and flying mane, Wide nostrils—never stretch'd by pain, Mouths bloodless to the bit or rein And feet that iron never shod, And flanks unscarr'd by spur or rod, A thousand horse, the wild, the free, Like waves that follow o'er the sea. On came the troop.... They stop—they start—they snuff the air, Gallop a moment here and there, Approach, retire, ...
— New National Fourth Reader • Charles J. Barnes and J. Marshall Hawkes
... his death; and Father Juan de las Missas, [who perished] at the hands of the hostile Camucones; besides other fathers. I regard it as superfluous to expatiate further on this, or to attempt to spur on those who are running so gloriously. Therefore I conclude with the words, which the glorious bishop and martyr, St. Cyprian, wrote in a similar case in his epistle number 81, to Sergius Rogatianus and his companions: Saluto vos fratres charissimi [ac beatissimi] optans ipsse quoque ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXV, 1635-36 • Various
... great delight," says old Nashe, "to see a young gentleman with his skill and cunning, by his voice, rod, and spur, better to manage and to command the great Bucephalus, than the strongest Milo, with all his strength; one while to see him make him tread, trot, and gallop the ring; and one after to see him make him gather up roundly; ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving
... the word 'coward' used of the family—I'll soon be one of!" Asgill returned, speaking on the spur of the moment, and wondering at himself the moment he had made the statement. "That's what I'm meaning! Do you see? And if you are for repeating the word, more by token, it'll be all the breakfast you'll have, for I'll cram it down your ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman
... speech of the boasting of works of the battle, After when every atheling by craft of the earl Over the high roof had look'd on the hand there, Yea, the fiend's fingers before his own eyen, Each one of the nail-steads most like unto steel, Hand-spur of the heathen one; yea, the own claw Uncouth of the war-wight. But each one there quoth it, That no iron of the best, of the hardy of folk, Would touch him at all, which e'er of the monster The battle-hand bloody ...
— The Tale of Beowulf - Sometime King of the Folk of the Weder Geats • Anonymous
... Yes, what's the use of plying whip and spur When there is not a penny of reward For him who tears him from the festal board, And mounts, and dashes headlong to perdition? Such doing for the deed's sake asks a knight, And knighthood's now an idle superstition. That was your ...
— Love's Comedy • Henrik Ibsen
... judges, set out on that circuit of which the memory will last as long as our race and language. The officers who commanded the troops in the districts through which his course lay had orders to furnish him with whatever military aid he might require. His ferocious temper needed no spur; yet a spur was applied. The health and spirits of the Lord Keeper had given way. He had been deeply mortified by the coldness of the King and by the insolence of the Chief Justice, and could find little consolation in looking back on a life, not indeed blackened by any atrocious crime, but ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... the deed, he scarcely knew that it was doing. It was a horrid, mad excitement, where the soul had spread its wings upon the whirlwind, and heeded not whither it was hurried. A terrible necessity had seemed to spur him onwards all the while, and one thing so succeeded to another, that he scarce could stop at any but the first. From the moment he had hidden in the shower-bath (but for God's interposing mercy), his doom appeared to have been sealed—robbery, ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... national spirit, and the embodiment in practice of devotion to principle," "a great ornament to the empire," "a pillar of the constitution," "a valuable institution, tending to the honour of the nobles, and based on a compassionate feeling towards the official caste," "a pillar of religion and a spur to virtue." The whole debate (which is well worth reading, and an able translation of which by Mr. Aston has appeared in a recent Blue Book) shows the affection with which the Japanese cling to the traditions of a chivalrous ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... Englishman, you will be sure to have this, or something like it, 'Oh, he has plenty of go in him; but he knows when to pull up.' He may have all other defects in him; he may be coarse, he may be illiterate, he may be stupid to talk to; still this great union of spur and bridle, of energy and moderation, will remain to him. Probably he will hardly be able to explain why he stops when he does stop, or why he continued to move as long as he, in fact, moved; but still, as by a rough instinct, he pulls up pretty much where he should, though he was ...
— Physics and Politics, or, Thoughts on the application of the principles of "natural selection" and "inheritance" to political society • Walter Bagehot
... shouts?" broke in Ailsa, as the hum of many voices reached their ears. "'Tis surely the young king that they are hailing. Spur on the horse, for I would not willingly miss the sight of ...
— The Thirsty Sword • Robert Leighton
... necessary to reduce poverty significantly. Privatization of government-owned copper mines relieved the government from covering mammoth losses generated by the industry and greatly improved the chances for copper mining to return to profitability and spur economic growth. Copper output increased in 2003 and is expected to increase again in 2004, due to higher copper prices. The maize harvest doubled in 2003, helping boost GDP by 4.0%. Cooperation continues with international bodies on programs to reduce poverty, including ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... beds of which are generally dry wastes, and the country is, except at a few places where permanent water is found, altogether sterile and hot. If we view the physical aspect looking north and north-west from Jacobabad, we notice a wide bay of plains extending between the broken spur of the Sulimani, and a second range of hills having a direction parallel to the outer range. This plain is called the Kachi, extends in an even surface for 150 miles from the Indus at Sukkur, and is bounded ...
— Afghanistan and the Anglo-Russian Dispute • Theo. F. Rodenbough
... have made themselves absolutely useful to him. This Scot, being a most inveterate enemy to France, lets the Prince rest neither night nor day, but is still inspiring him with new hopes of a crown, and laying him down all the false arguments imaginable, to spur the active spirit: my lord is not of the opinion, yet seems to comply with them in Council; he laughs at all the fopperies of charms and incantations; insomuch, that he many times angers the Prince, and is in eternal little feuds with Hermione. The German ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... the toil has not harmed him—the poverty has not cramped him, nor crippled his energies. "Poverty is very inconvenient," he said on one occasion, in speaking of those early years, "but it is a fine spur to activity, and may be ...
— From Canal Boy to President - Or The Boyhood and Manhood of James A. Garfield • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... found in the catalogues of fashionable summer resorts. It lies on a low spur of the Cumberland range of mountains on a little tributary of the Clinch River. Lakelands proper is a contented village of two dozen houses situated on a forlorn, narrow-gauge railroad line. You wonder whether the railroad lost itself in the pine woods and ...
— Sixes and Sevens • O. Henry
... like the Courier of Saint Petersburgh in the circle at Astley's or Franconi's: only he sits his own horse instead of standing on him. The immense jack-boots worn by these postilions, are sometimes a century or two old; and are so ludicrously disproportionate to the wearer's foot, that the spur, which is put where his own heel comes, is generally halfway up the leg of the boots. The man often comes out of the stable- yard, with his whip in his hand and his shoes on, and brings out, in both hands, one boot ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens
... first markore was to fall so easily. After this we tracked the first herd for a long distance over the snow, until they scampered down an almost perpendicular face of snow and ice, and here we gave them up, halting on a spur of the mountain for a repast of chicken, eggs, chupatties, and cold tea. During our morning's work we had come across some most break-neck places, and had one or two narrow escapes, which, at the time, one was hardly conscious of. The snow ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight
... reasoning is entitled to rank in the political classics of America as the Address to the Electors of Bristol ranks in the political classics of England. As a debater in the House Mr. Davis may well be cited as an exemplar. He had no boastful reliance upon intuition or inspiration or the spur of the moment, though no man excelled him in extempore speech. He made elaborate preparation by the study of all public questions, and spoke from a full mind with complete command of premise and conclusion. In all that pertained to the graces of oratory ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... changes. Thus he trained her carefully and with precision, and when Cantemir saw the trap that held him where he was and gave Lord Cedric the upper-hand, he fell into the spleen and played out of time, and Cedric flung around and caught his spur in Dame Seymour's petticoats, and he swore beneath his breath, and Katherine smiled at his discomfiture and her own untutored grace, and she made bold and took a step or two on her own dependence. Then there chimed eight from the old French clock of black ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... religious interest; news of it spread from Inverary as swift as men could travel; and I was rejoiced to learn that, up to a late hour that Saturday, it was not yet concluded: and all men began to suppose it must spread over to the Monday. Under the spur of this intelligence I would not sit to eat; but, Duncan having agreed to be my guide, took the road again on foot, with the piece in my hand and munching as I went. Duncan brought with him a flask of usquebaugh and a hand-lantern; which ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... shrill voices were lost in the distance. There were other people in the street, of other features and in different garbs, of prouder bearing and hot, restless manner, broad-shouldered, erect, manly, with spur on heel and sword at side. The outline of the old synagogue melted into the murky air and changed its shape, and stood out again in other and ever-changing forms. Now they were passing before the walls of a noble ...
— The Witch of Prague • F. Marion Crawford
... start early and run through to Brown's Park. Halfway down the valley, a spur of a red mountain stretches across the river, which cuts a canyon through it. Here the walls are comparatively low, but vertical. A vast number of swallows have built their adobe houses on the face of the cliffs, on either ...
— Canyons of the Colorado • J. W. Powell
... food and cooking pots, started off just as the moon rose over the nearest cedars, and laughed at Fred marshaling the sleepy porters by lamplight in the open space between the house and barn. He was to follow as fast as the loaded porters could be made to travel, and with that concertina of his to spur them on there was little likelihood of losing touch. But the rear-guard, when it comes to pursuing a retreating enemy, is ever ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy
... you know?" his mother asked. Ben's eyes looked violent and he bit his lips. Adelaide commenced speaking before her mother had finished her question, as if she only needed the spur of her voice to be lively and agreeable, ...
— The Morgesons • Elizabeth Stoddard
... till Peter was growing tongue-tied, and as red in the face as a bubbly-jock; and, to speak the truth, my own een began to reel with the merligoes. In a jiffy, both of us found our hearts waxing so brave as to kick and spur at all niggardly hesitation; and we leuch and thumped on the good-man of the inn-house's mahogany table, as if it had been warranted never to break. In fact, we were as furious and obstrapulous as two unchristened Turks; and it was a mercy that ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... a leg and spur on each side of the horse to urge and to guide him, should ride without any whip at all if the horse has been subjected to the leg, so as to have the right hand as free for the reins as the left: there should be no such thing as "a bridle hand." If a whip is carried, ...
— Hints on Horsemanship, to a Nephew and Niece - or, Common Sense and Common Errors in Common Riding • George Greenwood
... happiness was conferred on them. It is surely very wrong and ill-mannered in people to ask for an introduction unless they are prepared to make talk; it throws too great an expense and trouble on the wretched lion, who is compelled, on the spur of the moment, to convert a conversable substance out of thin air, perhaps for the twentieth time that evening. I am sure I did not say—and I think I did not hear said— one rememberable word in the course of this visit; though, nevertheless, it was a rather agreeable one. ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... part," says he, "I like a child who is encouraged by commendation, is animated by a sense of glory, and weeps when he is outdone. A noble emulation will always keep him in exercise, a reprimand will touch him to the quick, and honour will serve instead of a spur. We need not fear that such a scholar will ever give himself up to sullenness." Mihi ille detur puer, quem laus excitet, quem gloria juvet, qui virtus fleut. Hic erit alendus ambitu: hunc mordebit objurgetio; hunc honor excitabit; in ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... of the ducks rising from the water. Show the reeds at the mouth of the creek and the rocky spur toward which the ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Literature • Ontario Ministry of Education
... rage, Caldelas turned his horse, leaving to Don Rafael the duty of collecting the dispersed soldiers, and, furiously plying the spur, he galloped off towards the ground where Regules was still contesting the ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid
... before you on the ground, like a triumphant conjuror. It is my common practice when a piece of conduct puzzles me, to attack it in the presence of Jack with such grossness, such partiality, and such wearing iteration, as at length shall spur him up in its defence. In a moment he transmigrates, dons the required character, and with moonstruck philosophy justifies the act in question. I can fancy nothing to compare with the vigour of these impersonations, the strange scale of language, flying ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the readiness of the merchantman Valeria and of Commander Stockwell's destroyer to turn happy accidents to the best account on the spur of the moment. The Valeria bumped over a rising submarine at three o 'clock one summer morning off the coast of Ireland. Instantly all hands ran to "action stations," when the gunner saw, to his delight, that ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... down with the current, and brushed me off. I did the same; but he met me with his feet, and I drifted by. However, I had him by the leg with my one good hand, and he came with me. We swam, side by side; but he beat me, and scrambled to his feet on the small spur of rock that meant life to each of us, but not to both. I swam weakly around to the south, and then down on him; realizing that my strength was giving out. But the fight went on, and I soon realized that his gun was soaked, or left behind; otherwise he ...
— The Grain Ship • Morgan Robertson
... a wet morning I arrived at Charles City, from which I was to take "the spur" for Osage. Stiffened and depressed by my night's ride, I stepped out upon the platform and watched the train as it passed on, leaving me, with two or three other silent and sleepy passengers, to wait until seven o'clock in the morning for the ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... his teeth. 'Close as wax, I see; and perhaps not quite so pliable. But take care, my pretty youth,' he added, scornfully; 'Hugh Redgauntlet will prove a rough colt-breaker—he will neither spare whipcord nor spur-rowel, I ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... the year the Tonkawanda irrigation district was opened, he settled himself on a spur of San Jacinto where it plunges like a great dolphin in the green swell of the camissal, and throws up a lacy foam of chaparral along its sides. Below him, dotted over the flat reach of the mesa, the four ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy
... "can one solitary speech fill the hearer's soul on the selfsame day with honour and uprightness, guard him from all that is base, spur him to undergo, as he ought, for the sake of glory every toil and every danger, implant in him the faith that it is better to die sword in hand than to escape by flight? [52] If such thoughts are ...
— Cyropaedia - The Education Of Cyrus • Xenophon
... I am a subject of the Republic of Venice, by profession a man of letters, and in rank a Knight of the Golden Spur. I have sufficient means, and I travel for my pleasure. I am known to the Venetian ambassador, the Count of Aranda, the Prince de la Catolica, the Marquis of Moras, and the Duke of Lossada. I have offended in no manner against the ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... was all done literally on the spur of the moment, and scarcely five minutes after the mad idea had entered Tommy's head the three boys stood in a dark corner of the drive with their booty, consisting of table silver, some valuable miniatures, and a collection of gold coins, securely tied up in a gaudy gold-embroidered ...
— The Rebellion of Margaret • Geraldine Mockler
... places. Being A Preservative against Melancholy. Gathered by Andrew Board, Doctor of Physick. This may be Reprinted, R. P. London: Printed for W. Thackeray at the Angel in Duck-lane, near West-Smithfield, and J. Deacon at the Angel in Gilt-spur-street. ...
— Catalogue of the Books Presented by Edward Capell to the Library of Trinity College in Cambridge • W. W. Greg
... the winter time they are very stationary, each band staying within a very few miles of the same place, and from their size and the open nature of their habitat it is almost as easy to count them as if they were cattle. From a spur of Bison Peak one day, Major Pitcher, the guide Elwood Hofer, John Burroughs and I spent about four hours with the glasses counting and estimating the different herds within sight. After most careful work and cautious reduction of estimates in each case ...
— American Big Game in Its Haunts • Various
... acted on the spur of the moment. With clenched fists and blazing eyes he stood between the drover and the bound man. For a moment there was silence except for the moaning of the tortured man. Mick looked at Sax and said, with a cruel smile: "Well, and who told you ...
— In the Musgrave Ranges • Jim Bushman
... sixteenth century did not find them, nor did the seventeenth, nor the eighteenth.' But it may be urged, in reply to this, that the theoretic conjecture often legitimately comes first. It is the forecast of genius which anticipates the fact and constitutes a spur towards its discovery. If, instead of being a spur, the theoretic guess rendered men content with imperfect knowledge, it would be a thing to be deprecated. But in modern investigation this is distinctly not the case; Darwin's theory, ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... the unusual shape and pleasing colours of the shell, it is remarkable because it seems to be actually incorporated with its host. The foot of the mollusc is extended into a peduncle, consisting of fibres and tendons, by which the animal is a fixture to a spur of coral. At the point of union (to facilitate which there is a hiatus in the margins of the peduncle) the sarcode or "flesh" of the coral is denuded, its place being occupied by ligaments, which by minute ramifications adhere ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield
... view of Vaygats Island. It appears, when seen from the sea off the west coast, to form a level grassy plain, but when we approached Yugor Schar, low ridges were seen to run along the east side of the island, which are probably the last ramifications of the north spur of Ural, known by the ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold
... were not invented by him on the spur of the moment. They were arranged beforehand. Their outlines are laid down in the German war book. They are part of the system in which Germany has been scientifically trained. It is the essence of that system to make such ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... alternation was repeated until, on the evening of the third day, we left Durumaland behind us and entered upon the great desert that stretches thence almost without a break as far as Teita. We once got very near to our advance-guard; I gave my steed the spur, in order to see the men at their work, but they made it their ambition to prevent us from getting quite close to them. With eager haste they plied knife and hatchet in the thick thorny bush, until ...
— Freeland - A Social Anticipation • Theodor Hertzka
... his arm, and fiercely raised, And sternly shook his hand on high, As doubting to return or fly;[cz] Impatient of his flight delayed, Here loud his raven charger neighed— Down glanced that hand, and grasped his blade; That sound had burst his waking dream, As Slumber starts at owlet's scream. The spur hath lanced his courser's sides; Away—away—for life he rides: 250 Swift as the hurled on high jerreed[70] Springs to the touch his startled steed; The rock is doubled, and the shore Shakes with the clattering tramp no more; The ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... spur of the moment, to avoid the direct answering of the question and that he might learn the exact truth about something else, he drew forth the ...
— Murder Point - A Tale of Keewatin • Coningsby Dawson
... afford to waste idle hours and empty plants while awaiting the end of the recession. We must show the world what a free economy can do—to reduce unemployment, to put unused capacity to work, to spur new productivity, and to foster higher economic growth within a range of sound fiscal policies and ...
— State of the Union Addresses of John F. Kennedy • John F. Kennedy
... trail on which we traveled during the morning ran over an exceedingly rough lava formation—a spur of the lava beds often described during the Modoc war of 1873 so hard and flinty that Williamson's large command made little impression on its surface, leaving in fact, only indistinct traces of its line of march. By care and ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... John's soul, appreciative of the beauties of nature at the dread hour of execution, seeing in them doubtless the handiwork of nature's God, exclaimed "This is indeed a beautiful country." In the front, dim in the distance, was Winchester, readily discovered by the bold mountain spur in its rear. Smaller villages dotted the valley, variegated by fields and woods—all rebellious cities of the plain, nests of treason and granaries of food for traitors. A blind mercy that, on the part of the Administration, that procured its almost total exemption from the ...
— Red-Tape and Pigeon-Hole Generals - As Seen From the Ranks During a Campaign in the Army of the Potomac • William H. Armstrong
... we came to the side of a spinney with a low wall of rough stones cutting it off from the field. I was intently looking ahead, when on a sudden Sultan swerved so powerfully that I rocked in the saddle. I wouldn't have touched him with the spur, short of utter necessity, for a fistful of guineas, and I soothed him, and then turned to look for what ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... Something more human. Something which made success a thousand times more pleasing to contemplate. He felt that with Kate at his side giant's work would become all too easy. Her ravishing smile of encouragement would be a gentle spur to the most jaded energies. The delight of bearing her upon his broad shoulders in his upward career, would be bliss beyond words, and, in the interim of his great efforts, the care and happiness of her loyally courageous heart ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... even in that moment of renunciation, that it was a wonderful thing that he could at last go on alone. A year ago he had needed all of Mary's strength to spur him to the effort, all of her belief in him. Now with his heart still crying out for her, needing her, he could ...
— Contrary Mary • Temple Bailey
... road was a hollow, a sunken ravine,[95] Overshadowed completely by wood like a screen; I clambered the bank, and I needs must confess, That one touch of the spur grazed the side ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... competence; that 'fatal gift,' as it is called, which encourages idleness in youth by doing away with the necessity for exertion. I never hear the same people inveighing against great inheritances, which are much more open to such objections. The fact is, if a young man is naturally indolent, the spur of necessity will drive him but a very little way, while the having enough to live upon is often the means of preserving his self-respect. One constantly hears what humiliating things men will do for money, whereas the truth is that ...
— Some Private Views • James Payn
... and wisdom out of long experience, and being set by God and nature in charge over the headstrong instincts of ignorant or capricious youth, cannot avoid the duty of frequently applying the curb to excessive desires, and the spur to defective ones. A sense of chafing, an impulse to resent and rebel, will naturally often arise. And, in every such collision of passion and rule, there is a tendency to hostility. It is needless to say how lamentably frequent are the examples in which this tendency ...
— The Friendships of Women • William Rounseville Alger
... over Ballinrobe Fair Green, the illuminated tents light up the foreground pleasantly, while the moon tinges the tree-tops and the river Robe with silver. All is beautiful enough were it not for the persistent rattle of the sabre and the jingle of the spur. So far as can be ascertained at present the Ulster contingent will consist of no more than fifty men, who will probably arrive by train at Claremorris about three o'clock to-morrow afternoon. Early in the forenoon a hundred infantry and sixty sabres of the Royal Dragoons ...
— Disturbed Ireland - Being the Letters Written During the Winter of 1880-81. • Bernard H. Becker
... can't express myself.—What you say of "Sid Hamet" is well enough; that an enemy should like it, and a friend not; and that telling the author would make both change their opinions. Why did you not tell Griffyth(39) that you fancied there was something in it of my manner; but first spur up his commendation to the height, as we served my poor uncle about the sconce that I mended? Well, I desired you to give what I intended for an answer to Mrs. Fenton,(40) to save her postage, and myself trouble; and I hope I have done it, if ...
— The Journal to Stella • Jonathan Swift
... foot of mine?' says you. 'Well, it's pointed to the next townland, where there's just as pretty a one as you.' And you'll find her come around; maybe there'll be a bit of an argument, but she'll come around. And if she doesn't, there'd have been no hope for you, anyway. A touch o' the spur for the lazy mare and a bit sugar for the jumper! And when you've done loving her, gie her a chuck in the chin: 'Good-by! Good luck! What you keep to yoursel' 'll worry nobody,' says you. And ...
— The Wind Bloweth • Brian Oswald Donn-Byrne
... into the little conspiracy against the extension of Mr. Grayson's knowledge, even Churchill, under the whip and spur of Harley's will, promising a sullen silence. The case itself presented aspects that stirred these men, calling as it did for an alertness of mind and delicacy of handling that appealed to their sense of responsibility; hence it aroused their interest, ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... Canadians in his hire, his enemies had found means to detach them, also, from his interests."—Yet, "under the pressure of all his misfortunes," says a missionary, "I have never remarked the least change in him; no ill news seemed to disturb his usual equanimity: they seemed rather to spur him on to fresh efforts to retrieve his fortunes, and to make greater discoveries than he had ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 12 • Editor-In-Chief Rossiter Johnson
... and gilt spur, beautifully enamelled, which once decked the heel of a noble knight, have been found in our fields, and remind us of those battles which were fought ...
— English Villages • P. H. Ditchfield
... Ethelindy but she mus' up an' offer to show the officer the way out by that thar cave what tunnels through the spur of the mounting down todes the bluffs, what sca'cely one o' the boys left in the Cove would ...
— The Raid Of The Guerilla - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... of reading the life of Mary Fletcher I find much deep instruction and encouragement. Many of her remarks have proved like a goad to spur me on in the way of holiness. An extract made by her from Dr. Doddridge's life aptly speaks the language of my heart, when in my silent breathing to the Almighty I am led to crave an enlargement of my gift in ...
— Memoir and Diary of John Yeardley, Minister of the Gospel • John Yeardley
... said? Just on the spur of the moment—I said, "Madam, I don't want to be unkind, but I really think the reason you are not happy is that you haven't been ...
— The University of Hard Knocks • Ralph Parlette
... was aware that he was hungry; ay, even through the tortures of the cold, even through the frosts of despair, a gross, desperate longing after food, no matter what, no matter how, began to wake and spur him. Suppose he pawned his watch? But no, on Christmas-day - this was Christmas-day! - the pawnshop would be closed. Suppose he went to the public-house close by at Blackhall, and offered the watch, which was worth ten pounds, in payment for a meal ...
— Tales and Fantasies • Robert Louis Stevenson
... appear'd as if in haste To spur the steps of June; as if their shades Of various green were hindrances that stood Between them and their object: yet, meanwhile, There was such deep contentment ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth
... pieces of wood from the seats to throw at him. Insults and invectives were showered on the picadors, until at last one of them, stung by the filthy abuse of the mob, drove his spurs so deep into his horse that the animal reared a little; the picador then, with spur and knee, almost lifted him on to the long pointed horns of the bull, who, forced back against the hoarding, had lowered his head in anger as the blood streamed from the ...
— Five Nights • Victoria Cross
... brought themselves back, sir," replied Wilson with a smile. "It's a pleasure to command such a nervy crowd as that. You don't need to use the spur. I'm mostly busy putting on the brakes. It would have done your heart good if you could have seen the way they waded into the Huns. That fellow Sheldon particularly is a crackerjack when it comes to a scrap. He's as strong as an ox and as quick as ...
— Army Boys in the French Trenches • Homer Randall
... because of a sick woman's whim! If I had not let you go to Fontenoy, we might to-day have heard the rushing of a mightier river than the Rivanna yonder! Delay, delay, where haste itself should have felt the spur!" ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... single slip or false step and away one would go over the edge, to bring up, perhaps, on a rock a thousand feet below. I shall hook on the rope-ladder, and endeavour to make a start from yonder naked spur of rock." ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... for a minute or two later the Cato struck upon an outlying spur of the reef, not a cable-length away. Like the Porpoise, she at once fell over on her side, but with her deck facing the sweeping rollers, and each succeeding wave spun her round and round like a top and swept ...
— The Naval Pioneers of Australia • Louis Becke and Walter Jeffery
... the winding path down to the creek. Buck Mulligan stood on a stone, in shirtsleeves, his unclipped tie rippling over his shoulder. A young man clinging to a spur of rock near him, moved slowly frogwise his green legs in the deep jelly ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... The lofty spur of the Chiltern Hills which overhangs the church of Ellsborough is traditionally the site of ...
— Early Britain—Roman Britain • Edward Conybeare
... reluctantly that my sunrise evoked no merry jest at all." Dear Jones was an honest man, and would scorn to invent a merry jest on the spur of the moment. ...
— The Best Ghost Stories • Various
... not the greatest help and spur to commerce that property can be so readily conveyed and so well secured by a compte en banc, that is, by only writing one man's name for another's in ...
— The Querist • George Berkeley
... him by the two elbows behind, and he started like a horse that has never felt even the whip will do at the spur's touch. Almost at the same time my heart came leaping into my mouth, and if ever a woman nearly died of fright, I was that woman, for some one behind me put a hand on my shoulder and ...
— In Homespun • Edith Nesbit
... counter; but whatever good qualities he may have once possessed, he was evidently now one of the sorriest of jades—worth no more than the value of his own skin. Notwithstanding the repeated strokes of the spur, which his rider administered without stint, it was impossible to force him into anything more rapid than a shambling walk, and at this slow pace was he proceeding, evidently to the great chagrin ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid
... with every species of red pottery, from cups to immense water-jars, in great nets on the backs of horses, asses, men, and women. Beyond the railroad the trail picked its way, with several climbs over rocky spur-ends, along the marshy edge of the lake, which was so completely surrounded by mud and reeds that I had to leave unfulfilled my promised swim in it. The trip was made endless by the incessant chatter of the "doctor," who rattled on in English ...
— Tramping Through Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras - Being the Random Notes of an Incurable Vagabond • Harry A. Franck
... northwards, while Morano's heels kept his horse up close to his master's. Morano rode as though trained in the same school that some while later taught Macaulay's equestrian, who rode with "loose rein and bloody spur." Yet the miles went swiftly by as they galloped on soft white dust, which lifted and settled, some of it, back on the lazy road, while some of it was breathed by Morano. The gold coin on the green silk ...
— Don Rodriguez - Chronicles of Shadow Valley • Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, Baron, Dunsany
... whose courage would not respond to the spur of some huge burglar would die rather than be beaten by ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, April 8, 1914 • Various
... the north-bound passenger train that departed five minutes later. But at Webb, a few miles out, where it was flagged to take on a traveller, he abandoned that manner of escape. There were telegraph stations ahead; and the Kid looked askance at electricity and steam. Saddle and spur were his rocks ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... literature that warps the imagination and weakens the will should be placed on the tabooed list. In my case, however, the best literature failed to meet with any responses. Nothing was inclined to spur me into action. I did not care to read of great exploits; they gave me mental unrest. Once I read that a person by walking three hours a day would in seven years pass a space equivalent to the circumference of the globe. This thought staggered me and I believed there must be something wrong ...
— Confessions of a Neurasthenic • William Taylor Marrs
... the pendant crucifix. His frame was angular and above the ordinary height. His face was long and narrow, with a hawk-like nose, pointed chin, thin, straight lips, prominent cheek bones and deep-set grey eyes that glittered and chilled like those of a snake. He swept the others from helm to spur with a single glance, and Aymer saw his eyes fasten for an instant on the Ring ...
— Beatrix of Clare • John Reed Scott
... sedan-chair when we arrived at an imprint in the marble rock known as 'Martinsdruck.' The gigantic peaks of the Schreckhorn, the Eiger, the Kischhorn, rose around us, almost overwhelming us with their grandeur. To the right, the Mittelegi, a spur of the Eiger, elevated its bare and polished sides. Suddenly the songs ceased, and my travelling companions uttered those exclamations, familiar to Alpine populations, which re-echoed from rock to rock. They had caught sight of a hunter, gliding phantom-like along the steep ascent of the ...
— Celebrated Women Travellers of the Nineteenth Century • W. H. Davenport Adams
... Edict of the Sex The World-child The Heights On seeing 'The House of Julia' at Herculaneum A Prayer What is Right Living? Justice Time's Gaze The Worker and the Work Art thou Alive? To-day The Ladder Who is a Christian? The Goal The Spur Awakened! Shadows The New Commandment Summer Dreams The Breaking of Chains December 'The Way' The Leader to be The Greater Love Thank God for Life Time Enough New Year's Day Life is a Privilege In an Old Art Gallery True Brotherhood The Decadent Lord, speak again My Heaven Life God's Kin Conquest ...
— Poems of Progress • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... the Petit Bois and the Maedelsteed Spur, lying respectively to the west and the southwest of the ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... knowledge of God as Friend and Father; that we seek to bring him into a full, rich experience of spiritual union with the divine; that we desire to ground his life in personal purity and free it from sin; that we would spur him to a life crowned with deeds of self-sacrifice and Christlike service; that we would make out of him a true Christian. This is well and is a high ideal, but in the end it sums up the results of the religious knowledge, attitudes, and acts we have already set forth as our ...
— How to Teach Religion - Principles and Methods • George Herbert Betts
... spur of the moment, "I have no such qualities as you naturally seek in a secretary. I received my education at Eton and at Cambridge University. If you want a secretary to bowl you a straight ball, or pull a fairly strong oar, I am your man, for I learnt ...
— Dross • Henry Seton Merriman
... burning frontier, sleeps with his hand on his weapon, like an American lieutenant among the Sioux behind a western stockade. His dwelling is simply a camp and a refuge. Straw and heaps of leaves cover the pavement of the great hall, here he rests with his troopers, taking off a spur if he has a chance to sleep. The loopholes in the wall scarcely allow daylight to enter; the main thing is not to be shot with arrows. Every taste, every sentiment is subordinated to military service; there are certain ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... grasp, see connections that have escaped him, understand the force of arguments which he missed; and he will assume a more independent and critical attitude toward what he has heard than was possible on the spur of the moment, when he was driven on and could not stop and reflect. At home, in the quiet of his study, he can organize the material, see the parts of the discourse in their relations to each other, and re-create the whole as it lived ...
— College Teaching - Studies in Methods of Teaching in the College • Paul Klapper
... head, "and we can't walk by each other's consciences. But talking about seeing 'all the truth' makes me think of something. You know I was in the Berkshire Hills last summer? Well, I saw Greylock from several points of view. From one it seemed a rather sharp spur; from another it was long and obtuse; and from the last,—when somebody pointed out an ordinary, featureless ascent and said: 'That's Greylock,' I could scarcely believe it. I imagine our views of the truth are somewhat like that. It will take time to walk all around ...
— The First Soprano • Mary Hitchcock
... so directly to the core of the matter, divesting a question always of all superfluous details, and with such an air of finality, that I seemed to find myself struggling in deep water, with no footing under me. Value of life? How could I answer the question on the spur of the moment? The sacredness of life I had accepted as axiomatic. That it was intrinsically valuable was a truism I had never questioned. But when he challenged the truism ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... think a woman says what I have said on the spur of the moment? Do you think I merely happened to see you to-day, merely happened to say what I've said? You know better. This has been coming for months. I fought it hard at first; with convention, with your idea of right and wrong. Now I laugh at them ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge
... shown to the enemy, the artillery to be put in position loaded with shell, spiked and wheels cut down. The detachment of the Seventh being the rear guard was ordered to remain in position one hour after the column moved, which movement was made to the left and around a spur of the mountain out of sight, striking the valley again, five miles further down at Childer's Gap, finding one regiment of the enemy's cavalry, which made a hasty retreat down the valley after receiving one volley from the First Tennessee ...
— History of the Seventh Ohio Volunteer Cavalry • R. C. Rankin
... life came knocking at the door, he welcomed it. For when morning broke on the 12th of April, 1861, and the first guns of the Civil War roared upon Sumter, Grant marched to the front, and soon became a brigadier-general "The spur of disappointed hopes, the fire of his ambition, and the iron will that lay back of many of his failures—all the qualities latent in the man of coming greatness, sprang ...
— A Fleece of Gold - Five Lessons from the Fable of Jason and the Golden Fleece • Charles Stewart Given
... poor must study hard so that they may become rich. They become doctors, functionaries, officers. I shall be a 'tinkler.' A sword at my side, spur on my boots. Cling, cling! And what are you ...
— Foma Gordyeff - (The Man Who Was Afraid) • Maxim Gorky
... father's dissoluteness and of an ancient quarrel between him and yours, to bleat of my trumped-up course of piracy and my own ways of life as a just cause why I may not wed your sister whilst the real consideration in your mind, the real spur to your hostility is not more than the matter of some few paltry pounds a year that I hinder you from pocketing. A God's name ...
— The Sea-Hawk • Raphael Sabatini
... summoned to his banner. If he was forced to give battle, he resolved to give it on ground he had himself chosen, and advancing near enough to the coast to check William's ravages he entrenched himself on a hill known afterwards as that of Senlac, a low spur of the Sussex downs near Hastings. His position covered London and drove William to concentrate his forces. With a host subsisting by pillage, to concentrate is to starve; and no alternative was left to the Duke but a decisive victory ...
— History of the English People, Volume I (of 8) - Early England, 449-1071; Foreign Kings, 1071-1204; The Charter, 1204-1216 • John Richard Green
... were only two places where he could go—his grandfather's in Park Lane, and Timothy's in the Bayswater Road. Which was the less deplorable? At his grandfather's he would probably get a better dinner on the spur of the moment. At Timothy's they gave you a jolly good feed when they expected you, not otherwise. He decided on Park Lane, not unmoved by the thought that to go up to Oxford without affording his grandfather a chance to tip him was hardly ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... ridge from Samaria through Nablus, Jerusalem, Bethlehem and Hebron to Beersheba. Communications from east to west are, however, more easy along the spurs and intervening valleys. To attempt an advance northwards, from spur to spur, is tedious work; after a comparatively short push a pause is necessary to enable roads to be constructed for bringing forward guns and supplies. We had an illustration of this in March, 1918, when a forward move of this character met at first ...
— With the British Army in The Holy Land • Henry Osmond Lock
... and masses of quartz and small ranges composed of shining slabs of a grey, tough and wavy stone with masses of quartz. A good deal of spinifex but no scrub to interrupt us. Will make for a distant low spur of main range tomorrow in ...
— McKinlay's Journal of Exploration in the Interior of Australia • John McKinlay
... my recreant muse—sometimes apt to refuse The guidance of bit and of bridle— Still blankly demur, spite of whip and spur, Unimpassioned, inconstant, or idle; Only let me puff, puff, till the brain cries, "Enough!" Such excitement is all I'm in lack o', And the poetic vein soon to fancy gives rein, Inspired ...
— Pipe and Pouch - The Smoker's Own Book of Poetry • Various
... only friend," said Maudelain, "I may not comprehend, but I know that by no unhallowed art have you won back to me." Hair by hair he scattered upon the floor that which he held. "Time is! and I have not need of any token to spur my memory." He prized up a corner of the hearthstone, took out a small leather bag, and that day purchased a horse ...
— Chivalry • James Branch Cabell
... that rests with the spur on his heel, As the guardsman that sleeps in his corselet of steel, As the archer that stands with his shaft on the string, He stoops from his toil to the garland ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... mechanical career, and yet having attained some distinction by it he could not forego this work which raised him, in a way, to a position of dominance over these people. Now the sight of presumably so efficient a person in need of aid or exercise, to be built up, was all that was required to spur him on to the most waspish or wolfish attitude imaginable. In part at least he argued, I think (for in the last analysis he was really too wise and experienced to take any such petty view, although there is a subconscious "past-lack" motivating ...
— Twelve Men • Theodore Dreiser
... to take a motherly interest in the charming Violet, and whose honest frankness had appealed to him from the first, appeared to be the good genius of the little company. As he came to know her better during the next few days, under the sharp spur of adversity, he realised more and more how much goodness and strength of character lay hidden under the rough exterior and the sharp tongue, and his liking changed into an honest admiration. Mr. Smith was ponderous and ...
— His Lordship's Leopard - A Truthful Narration of Some Impossible Facts • David Dwight Wells
... spears and moony spokes Gleam from the rocks and lighten through the oaks— A sea of splendour! How the chariots rolled On wheels of blinding brightness manifold! While stumbling over spike and spine and spur Of sultry lands, escaped the son of Ner With smitten men. At this the front of Saul Grew darker than a blasted tower wall; And seeing how there crouched upon his right, Aghast with fear, a black Amalekite, He called, and said: "I pray thee, man of pain, Red from the scourge, and recent from the ...
— The Poems of Henry Kendall • Henry Kendall
... to the left, leading along a narrow outstanding spur of table-land to a summer-house, the prospect from which is among the noted beauties of Brockhurst. This summer-house or Temple, as it has come to be called, is an octagonal structure. Round-shafted pillars rise at each projecting angle. In the recesses ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... life he had had a horror of definite appointments. An invitation to tea a week ahead had been enough to poison life for him. He was one of those young men whose souls revolt at the thought of planning out any definite step. He could do things on the spur of the moment, but plans ...
— A Man of Means • P. G. Wodehouse and C. H. Bovill
... mine—a wooing that precluded the possibility of winning, and yet a wooing that had won. Aye, it had won; but it might not take. I made fine distinctions and quaint paradoxes as I tugged at my oars, for the human mind is a curiously complex thing, and with some of us there is no such spur to humour as the ...
— Bardelys the Magnificent • Rafael Sabatini
... by the same principles as himself, will be bound by the sacred and priceless law of mutual support. Accordingly, both he and all his fellows fix their minds on acting with zeal and judgment upon the spur of the moment, and with the certainty that they will not be deserted. Experience shows, on the contrary, that a Frenchman or a Spaniard, working under a system which leans to formality and strict order being maintained in battle, has ...
— Fighting Instructions, 1530-1816 - Publications Of The Navy Records Society Vol. XXIX. • Julian S. Corbett
... had reached a lower spur of that range on which were located both the sawmill and Plant's summer quarters. He drew a deep breath and looked about him over the topography spread below. Then he examined with an expert's eye the wooded growths. His glance fell ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White
... the whole of her life. The palace seemed a different place to her, now that it contained the doll that had come from Fairyland; and she immediately named her the Lady Emmelina, which was the most important name she could remember on the spur of the moment. From that day the Princess and her doll were never separated. When the Prince and Princess went for a drive, the Lady Emmelina sat up stiffly between them; when the Professors came to give the children their lessons, they found that they had to give them also to a little lady in a ...
— All the Way to Fairyland - Fairy Stories • Evelyn Sharp
... historical representations in one of his principal palaces; Hercules I. kept the anniversary of his accession to the throne by a splendid procession, which was compared to the festival of Corpus Christi; an Order, which had nothing in common with medieval chivalry, called the Order of the Golden Spur, was instituted by his court, and conferred upon those who reflected lustre by their deeds or their literary gifts upon the house of Este; while, to crown all, we read at this day on the tower of the cathedral ...
— Roman Mosaics - Or, Studies in Rome and Its Neighbourhood • Hugh Macmillan
... of the desert, and his words were a spur to her quick pride. She rose at once, her bosom rising and falling fast. She would ...
— Oh, You Tex! • William Macleod Raine
... concerned. The private car owners and the owners of industrial railroads are entitled to a fair and reasonable compensation on their investment, but neither private cars nor industrial railroads nor spur tracks should be utilized as devices for securing preferential rates. A rebate in icing charges, or in mileage, or in a division of the rate for refrigerating charges is just as pernicious as a rebate in any other way. No lower rate should apply on goods imported ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... diligently; urged on by a three or four-fold motive; for the love of them, and for her own sake, that John might think she had done well that she might presently please and satisfy Alice above all, that her mother's wishes might be answered. This thought, whenever it came, was a spur to her efforts so was each of the others; and Christian feeling added another, and kept all the rest in force. Without this, indolence might have weakened, or temptation surprised her resolution; little ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... after weaving, contributed greatly to enrich Gaul. Undoubtedly even before the Roman conquest, Gaul worked gold mines; it seems, however, that silver mines remained untouched until about the time of Augustus. At any rate, the discovery of some deposits of gold and silver then gave a spur to several flourishing industries; jewelry-making, and—an original Gallic industry of much importance—silver-plating and tinning. Here is another extract from Pliny, from which you will see that in those times they already made in ...
— Characters and events of Roman History • Guglielmo Ferrero
... built on a long series of separate plans or "stunts,'' each of which was begun and executed in a burst of creative enthusiasm. His first few months' achievement as sales manager was due to the same stimulus, but as the months went by the spur of novelty became dulled. Lacking the discipline which would have enabled him to force voluntary attention and the resulting interest in his tasks, he failed also to trace the cause of his flagging invention ...
— Increasing Efficiency In Business • Walter Dill Scott
... Umzinyati River; thence down the course of the Buffalo River to the junction with it of the Blood River; thence up the course of the Blood River to the junction with it of Lyn Spruit or Dudusi; thence up the Dudusi to its source; thence 80 yards to Bea. I., situated on a spur of the N'Qaba-Ka-hawana Mountains; thence 80 yards to the N'Sonto River; thence down the N'Sonto River to its junction with the White Umvulozi River; thence up the White Umvulozi River to a white rock where it rises; thence 800 yards to Kambula ...
— A Century of Wrong • F. W. Reitz
... twenty others. Twelve of these were accoutred with war saddles, and frontlets of proof, being intended for the use of as many cavaliers, or troopers, retainers of the family of Arnheim, whom the seneschal's exertions had been able to collect on the spur of the occasion. Two palfreys, somewhat distinguished by their trappings, were designed for Anne of Geierstein and her favourite female attendant. The other menials, chiefly boys and women servants, had inferior horses. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 373, Supplementary Number • Various
... less than five hundred militia and friendly Maoris, the Governor sat down before the fort, which rose on a high, steep kind of plateau, above a small river. But though too strong for front attack, it was itself liable to be commanded from an outwork on a yet higher spur of the hills. Bringing common sense to bear, Grey quietly despatched a party, which captured this, and with it a strong reinforcement about to join the garrison. The latter fled, and the bloodless capture of Weraroa was justly regarded as among the most brilliant ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves
... outgrown. Hence the older part of all these river towns, from Bremen to Koenigsberg, rests upon hills, while in every case the newer and lower part is built on piles or artificially raised ground on the alluvium.[412] So Utrecht, the Ultrajectum of the Romans, selected for its site a long raised spur running out from the solid ground of older and higher land into the water-soaked alluvium of the Netherlands. It was the most important town of all this region before the arts of civilization began the conquest by dike and ditch of the amphibian coastal belt which now comprises one-fourth ...
— Influences of Geographic Environment - On the Basis of Ratzel's System of Anthropo-Geography • Ellen Churchill Semple
... baits, be not sufficient, there be many others, which will of themselves intend this passion of burning lust, amongst which, dancing is none of the least; and it is an engine of such force, I may not omit it. Incitamentum libidinis, Petrarch calls it, the spur of lust. "A [5141] circle of which the devil himself is the centre. [5142]Many women that use it, have come dishonest home, most indifferent, none better." [5143] Another terms it "the companion of all filthy delights and enticements, and 'tis not easily told what inconveniences come by it, ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... Sawyers found themselves possessed of a large and lively family, all methods of discipline, whether sanctioned by long custom or invented on the spur of the moment, through the extreme urgency of the ...
— Treasure Valley • Marian Keith
... back the curtains That surround each other's lives, See the naked heart and spirit, Know what spur the action gives, Often we should find it better, Purer than we judged we should, We should love each other ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... as my uncle the Cardinal gave it to me,' Don Alberto answered with assurance, though he had invented the commission on the spur of the moment, quite sure that he could easily make it a genuine order, though it would never be executed if his own plans for carrying off Ortensia on Saint ...
— Stradella • F(rancis) Marion Crawford
... One just happens to have the knack of keeping one's head and acting quickly on the spur of the moment. Some people ...
— The Girl on the Boat • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... treated as I treated Simpkins this afternoon without feeling a little sorry for him. I bumped his head in the most frightful manner when I was dragging him down. No; I think it's all right now as far as Miss King is concerned. I'll go in and see Simpkins to-morrow and spur him on a ...
— The Simpkins Plot • George A. Birmingham
... stream down the middle. Then we left the river, and rode along the high bank flanking the valley. All paved roads had ended at Tengyueh, and the track was deeply cut and jagged by the rains. At one point in to-day's journey the road led up an almost vertical ascent to a narrow ledge or spur at the summit, and then fell as steeply into the plain again. It was a short-cut, that, as you would expect in China, required five times more physical effort to compass than did the longer but level road which it was intended to save. So ...
— An Australian in China - Being the Narrative of a Quiet Journey Across China to Burma • George Ernest Morrison
... Spooner Shubab Spooner William Spooner Jonathan Sprague Simon Sprague Philip Spratt Charles Spring Richard Springer John Spriggs Joshua Spriggs Thomas Spriggs William Springer Alexander Sproat Thomas Sproat Gideon Spry Long Sprywood Nathaniel Spur Joshua Squibb David Squire John St. Clair Francisco St. Domingo John St. Thomas John Staagers Thomas Stacy Thomas Stacey Christian Stafford Conrad Stagger Edward Stagger Samuel Stalkweather John Standard Lemuel Standard Butler Stanford Richard Stanford ...
— American Prisoners of the Revolution • Danske Dandridge
... the 3rd regiment, and two hundred men of the 2nd irregular cavalry, who, with Lieutenant Swinton, had volunteered to serve on foot, were to advance upon another face of the ridge, from the little village of Chulbarah, where they had been posted; this party, ascending a spur of the hill on its left, was to co-operate opportunely with the advance of the other detachments. Major Fisher, at the head of a body of regular native infantry and irregular cavalry, with guns mounted upon elephants, were in support, and to ascend (the cavalry, of course, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan |
