"Whipcord" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... — N. filament, line; fiber, fibril; funicle^, vein; hair, capillament^, cilium, cilia, pilus, pili; tendril, gossamer; hair stroke; veinlet^, venula^, venule^. wire, string, thread, packthread, cotton, sewing silk, twine, twist, whipcord, tape, ribbon, cord, rope, yarn, hemp, oakum, jute. strip, shred, slip, spill, list, band, fillet, fascia, ribbon, riband, roll, lath, splinter, shiver, shaving. beard &c (roughness) 256; ramification; strand. Adj. filamentous, filamentiferous^, filaceous^, filiform^; fibrous, fibrillous^; thread-like, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... bug" were the sole words which escaped his lips during the journey. For my own part, I had charge of a couple of dark lanterns, while Legrand contented himself with the scarabaeus, which he carried attached to the end of a bit of whipcord, twirling it to and fro, with the air of a conjurer, as he went. When I observed this last plain evidence of my friend's aberration of mind, I could scarcely refrain from tears. I thought it best, however, to humor his fancy, at least for the present, or until I could adopt some ...
— Short-Stories • Various
... he rather resembled an antique and dilapidated baboon; his face was wrinkled like a dried nut and his quick little eyes were bloodshot. I never knew what his age was, any more than he did himself, but the years had left him tough as whipcord and absolutely untiring. Lastly he was perhaps the best hand at following a spoor that ever I knew and up to a hundred and fifty yards or so, a very deadly shot with a rifle especially when he used a little single-barrelled, muzzle-loading gun of mine made by Purdey which he named Intombi ...
— She and Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... great sponge from the locker, he sopped up and squeezed till the bottom of the boat was quite clear of water, and by this time, close down by the keel, Max had seen an ordinary wine-cork, with a piece of whipcord attached to it, stuck upright in the hole used for draining the boat when ...
— Three Boys - or the Chiefs of the Clan Mackhai • George Manville Fenn
... as whipcord. "Keep down!—keep down!" I bent almost double and walked fast at the same time. My mind turned to September 1916, when I walked along Pozieres Ridge, just before the Courcellette fight, and was ...
— Pushed and the Return Push • George Herbert Fosdike Nichols, (AKA Quex)
... crossbow amid the breathless silence of the crowded audience consisting of seven boys and three girls, exclusive of Kitty Collins, who insisted on paying her way in with a clothes-pin. I raised the cross-bow, I repeat. Twang! went the whipcord; but, alas! instead of hitting the apple, the arrow flew right into Pepper Whitcomb's mouth, which happened to be open at the time, and ...
— The Story of a Bad Boy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... manufacture of which is very curious. The twine of which they are made, appears to be composed of the fibres of the flax plant, with very little preparation; it is very strong, heavy, and so admirably well twisted as to have the appearance of the best whipcord. Governor Phillip mentions having had lines of their manufacture, which were made from the fur of some animal, and others that appeared to be of cotton. The meshes of their nets are formed of large loops, very artificially inserted ...
— The Voyage Of Governor Phillip To Botany Bay • Arthur Phillip
... connection with this, it may be mentioned that when the practice of pressing to death had become nearly extinct, prisoners who declined to plead were tortured, in order to compel them to do so, by twisting and screwing their thumbs with whipcord. ...
— Bygone Punishments • William Andrews
... I rode in grey whipcord breeches, tan boots, a blue serge coat, white stock, and never a hat or cap till the snow blew. I used to laugh when the peasants asked leave to lend me a cap or to run back and find the one ...
— The Princess Elopes • Harold MacGrath
... was unused to oaths at that time and they cut me like whipcord, but all the same my pulse ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... silent. Yet, when at his ease with an equal, he could readily assume a less quarter-deck style, and he had a fund of little, dry stories of the world and its ways which were of interest from one who had seen so many phases of life. Dry and spare, as lean as a jockey and as tough as whipcord, he might be seen any day swinging his silver-headed Malacca cane, and pacing along the suburban roads with the same measured gait with which he had been wont to tread the poop of his flagship. He wore a good service stripe upon his ...
— Beyond the City • Arthur Conan Doyle
... even a buckle, or an inch of whipcord; and if, some years hence a petrified whipple tree, or the skeleton of a coachman, should be turned up, they will be hung up side by side with rusty armour and the geological gleanings of ...
— Hints on Driving • C. S. Ward
... legs free play in walking, were brown, grizzled, sturdy travellers. They had walked a hundred leagues together from the hot plains of Syria, through the snow-swept passes of the Taurus mountains, and over the sun-scorched levels of the high plateau.[5] Their muscles were as tireless as whipcord. Their courage had not quailed before robber or blizzard, the night yells of the hyena or the stones ...
— The Book of Missionary Heroes • Basil Mathews
... to Torpenhow, 'and this gray oaf dares to be a thief! I have seen an Esneh camel-driver have the black hide taken off his body in strips for stealing half a pound of wet dates, and he was as tough as whipcord. This things' ...
— The Light That Failed • Rudyard Kipling
... eyes and a limp lower jaw that leaves his mouth half open all the time; and his costume looks like it had been made up from back door contributions,—a faded coat three sizes too small, a forty fat vest, and a pair of shiny black whipcord pants that someone had been married ...
— Odd Numbers - Being Further Chronicles of Shorty McCabe • Sewell Ford
... exactly alike, both of them well tied up with good whipcord. Ben took his parcel to the table, and began to examine the knot, ...
— McGuffey's Fourth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... basins, or where a ledge of resisting rock made a wet-season water fall. Such places had to be discreetly scaled, for the rock was worn to polished smoothness and hand and foot holds were few and far between. Aerial roots, thin as whipcord, hung from the branches of trees crowding on the brink of the ravine, and with tasselled terminals sopped up moisture. A melancholy, humming monotone pervaded the ravine, seeming to increase in remonstrance and warning the higher I ascended. Wylo ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... closed the door, and crossed to the stairs. There he stopped. From his pouch he had drawn a fine length of whipcord, attached at one end to a tiny bodkin of needle sharpness. That bodkin he drove into the edge of one of the panels of the wainscot, in line with the topmost step; drawing the cord taut at a height of a ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini
... when we alighted. Do not imagine that it was at the door of her old house. It was in a wide street opening on a splendid square, and pillars were before the houses, and inside there was the enchantment of a little fountain playing thin as whipcord, among ferns, in a rock-basin under a window that glowed with kings of England, copied from boys' history books. All the servants were drawn up in the hall to do homage to me. They seemed less real and living than the wonder of the sweet-smelling chairs, the birds, and the elegant dogs. Richest ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... horizontal bands which are so common among the Fuegians. Their chief pride consists in having everything made of silver; I have seen a cacique with his spurs, stirrups, handle of his knife, and bridle made of this metal: the head-stall and reins being of wire, were not thicker than whipcord; and to see a fiery steed wheeling about under the command of so light a chain, gave to the horsemanship a ...
— The Voyage of the Beagle • Charles Darwin
... and dog, were all the living things I saw. The ground was iron, the colour of what had once been herbage a glaring brown. Of the flowers none but the hardiest had outlived the visitation of the sun. I saw rest-harrow which has a root like whipcord, and the flat thistle which thrives in dust. The harebells floated no more, the discs of the scabious were shrivelled husks; ladies' bedstraw was straw indeed, but not for ladies' uses. Three miles away from anywhere we came ...
— In a Green Shade - A Country Commentary • Maurice Hewlett
... up, on which there were seated astraddle the whole hundred of the baronet's musqueteers, each engaged in plaiting into a queue the hair of the man who sat in front of him. A boy walked up and down with a pot of grease, by the aid of which with some whipcord the work was going forward merrily. Sir Gervas himself with a great flour dredger sat perched upon a bale of wool at the head of the line, and as quickly as any queue was finished he examined it through his quizzing glass, and if it found favour in his eyes, daintily ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... describe all the clever tricks he performed. He put a ring into a handkerchief, and it disappeared. He passed an awl through a piece of wood and Placolett's nose, and then put a piece of whipcord through the hole, working it backwards and forwards, to the dwarfs evident agony; and then he produced a funnel, which he held at a boy's elbow, and by pumping away with the other arm, at last a stream of wine flowed out. ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... last jump rose before us, and they faced it game as ever — We were both at spur and whipcord, fetching blood at every bound — And above the people's cheering and the cries of 'Ace' and 'Quiver', I could hear the trainer shouting, 'One more run for Snowy River.' Then we struck the jump together and came smashing to ...
— The Man from Snowy River • Andrew Barton 'Banjo' Paterson
... understanding with Joe, but the major hadn't the knack of cordiality, and nobody felt too much at ease with him. Besides, Joe was wearing a uniform for the first time this morning. There were only eight such uniforms in the world, so far. It was black whipcord, with an Eisenhower jacket, narrow silver braid on the collar and cuffs, and a silver rocket for a badge where a plane pilot wears his wings. It was strictly practical. Against accidental catchings in machinery, ...
— Space Tug • Murray Leinster
... sailor, whose muscles were like whipcord, shook his head and fairly made the yawl spring beneath his ...
— Ralph Granger's Fortunes • William Perry Brown
... are soundly built, stranger; you are made of iron and whipcord, finely formed, quick and alert." He threw a word to one of his heavy-faced attendants, then suddenly stood up and descended from his throne. He came ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... hour-and-half ago," grumbles responsive the drowsy Porter.—"C'est bien." Yes, it is well;—though had not such hour-and half been lost, it were still better. Forth therefore, O Fersen, fast, by the Barrier de Clichy; then Eastward along the Outward Boulevard, what horses and whipcord can do! ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... anybody else in the world. When he grows up I shall keep his house, and we shall always live together. I can tell him everything he doesn't know. But I think Tom's clever, for all he doesn't like books; he makes beautiful whipcord and rabbit-pens." ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... with powdered wig and slouched hat), I should say, that, although he certainly would not in any case have suffered the coachman to proceed while the horse was unfit for service, and likely to suffer by being urged forward, yet the man of whipcord escaped some severe abuse and reproach by the agreeable mode which the traveller found out to pass ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... on Hill, So wo iz me begon, trolly lo Over a Whinny Meg, Hey ding a ding, Bony lass upon a green, My bony on gave me a bek, By a bank az I lay; and two more he hath fair wrapt up in parchment, and bound with a whipcord!" It is no wonder that Ritson, in the historical essay prefixed to his collection of Scottish Songs, should speak of some of these ballads with a zest as if he would have sacrificed half his library to untie the said ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... himself was, about being able to make the return trip in safety. The horses were tired; so, too, were the men who had broken the heavy trail for so many miles, with the exception of Sam himself, who seemed built of whipcord and elastic. They would be greatly encumbered by the woman, for she would certainly give out during the journey. The one point in their favor was that they could follow a trail which had already ...
— Ridgway of Montana - (Story of To-Day, in Which the Hero Is Also the Villain) • William MacLeod Raine
... stated in our previous account, Oscar had no particular history. He had simply graduated to the detective force, and had made a great success; and as also stated, he was a young man of singularly effeminate appearance, with muscles like a whipcord and powers of endurance that were seemingly tireless. He was not only a great athlete but a wonderful boxer, and it was a favorite role with him to assume the character of a dude, and many a surprise he had given to various smart Alecs during his career on the force, and with the surprise ...
— Cad Metti, The Female Detective Strategist - Dudie Dunne Again in the Field • Harlan Page Halsey
... usual lot," said Doubleday, with the air of a man who gives "feeds" every day of his life. "The two Wickhams, and Joe Whipcord, and the Field-Marshal, and an Irish fellow who is lodging with him. We ought to have ...
— My Friend Smith - A Story of School and City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... winners. I put my money on them. Nothing on earth can stop those fellows, native-born Americans, all grit and get-up. See that tall one smoking a cigar and looking at the women? He's an athlete. Name's Mervin; all whipcord and whalebone; springy as a bent bow. He's a type of the Swift. He's bound to get there. See the other. Hewson's his name; solid as a tower; muscled like a bear; built from the ground up. He represents the Strong. Look at the grim, determined face of him. You can't down ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... us. Life isn't half long enough, and we're going to talk faster and more crisply, do more and know more, and dwell less on any subject than you can possibly imagine. We are "the best"—made of wire and whipcord.' And Val was unconsciously forming himself on a set whose motto was: 'We defy you to interest or excite us. We have had every sensation, or if we haven't, we pretend we have. We are so exhausted with living that no hours ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... took the chair which Ayscough drew forward and sat down, throwing open his heavy overcoat, and revealing a whipcord riding-suit ...
— The Orange-Yellow Diamond • J. S. Fletcher
... fairly well and sign his name. This man, who is still young, began life as carter's lad, in which occupation he had not been long engaged before the horse-hair carefully accumulated as a perquisite disappeared. Whipcord and similar small articles next vanished, and finally a handsome new whip. This last, not being so easily disposed of, was traced to his possession and procured him a sound thrashing. Some short time afterwards a carthorse was found in the fields stabbed in several places, though, fortunately, ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... another matter, which only a Turk can understand. These fellows believe in the knife or a piece of whipcord as ending unpleasant difficulties most effectually. You see they were not ordinary rogues. They pretended to be conspirators actuated by pure political motives—motives which a common servant like Hussein could not really be expected ...
— The Albert Gate Mystery - Being Further Adventures of Reginald Brett, Barrister Detective • Louis Tracy
... harvest-homes half-a-century ago; and slowly spells over the service in a prayer-book which asks blessings upon a king instead of a queen. She often keeps the village "confectioner's" shop—i.e., a few bottles of sweets and jumbles in the window, side by side with "twists" of whipcord for the ploughboys and carters, and perhaps has a license for tobacco ...
— The Toilers of the Field • Richard Jefferies
... Woolsey, Melrose, Melton, Meltonette, Merino, Mohair Brilliantine, Montagnac, Orleans, Panama Cloth, Prunella, Sacking, Sanglier, Sebastopol, Serge, Shoddy, Sicilian, Sultane, Tamise, Tartans, Thibet, Tricot, Tweed, Veiling, Venetian, Vigogne (Vicuna), Vigoureux, Voiles, Whipcord, Worsted Diagonals, ...
— Textiles • William H. Dooley
... a weak-eyed boy with a chronic headache, had a deal of whipcord fiber in his make-up. He stood the test and grubbed at his books every night until the clock tolled twelve. He was born at a peculiar time, being a child of the Reformation married to the Renaissance. ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... back in his chair with his hands bound to his sides. Round his head the two strangers had strung a piece of knotted whipcord which one of them was drawing tighter and tighter with the aid of a penknife twisted in the bandage. The face of the victim was ghastly white, his eyes rolled, and the great beads poured down his cheeks. Berrington ...
— The Slave of Silence • Fred M. White
... where some stones gave him purchase, dug the toes of his boots into the wet soil and stuck like a limpet. It needed some strength to keep the position for long, but the muscles of his arms and legs were like whipcord. ...
— Greenmantle • John Buchan
... interior of two or three of the cells deepened this impression. In each was a small wooden bedstead about a foot and a half high, with nothing upon it but a very thin paillasse, a black blanket (the colour of the wool), and a little bolster. Upon a nail hung a small cat-o'-nine-tails of knotted whipcord. ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... Fancy stitches and cunning invention which provided for thrice the usual number of cartridges told one tale; flannel paddings which sought to make of the military appointment a winter garment told another. The Boers, I suppose, envied us our serge and whipcord, but to examine their homely makeshifts was to realise that even the art of Stohwasser may leave something to be desired. Although they eyed us diligently they had now fallen strangely silent; they offered us little ...
— The Relief of Mafeking • Filson Young
... one who counts himself the broadest of English churchmen. Truly Gibbie got no fat out of his food, but he got what was far better. What he carried—I can hardly say under or in, but along with those rags of his, was all muscle—small, but hard, and healthy, and knotting up like whipcord. There are all degrees of health in poverty as well as in riches, and Gibbie's health was splendid. His senses also were marvellously acute. I have already hinted at his gift for finding things. His eyes were sharp, quick, and roving, and then they went near ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald
... an unco kippage,' said Mrs. Flockhart to Evan as he descended; 'I wish he may be weel,—the very veins on his brent brow are swelled like whipcord; wad he no ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... to nineteen months, working harder than any people in the parish, and enjoying themselves more. I would match them for labour and laughter against any family in England. She is a blithe, jolly dame, whose beauty has amplified into comeliness; he is tall, and thin, and bony, with sinews like whipcord, a strong lively voice, a sharp weather-beaten face, and eyes and lips that smile and brighten when he speaks into a most contagious hilarity. They are very poor, and I often wish them richer; but I don't know—perhaps it might ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford
... his body, but he gave a jerk of his will-power which brought the veins out like whipcord upon his forehead, and drove the nails deep into the ...
— Leonie of the Jungle • Joan Conquest
... "mop" is derived from an old custom which ordained that the maid-servants who came to find situations should bring their badge of office with them to the fair. They came with their brooms and mops, just as a carter would tie a piece of whipcord to his coat, and a shepherd's hat would be decorated with a tuft of wool. Time was when the labouring man was never happy unless he changed his abode from year to year. He would get tired of one master and one village, and be off to Cirencester ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs
... backstair intrigue with a shameless aristocracy! All that kind of villainy has been wiped out; and the men of the Royal Navy are now treated like human beings; and they do their work not a whit less courageously and well than they did when it was customary to lash God's creatures with strands of whipcord loaded with lead until the blood oozed from their skins. There is no need to press either men or boys to enter the King's Naval Service. It has now been made sufficiently attractive to obviate the need for that. Nor is there any necessity ...
— Windjammers and Sea Tramps • Walter Runciman
... shown, proceed to live up to them in every particular. From start to finish it is the virtuous Ben—his generosity, thrift, and foresight are never allowed to lapse for an instant—who triumphs in every episode. He saves his string, "good whipcord," when requested by Mr. Gresham to untie a parcel, and it thereafter serves to spin a fine new top, to help Hal out of a difficulty with his toy, and in the final incident of the story, an archery contest, our provident hero, finding his bowstring ...
— Forgotten Books of the American Nursery - A History of the Development of the American Story-Book • Rosalie V. Halsey
... by a gentleman of that country, brought up to London, and tried before a Court of Admiralty, in May, 1725. When the first indictment was read, Gow obstinately refused to plead, for which the Court ordered his thumbs to be tied together with whipcord. The punishment was several times repeated by the executioner and another officer, they drawing the cord every time till it broke. But he still being stubborn, refusing to submit to the court, the sentence was pronounced against him, which the law appoints in such cases; ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms
... finding the hedges close in upon the road, boldly took his beasts along the neglected parterres until at last he reached the stables. Here, near the open door he saw Malsain, tall and thin, but muscular and strong as whipcord, sitting down by the light of a guttering candle to a meagre repast of bread and cheese, washed down with water—for Malsain ...
— Orrain - A Romance • S. Levett-Yeats
... hand, was a man of singular temperament. He was good-looking and more intelligent than any native I had ever before seen. His habit was spare, but his muscles were firm, and his sinews like whipcord He must indeed have had great confidence in his own powers to have undertaken a journey of more than 200 miles from his own home. He was very taciturn, and would rather remain at the officers' fire ...
— Expedition into Central Australia • Charles Sturt
... carefully, compactly, and quickly, like a man accustomed to do all sorts of strange things, he tied the handkerchief full of stones to the whipcord that bound the brown-paper parcel, and dropped ...
— Henry Dunbar - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... written by a woman who mothered an intellectual child of cormorant appetite. That child learned everything in sight from fairies to grease-traps. What was difficult to manage in that mass of whipcord mental fibre, was put into verse and sung. The book told how the child was nourished on all things that only specialists among men cared to litter their minds with. Then there was a supplement of additional assimilations, and how to ...
— Child and Country - A Book of the Younger Generation • Will Levington Comfort
... of Government not many years ago, an officer of the Royal Household was chatting with one of the Queen's old coachmen (whose name and location I, for obvious reasons, forbear to indicate). "Well, Whipcord, have you seen your new Master of the Horse yet?" "Yes, sir, I have; and I should say that his lordship is more of an indoors man." The phrase has a touch of genial contempt for a long-descended but effete aristocracy which tickles the democratic palate. ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell
... the town, he had found in the wilderness—an acquaintance. It was one Arbuthnot, an Australian colonel of artillery who, through the chances of war, had rendered his battalion great service. A keen, sparely built man made of leather and whipcord, with the Australian's shrewd ...
— The Mountebank • William J. Locke
... cartridge about three times the size of those they used in the rock. Jim Bently said it was big enough to blow the bottom out of the river. The inner skin was of stout calico; Andy stuck the end of a six-foot piece of fuse well down in the powder and bound the mouth of the bag firmly to it with whipcord. The idea was to sink the cartridge in the water with the open end of the fuse attached to a float on the surface, ready for lighting. Andy dipped the cartridge in melted bees'-wax to make it water-tight. 'We'll have to leave it some time before we light it,' said Dave, 'to ...
— Joe Wilson and His Mates • Henry Lawson
... than mauve, and, rarely, pure white. Generally the plant depends upon others or cracks or crevices in rock for foothold. It shares the grasp the spongy moss may take on the slippery surface, or when the root, thin as whipcord, of a certain fig-tree has crept across the face of the grey rock forming a ridge or barricade against which decayed vegetation accumulates, there the BAEA flourishes, displaying an indeterminate line ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... school readers of an earlier day. With all their faults they at least did not overlook the value of standard realistic stories. In these readers was found the very moral story of the boy who won the day because of his forethought in providing an extra piece of whipcord. There was also "Meddlesome Matty," and the honest office-boy, the heroic lad of Holland, and the story of the newly liberated prisoner who bought a cage full of captive birds and set them free. These and many others still persist ...
— All About Johnnie Jones • Carolyn Verhoeff
... did not wish to disturb the plots and counterplots that he was confident were forming in Clay's brain, and his devotion would have been severely tried had he known that his hero's mind was filled with a picture of a young girl in a blue shirt-waist and a whipcord riding-skirt. ...
— Soldiers of Fortune • Richard Harding Davis
... which they woold or cue round with the rind of a slender plant, down to about an inch of the ends; and, as the hair grows, the woolding is continued. Each of these cues or locks is somewhat thicker than common whipcord; and they look like a parcel of small strings hanging down from the crown of their heads. Their beards, which are strong and bushy, are generally short. The women do not wear their hair so, but cropped; nor do the boys, till they approach manhood. Some few men, women, ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World Volume 2 • James Cook
... particularly distinguished himself. He moved an address on the subject to the prince regent, in doing which he remarked:—"There are but few persons who know what is the dreadful manner in which this torture is inflicted. The instrument, formed of pieces of whipcord, each as thick as a quill, and knotted, is applied by the main strength of fresh men, relieving each other, until human nature can bear no more; and then, if pains are taken to recover the unhappy sufferer, it is only ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... chauffeurs wear black liveries in town. In the country they wear gray or even their ordinary whipcord with a black band on ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... pure imagination, my sweet boy," said Amyas, laying his great hand on Frank's head, and mimicking his mother's manner. "I say, dear Frank, let's step into this shop and buy a penny-worth of whipcord." ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... five minutes; the clamour deepens, the hubbub seems increasing; but ere the last sixty seconds expire, a sharp winding of warning bugles begins. Coachee flourishes his whip, greys and chestnuts prepare for a run, the reins move, but very gently, there is a parting crack from the whipcord, and the brilliant cavalcade is gone—exeunt omnes! Lombard Street is a different place now, far more imposing, though still narrow and dark; the clean-swept roadway is paved with wood, cabs pass noiselessly—a capital thing, only take care you are not run over. Most of the banks and assurance ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... notice, he laughed to himself, twisted his mustaches, looked proudly at his brawny arms, whose swollen veins looked like so many pieces of blue whipcord, swung his axe twice around his head, and with one blow chopped off one of the biggest branches of the enchanted tree. To his horror and dismay, however, there immediately sprang forth two more branches, each bigger ...
— Our Young Folks, Vol 1, No. 1 - An Illustrated Magazine • Various
... was tough, was solid as stump of oak Untouched at the core by a thousand years: much less had its seventy broke One whipcord nerve in the muscly mass from neck to shoulder-blade Of the mountainous man, whereon his child's rash hand like a ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... A mass of whipcord muscle, it can be made rigid, or flexible, at will. He can sit back with his hind feet resting on one stalk, hitch his tail round another, and lean his full weight against it. His full weight is one-sixth of an ounce. ...
— "Wee Tim'rous Beasties" - Studies of Animal life and Character • Douglas English
... his numbness, Rupert Venner fought back furiously, humiliated, and ashamed. Whether he would or not, he forgot all his chivalry, and strove to meet this appalling woman with strength against strength; but in Dolores he met a thing of wire and whipcord where moments before had been a creature of warm softnesses; a being of feline agility, and devilish skill that reflected the devilish skill of her teacher, Milo. The chain-links tinkled and clashed against their swaying bodies, but she never let them fall; they hung from her girdle; her hands ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... plant two stakes in the shallow water, near the rice beds, and to these I attached a slender rope made by braiding long strips of the inner bark of the basswood together; to these again I fastened, at regular intervals, about a quarter of a yard of whipcord, headed by a strong perch-hook. These hooks I baited with fish offal, leaving them to float just under the water. Early next morning, I saw a fine black duck fluttering upon the line. The boy ran down with the paddles, but ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... himself; and if they think his keeping under his Body imports so much, they must first prove that the Body cannot be kept under by a virtuous Mind, and that the Mind cannot be made virtuous but by a Scourge; and consequently, that Thongs and Whipcord are Means of Grace, and Things necessary to Salvation. The truth is, if Mens Religion lies no deeper than their Skin, it is possible they may scourge themselves into very great Improvements.——But they will find that bodily Exercise touches not the Soul; ...
— A Discourse Concerning Ridicule and Irony in Writing (1729) • Anthony Collins
... the exercise of his vocation, generally carries under his arm a small box containing the instruments necessary, and which consist principally of various pairs of scissors, and the ACIAL, two short sticks tied together with whipcord at the end, by means of which the lower lip of the horse, should he prove restive, is twisted, and the animal reduced to speedy subjection. In the girdle of the esquilador are stuck the large scissors called ...
— The Zincali - An Account of the Gypsies of Spain • George Borrow
... the streets of New York every day with thirty-five or forty sightseers on its broad back, while a groom in whipcord blows an incongruous coaching-horn ...
— Stories of Inventors - The Adventures Of Inventors And Engineers • Russell Doubleday
... at a glance that he was a man well over six feet tall, with whipcord muscles and a keen, eager, domineering air. Unlike any of the other Folk, his hair (snow-white) was not twisted into a fantastic knot and fastened with gold pins, but hung loose and was cut square off at about the level of his shoulders, forming a tremendous, bristly mass that ...
— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England
... Hottentot named Ventvoegel, or "windbird," and one a little Zulu named Khiva, who had the merit of speaking English perfectly. Ventvoegel I had known before; he was one of the most perfect "spoorers," that is, game trackers, I ever had to do with, and tough as whipcord. He never seemed to tire. But he had one failing, so common with his race, drink. Put him within reach of a bottle of gin and you could not trust him. However, as we were going beyond the region of grog-shops this little weakness of his did not ...
— King Solomon's Mines • H. Rider Haggard
... clematideae, reaching out arms all tufted with white aigrettes. And among them twined yet slenderer plants, binding them more and more closely together, weaving them into a fragrant woof. Nasturtium, bare and green of skin, showed open mouths of ruddy gold; scarlet runners, tough as whipcord, kindled here and there a fire of gleaming sparks; convolvuli opened their heart-shaped leaves, and with thousands of little bells rang a silent peal of exquisite colours; sweetpeas, like swarms of settling butterflies, folded tawny or rosy wings, ready to be borne yet farther ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola
... twenty-two inches; but the diameter of the thickest part of the body is little more than a quarter of an inch. It is of light-brown colour, with iridescent shades variegated with obscurer markings, and looks like a piece of whipcord. One individual which I caught of this species had a protuberance near the middle of the body. Upon opening it, I found a half-digested lizard which was much more bulky than ...
— The Naturalist on the River Amazons • Henry Walter Bates
... disaster, he was just proving to Patty that his taking the hatband to spin his top had nothing to do with his misfortune, and he was at the same time endeavouring to refute his uncle's opinion that the waste of the whipcord that tied the parcel was the original cause of all his evils, when he was summoned to try his skill ...
— The Parent's Assistant • Maria Edgeworth
... his only passenger, touched the nigh leader with the most delicate hint of a whipcord, and said confidentially ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 65, March, 1863 • Various
... the least of it, was curious, considering that he had an assortment of locks of hair—black, brown, and lint-white—up in the bottom of his "kist" in the stable loft where he slept. He kept them along with his whipcord and best Sunday pocket knife, and sometimes he took a look at them when he had to move them in order to get his green necktie. "I never really likit a lass afore, Jess, ye may believe me, for I wasna a lad to rin after them. But ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... often seen quarrelling between the buyers and the drovers, the buyers insisting on the drovers letting them alone, while the drovers will not let them stand. I have seen a clever man keep some of the best beasts always in view of the buyers, a stick with a whipcord being ...
— Cattle and Cattle-breeders • William M'Combie
... unreasonableness of expecting that I would risk horses in a place where they would probably be stolen before the morning, he replied, "True, true, you have perhaps done right." He then refastened his macho, adding for additional security a piece of whipcord, which he ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... is important to know where it is, and what are its purely mechanical relations to other parts of the body. My arms and legs are levers, and I can calculate the pressure necessary to support a weight on the hand, as though my bones and muscles were made of iron and whipcord. I am a piece of mechanism, though I am more, and all the principles of simple mechanics apply to my actions, though they do not, by themselves, suffice to explain the actions. The discovery of the circulation of the blood explained, as I understand, ...
— Social Rights and Duties, Volume I (of 2) - Addresses to Ethical Societies • Sir Leslie Stephen
... of his heart, a tentacle had budded. It was as long as his arm, but thin, like whipcord, and soft ...
— A Voyage to Arcturus • David Lindsay
... humane arguments, according to Johnson, op. cit., consisted in tying his thumbs together with whipcord, "which was done several times by the executioner and another officer; they drawing the ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward
... the strength and endurance of the packmen, excited his admiration. What wonderful raw material! Given drill and discipline, what might not be achieved on the frontier with such craftsmen! The muscles, all whipcord, of these rugged Canadians, part coureur de bois, part scout, amazed him. One thing was not so evident as he could have wished. Their love seemed to be more for race and language, home and wilderness, than for King and country. ...
— The Story of Isaac Brock - Hero, Defender and Saviour of Upper Canada, 1812 • Walter R. Nursey
... in a plain alone, and shot right up, I don't know how many thousand feet, into the air, a long, narrow, spearlike mountain. The whole face of it, from top to bottom, was covered with a network of spiders' webs, with threads of various sizes, from that of silk to that of whipcord. The webs shook, and quivered, and waved in the sun, glittering like silver. All about ran huge, greedy spiders, catching huge, ...
— Adela Cathcart, Vol. 3 • George MacDonald
... fittingly be considered in a group by themselves. Some botanists have made a separate genus for them, viz., Cleistocactus, but for all practical purposes they may be grouped under the above heading, whilst popularly they are known as the Rat's-tail or Whipcord Cactuses. Two of them—viz., C. flagelliformis and C. Mallisoni—are generally grafted on the stem of some erect, slender Cereus or Pereskia, or they may be worked on to the stem of a climbing Cereus, such as C. triangularis, ...
— Cactus Culture For Amateurs • W. Watson
... with it of all religious sects and orders of worship. From his prison at Newgate he had written that the enaction of laws restraining persons from the free exercise of their consciences in matters of religion was but "the knotting of whipcord on the part of the enactors to lash their own posterity, whom they could never promise to be conformed for ages to come to a national religion." Again and again had he preached and proclaimed the folly and wickedness of attempting to change the religious opinions of men by the ...
— Luther and the Reformation: - The Life-Springs of Our Liberties • Joseph A. Seiss
... hardly been hissed out by the gypsy when he took from his pocket a long, thin coil of whipcord, which he entangled in a complicated mesh around the cripple's body. It was not the ordinary binding of a prisoner. The slender lash passed and repassed in a thousand intricate folds over the powerless limbs of the poor humpback. When the operation was completed, he looked as if he had ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... Alive yet? Ah, well-a-day! well-a-day!" said she, in a feeble, mournful tone, slowly rubbing together her long, skinny, wrinkled hands, on the backs of which the veins stood out like knotted whipcord. She repeated the last words several times, in a truly doleful tone, gently ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... carried into execution, he was taken into a small room adjoining the court. Here Marvel, the executioner, who was in attendance, was commanded by Wild to tie his thumbs together, which he did with whipcord so tightly, that the string cut to the bone. But, as this produced no effect, and did not even elicit a groan, the prisoner was ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... is frozen; my hands are numblike and dead; But oh, my feet keep a-moving, heavy and hard and slow; They're trying to kill me, kill me, the night that's black overhead, The wind that cuts like a razor, the whipcord lash of the snow. Keep a-moving, a-moving; don't, don't stumble, you fool! Curse this snow that's a-piling a-purpose to block my way. It's heavy as gold in the rocker, it's white and fleecy as wool; It's soft as a bed of feathers, it's warm as a stack of hay. Curse on my feet that slip so, ...
— Ballads of a Cheechako • Robert W. Service
... trail, we and the tourists aroused in each other a mutual interest. One husband was trying to encourage his young and handsome wife to go on. She was beautifully dressed for the part in a marvelous, becoming costume of whipcord—short skirt, high laced elkskin boots and the rest of it; but in all her magnificence she had sat down on the ground, her back to the cliff, her legs across the trail, and was so tired out that she could hardly muster interest enough to pull them in out of the way of our ...
— The Mountains • Stewart Edward White
... Wayland looked at her and felt his masterdom going to those same winds; for the pace had painted her ivory cheeks, not rose color, but the deep flame of the wild flower. Some day, perhaps,—no matter; he set his teeth and screwed the whipcord muscles taut; for the moraine stones had begun to roll, and there was a zig-zag flash of lightning that sent fire balls sizzling over the rock. He braced her to the leap down the steep sliding moraine, and felt the frenzy of joy ...
— The Freebooters of the Wilderness • Agnes C. Laut
... up the second stair was lit by little lamps, fed by mouldy oil; and all the way up that waltz rang in Nobili's ear. It mounted to his brain like fumes of new wine tapped from the skin. A green door of faded baize faced him on the upper landing, and another bell—a red tassel fastened to a bit of whipcord. He rang it hastily. This time a servant came promptly. He carried in his ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot
... soon rendered his adversary hors de combat, when the victor dragged his prize to his companion, and displayed to his wondering gaze a snake upwards of a yard long, and very thick. Philip then secured his trophy by slipping a noose of whipcord over its head, and tying it to ...
— Hollowdell Grange - Holiday Hours in a Country Home • George Manville Fenn
... hearts in the breasts of these northern men and women, albeit they are as undemonstrative as the English—or we Americans, for that matter. It is exhilarating to see such people—whose digestion is sound, whose nerves are tough as whipcord, whose blood runs in a strong full stream, whose impulses are perfectly natural, who are good without knowing it, and who are happy without trying to be so. Where shall we find such among our restless ...
— Northern Travel - Summer and Winter Pictures of Sweden, Denmark and Lapland • Bayard Taylor
... Levasseur spoke without anger, with a coldly mocking regret. His fingers had been busy tying knots in a length of whipcord. He held it up. "You know this? It is a rosary of pain that has wrought the conversion of many a stubborn heretic. It is capable of screwing the eyes out of a man's head by way of helping him to see reason. As ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... told a different story. A girl—dressed in far different fashion from Robert Fairchild's limited specifications of feminine garb—she caused him to gasp in surprise, then to stop and stare. Again she waved a hand and stamped a foot excitedly; a vehement little thing in a snug, whipcord riding habit and a checkered cap pulled tight over closely braided hair, she awaited him with all ...
— The Cross-Cut • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... dishes were washed and put away when Cheyenne and Bartley appeared. Clean-shaven, his dark hair brushed smoothly, a small, dark-blue, silk muffler knotted loosely about his throat, and in a new flannel shirt and whipcord riding-breeches—which he wore under his jeans when on the trail—Bartley pretty well approximated Little Jim's description of him as a dude. And the word "dude" was commonly used rather to differentiate ...
— Partners of Chance • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... feelings of higher satisfaction, I am sure, than any monarch ever experienced upon entering a new palace. Augustus now pointed out to me the method of fastening the open end of the box, and then, holding the taper close to the deck, showed me a piece of dark whipcord lying along it. This, he said, extended from my hiding-place throughout an the necessary windings among the lumber, to a nail which was driven into the deck of the hold, immediately beneath the trap-door leading into his ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 3 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... shows an effective method of handcuffing in emergencies. The officer takes a piece of whipcord and makes a double running knot: he ties one noose round the wrist of the prisoner, whose hand is then placed in his trousers pocket, the cord is lashed round the body like a belt, and brought back and slipped through the noose again. The prisoner ...
— The Strand Magazine: Volume VII, Issue 37. January, 1894. - An Illustrated Monthly • Edited by George Newnes
... back of half a dozen I find written, So, so, and no more—and upon a couple Moderato; by which, as far as one may gather from Altieri's Italian dictionary,—but mostly from the authority of a piece of green whipcord, which seemed to have been the unravelling of Yorick's whip-lash, with which he has left us the two sermons marked Moderato, and the half dozen of So, so, tied fast together in one bundle by themselves,—one may safely suppose he meant pretty near ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... awfully rushing, her neck out—her nose forward—her nostrils open—her eye eager—covered with foam, but showing no sign of fatigue, nor any further inclination to baulk. Gayner was sitting her beautifully, not attempting to hold her, for he knew that if he stopped her, whipcord wouldn't make her run again; but with a firm, steady pull on her mouth—his hands low, and both on the reins, and his legs well tucked in. There she came, on at the leap without easing her pace for a moment, and going over the carcass ...
— The Macdermots of Ballycloran • Anthony Trollope
... undertaken; for, on pretence that I had written impertinent letters to my grandfather, he caused a board to be made with five holes in it, through which he thrust the fingers and thumb of my right hand, and fastened it by whipcord to my wrist, in such a manner as effectually debarred me the use of my pen. But this restraint I was freed from in a few days, by an accident which happened in a quarrel between me and another boy; ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... four-wheeler in my life! The harness is tied up with string, and the rein's broken. The idiot says if he had a stout bit of whipcord, he could make it square." No sooner have the words passed the doctor's lips than Miss Sally is off on a ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... Barrington's Observations on the Statutes, that, until the above-mentioned act, it was usual to torture a prisoner by tying his thumbs tightly together with whipcord in order to extort a plea; and he mentions the following instances where one or more of these barbarous ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 236, May 6, 1854 • Various
... recognise him. His face flushed and darkened. His brows were drawn into two hard black lines, while his eyes shone out from beneath them with a steely glitter. His face was bent downward, his shoulders bowed, his lips compressed, and the veins stood out like whipcord in his long, sinewy neck. His nostrils seemed to dilate with a purely animal lust for the chase, and his mind was so absolutely concentrated upon the matter before him that a question or remark fell unheeded upon his ears, or, at the most, only provoked a quick, impatient snarl ...
— The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... the road I came upon the Border Mounted Rifles, saddles off, and lolling on the grass. All farmers and transport riders from the northern frontier, lean, bearded, sun-dried, framed of steel and whipcord, sitting their horses like the riders of the Elgin marbles, swift and cunning as Boers, and far braver, they are the heaven-sent type of irregular troopers. It was they who had ridden out and made connection with the returning ...
— From Capetown to Ladysmith - An Unfinished Record of the South African War • G. W. Steevens
... hand was still on his arm. She felt it suddenly harden and twitch with murderous anger. But, by an effort that made the veins of his temple swell like whipcord, he refrained from striking the ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... if not actually younger in days and years, you look more hardy and like whipcord than Jasper, or any of them; and there will be more of you, thirty years hence, than of all of them put together. A good conscience will keep one like you a mere boy ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... Christianity. It is coming back more strongly year after year, coming back with increased vitality, with more reality and strength behind it; coming back because the Christ within the Church, finding that forgetfulness was coming over the modern mind, has, as in the olden days, used a scourge of whipcord instead of only the voice of love. For inasmuch as the voice of love was not listened to, and the reality of His presence was being forgotten, He has used the whip of what is called the Higher Criticism to drive men out of books back to the living Master of the Christian faith. When you build the ...
— London Lectures of 1907 • Annie Besant
... have been suppressed in recent years, but some survive and thrive with even greater vigour than ever. Some are hiring fairs, where you may see young men with whipcord in their caps standing in front of inns ready to be hired by the farmers who come to seek labourers. Women and girls too come to be hired, but their number decreases every year. Such is the Abingdon fair, which no rustic in the adjoining villages ...
— Vanishing England • P. H. Ditchfield
... the Kennedy House, arrived at the opening of the new scholastic year, he arrived magnificently in a special buggy, his changed personal appearance spreading wonder and incredulity before him. He was stylishly encased in a suit of tan whipcord, with creases down his trousers front that cut the air like the prow of a ship. On his head, rakishly set, was a Panama hat, over his arm was a natty raincoat and he ...
— The Varmint • Owen Johnson
... let me deal with him," said Pearson, who was a true soldier of fortune, and had been a buccaneer in the West Indies, "I think that, by a whipcord twitched tight round their forehead, and twisted about with a pistol-but, I could make either the truth start from their lips, or the ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott
... that celebrated humorist of Coventry, whose library of ballads, almanacs, and penny histories, fairly wrapped up in parchment, and tied round for security with a piece of whipcord, remains still the envy of antiquaries, being himself the ingenious person under whose direction the pageant had been set forth, rode valiantly on his hobby-horse before the bands of English, high-trussed, saith Laneham, and brandishing his long sword, as became an experienced ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... dreading no harm, in all simplicity went towards him, and drew a sixpence out of his leather satchel, thinking that Marquet would have sold him some of his cakes. But, instead of cakes, he gave him with his whip such a rude lash overthwart the legs, that the marks of the whipcord knots were apparent in them, then would have fled away; but Forgier cried out as loud as he could, O, murder, murder, help, help, help! and in the meantime threw a great cudgel after him, which he carried under his arm, wherewith he hit him in the coronal joint of ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... were, they were larger than his lordship wanted—two books, one for Jack and one for himself, being all they contained; while the other shelves were filled with hunting-horns, odd spurs, knots of whipcord, piles of halfpence, lucifer-match boxes, gun-charges, and ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... court, and the title, PEEBLES AGAINST PLAINSTANES. This huge mass was deposited on the table, and my father, with no ordinary glee in his countenance, began to draw out; the various bundles of papers, secured by none of your red tape or whipcord, but stout, substantial casts of tarred rope, such as might have held small ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... coat. "My goodness!" said he to Torpenhow, "and this gray oaf dares to be a thief! I have seen an Esneh camel-driver have the black hide taken off his body in strips for stealing half a pound of wet dates, and he was as tough as whipcord. This thing's soft ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... then," said Greasy Gus. "Now, here's what I know about it. I got out of Derlingport with Henry, and when the farmer dumped us from his wagon I hitched this whipcord to Henry's leg and drove him along the road. After while I hit this town of Riverbank. I thought maybe the police would be looking for Henry. So I took to an alley instead of a regular street, and ...
— Philo Gubb Correspondence-School Detective • Ellis Parker Butler
... sir, all right: a little stiff or so across the back, but not so bad as the tiger at Bundleapoor. I'm not as young as I used to be, and there's a difference between young men and old ones. Young men are all whalebone and whipcord, and it's nothing but hopping, skipping, and jumping with them all day long; when 235you're turned of sixty-five, sir, the whalebone gets stiff, the whipcord wears out, the skip and jump take their departure, and the hop becomes ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... disdainest thou to render to man, who bruises thee to try thy virtue, a thousand humbler services. Thou preservest our horses from flies, our fruit from birds; and who has not felt how thou cheerest the weary length of continental travelling, by the crack of thy whipcord at the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... form of this Hercules had increased in width. He was habited like Alcides; his enormous limbs, furrowed with veins as thick as whipcord, were covered with a close-fitting flesh-colored garment, to which a pair of red drawers formed a ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... got a piece of thin plank for her deck, and built on her bulwarks, with the windlass, the binnacle, caboose, and combings of her hatchway complete. Next I commenced rigging her. I formed all the blocks, and expended many a penny in purchasing whipcord and twine of different thickness, as well as linen for her sails. Having often carefully watched the sailmakers at work, and helped them when they would allow me, I was able not only to cut out the sails properly, but ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston
... time than it takes to tell Hayle had complied with the other's request, and was hard at work picking out the earth which held the enormous flagstone in its place. A state of mad excitement had taken hold of the men, and the veins stood out like whipcord upon Hayle's forehead. It was difficult to say how many feet separated them from the treasure that was to make them lords of all the earth. At last the stone showed signs of moving, and it was possible for Kitwater to insert his bar beneath one ...
— My Strangest Case • Guy Boothby
... husband who, at the far end of the room, was red in the face from the unusual exertion of trying to coax the buckle of a strap into a hole obviously out of reach. He pulled and strained till the muscles stood out on his neck and brawny arms like whipcord, and still the obstinate buckle declined to be coerced. The more it resisted, the more determined he was to make it obey. Go in it must, if sheer strength would do it. The vice-president of the Americo-African Mining Company was no weakling. A six-foot athlete and captain of the Varsity football ...
— The Mask - A Story of Love and Adventure • Arthur Hornblow
... darkened. He clenched his fist, and the veins on his temple swelled up like whipcord. Had she waited? He remembered Bill's scoffing words. Could it be true of Laura? Was she false to him? The possibility of such a thing had never entered his head before, but now he was tortured with the agonies and doubts ...
— The Easiest Way - A Story of Metropolitan Life • Eugene Walter and Arthur Hornblow
... you are! I am sure I could always find something to spend sixpence in. String? One is always wanting string. You may have a good ball of whipcord.' ...
— The Doll and Her Friends - or Memoirs of the Lady Seraphina • Unknown
... with the whipcord in his mouth, and proceeding to wind up his sportive engine. "You was a-saying that Harry was very poor now, and that we oughtn't to help him. That's what you ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... no loose pieces to this net, which, from the nature of the slides, is remarkably strong, and is easily opened and shut. (Fig. 44 shows the net folded, and with the arms slid down one on the other.) To finish, tie a piece of whipcord in the holes from b to b, and sew the holland all around the net as before, leaving plenty of room for the playing of the slides; the "leno" is then sewn to this in the usual manner, and thus becomes a fixture, ...
— Practical Taxidermy • Montagu Browne
... salted tale. I have prospered, I was made to prosper. This good belly of mine, this broad, easy gullet, these hands, this portly beard, which may now get as white as it can, since I have done with gossip Fra Clemente—a wrist of steel, fingers as hard as whipcord, and legs like anchor-cables; all these were fostered and made able by brown St. Francis' merry sons. Fra Palamone, dear unknown, Fra Palamone, ever your servant! And now—"here, with another revolting change, he turned his lips back to show his tooth—"And now," said he, "you fish-eyed, ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... with sawdust; or, best of all, to see an antique Brother, with scarecrow legs, and low shoes which had presumably been in his possession or that of his predecessors for a long series of years, wheeling a barrow of liquid manure, with his gown looped up high by means of stout whipcord and an arrangement of large brass rings. The Brother whose business it was to do such cooking as might be required by visitors, grinned in the most friendly and engaging manner from ear to ear when he was looked at; and, by fixing him steadily with the eye, he could be kept ...
— Ice-Caves of France and Switzerland • George Forrest Browne
... of Leeds has recorded cases in which he made a small incision through the skin, and mylohyoid and geniohyoid muscles, and through this passed a curved needle bearing the chain of the ecraseur completely round the base of the tongue. In one case the chain was unsatisfactory, but strong whipcord was introduced as it was withdrawn, and tied with all possible force. The organ eventually sloughed away, with a cure which lasted at ...
— A Manual of the Operations of Surgery - For the Use of Senior Students, House Surgeons, and Junior Practitioners • Joseph Bell
... finished takin' care o' Starlight, I give Monody's mount a look-over. The old bald-face was whipcord an' steel; but he looked purty near ready to ...
— Happy Hawkins • Robert Alexander Wason
... strong cheese cloth, and two pieces of strong calico of the same size as the canvas bed; put hems in the ends of the upper one large enough to take half-inch sticks, to all four extremities of which 8 feet of whipcord is to be attached. The calico forms the top and bottom of what we used to call the "meat safe," the sides being of cheese cloth. A small, flapped opening is left on the lower side. When once inside you are quite safe from ...
— Getting Gold • J. C. F. Johnson
... of a big, burly figure—and then a dense fine spray of intense odour caught him full in the face. Blindly he sought to bang the door, but staggered sideways in an agony of gasping and weeping. He fell, clawing at the wall, and lay stupefied, at the mercy of the unknown, who promptly proceeded with whipcord to truss him up both neatly and securely. Then he was gagged, drawn into the room on the right, the ...
— Till the Clock Stops • John Joy Bell
... a young man with pink cheeks and a milky-white forehead, who held his hat in one hand with a pair of khaki-colored kid gloves, and kept passing a hand over his light well-brushed hair. Andrews felt dirty and ill-smelling in his badly-fitting uniform. The sight of this perfect young man in his whipcord breeches, with his manicured nails and immaculately polished puttees exasperated him. He would have liked to fight him, to prove that he was the better man, to outwit him, to make him forget his rank and his important air.... The lieutenant had gone in to see the colonel. Andrews found ...
— Three Soldiers • John Dos Passos
... was a habit she couldn't get over. But it no longer gave her keen pleasure. She told herself that her three friends were deteriorating in their middle age. Lizzie's sharp face darted malice; her tongue was whipcord; she knew where to flick; the small gleam of her eyes, the snap of her nutcracker jaws irritated Harriett. Sarah was slow; slow. She took no care of her face and figure. As Lizzie put it, Sarah's appearance ...
— Life and Death of Harriett Frean • May Sinclair
... Emmeline now. She saw her brothers, Michael and Nicholas. Michael's soul was the prey of its terror of the herd-soul. The shrill voices, fine as whipcord and sharp as needles, tortured him. Michael looked beautiful in his martyrdom. His fair, handsome face was set clear and hard. His yellow hair, with its hard edges, fitted his head like a cap of solid, polished metal. ...
— The Tree of Heaven • May Sinclair
... as he watched the mountaineer, and the long, scraggy hands and whipcord neck seemed to interest him greatly. He looked at his own slim brown hands with a half smile, and it was almost as cruel as the laugh of the other. Yet it had, too, a knowledge and an ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... first eyes that Steve encountered that evening were those of Archibald Wickersham. While shaking hands with the girl, he bowed in grave welcome to the tall figure in leather puttees and whipcord riding-breeches, and Wickersham, from the far side of the room, bowed back in equal gravity. Then Caleb Hunter grasped Steve's elbow and spun him around toward the light and peered at him accusingly. Barbara had not noticed until then ...
— Then I'll Come Back to You • Larry Evans
... here?—I want to know that," Stolphe demanded. Jean Jacques' hands were opening and shutting. "Because I want to talk to you. If you don't sit down, I'll give you no chance at all. . . . Sit down!" Jean Jacques was smaller than Stolphe, but he was all whipcord and leather; the other was sleek and soft, but powerful too; and he had one of those savage natures which go blind with hatred, and which fight like beasts. He glanced swiftly ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... demons let loose, echoed throughout the length and breadth of marble halls. Caius Nepos took to his heels and fled like one possessed, with hands pressed to his ears, trying to shut out the awful sounds that pursued him all down the corridors: the shrieks of pain, the whizzing of whipcord through the air, and, rising above all these, that awful laugh which must have found its origin ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... unco kippage,' said Mrs. Flockhart to Evan, as he descended; 'I wish he may be weel,—the very veins on his brent brow are swelled like whipcord: wad he no ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott
... were standing out like whipcord on Granet's flushed forehead. He swayed on his feet. Twice he had seemed as though he would spring ...
— The Kingdom of the Blind • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... beside the coat cupboard, suddenly as though some strong spring which held him there had been released, and the strong spring was in his tense body alone. For the first time in his life he felt all steel and wire and whipcord, and many fires. He threw himself on the intruder and fought ...
— The Best British Short Stories of 1922 • Edward J. O'Brien and John Cournos, editors
... laughed hoarsely to herself until the scraggy sinews of her withered neck stood out like whipcord. She was still chuckling and coughing when the merchant came back into ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... narrow wooden ring fixed to a short handle. The drumstick consists of a splinter of whalebone 300 to 400 millimetres long, which towards the end runs into a point so fine and flexible, that it forms a sort of whipcord. When the thicker part of the piece of whalebone is struck against the edge of the drum-skin, the other end whips against the middle, and the skin is thus struck twice at the same time. The drum is commonly played by the man, ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold
... the still invariably worn "dokoljenice" are white gaiters, fastened at the back with hooks and eyes, which reach to the "opanki"—shoes made of a flat leather sole, bound over with a thick network of whipcord. ...
— The Land of the Black Mountain - The Adventures of Two Englishmen in Montenegro • Reginald Wyon
... pocket-handkerchief, and viewed with complacency. To-day, when it came to be-tied, she had to apply to Geordie, her unfailing help in all extremities; and he in his efforts to make an imposing bow like the one which decorated Mistress Gowrie's ample chin, had knotted the strings after the manner of whipcord, so that they required all Grace's ...
— Geordie's Tryst - A Tale of Scottish Life • Mrs. Milne Rae
... the utmost coolness and deliberation imaginable, unbuttoning the waistcoat and the shirt of the man he had murdered with fingers that neither twitched nor shook. There were a gold cross and a bunch of silver medals hung by a whipcord about the neck of the dead man. This Captain Morgan broke away with a snap, reaching the jingling baubles to Harry, who took them in his nerveless hand and fingers that he could hardly close upon what ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard I. Pyle
... hair and mustache. He had lost one eye, the other was that light gray colour that is usually associated with indomitable nerve. He had a shrewd, rather humorous expression, and gave one the impression of being very capable. Dressed in a neat whipcord suit, wearing light shoes and a carefully tied tie, recently shaved—a luxury we had denied ourselves, all this time—he was certainly an interesting character to meet in this out-of-the-way place. We should judge he was a little over forty ...
— Through the Grand Canyon from Wyoming to Mexico • E. L. Kolb
... there was a big crowd and a lot of pushing and hustling. I noticed several Chinamen hanging round and pressing together; now that I come to think of it, they surrounded me. The rope was not the usual thick hawser, but something thinner and more flexible—more like whipcord such as a fellow could carry ...
— The Road to Mandalay - A Tale of Burma • B. M. Croker
... all his speed, when he got into the street there was the jealous lover at his elbow. They darted with all speed into the Strand; got a coach. Sir Charles, on the box, gave Jehu a guinea, and took the reins—and by a Niagara of whipcord they attained Lambeth; and at length, to his delight, Pomander saw another coach before him with a gold-laced black slave behind it. The coach stopped; and the slave came to the door. The shop in question was a few hundred yards distant. The adroit Sir Charles not only stopped but ...
— Peg Woffington • Charles Reade
... are not satisfied with it there is skipping extraordinary, one feat of which is now and then to send the rope round twice before you touch the ground again. To do this, as it cannot be done with a mere rope, you must make a new rope of whipcord, in the middle of which you place a small chain about a foot long. This chain gives the weight necessary for whirling the rope very ...
— What Shall We Do Now?: Five Hundred Games and Pastimes • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... months. Tales are told of the consternation once caused among the church fiddlers when, on the occasion of their producing a new Christmas anthem, he did not come to time, owing to being snowed up on the downs, and the straits they were in through having to make shift with whipcord and twine for strings. He was generally a musician himself, and sometimes a composer in a small way, bringing his own new tunes, and tempting each choir to adopt them for a consideration. Some of these compositions which ...
— Under the Greenwood Tree • Thomas Hardy
... face more resembled an old skull than the countenance of a living being, even to the hollow, darkened sockets, at the bottom of which glittered her little black eyes. Her arms had dwindled away into nothing but whipcord and wire. Her hair, half black, half gray, hung in total neglect nearly to the ground, and her sole garment consisted of the remnant of a discarded buffalo robe tied round her waist with a string of hide. Yet the old squaw's ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr. |
