"Yarn" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... young John. And young John he took to ridin' straight and hard and 'tendin' to business. I ain't sayin' he ever got to be president or superintendent of a Sunday School, for this ain't no story-book yarn; but he always held a good job when he wanted it, and he worked for a good ...
— Jim Waring of Sonora-Town - Tang of Life • Knibbs, Henry Herbert
... entered, and the temperature raised to boiling, which is continued for 21/2 to 3 hours, that is, until a sample taken does no longer surrender any color to a hot solution of soap. Loose wool and worsted slubbing can be entered at 60 deg. C. (140 deg. F.). In dyeing yarn and piece-goods, however, it is advisable to enter the bath cold, work for about 1/4 hour in the cold, and then slowly to raise the temperature in about one hour to the boiling point. With this precaution, level and thoroughly dyed goods are always obtained. If the wool is entered ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 530, February 27, 1886 • Various
... with traffickers, and blocked with stalls and wares. Coal is for sale, both pure and mixed with clay in briquettes, and salt in blocks almost as black as coal, and three times as heavy, and piles of drugs—a medley of bones, horns, roots, leaves, and minerals—and raw cotton and cotton yarn from Wuchang and Bombay, and finished goods from Manchester. At one of the villages there was a chair for hire, and, knowing how difficult was the country, I was willing to pay the amount asked—namely, 7d. for nearly seven ...
— An Australian in China - Being the Narrative of a Quiet Journey Across China to Burma • George Ernest Morrison
... each of the departments were arranged almost at random. Even a few years ago we sometimes saw factories in which the materials worked upon were moved upstairs, then downstairs, then back upstairs, hither and yon, until a diagram of their wanderings looked like a tangle of yarn. Even in offices, desks were placed at random and letters, orders, memoranda, and other documents and papers were moved about with all of the orderliness and method of a school-girl playing "pussy wants a corner." Modern scientific management, ...
— Analyzing Character • Katherine M. H. Blackford and Arthur Newcomb
... a Boston paper and read them some of the news. Miss Eunice went on with her fringe. Elizabeth was knitting a sock for Chilian out of fine linen yarn, spun by herself, and she put pretty open-work stitches all up the instep. For imported articles were still dear, and there was a pride in the women to do all for themselves that they could. Cynthia leaned her head on Rachel's lap ...
— A Little Girl in Old Salem • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... bad company. I was shipmates with thousands of rats on that last passage. Want the yarn? It'll ...
— The Grain Ship • Morgan Robertson
... been successfully cultivated in this State for domestic use, and some for exportation. Two or three spinning factories are in operation, and produce cotton yarn from the growth of the country with promising success. This branch of business admits of enlargement, and invites the attention of eastern manufacturers with small capital. Much of the cloth made in families who have emigrated from States south of the ...
— A New Guide for Emigrants to the West • J. M. Peck
... was more furious than ever, and did nothing but plot mischief against the man's daughter, who was daily growing more and more beautiful. At last, one day the wicked woman took a large pot, put it on the fire and boiled some yarn in it. When it was well scalded she hung it round the poor girl's shoulder, and giving her an axe, she bade her break a hole in the frozen river, and rinse the yarn in it. Her stepdaughter obeyed as usual, and went ...
— The Red Fairy Book • Various
... I went a-fishing, but caught not one fish that I durst eat of, till I was weary of my sport; when, just going to leave off, I caught a young dolphin. I had made me a long line of some rope- yarn, but I had no hooks; yet I frequently caught fish enough, as much as I cared to eat; all which I dried in the sun, and ate ...
— Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe
... you," and so saying, he retreated from the table, and presently brought forth a curious oak box from a mysterious corner of the hutch, and after some difficulty in drawing out the sliding cover, produced a roll of tawny newspapers, tied up with rope yarn, a colored wood engraving in a black frame—a portrait, with the inscription, "James Wolfe, Esq'r, Commander in Chief of His Majesty's Forces in the Expedition to Quebec," and on the reverse the following scrap from the London ...
— Acadia - or, A Month with the Blue Noses • Frederic S. Cozzens
... ship's timekeeper, its exceeding delicate accuracy, and the wreck and destruction that have sometimes resulted from its varying a few seemingly trifling moments from the true time; then, in due course, my comrade, the Reverend, got off on a yarn, with a fair wind and everything drawing. It was a true story, too—about Captain Rounceville's shipwreck —true in every detail. It ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... pitching you his yarn," cried Randall, "he left out the blackmail. He bragged in his beastly way that Colonel Boyce was worth a thousand a year to him. All he had to live upon now that the blood-suckers had ruined his business. Then he began ...
— The Red Planet • William J. Locke
... semi-official Statement of Arts and Manufactures, the value of the textile products of North Carolina was greater than that of Massachusetts. Every farmhouse had spinning-wheels and one loom or several on which the women of the family spun yarn and wove cloth for the family wardrobe. On the large plantations negro women produced much of the cloth for both slaves and family. Except on special occasions, a very large proportion of the clothing worn by ...
— The New South - A Chronicle Of Social And Industrial Evolution • Holland Thompson
... are formed of an oval case of sacking, filled with combustible matter, and attached to a culot of cast-iron. The whole is covered with a net of spun-yarn. Light-balls are used to light up our own works, and are not armed; fire-balls being employed to light up the works or approaches of an enemy, it is necessary to arm them with pistol-barrels, in order to prevent, any one from extinguishing them. When made of very combustible ...
— Elements of Military Art and Science • Henry Wager Halleck
... what remains? Now last night when you told us that amazing yarn of yours, you said something about a mountain full of gold, and houses full of gold, among your people. Jeekie, do you think——" and he paused, looking ...
— The Yellow God - An Idol of Africa • H. Rider Haggard
... on the way. He was so busy, though, darting about from stall to stall, that Joan could never get up to him. But she could see what he was doing, and the sight made Joan's blood boil with indignation! He was helping himself to everything that took his fancy! Yarn, stockings, boots, spoons, clothing, until the wonder was that he could manage to stow the ...
— Cornwall's Wonderland • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... nice little girl who lived with her mother in a small house in the woods. They were very poor, for the father had gone away to dig gold, and did not come back; so they had to work hard to get food to eat and clothes to wear. The mother spun yarn when she was able, for she was often sick, and Rosy did all she could to help. She milked the red cow and fed the hens; dug the garden, and went to town to sell the ...
— The Louisa Alcott Reader - A Supplementary Reader for the Fourth Year of School • Louisa M. Alcott
... 'Fun,' with which I was connected. This I declined to do unless he would take me on the regular staff of Punch. This he declined to do, and so the matter ended. I had previously offered 'The Yarn of the Nancy Bell' (the first of the Bab Ballads) to Punch, but Mark Lemon declined it on the ground that it was 'too cannibalistic for his readers.'" So Mr. Gilbert knew Punch no more; and it is commonly related that he enjoys nothing more than an occasional ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann
... isn't it? Gideon—Gideon in this sort of mess. Gideon, the best of the lot of us.... You see, even if it's all moonshine about Hobart, as I'm quite prepared to believe it probably is, he's gone and given plausibility to the yarn by falling in love with Hobart's wife. Nothing can get round that. Why couldn't he have chucked it—gone away—anything—when he felt it coming on? A strong, fine, keen person like that, to be bowled over by his sloppy emotions and dragged through the mud, like any beastly sensualist, ...
— Potterism - A Tragi-Farcical Tract • Rose Macaulay
... testify. If any land agent of the general government has received wagon loads of base coin from us in payment for lands, let him say so. Or if he has received any at all, let him tell it. These witnesses against us have spun a long yarn." ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... That's why I am giving you this yarn of how he came to be with us, like a sort of dog—dashed sight more useful, though. You know how he can trot around with trays? Well, he could bring down an ox with his fist, at a word from the boss, just as cleverly. And fond of the governor! Oh, my word! More than any ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... sitting on the front stoop with her knitting. She often sat there dressed daintily of an afternoon. Her hands were white and looked well against the blue yarn she was knitting. Besides there was something domestic and sentimental in a stocking. It gave a cosy, homey, air to a woman, Hannah considered. So she sat and knitted and smiled at whomsoever passed by, luring many in to sit and talk with her, so that ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... nerves were in training. He waited, knowing that he should best get the whole by allowing the yarn to reel off unbroken; so now he only gave utterance to an attentive 'But ...
— Wych Hazel • Susan and Anna Warner
... replied Prescott, lowering his voice. "Dodge tells people that he left because he didn't like the crowd or the life there. We haven't changed the story any since our return. We'll tell you fellows, for we never used to have any secrets from you in the old days. But you mustn't pass the yarn around." ...
— Dick Prescott's Third Year at West Point - Standing Firm for Flag and Honor • H. Irving Hancock
... to spin them a yarn. The old gentleman settled himself in his chair, my mother smoothed her apron, folded her hands, and looked meekly into my face. Tom Lokins filled his pipe, stretched out his foot to poke the fire with the toe ...
— Fighting the Whales • R. M. Ballantyne
... instrument for the expression of serious thought and virile passion. He lacked indeed the temperamental balance of Lamb. His insight into human nature was intellectual rather than sympathetic. Though as a philosopher he understood that the web of life is of a mingled yarn, he has given us none of those rare glimpses of laughter ending in tears or of tears subsiding in a tender smile which are the sources of Lamb's depth and his charm. The same thing is true of his humor. He relished heartily its appearance in others and ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... Scotland. Here, for some reason or other, the man insisted on calling his charming and unknown companion Astarte, a name which, if I had been in her place, I should have been inclined to resent. But Mr. BRIDGES' dialogue is nearly always bright, and his knowledge of the machinery of yarn-spinning excellent. There is just one other point however which I should like to mention. The book includes a brand-new Russian wolf-story, in which the heroes protect themselves from the bites of these ferocious quadrupeds by putting on armour, which ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, July 29, 1914 • Various
... frivolous little aprons, and on their heads jaunty white caps perched on hair which made the girls go off into fresh fits of merriment. It was the most wonderful hair-dressing the girls had ever seen; heavy braids, thick curls, even pompadours—and all made out of yarn. ...
— Glenloch Girls • Grace M. Remick
... its gabled houses commanded at one end by the frowning heights of the castle, and overlooked at the other by a watch-tower, wears an air impressively mediaeval. The village was once a noted emporium for cloth, and "Dunsters" were quoted at reputable prices by every chapman. The venerable yarn market still stands; the date 1647 is the date of its repair by the grandson of the builder, George Luttrell. The Castle claims first attention, as the history of Dunster is largely the story of the Castle. It was, as might be expected, a legacy of the Conquest. It was ...
— Somerset • G.W. Wade and J.H. Wade
... explained the journalist, "—the jam and the break, and all this magnificent struggle afterwards. It makes a great yarn. I feel tempted sometimes to help it out a little—artistically, you know—but of course that wouldn't do. She'd make a ripping yarn, though, if I could get up some motive outside mere trade rivalry for the blowing up of those dams. That would just ...
— The Blazed Trail • Stewart Edward White
... difficulty or jar was like waking from a dream and entering again on a pleasant reality. There was the excellent dinner and the usual complaints about the Southdown Road, the cigars in the billiard- room, conversation about pictures and investments, gin and water, and then a long yarn with Willy in his bedroom. Life moved at the Manor House without any spring creaking, without jolt or jar, and it was this beautiful regularity that made Frank feel so healthily and so unexpectedly happy. He loved the desolation of Ireland. This was the stronger sense, but there was another ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... "if he's pretty cute he may p'rhaps bluff a skipper or two; but I guess he'll very soon be euchred—a man-o'-war'll nab him afore he can say 'Jack Robinson'. And now," he continued, "about you 'uns. From things said while you was spinnin' that yarn of the mutiny I seemed to get a sort of notion that you'd like me to put ye ashore as soon as ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood
... stand the justice of your country, come to the proof with a better plea. What? lantern and cutlass yours; you the one that knew the house; you the one that saw; you the one overtaken and denounced; and you spin me a galley yarn like that? If that is all your defence, you'll ...
— The Plays of W. E. Henley and R. L. Stevenson
... yarn, whatever it is, till to-morrow, Neal," he said. "I didn't hear anything special. Perhaps I was too far away. I'm so wet and jaded that I feel as limp as a washed-out rag. Let's get back to camp as ...
— Camp and Trail - A Story of the Maine Woods • Isabel Hornibrook
... and we tied our caps to our heads; but mostly she strolled on at the rate of three miles an hour. What could you expect? She was tired—that old ship. Her youth was where mine is—where yours is—you fellows who listen to this yarn; and what friend would throw your years and your weariness in your face? We didn't grumble at her. To us aft, at least, it seemed as though we had been born in her, reared in her, had lived in her for ages, had never known any other ...
— Youth • Joseph Conrad
... pair of moccasins, using an old flour sack for the uppers and a pair of skin mittens for the feet. George did some neat work on his moccasins and clothing, and I made my trousers look quite respectable again, and ripped up one pair of woollen socks to get yarn to darn the holes in another. Altogether it was rather a pleasant day, even though Hubbard's display of his beautiful new moccasins did savour of ostentation and thereby excite much heartburning on the part of George ...
— The Lure of the Labrador Wild • Dillon Wallace
... it. I'll go to the people who bought the boxes you want, and—I don't know what I'll say to them, exactly—but I'll fix up such a yarn that they'll beg me to take the boxes off ...
— Vicky Van • Carolyn Wells
... in the lodge War Eagle told a queer yarn. I shall modify it somewhat, but in our own sacred history there is a similar tale, well known to ...
— Indian Why Stories • Frank Bird Linderman
... that an old bachelor, wedded to trout-fishing and tobacco-smoke; familiar with nothing but whist, yarn stockings, flannels and shooting-jackets; without the least possible relish for landscape or color, for the twittering of birds, or the swarming of bumble-bees and forest-leaves; with no sense of poetry, ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 5. May 1848 • Various
... persisted in assuming that the cuts were made transversely, or across, and that therefore the complete length was nine cables. The skipper, however, explained (and the point is quite as veracious as the rest of his yarn) that his cuts were made longitudinally—straight from the tip of the nose to the tip of the tail! The complete length was therefore only three cables, the same as each piece. Simon was not asked the exact length of the serpent, but how long it must have been. It must have been at least three cables ...
— The Canterbury Puzzles - And Other Curious Problems • Henry Ernest Dudeney
... yarn for greenhorns," said Demorest, contemptuously. "I know all the ranch proprietors for twenty leagues around, and they've lost as many cattle and ...
— The Argonauts of North Liberty • Bret Harte
... through, but it was another case altogether, no more like the other one than a apple-pie is like a mug o' cider. An' then they both took it up, an' they swung it around between them, till it was all twisted an' knotted an' wound up, an' tangled, worse than a skein o' yarn in a nest o' kittens, an' then they give it ...
— Rudder Grange • Frank R. Stockton
... is the yarn. You see in the first place, you didn't marry Jude and Joyce as tight as an older and more experienced hand would have done. I ain't blaming you, but I've used the thought to help me to be more Christian ...
— Joyce of the North Woods • Harriet T. Comstock
... went up to make their request in due form, to the great delight of gentle Aunt Peace, who got quite excited with the fun that went on while they would yarn, looked up darning needles, and fitted out a nice little ...
— Eight Cousins • Louisa M. Alcott
... leisurely, "I'll be found at the Sailor's Rest for the next week. Then I'm going as skipper of The Firefly steamer, Port o' London, to Algiers. You can send the sheriff along whenever you choose. But I mean to have my picnic first, and to-morrow I'm going to Inspector Date with my yarn. Then I guess that almighty aristocrat wilt find himself ...
— The Green Mummy • Fergus Hume
... passed. Then the door of the room downstairs opened with a bang. The man who had entered announced: "They've captured two of the engine stealers over at Julian's Gap! They confessed to it, but first they told a cock-and-bull yarn about coming from Fleming County, Kentucky, to ...
— Tom of the Raiders • Austin Bishop
... before we floated past her Anderson reading the Bible to Jack Anderson reading the news of the Battle of the Nile Jack's Father landing after the Battle of the Nile Jack in Nanny's Room Jack and Bramble aboard the Indiaman The Fore-peak Yarn "How's her head, Tom?" Bramble saving Bessie Jack heaving the lead Nanny relating her story Jack and his Father under the Colonnade A Surprise Bramble and Jack carried into a French Port The Leith Smack and the Privateer The Arrival of the Privateer at Lanion ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... Science Fiction magazine was "Vampires of Venus," by Anthony Pelcher, which appeared in your April issue. It was so idiotic, so flat and inane, that it might have passed for a burlesque rather than a straight story, were it not painfully evident that the author was serious. The yarn was unworthy of Astounding Stories and did not ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, August 1930 • Various
... fool me any more. You told me to come, didn't you? You must have told some yarn to your daughter to ...
— The Landloper - The Romance Of A Man On Foot • Holman Day
... says that making plywood reminds him of the way Mrs. Bunyan made pies during the hard times of pioneer days. She would take pancakes, spread molasses between and sew around the edges with yarn. ...
— The Marvelous Exploits of Paul Bunyan • W.B. Laughead
... some sheep; and mother shears and cards, and Lurindy spins,—I can't spin, it makes my head swim,—and I knit, knit socks and sell them. Sometimes I have needles almost as big as a pipe-stem, and choose the coarse, uneven yarn of the thrums, and then the work goes off like machinery. Why, I can knit two pair, and sometimes three, a day, and get just as much for them as I do for the nice ones,—they're warm. But when I want to ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 40, February, 1861 • Various
... a General; only you must promise not to scratch their faces with your beard, as papa sometimes does—just for fun, you know. Besides which, my dear friend, they will give you a mitten apiece. How would you like that? They make lots for the soldiers, out of skeins of long yarn; mamma says you are a famous fellow for spinning splendid yarns yourself. Ours is dark blue; but mamma says, yours are all the colors of the rainbow, and a great deal of black besides; and everybody is delighted with them, and all the ...
— The Two Story Mittens and the Little Play Mittens - Being the Fourth Book of the Series • Frances Elizabeth Barrow
... the fellow that drops in on you when you ain't expectin' company, and just swipes your string of fish like he did Jud's. I might 'a thought Jud was giving us a yarn to explain why he didn't have anything to show for his morning's work; but both Little Billie and Gusty saw the same thing. Say, that's another link we got to straighten out. What's a crazy man doing up here; and is he in the same ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts Afloat • George A. Warren
... Why, it says, "Dick," it says—(it calls me Dick acos it's known me from a babby)—"Dick," it says, "you ain't shy—you ain't modest—speak you up for him as is!" Robin, my lad, just you lay me alongside, and when she's becalmed under my lee, I'll spin her a yarn that shall sarve to fish you two together for life! ROB. Will you do this thing for me? Can you, do you think? Yes (feeling his pulse). There's no false modesty about you. Your—what I would call ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan
... he heard his son chuckle again. He had certainly caught a tartar—possibly two. With a twisted smile he recalled the old yarn of the hunter who caught the bear by the tail. Willing to ...
— The Pagan Madonna • Harold MacGrath
... As he spoke, they had come into another house; and at the sight of a spinning wheel on a stove-bed, they thought it still more strange and wonderful, but the servant boys again told them that it was used for spinning the yarn to weave cloth with, and Pao-y speedily jumping on to the stove-bed, set to work turning the wheel for the sake of fun, when a village lass of about seventeen or eighteen years of age came forward, and asked them not to meddle with ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... warned Hilyar not to fall foul. The British captain then braced back his yards, remarking that if he did fall aboard it would be purely accidental. "Well," said Porter, "you have no business where you are; if you touch a rope-yarn of this ship I shall board instantly." [Footnote: "Life of Farragut," p. 33.] The Phoebe, in her then position, was completely at the mercy of the American ships, and Hilyar, greatly agitated, assured Porter that he meant nothing hostile; and the Phoebe backed down, her yards passing ...
— The Naval War of 1812 • Theodore Roosevelt
... gathered around the camp fire, discussing our evening meal of fresh antelope steaks. Many were the stories told of trapper life, and as we filled our pipes for a smoke before retiring, the subject of conversation was upon food. All had some anecdote to relate and after each had spun his yarn, Harding, who up to the present had been silent, drawled out, "Wal, I 'spect as how yer have had some tol'rable bad jints in yer time, but I think I kin jest lay over anything in this yer party in the way o' ...
— Seven and Nine years Among the Camanches and Apaches - An Autobiography • Edwin Eastman
... food and water, a suggestion which was, of course, adopted. We had no fishing lines or hooks on board; a bit of an old file was, however, discovered, and with it and a hammer Jacotot undertook to make some hooks, while Kelson spun some fine yarn for lines. ...
— James Braithwaite, the Supercargo - The Story of his Adventures Ashore and Afloat • W.H.G. Kingston
... cried. "You are a pair! First there's Elsie's yarn about that grindstone, and now you try to stuff some silly story into us of Bob's running about the house when he was ...
— Under Padlock and Seal • Charles Harold Avery
... the main-hatch besides, and a lot of spun-yarn. Of course that's not strong enough for real service, but ...
— The Eagle Cliff • R.M. Ballantyne
... that she might give it to Ann, whom she loved so much. Knowing, as she did, that Ann was poor, and able to have but little bravery of apparel, it was often on her mind to give her somewhat of her own, albeit that was but scanty; and she hath toiled overtimes at her wheel all winter, and sold the yarn in Salem, and so gained a penny at a time wherewithal to buy that cape for Ann. And now will it hang her, the ...
— Giles Corey, Yeoman - A Play • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... was finished. Out of the little doctor's chaos of pink flannel Harmony had brought order. The result, masculine and complete even to its tassels and cord of pink yarn, was ready to be presented. It was with mingled emotions that Anna Gates wrapped it up and gave it ...
— The Street of Seven Stars • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... different yarn to the one you told on the stairs this afternoon," said Will. "See Monty ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy
... Women's jackets of cotton and abak, embroidered with red, yellow, white, and black cotton yarn. Upper Agsan. c, War chief's red jacket. Insignia of bagni-ship used by Manbos of the upper Agsan. d, War chief's red headkerchief. This indicates that the wearer has killed at least three people. e, Hat of sago palm bark. Middle Agsan. f, Man's jacket ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan
... good yarn about old times, and it ended in his inviting me down to Styles to spend ...
— The Mysterious Affair at Styles • Agatha Christie
... and she threaded her needle and snipped off the yarn before she answered, "No, thank you, Becky. Mother couldn't do without me, and I hate going to school. I can read and write and cipher as well as anybody now, and that's enough for me. I'd die rather than teach school for ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... politeness alone has kept me from naming the full extent of my wait. If you please, sir," he turned to Dick, "she was in the clutches of a beggar who obtained twenty-five dollars by a most extraordinary yarn." ...
— Uncle Noah's Christmas Inspiration • Leona Dalrymple
... have to lie so outrageously in this yarn. My hero has killed more Indians on one war-trail than I have killed in all my life. But I understand this is what is expected in border tales. If you think the revolver and bowie-knife are used too freely, you may cut out a fatal shot or stab wherever ...
— Last of the Great Scouts - The Life Story of William F. Cody ["Buffalo Bill"] • Helen Cody Wetmore
... miscellany, ambigu|, medley, mess, hotchpot[obs3], pasticcio[obs3], patchwork, odds and ends, all sorts; jumble &c. (disorder) 59; salad, sauce, mash, omnium gatherum[Lat], gallimaufry, olla-podrida[obs3], olio, salmagundi, potpourri, Noah's ark, caldron texture, mingled yarn; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... Lincoln wore flax and tow linen pantaloons—I thought about five inches too short in the legs—and frequently he had but one suspender, no vest or coat. He had a calico shirt such as he had in the Black Hawk War; coarse brogues, tan-colour; blue yarn socks, a straw hat, old style, and without a band." It is recorded that he preferred dealing with men and boys, and disliked to wait on the ladies. Possibly, if his attire has been rightly described, the ladies, even the Clary's Grove ladies, may ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... Walter by his servant when he first saw his master smoking, and imagined he was on fire. The story was first associated with Raleigh by a writer in 1708 in a magazine called the British Apollo. According to this yarn Sir Walter usually "indulged himself in Smoaking secretly, two pipes a Day; at which time, he order'd a Simple Fellow, who waited, to bring him up a Tankard of old Ale and Nutmeg, always laying aside the Pipe, when he heard his servant coming." On this particular occasion, however, ...
— The Social History of Smoking • G. L. Apperson
... of my pet, and would curl its long wool over a stick, Finally, it was killed by an angry cow. I have a pair of little stockings, knitted of yarn spun from the lamb's wool, the heels of which have been raveled out and given away piecemeal ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, Nov 1877-Nov 1878 - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... tell you all about it fully, later on," Jack said, "but it would take me till night to give you the full yarn now. But first you must tell me what has happened here. You know I have heard nothing, and only know that Sebastopol ...
— Jack Archer • G. A. Henty
... the crew,—Louis he is called, a rotund and jovial-faced Nova Scotia Irishman, and a very sociable fellow, prone to talk as long as he can find a listener. In the afternoon, while the cook was below asleep and I was peeling the everlasting potatoes, Louis dropped into the galley for a "yarn." His excuse for being aboard was that he was drunk when he signed. He assured me again and again that it was the last thing in the world he would dream of doing in a sober moment. It seems that he has been seal-hunting regularly each season for a dozen years, and is accounted one of the two ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... bottles and side elevations of premature babies," surmised Killigrew; "you're a foul old thing! But we'll come and have a yarn over 'em anyway. I'm not in a hurry to face my revered parents and I daren't take this good little boy to some places you and I know of. I'm ...
— Secret Bread • F. Tennyson Jesse
... had been cast upon their shores." Thus all ends as happily as a comedy; everybody and everything are saved; men and ships return: meanwhile Bracciolini has entertained his reader with a pretty, exciting episode, (what British sailors call "a yarn"), without making himself absolutely ridiculous by placing on record that the Romans in the days of Tiberius lost "a thousand ships"; though he certainly gives credit to his reader for considerable credulity by inviting him to believe that the Romans at any time ever had a fleet amounting ...
— Tacitus and Bracciolini - The Annals Forged in the XVth Century • John Wilson Ross
... due length again, the danger is removed. The wise woman must never ask money for her trouble, but take what is given." In another part of Germany, "a woman is stript naked and measured with a piece of red yarn spun on a Sunday." Sembrzycki tells us that in the Elbing district, and elsewhere in that portion of Prussia, the country people are firmly possessed by the idea that a decrease in the measure of the body is the source of all ...
— The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought • Alexander F. Chamberlain
... conquer the resistance or gain a single inch. The visitors were puzzled, and Finn then ordered one of the negroes to bring a couple of powerful oxen, yoked to a gill, employed to drag out the stumps of old trees. For many minutes the oxen were lashed and goaded in vain; every yarn of the hawser was strained to the utmost, till, at last, the two brutes, uniting all their strength in one vigorous and final pull, it was dragged from the water, but the monster had escaped. The hook had straightened and to its barb were attached pieces of thick bones and cartilages, which ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat
... Morrison cottage Grandma Whitby was knitting stockings for the little Morrisons at a furious rate and every once in a while sending one of the children out for more wood or a fresh pail of water or some more yarn. Joe could see the children sitting around the dining-room table with their books and games and arguing with each other every time the grandmother made ...
— Green Valley • Katharine Reynolds
... yarn. To separate the circumstances of the story from the story itself, I will first ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... malice, his bluntness of speech, and his wealth. Short, thick-set, vigorous, with little sharp eyes set in a big red face, pitted with smallpox, he had been known as a petticoat-hunter: and he had not altogether lost his taste for it. He loved a spicy yarn and good eating. It was a sight to see him at meals, with his son Antoine sitting opposite him, with a few old friends of their kidney: the district judge, the notary, the Archdeacon of the Cathedral:—(old Jeannin ...
— Jean Christophe: In Paris - The Market-Place, Antoinette, The House • Romain Rolland
... consists of more bread with soup. This soup has everything in it except nourishment. The bead on this soup is noticeable for quite a distance. It is disagreeable. Several days ago I heard that the Mayor was in the soup, but I didn't realize it before. I thought it was a newspaper yarn. There is everything in this soup, from shop-worn rice up to neat's-foot oil. Once I thought I detected cuisine ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VIII (of X) • Various
... of supper to celebrate his getting his first, and it was while coming back from that that Wyatt got collared. Well, I'm blowed if Neville-Smith doesn't toddle off to the Old Man after school to-day and tell him the whole yarn! Said it was all his fault. What rot! Sort of thing that might have happened to any one. If Wyatt hadn't gone to him, he'd probably have gone out ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... sum of money, he bribed the person in whose hands it was, and brought it with him to these parts; but he keeps it jealously from all eyes, in order that the Duke may not get wind of it, fearing he should in some way be deprived of his treasure." While spinning out this lengthy yarn, Messer Alfonso did not look at me, because we were not previously acquainted. But when that precious clay model appeared, he displayed it with such airs of ostentation, pomp, and mountebank ceremony, ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... told my wife some rotten yarn about instinct guiding him to her; said he felt sure that the strength of his great love would somehow lead him to her side. He didn't say that to me, couldn't, you know. But it's wonderful what a fellow will say to a woman, if she's sympathetic, and ...
— Our Casualty And Other Stories - 1918 • James Owen Hannay, AKA George A. Birmingham
... again, I didn't! It's just as it may strike you! As a news man, I know how this kind of yarn would be ...
— The Freebooters of the Wilderness • Agnes C. Laut
... land's sakes,' I said, 'hand me them needles.' So I fussed around a little, and it all came back. What's funny about it is, I had not knitted a stitch since I was about ten. Old mistress used to make me knit socks for the soldiers. I remember I knit ten pair out of coarse yarn, while she was doing a couple for the officer out of fine wool and silk mixed. I used to knit pulse warmers, and 'half-handers',—I bet you don't know what they was. Yes, that's right; gloves without any fingers, 'cepting a thumb and it didn't have any end. I could even knit on four needles when ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Arkansas Narratives Part 3 • Works Projects Administration
... same trip they all assembled around a common campfire. The guides were given the floor, or ground, and they made the most of the occasion. Such competition as there was! Each, of course, felt obliged to uphold the honor of his party and out-yarn his fellows. Their stories grew in the telling, each more lurid than the last. There were thrilling tales of bear fights; of battles with arctic storms above timberline; of finding rich gold-strikes ...
— A Mountain Boyhood • Joe Mills
... possible the Russians thought the yarn to be merely another native fairy tale," continued Kilbuck, waving a careless hand. "As I said there may be no other foundation for it. It has come down now for over two hundred years, and you may be sure when an Indian tells a story it ...
— Where the Sun Swings North • Barrett Willoughby
... titles, and it is a ripping good tale from Chapter I to Finis—no weighty problems to be solved, but just a fine running story, full of exciting incidents, that never seemed strained or improbable. It is a dainty love yarn involving three men and a girl. There is not a dull or ...
— The Third Degree - A Narrative of Metropolitan Life • Charles Klein and Arthur Hornblow
... equipment, electric power machinery, food and livestock, metal and metal products, chemicals and chemical products, plastics, yarn, paper ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... and tied, and the adjutant brought a small whip made of cotton, which consisted of a number of strands and knotted at the ends; but these knots were all cut off by the adjutant before the drummer took it, which made it not worse than to have been whipped with cotton yarn. ...
— American Prisoners of the Revolution • Danske Dandridge
... are considered to be proficient. In the census of 1901 nearly a quarter of the whole caste were shown as malguzars or village proprietors and lessees. They wear a coarse cloth of homespun yarn which they get woven for them by Gandas; probably in consequence of this the Agharias do not consider the touch of the Ganda to pollute them, as other castes do. They will not grow turmeric, onions, garlic, san-hemp or tomatoes, nor will they rear tasar silk-cocoons. ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell
... of entertainment, for she was fascinated by the whir of the looms, by the nimble fingers of the weavers, and by the general air of efficiency. Admiringly she watched Sally Ann Hyatt, the tall capable weaver from Vermont. When the yarn on the beam was tangled or there was something wrong with the machinery, Elijah, the overseer, always called out to Sally Ann, "I'll tend your loom, if you'll look after this." Sally Ann never failed to locate the trouble or to untangle the yarn. Yet she was never ...
— Susan B. Anthony - Rebel, Crusader, Humanitarian • Alma Lutz
... the money saved from the wreck, the Wamsutta mills have become a corporation with a capital of three million dollars. The Potomska mills have accumulated a capital of fifteen hundred thousand, the Grinnell mill has eight hundred thousand, the Acushnet mill six hundred thousand, the Yarn mills three hundred thousand. In addition to these cotton mills other industries have sprung up, so that the total capital represented by the various corporations is over nine millions of dollars. Banking also proved profitable. Of the ...
— The New England Magazine, Volume 1, No. 5, Bay State Monthly, Volume 4, No. 5, May, 1886 • Various
... Quebec years before, and had got caught in Rat Portage when the Canadian Pacific Railway was a-building; a man who, in addition to his unparalleled knowledge of wood-craft and bush-lore, could also sing the old voyageur songs and tell a capital hunting yarn into the bargain. He was deeply susceptible, moreover, to that singular spell which the wilderness lays upon certain lonely natures, and he loved the wild solitudes with a kind of romantic passion that amounted almost to an obsession. The life of the backwoods ...
— The Wendigo • Algernon Blackwood
... voices. I suppose if you could hear yourself speak you would say, 'I never knew that my voice sounded like that.' And I am quite sure that many of you, if the curtain could be drawn aside which is largely woven out of the black yarn of your own evil thoughts, and you could see yourselves as in a mirror, you would say, 'I had no notion that I looked like that.' 'There is that maketh himself rich, and ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... length the Queen took upon herself to grant patents of monopoly by scores. There was scarcely a family in the realm which did not feel itself aggrieved by the oppression and extortion which this abuse naturally caused. Iron, oil, vinegar, coal, saltpetre, lead, starch, yarn, skins, leather, glass, could be bought only at exorbitant prices. The House of Commons met in an angry and determined mood. It was in vain that a courtly minority blamed the Speaker for suffering the acts of ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... woman has spun her yarn, Miles," the mate resumed, "we will go on with matters and things. I have been talking with the mother of the youngster that fell overboard, and giving her some advice for the benefit of her son in time to come; and what do you think she gives as the ...
— Miles Wallingford - Sequel to "Afloat and Ashore" • James Fenimore Cooper
... freezing. Hurry up, so far. Afterwards there'll be a good yarn to tell in the sewer where the boys are, about what ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... did not frighten you, dear Aunt Janet, by the yarn of the lady in the coffin. But I know you are not afraid; you have told me too many weird stories for me to dread that. Besides, you have Second Sight—latent, at all events. However, there won't be any more ghosts, or about ghosts, in this letter. I want to tell ...
— The Lady of the Shroud • Bram Stoker
... country for a wife,—a swarthy breed, not over pretty, whose Indian mother had mated with a Russian fur-trader some thirty years before at Kutlik on the Great Delta. Bishop went down one Sunday morning to yarn away an hour or so with Whipple, but found the wife alone in the cabin. She talked a bastard English gibberish which was an anguish to hear, so the pocket-miner resolved to smoke a pipe and depart without rudeness. ...
— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London
... squirrels,' &c. Hemp and flax grew more naturally there than elsewhere, which, being well regarded, would give provision for canvas, cables, cording, besides thread, linen cloth, and all stuffs made of linen yarn, 'which are more fine and plentiful there than in all the rest of the kingdom.' Then there were the best materials of all sorts for building, with 'the goodliest and largest timber, that might compare with any in his majesty's ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin
... was back again, a chance career ended, with option of picking up the severed threads—his inheritance at the loom—and of retying them, warp and weft, and continuing the pattern according to the designs of the tufted, tinted pile-yarn, knotted in by his ancestors ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers |
