"Broomstick" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "speculator" and brought to Georgia where he was sold to the Wyches of Macon. He cooked for them at their Hotel, "The Brown House" for a number of years, then was sold "on the block" to Mr. Stevens of Upson County. Betsy was sold at this same auction. Betsy and Peter were married by "jumping the broomstick" after Mr. Stevens bought them. They had sixteen children, of which Emily is the next to the last. She was always a "puny", delicate child and her mother died when she was about seven years old. She heard people tell her father that she "wasn't intented to be raised" 'cause she ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Georgia Narratives, Part 3 • Works Projects Administration
... lame the oxen in the plough, that she could smite her persecutors with pains and sickness, that she could rouse storms in the sky and strew every shore with the wrecks of ships and the corpses of men, that as night gathered round she could mount her broomstick and sweep through the air to the witches' Sabbath, to yield herself in body and soul to the demons of ill. The nascent scepticism that startled at tales such as these was hushed before the witness of the Bible, for to question the existence of sorcerer or daemoniac seemed questioning ...
— History of the English People, Volume V (of 8) - Puritan England, 1603-1660 • John Richard Green
... Stop it! Don't let it bite me!" cried the old gentleman rabbit, and he tried to get out of the way, but he slipped on his broomstick crutch and fell down, and a piece of prickly holly fell on him and tickled him so that ...
— Curly and Floppy Twistytail - The Funny Piggie Boys • Howard R. Garis
... soldier's campaigning uniform, and, driving at that, got his bayonet into a Dutchman's shirt just in time to save himself from being shot. An officer had an exciting bout with a Kaffir who was fighting on the Boer side, the weapon on one side being a broomstick that had been used as an alpenstock for hill-climbing, and on the other a Mauser rifle which the Kaffir had no chance to reload, so quickly were the blows showered upon him, and a bayonet-thrust delivered at hazard as he ...
— Four Months Besieged - The Story of Ladysmith • H. H. S. Pearse
... children, she is almost ingratiating. Of course, she is seeking to lure them to a horrible fate, but though she does not deceive them for even a moment, her musical manner is much like theirs, except when she is whirling through the air on a broomstick. ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... worse for wear, she ups an' reproaches 'm, which, God knows, that ain't no time to argue with a man. You don't want to argue with a fella when he's so. You just want to tellm'. Tell'm with the help of a broomstick if you want to, but tell'm, or leave'm alone. An' it's bad for the childern—all this is—it's bad for Cora an' Francie. What idea'll they get o' the holy estate o' matrimony, I should like to know? That the man has the upper hand? That's a nice notion for a girl to grow up with, ...
— Martha By-the-Day • Julie M. Lippmann
... in the very beginning announced that her mother did not want her to take part and that she did not care to herself, as she was to have the fun of entertaining them all at her house, and moreover, she "couldn't act any more than a broomstick." ...
— A Dear Little Girl at School • Amy E. Blanchard
... ever, sat watching the proceedings with extraordinary unconcern. He had never been heard openly to express his disbelief in witches, but had often cut such jokes at their expense as left it to be inferred; publicly stating on several occasions that he considered a broomstick an inconvenient charger, and one especially unsuited to the dignity of the female character, and indulging in other free remarks of the same tendency, to the great amusement of his ...
— Master Humphrey's Clock • Charles Dickens
... miners maintained an orderly and business-like procedure. The chairman's indigestion had vanished with his sudden assumption of responsibility, and he showed no trace of drink in his bearing. Beneath a lamp one was binding four-foot lengths of cotton tent-rope to a broomstick for a knout, while others, whom Lee had appointed, were drawing lots to see upon whom would devolve the unpleasant duty of flogging the captive. The matter-of-fact, relentless expedition of the affair shocked Burrell inexpressibly, and seeing Poleon and ...
— The Barrier • Rex Beach
... a tea-party hight, Which, like meeting of witches, is brewed up at night, Where each matron arrives fraught with tales of surprise, With knowing suspicion and doubtful surmise; Like the broomstick-whirled hags that appear in Macbeth, Each bearing some relic of venom or death, To stir up the toil and to double the trouble, That fire may burn, and that cauldron may bubble. The wives of our cits of inferior degree Will soak up repute in a little Bohea; The potion is ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various
... Sidi Tart'ri and his faithful spouse by the broomstick wedding would finish the evening on their terrace, a broad white roof which ...
— Tartarin of Tarascon • Alphonse Daudet
... idiot. You're a scorpion—a brimstone scorpion! You're a sweltering toad. You're a chattering clattering broomstick witch that ought to be burnt!" gasps the old man, prostrate in his chair. "My dear friend, will you shake me ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... that would not have been made, had the authorities upon the subject been investigated with only slight attention. No feature of the crime of witchcraft is better attested than this; and the modern witch of story-books is still represented as riding on a broomstick—a relic of the enchanted rod with which the devil used to provide his worshippers, upon which to come to his sabbaths.[1] One of the charges in the indictment against the notorious Dr. Fian ran thus: "Fylit for suffering himself to be careit to North Berwik kirk, as if he had bene souchand ...
— Elizabethan Demonology • Thomas Alfred Spalding
... Would that youth could come again! Would that I might fall in line As a little boy of nine, But with broomstick for a gun, And with paper hat that I Bravely wore back there for fun, Never more may I defy Foes that deep in ambush kneel— Now my warfare's grim and real. I that once was brave and bold, Now ...
— Just Folks • Edgar A. Guest
... eyes are like stars on the sea. Come, then, angelic Rock, Rocher des Anges, and waltz with your Ste. Valerie!" And he would take Abby by the waist, and try to waltz with her, till she reached for the broomstick. I have told you, Melody, that Abby was the homeliest woman the Lord ever made. Not that I ever noticed it, for the kindness in her face was so bright I never saw anything but that; but strangers would speak of it, and Yvon himself, before he heard her speak, made a little face, I remember, ...
— Rosin the Beau • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
... flame sends out its flashes Through creviced roof and shattered sashes! The witch-grass round the hazel spring May sharply to the night-air sing, But there no more shall withered hags Refresh at ease their broomstick nags, Or taste those hazel-shadowed waters As beverage meet for Satan's daughters; No more their mimic tones be heard, The mew of cat, the chirp of bird, Shrill blending with the hoarser laughter Of the fell demon following after! The cautious goodman nails no more A horseshoe on ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... lazy gluttonous scoundrels, who swallowed long pieces of raw pork the whole of the day, and towards evening were, from repletion, hanging their heads over the sides of the canoe and quite ill. They had been regaled with pork and whisky going up; we gave them salt fish and a broomstick by way of variety on their return, and they behaved very well under the ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... hold of a broomstick, and gave her a good lesson, in order to get something for the ten sequins which I had been foolish enough to pay in advance. But I have broken none of her limbs, and I took care to apply my blows only on her posteriors, on which spot I have no doubt that ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... do not know Lady so well as I. Not Cromwell's best horse could comfort me for her. I MUST find her. Give me leave, sir; I must go and think. I cannot mount and ride, and leave her I know not where. Go I will, if it be on a broomstick, but this morning I ride not. Let the men put up their horses, Stopchase, ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... of his work, whether it range from the first volume of Modern Painters to Verona in time, or from The Seven Lamps of Architecture to Unto This Last in subject. If anybody ever could "write beautifully about a broomstick" he could: though perhaps it is a pity that he so often did. But this faculty, and the entire absence of bashfulness which accompanied it, are no doubt grand accommodations for letter-writing; and the reader of Mr. Ruskin's letters gets the ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury
... when the sound of the quick young feet had died away. "Open your budget, Deborah. There's naught in it, I'll swear, but some fal-lal about your flowered gown or an old woman's black cat and corner broomstick." ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston
... Mr. Brown. And he did. And, surely enough, when the broomstick was held crosswise in front of him, up rose Toby on his hind legs, just as when Mr. ...
— Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue and Their Shetland Pony • Laura Lee Hope
... beyond the coldest places known! Perhaps he has found a cheerful and comfortable summer home, bright and bracing, somewhere near the North Pole, on which somebody will find him, may be, one of these days, quietly perched, preening himself, and looking at a distance like a bit of red cloth on a broomstick. If he has found a cozy spot away up there, he's smarter than any Arctic ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, V. 5, April 1878 - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... up reluctantly. "Thank you, I certainly shall," said he quite soberly. "But—must we go this minute? Surely you can sit out one number, and I'll promise after that to stand on my head and dance with a broomstick if ...
— The Twenty-Fourth of June • Grace S. Richmond
... Rape of the Lock." There is a whole literature of mockery: parodies like Prior's "Ballad on the Taking of Namur" and "The Country Mouse and the City Mouse"; Buckingham's "Rehearsal" and Swift's "Meditation on a Broomstick"; mock-heroics, like the "Dunciad" and "MacFlecknoe" and Garth's "Dispensary," and John Phillips' "Splendid Shilling" and Addison's "Machinae Gesticulantes"; Prior's "Alma," a burlesque of philosophy; Gay's "Trivia" and ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... threateningly, "Your 'will' is in your mother's pocket." It is in her pocket that she carries the rope for whipping the child. Another locution is, "Your will is in the corner" (i.e. the corner of the room in which stands the broomstick) (431. ...
— The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought • Alexander F. Chamberlain
... of snow and ice; Whether it feels Painful, when one congeals; How this man felt When he began to melt; Whether he wore his human form and face With any extraordinary grace; If many mortals fell As victims to the spell; Or if, As he stood, stark and stiff, With a bare broomstick in his arms, And not a trace of transcendental charms, That man of snow Grew wise enough to know That the Brook's hopes were but a Poet's dream, And well content to be again a stream, On the first sunny day, Flowed quietly away; Or what the end ...
— Verses for Children - and Songs for Music • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... way, but as hot as pepper. His name is Peter McDonald, and he is considerable well to do in the world. He is a Highlander; and when young went out to Canada in the employment of the North-west Fur Company, where he spent many years, and married, broomstick fashion, I suppose, a squaw. Alter her death he removed, with his two half-caste daughters, to St John's, New Brunswick; but his girls I don't think were very well received, on account of their colour, and he came down here and settled ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... that he'd purchase hosts Of squibs and sweets to mess the pantry; That horrid boy, and broomstick-ghosts On timid JANE would oft, and ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 103, October 1, 1892 • Various
... them came right up to the man, who was stooping down, as if he were going to jump over him, which so frightened the fellow that, instead of rising, he seized the short broomstick, with one hand on either end, and held it over his head. He remained a few seconds in this position, when the sheep made a spring, and jumped fairly over him, without touching ...
— Minnie's Pet Lamb • Madeline Leslie
... to make some use of her power and come out and carry me home on her broomstick steed," she answered, looking up at ...
— The Beautiful Eyes of Ysidria • Charles A. Gunnison
... say not, unless your back is proof against a broomstick," answered Fairfield, coarsely. "I tell my servant to treat all who call in ...
— Making His Way - Frank Courtney's Struggle Upward • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... her without making her his wife," said the priest. "He will jump over a broomstick with her and will ask me to help him,—so that your feelings and hers may be spared for a week or so. Mrs. O'Hara, he is a villain,—a vile, heartless, cowardly reprobate, so low in the scale of humanity that I degrade myself by spaking ...
— An Eye for an Eye • Anthony Trollope
... and a log house (can live in either); log barn; 20 acres in cultivation; 60 acres timber land; balance pasture land; well watered. We will sell this place for $1575. Will throw in a cook stove and all the household furniture, consisting of a frying-pan handle and a broomstick; also a cow and a yearling calf; also one bay heifer; also 8400 lbs. of hay, minus what the above-named stock have consumed during the winter; also 64 bushels of oats, subject to the above-mentioned diminution. ...
— Northern California, Oregon, and the Sandwich Islands • Charles Nordhoff
... about five feet apart and four feet to the crotches. Across them lay a green stick (lug-pole) somewhat thicker than a broomstick. Now cut three or four green crotches from branches, drive a nail in the small end of each, or cut a notch in it, invert the crotches, and hang them on the lug-pole to suspend kettles from. These pothooks are to be of different length so that the kettle can be adjusted ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... Moller. 'I'll see if he's willin' to say anyting to-night.' And down he set into a chair. Well, you'd have died! In a bit his head and legs begun to jerk like he had St. Vitus dance, and then he straightened out, stiff as a broomstick. It was the silliest thing ever I seen. I felt real sorry for Doc, he was so dead ...
— Kilo - Being the Love Story of Eliph' Hewlitt Book Agent • Ellis Parker Butler
... and all-besetting terrors of a woman's tongue? The moment Wolf entered the house, his crest fell, his tail drooped to the ground, or curled between his legs, he sneaked about with a gallows air, casting many a sidelong glance at Dame Van Winkle, and at the least flourish of a broomstick or ladle, he would fly to ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... fanatics like that, are bound to meddle with other people's consciences, I suppose we'll just have to let them do it. 'If it plazes her, it don't be hurtin' me,' as Mike Cassidy said when Judy hammered him with the broomstick. ...
— The End of the Rainbow • Marian Keith
... notice that he was even more solemn than usual. When she appeared, he gave one more glance at the spot he had been sweeping, and then grounded his broom like a musket, folded his hands on the end of the broomstick and looked at her as if he wondered what on earth had brought her to the palace at that moment, and wished that she would take herself off again ...
— The Heart of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... would never think to fear him; And you can not, must not hear him. He's so particular, you know, He'd just pick up his traps and go If but one little eye should peep That he thought was fast asleep. Searching broomstick, nails, and shelf, Till he finds the little stocking— Softly lest you hear his knocking— Smiling, chuckling to himself, He fills it from his Christmas store, And out he slips to ...
— Debris - Selections from Poems • Madge Morris
... of water and a broomstick he beat out the fire, and went for a run to warm up. But when he came back there was more wind, so that he could not keep warm in the tent, and more rain, so that he could not find shelter in the woods. In the end he discovered a ruined barn, in a ...
— Love's Pilgrimage • Upton Sinclair
... "We'll jump the broomstick in about a month from now," Dad said, full of satisfaction for his business stroke. "I aim to settle down and quit ...
— The Flockmaster of Poison Creek • George W. Ogden
... demanded his money. The butcher thought it was a joke, but the peasant said, "Jesting apart, I will have my money! Did not the great dog bring you the whole of the slaughtered cow three days ago?" Then the butcher grew angry, snatched a broomstick and drove him out. "Wait a while," said the peasant, "there is still some justice in the world!" and went to the royal palace and begged for an audience. He was led before the King, who sat there with his daughter, and ...
— Household Tales by Brothers Grimm • Grimm Brothers
... considered them beneath the dignity of his vocation. He says nothing of the valiant matron in Chatham Row who, in the impatience of her patriotism, hoisted the American flag over her door two hours before the stipulated moment, noon, and defended it against a British provost officer with her broomstick. Nor does he allude to the great scene at the principal flag-staff, which the retiring garrison had plentifully greased, and from which they had removed the blocks and halyards, in order to retard the hoisting of the stars and stripes. He does not tell ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton
... gingerbread cookies, and brown sticky squares of what was known in all circles in Elgin as taffy. She came, it was understood, with the dawn; with the night she vanished, spending the interval on a not improbable broomstick. Her gingerbread was better than anybody's; but there was no comfort in standing, first on one foot and then on the other, while you made up your mind—the horses were spirited and you could eat them a leg at a time, but there ...
— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan
... their surroundings of castles and donjons, savage landscapes and half-savage peoples, were in keeping; but those doings gravely reproduced with tinsel decorations and mock pageantry, by bucolic gentlemen with broomstick lances, and with muffin-rings to represent the foe, and all in the midst of the refinement and dignity of a carefully-developed modern ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... left Moscow for Paris, but on her way stayed in Vienna, studying under Professor Hellmer. One year later, at the Vienna Spring Exhibition, she exhibited her 'Die Hexe.' Here is no traditional witch, though the broomstick on which she will ride through the air is en evidence. She is a demoniac being, knowing her own power, and full of devilish instinct. The marble is full of life, and one seems to feel the warmth of her delicate, powerfully chiselled, ...
— Women in the fine arts, from the Seventh Century B.C. to the Twentieth Century A.D. • Clara Erskine Clement
... classic rule admits, and this arm has not the swelling proportions of life,—never seeing, that, though another statue was indeed designed for an Antinoues, this was never meant to be anything but a broomstick dressed in your grandfather's cloak, with a lantern in a pumpkin for a head. Oh, the dreariness of having to explain pleasantry! of appending to your banter Artemas Ward's parenthesis, "This is a goak"! of dealing with people who do not know the difference between a blow and a "love-pat," ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... broomstick form the subject of a poetical effusion, when the material of the broom itself is so often used in schools ...
— The Comic Latin Grammar - A new and facetious introduction to the Latin tongue • Percival Leigh
... you recollect they used to play at cricket In the bye-streets years ago, With a broomstick for a bat, a coat for wicket? Now the Bobbies hunt them so! The old ladies grumble at their skipping; The old gents object to their tip-cat; So they squat midst slums that shine like dirty dripping, Not knowing what the dickens to be at. And the young Town ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, March 15, 1890 • Various
... arms around an aged married man! Oh, if I had been there with my broomstick," cried Anastasia, "I'd have given a cadence, and spinning of legs to ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... inconceivable. I am in a condition to be surprised at nothing. If a witch on a broomstick rode in through my open window and lectured me on quaternions, I should accept her visit as a ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... mother-o'-pearl handle to it, and tries to cut the apple, but I could only make a mark on it such as you see on a hot-cross-bun. Then I looked at the blade of the knife, and it were just like silver, but were as blunt as a broomstick. However, I tried again, but it wouldn't cut; so I axes a tall chap in livery as stood behind my chair if they'd such a thing as a butcher's steel in the house, for I wanted to put an edge to my knife. Eh, you should have ...
— True to his Colours - The Life that Wears Best • Theodore P. Wilson
... if you ever saw my lovely chieftainess—if you have, you must be aware that it is impossible for any one to refuse her request, as she has more of the angel in face and temper than any one alive; so that if she had asked me to write a ballad on a broomstick I must have attempted it. I began a few verses, to be called the Goblin Page; and they lay long by me, till the applause of some friends whose judgement I valued induced me to resume the poem; so on I ...
— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various
... about twenty minutes ago," replied Hugh; "but you will overtake him within ten miles, at farthest. But, if mortal man could recover the girl, that fellow would do it, even if he had no better nag than a broomstick, like the ...
— Fanshawe • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... see for the first time, who were old acquaintances of theirs! There—grinning and brandishing his stick—was the Little Black Man who had worried Rudolf many a night as far back as he could remember. There was the Old Witch on the Broomstick, whom Ann had often described to him. There again, were other Bad Dreams that made the children almost smile as they remembered certain exciting times. The Angry Farmer—Rudolf had seen him before; he remembered ...
— The Wonderful Bed • Gertrude Knevels
... and down and round and round, faster and faster, growing smaller every second, until at last she was nothing but her real self, an ugly shriveled witch running round and round on a broomstick. With a loud shrill scream she mounted into the air and was away out of sight in an instant, leaving everybody staring open mouthed ...
— The Enchanted Island • Fannie Louise Apjohn
... pertinent to argue that because a sewer in a certain street needed cleansing, and because a proper array of men and buckets and brooms would cleanse it, therefore every man and woman on the streets, grave doctors of divinity, stately Mr. Dombey, Flora McFlimsey and Edmund Sparkler, should each shoulder broomstick or bucket, and plunge pell mell into the reeking filth. This argument proceeds upon the assumption that Christians can purge amusements only by using them in the forms and with the appliances attendant upon the world's abuse ...
— Amusement: A Force in Christian Training • Rev. Marvin R. Vincent.
... come forth and boast of her doings; can she show such a brood as mine? A wicked tyrant is that thieving Red-skin, and a bold rogue I warrant me. He would be captain in-doors, as well as out! An honest woman is no better in his eyes than one of your broomstick jumpers. And you, Ishmael Bush, the father of seven sons and so many comely daughters, to open your sinful mouth, except to curse him! Would ye disgrace colour, and family, and nation, by mixing white blood with red, and would ye be the parent of a race of mules! ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper
... Joe set his sponge, but it never would leaven; And as for Gib Jenkinson's cow that gaed yeld, It was very well known that Crummie was spelled. When Luckie Macrobie's sweet milk wouldna erne, The reason was clear—she bewitched the concern. True! no man could swear that he ever saw Her flee on a broomstick over North Berwick Law; But as for the fact, where was she that night When the heavens were blue with the levin-light? The broom wasna seen ahint the door; It had better to do than to sweep the floor. Then, sure there was something ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume XXIV. • Revised by Alexander Leighton
... trying still, no sooner had he got out of Peacepool, than there came running to him all the conjurers, fortune-tellers, astrologers, prophesiers, projectors, prestigiators, as many as were in those parts (and there are too many of them everywhere), Old Mother Shipton on her broomstick, with Merlin, Thomas the Rhymer, Gerbertus, Rabanus Maurus, Nostradamus, Zadkiel, Raphael, Moore, Old Nixon, and a good many in black coats and white ties who might have known better, considering in what ...
— The Water-Babies - A Fairy Tale for a Land-Baby • Charles Kingsley
... stage bellowing fearfully; the bull-dog seizes him by the nether extremities and hangs on with the tenacity of a vice. Round and round they run, Mujik roaring for help, bull-dog swinging out horizontally. The audience applauds; the master flings down his broomstick and seizes the dog by the tail; the old woman seizes master by the skirts of his coat; and all three are dragged around the stage at a terrific rate, while the younger members of the family shower down miscellaneous blows with their sticks and cudgels, which always happen ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne
... the vineyard). We were watching her riding up to the moon on your broomstick, Giuseppe. You will never ...
— The Man of Destiny • George Bernard Shaw
... broom-handle. Their cries summoned the others; and in a few moments the poor Hottentot was standing in the midst of an angry circle of chacmas, that were only prevented from springing in upon her by the expert manner in which she continued to ply the broomstick. ...
— The Bush Boys - History and Adventures of a Cape Farmer and his Family • Captain Mayne Reid
... Shipton, who had doubtless ridden on her broomstick from her Norfolk home, appeared and pronounced ...
— English Villages • P. H. Ditchfield
... not know that it is the awful magic mountain where the old witch who eats little children dwells?—and do you not know that she rides on a broomstick. I may need one to follow her, in case she has ...
— Operas Every Child Should Know - Descriptions of the Text and Music of Some of the Most Famous Masterpieces • Mary Schell Hoke Bacon
... formerly alluded to the well-known feats of the weird sisterhood on the broomstick; but it is affirmed that on these occasions the spirit left its earthly abode, the body being previously anointed with the ointment we have described. We cannot better illustrate this question (the possibility of which has been the subject-matter of many grave dissertations amongst the literati ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13, No. 355., Saturday, February 7, 1829 • Various
... should like my windows Egyptian, with hieroglyphics, sir; storks and coffins, and appropriate moldings above: I brought some from Fountains Abbey the other day. Look here, sir; angels' heads putting their tongues out, rolled up in cabbage leaves, with a dragon on each side riding on a broomstick, and the devil looking on from the mouth of an alligator, sir.[32] Odd, I think; interesting. Then the corners may be turned by octagonal towers, like the center one in Kenilworth Castle; with Gothic doors, portcullis, and all, quite ...
— The Poetry of Architecture • John Ruskin
... seeing a witch, not mounted on a broomstick, but on the respectable household cat, changed for that night into a flying fury; finally, along with my brothers, being captured, washed, and dressed, to join with other spirits worse than ourselves in "dooking" for apples and eating mashed potatoes ...
— Olivia in India • O. Douglas
... the cove in twelve hours," said Paul, "if this breeze lasts; it's blowing a gale out at sea, and the 'Polly' 'll fly like a witch on a broomstick." ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester
... quite a story. Little Juozapas, who was near crazy with hunger these days, had gone out on the street to beg for himself. Juozapas had only one leg, having been run over by a wagon when a little child, but he had got himself a broomstick, which he put under his arm for a crutch. He had fallen in with some other children and found the way to Mike Scully's dump, which lay three or four blocks away. To this place there came every day many hundreds of wagonloads of garbage and trash from the lake front, where ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... dearborn, Dame wouldn't be satisfied—not that she's avaricious—but den she must have something or somebody to snarl at, and I'm the unlucky dog at whom she always lets fly. Now, she got at me mit de broomstick so soon as I got back again; if I go home again, she will break my back. Tunner wasser! how sleepy I am—I can't go home, she will break my back—so I will sleep in de mountain to-night, and to-morrow I turn over a new leaf and drink no ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Rip van - Winkle • Charles Burke
... black, steadfast, all-seeing eyes; to feel those smooth, soft, all-soothing hands; to hear, across one's sleep, that three-footed step—the flat-soled left foot, the tiptoe right, and the padded end of the broomstick; and when one is so wakeful and restless and thought-driven, to have another's story given one. God, depend upon it, grows stories and lives as he does herbs, each with a mission ...
— Balcony Stories • Grace E. King
... died on the 27th of January, 1699. Swift then became chaplain to Lord Berkeley in Dublin Castle, and it was as a little surprise to Lady Berkeley, who liked him to read to her Robert Boyle's "Meditations," that Swift wrote the "Meditation on a Broomstick." In February, 1700, he obtained from Lord Berkeley the vicarage of Laracor with the living of Rathbeggan, also in the diocese of Meath. In the beginning of 1701 Esther Johnson, to whom Sir William Temple had bequeathed a leasehold farm in Wicklow, ...
— The Battle of the Books - and Other Short Pieces • Jonathan Swift
... a Welshman, Taffy was a thief, Taffy came to my house, and stole a piece of beef; I went to Taffy's house, Taffy was not at home; Taffy came to my house, and stole a marrow-bone. I went to Taffy's house, Taffy was in bed, I took up a broomstick and ...
— Children's Rhymes, Children's Games, Children's Songs, Children's Stories - A Book for Bairns and Big Folk • Robert Ford
... labor alone. The child needs to learn to work; but along with his work must be the opportunity for free and unrestricted activity, which can come only through play. The boy needs a chance to be a barbarian, a hero, an Indian. He needs to ride his broomstick on a dangerous raid, and to charge with lath sword the redoubts of a stubborn enemy. He needs to be a leader as well as a follower. In short, without in the least being aware of it, he needs to develop himself through his own activity—he needs freedom to play. If the child ...
— The Mind and Its Education • George Herbert Betts
... on a broomstick in Mother Goose," Mrs. Buck informed the hen and then since there was no hurry about the potatoes she fell to dreaming again. It was very peaceful on the shady porch with that whirlwind of a Judy gone for several hours on one of her crazy peddling jaunts. What a girl she was for plunging! Again ...
— The Comings of Cousin Ann • Emma Speed Sampson
... There was at once great excitement in the neighbourhood, because it was rumoured that the faeries had taken her. A villager was said to have long struggled to hold her from them, but at last they prevailed, and he found nothing in his hands but a broomstick. The local constable was applied to, and he at once instituted a house-to-house search, and at the same time advised the people to burn all the bucalauns (ragweed) on the field she vanished from, ...
— The Celtic Twilight • W. B. Yeats
... contributed would have sickened any man enjoying those blessings. But at that time we were out of 'em. You can't appreciate home till you've left it, money till it's spent, your wife till she's joined a woman's club, nor Old Glory till you see it hanging on a broomstick on the shanty of a consul ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... done over again in whatever way I thought proper on our return to Europe. But I was in far too great a Hurry to be Married to look too narrowly which way the Cat jumped; and a Romish Wedding is surely better than jumping over a Broomstick, which, unless we had adopted the uncouth Moresque custom, would have been all the Ceremony of Matrimony we could have had. So Pere Lefanu came privately, to avoid Gossip, to the Physician's House, and Lilias Lovell and John Dangerous were made One in the French Language, the contracting parties ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 3 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... disappeared, with her potent broomstick, behind the hedge of evergreens that shut off the backyard from our garden, in the wake of father and Jenny, who, being more speedy in their movements, were already out ...
— Young Tom Bowling - The Boys of the British Navy • J.C. Hutcheson
... roared the water-carrier; "is it you, ye bankrupt vagabonds, who have annoyed me? Begone; or by the sword of the Prophet, I'll impale you all three on my broomstick." ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Frederick Marryat
... this: She says that one hour after the thing was born the happy father was caught by the doctor and nurse seeing if it could hold its own weight up on a broomstick, like a monkey. She says he was acutely distressed when these authorities deprived him of the custody of his child. Wouldn't that fade you? Trying to see if a baby one hour old could chin itself! Quite all you would wish to ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson
... world where the marvellous child, Mozart, reigns like an enchanter. What though the tale of The Magic Flute is foolish beyond words. Who cares for the tale? Who thinks of the tale? It is only the wand in the hand of the magician. Though it be but a broomstick, it will open all the magic casements of earth and heaven, it will surround us with the choirs invisible, and send us forth into green pastures and by the ...
— Pebbles on the Shore • Alpha of the Plough (Alfred George Gardiner)
... reading a prosaic modern novel, and somewhere in the middle it turned without warning into a fairy tale. We should be surprised if one of the spinsters in Cranford, after tidily sweeping the room with a broom, were to fly away on a broomstick. Our attention would be arrested if one of Jane Austen's young ladies who had just met a dragoon were to walk a little further and meet a dragon. Yet something very like this extraordinary transition takes place in British history ...
— A Short History of England • G. K. Chesterton
... that he did not write an account of his travels in France; for as he is reported to have once said, that 'he could write the Life of a Broomstick[1155],' so, notwithstanding so many former travellers have exhausted almost every subject for remark in that great kingdom, his very accurate observation, and peculiar vigour of thought and illustration, would have produced a valuable ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell
... to all calls less emphatic than cold water and a broomstick, raised a rumpled head from ...
— Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch • Alice Caldwell Hegan
... when I love to gallop through history on Sir Walter's broomstick. At other hours it is pleasant to sit in converse with wise George Eliot. From her garden terrace I look down on Loamshire and its commonplace people; while in her quiet, deep voice she tells me of the hidden hearts that beat and throb beneath these ...
— Idle Ideas in 1905 • Jerome K. Jerome
... no muckle wi' heaven, I doubt, considering wha I carry ahint me—and as for hell, it will fight its ain battle at its ain time, I'se be bound.—Come, naggie, trot awa, man, an as thou wert a broomstick, ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... card to admire it further, and she scrutinized closely the funny old witch riding on a broomstick, after the ...
— Marjorie's Busy Days • Carolyn Wells
... never hears of these things till the mischief's done; all sorts of defects are found out in the stable door after the horse is stolen; there's an old woman turns up now. An old woman who seems to have been flying into town on a broomstick, every now and then. She watches the place a whole day before this fellow begins, and on the night when you saw him, she steals away with him and holds a council with him - I suppose, to make her report on going off duty, ...
— Hard Times • Charles Dickens*
... witch!" shouted Jack. "She rode in on a broomstick—she crept in through the keyhole. Where's the fire? Let's take her downstairs, and ...
— Jezebel • Wilkie Collins
... I will adopt you as my child," said she lightly. "Here I am with a son risen from the grave. Come! we will begin at once. I will go out and get what I want; you can dress, and come down to breakfast with me when I knock on the ceiling with the broomstick." ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... consarned old coot you! I tell you there's your hat, and there's the door: be off with yerself, quick metre, or I'll give ye a h'ist with the broomstick. ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IX (of X) • Various
... it! Wasn't he a jolly young chap who looked thoroughly well in his smart uniform; tall, broad-shouldered, strong of limb, with full ruddy face and black moustache; a fellow all the women ran after; was such as he to belong solely to a broomstick like his wife? It would be a sin and a shame! Lucky for her that she was so ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein
... wrists tied together with a handkerchief, and his legs secured just above the ankles with another handkerchief; his arms are then passed over his knees, and a broomstick is pushed over one arm, under both knees, and out again on the other side over the other arm. The "cocks" are now considered ready for fighting, and are carried into the center of the room, and placed opposite each other with their toes ...
— Games For All Occasions • Mary E. Blain
... smiled in a half-pitying way, took an old broomstick that he used for a poker, and scraping the ashes of the fire aside rolled the clay pig-pudding into the middle of the fire, and then covered it over with the burning ashes, and piled on some bits of wood and dry cabbage-stumps, making up a good fire, which ...
— Brownsmith's Boy - A Romance in a Garden • George Manville Fenn
... it, my lord count; for I was threatened with a broomstick when I tore it from the hands of the woman, who vowed I should not have a single potato. I dashed two ducats at her feet and made off with all speed; for the hour was almost up, and I had exhausted all my manners in the ten houses, which I had visited ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... If you're good and do whatever you're told, you shall sleep in a proper bedroom, and have lots to eat, and money to buy chocolates and take rides in taxis. If you're naughty and idle you will sleep in the back kitchen among the black beetles, and be walloped by Mrs. Pearce with a broomstick. At the end of six months you shall go to Buckingham Palace in a carriage, beautifully dressed. If the King finds out you're not a lady, you will be taken by the police to the Tower of London, where ...
— Pygmalion • George Bernard Shaw
... Jove, Mrs. Green, he was a damn lucky fellow to be able to do it," cried Vane, taking the kindly old hand in both his own. "If I wasn't afraid of him coming for me with a broomstick, I'd do the ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile
... forgive us! Well, there must be something in it,—there must be something in it, if it really gives you pleasure,—I daresay there is; we're so confoundedly uppish in the way we look at things. If either of them had a particle of drawing or a scrap of taste, if both of them weren't as bare as a broomstick of the least vestige of gift, or any suspicion of knowledge, there might be a good deal to say for them! Only, my dear Miss Bretherton, you see it's really not a matter of opinion; I assure you it isn't. I could prove to you as plain as that two and two make four, ...
— Miss Bretherton • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... birch-broom that was still too green and full of sap to be easily mastered; and she was in a very bad temper. Good day, Great-Aunt,' I said, I am your Great-Niece Viola.' I have no more use for great nieces,' she snapped, than for little ones.' And she continued to tussle with the broomstick and took no further notice of me. Then I went into the Hovel, where a fire burned on the hearth, and I took out my tools and fashioned a bit on the hob; and when it was ready I took it to her and said, This will teach it its manners'; and she put the bit on the broom, ...
— Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard • Eleanor Farjeon
... get out, I expect, when he wants to," replied the wrinkled humorist, with a weather-beaten grin. "They do say he whips off on a broomstick about once a month and steers for Bos-ton!" His fashion of utterance was a leisurely sing-song, like the roll of a vessel anchored ...
— Idolatry - A Romance • Julian Hawthorne
... drinking These-an'-That's cider and laughing with These-an'-That's wife, until the pair, very likely, took too much, and the woman without any cause broke into a passion, flew at the little man, and drove him out of doors, with broomstick or talons, while the gamekeeper hammered on the table and roared at the sport. His employer was an absentee who hated the Parson, so the Parson groaned in vain over ...
— Noughts and Crosses • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... and she hoped for a backward look before he turned in at the door. But he was absorbed in sailing a broomstick across Aunt Melvy's pathway, causing her to drop her basket and start after him ...
— Sandy • Alice Hegan Rice
... the shoulder and held her at arm's-length. She writhed and struggled and cursed. Her oaths might have been learned in the gutter. She kicked at him and strove to reach him with her nails, clawing the air. She looked like a witch on a broomstick. ...
— The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories • Gertrude Atherton
... look on as a fault of promise. There is always a chance that luxuriance may be pruned, but none short of a miracle that a broomstick may be made to blossom. There is, however, one absolute, and not relative fault in the book, which we find it harder to forgive, since it is one of instinct rather than of Art. The author seems to us prone to confound the terrible, (the only true subject of Art) with the horrible. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 5, No. 28, February, 1860 • Various
... ought not to be buried in consecrated ground; but as the old lady had left money to the church, her tombstone was erected after all in the little churchyard. The village boys declared that they had seen her riding on a broomstick over the church spire; but the Count did not believe such tales. He wondered what had become of the child; she was the prettiest, as well as the most mischievous and ...
— Fairy Tales from the German Forests • Margaret Arndt
... be drest by one: Where is that cur—(and I am loth To say that Betty swore an oath)— The sirloin's spoiled: I'll give it him!"— And Betty did look fierce and grim. Bob, who saw mischief in her eye, Avoided her—approaching nigh: He feared the broomstick, too, with physics As dread ...
— Fables of John Gay - (Somewhat Altered) • John Gay
... poor, broken thing! And there don't seem to be anybody to look after them. Mrs. Fotheringham is about as much good as a broomstick. Every family ought to keep a supply of superfluous girls. They're like the army—useless in peace and indispensable in war. Ha! here's ...
— The Testing of Diana Mallory • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... for their board, and there were many families where help was needed, both in Nepash and Litchfield, since every available man had gone to the war by this time. But while they talked a great scuffling and squawking in the woodhouse attracted the boys upstairs. Joe seized the tongs and Diana the broomstick. An intruding weasel was pursued and slaughtered; but not till two fowls, fat and fine, had been sacrificed by the invader and the tongs together. The children were all hungry, with the exhaustion of the cold weather, and clamoured to have these victims cooked for ...
— Good Cheer Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... flung back as quickly as its worn hinges and sagging bottom would allow, and a large body surmounted by a face like a big round full moon presented itself in the opening. A broomstick showed itself aggressively ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various
... in Hobart Town gaol, taken on the Shannon, exhibited these feats of quickness and strength. He would spring up into the air five feet, and reel round and round, with uncommon rapidity. He threw a broomstick, at twelve yards distance, through a hole in the sentry box, of but little larger diameter; and a lath, cast at thirty yards, pierced a hat through and through. They used no ...
— The History of Tasmania , Volume II (of 2) • John West
... the bottom stair to laugh for a second, then she handed the General to Pip. "To-morrow," she said, standing up and hastily smoothing the rich hair that the General's hands had clutched gleefully—"to-morrow I shall beat every one of you with the broomstick." ...
— Seven Little Australians • Ethel Sybil Turner
... England. There was a frightful massacre of the settlers once upon a time, and a frightful revenge. Also there was a witch, who lies buried under a great stone, so huge that she can't possibly squeeze through at night to ride on her deserted broomstick. There are legends, too, and the nicest we heard was the ghost-tale of Pirate Trickey, who was hanged on the seashore. That atonement wasn't enough for his crimes, though! He still haunts the beach, ever binding sand with a rope, and groaning above the sound of the waves ...
— The Lightning Conductor Discovers America • C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson and A. M. (Alice Muriel)
... that he did not write an account of his travels in France; for as he is reported to have once said, that 'he could write the Life of a Broomstick,' so, notwithstanding so many former travellers have exhausted almost every subject for remark in that great kingdom, his very accurate observation, and peculiar vigour of thought and illustration, would have produced a ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... times, when people were more afraid of the Devil and of witches than they are now, they liked to have a priest or a minister somewhere near to scare 'em off; but nowadays, if you could find an old woman that would ride round the room on a broomstick, Barnum would build an amphitheatre to exhibit her in; and if he could come across a young imp, with hoofs, tail, and budding horns, a lineal descendant of one of those "daemons" which the good people of Gloucester fired at, and were fired at by "for the best part of a month ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... dining room beyond. Just who were the housebreakers no man present could say; but Mistress McGann that afternoon communicated her suspicion to her sore-headed spouse, and did it boldly and with the aid of a broomstick. "It's all along," she said, "av your shtoopin' to dhrink wid them low lived salvages at Hay's. Now, ...
— A Daughter of the Sioux - A Tale of the Indian frontier • Charles King
... costume consists of a union suit (Munsing or any other standard brand), corset, brassiere, chemise, underpetticoat, overpetticoat, long black skirt, long black stockings, shoes, black waist and shawl, with a pointed witch's hat and a broomstick. The "modern" witch's costume is much simpler and inexpensive ...
— Perfect Behavior - A Guide for Ladies and Gentlemen in all Social Crises • Donald Ogden Stewart
... said to himself, as the house grew plainer; 'rebuilt at the worst time, by a man with no more taste than a broomstick. Still, he was the sixteenth owner, from ...
— Elizabeth's Campaign • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... the back seat of the box, whilst his Royal Highness made talk with the Beauty; to go out and fetch the carriage, and walk downstairs with that d—— crooked old dowager, that looks as if she usually rode on a broomstick, by Jove, or else with that bony old painted sheep-faced companion, who's raddled like an old bell-wether. I think, Newcome, you seem rather hit by the Belle Cousine—so was I last season; so were ever so ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... as to form a tongs; and gathered up in a corner was a truss of straw, covered with a rug and a thin old blanket, which had constituted a wretched substitute for a bed. That, however, which alarmed Barney most, was an old broomstick with a stump of worn broom attached to the end of it, as it stood in an opposite corner. This constituted the whole furniture of ...
— The Evil Eye; Or, The Black Spector - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... to know where all the brats offa junk heaps that witches use in their doin's gets to in the end? Watch the chimney! Maybe it flew outa there on a broomstick. ...
— The Dramatic Works of Gerhart Hauptmann - Volume II • Gerhart Hauptmann
... excellent materials to form one out of: but whilst the only merit an officer possesses is his ability to raise men; whilst those men consider and treat him as an equal, and in the character of an officer, regard him no more than a broomstick, being mixed together as one common herd; no order nor discipline can prevail, nor will the officer ever meet with that respect which is essentially necessary ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 2 (of 5) • John Marshall
... required in the play. No one had genius nor ambition enough to create an entire one, but a very realistic head was constructed, and this, fastened to a broomstick and thrust forward at the psychological moment, produced a startling and thrilling effect. The audience was stirred to its depth. Most of the young people were either on the stage or behind the curtain; but the few who were ...
— Janet of the Dunes • Harriet T. Comstock
... old squire, whom I have mentioned more than once, is an odd figure, with his bluff, red face,—coarsely red,—set in silver hair,— his clumsy legs, which he moves in a strange straddle, using, I believe, a broomstick for a staff. The breadth of back of these fat men is ...
— Passages From The American Notebooks, Volume 1 • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... is needed to transform the scene into a giant Hallowe'en festival is to have a witch whisk by on a broomstick, or a ghost bob up from behind a tombstone," declared Mrs. Tolman. "Just think! If we had come by train we would have ...
— Steve and the Steam Engine • Sara Ware Bassett
... fear.... I venture that many a vote for prohibition comes from gentlemen who look longingly through swinging doors—and pass on in propitiation of Satan and their alert consorts, the lake of brimstone and the corrective broomstick.... ...
— Damn! - A Book of Calumny • Henry Louis Mencken
... I heard something outside the shed," said Christian. "I wish troubles would come in the daytime, for then a man could show his courage, and hardly beg for mercy of the most broomstick old woman he should see, if he was a brave man, and able to run out of ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... why a woman should exhibit an overgrown broomstick when an Italian train passes a flag station, any more than I know why, when a squad of Paris firemen march out of the engine house for exercise, they should carry carbines and knapsacks. I only know ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... learned from her that the dark hag, which had somewhat puzzled him in the butler's account of his master's avocations, had nothing to do either with a black cat or a broomstick, but was simply a portion of oak copse which was to be felled that day. She offered, with diffident civility, to show the stranger the way to the spot, which, it seems, was not far distant; but they were prevented by the appearance of the Baron of Bradwardine ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... unsympathetic, and wouldn't have cared if Miss Dierdre O'Farrell had flown off on a broomstick, or been kidnapped by a German aviator. My heart, however, was sure that nothing had happened and I suspected that her brother had trumped up an excuse to join us. It vexed me that Brian should show concern. If only he knew how ...
— Everyman's Land • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... mia, you should have seen this paladin," he continued, coming forward. "Why, Orlando was never half so furious as he when he stood there telling them what manner of dirt they were, and bidding them to bed ere he drove them with a broomstick." ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini
... to amuse her in the sitting-room, Zo had tried the bedroom next. She now returned to Ovid, dragging after her a long white staff that looked like an Alpen-stock. "What's this?" she asked. "A broomstick?" ...
— Heart and Science - A Story of the Present Time • Wilkie Collins
... member who discovered, after the committee meeting, that the address on the forsaken broomstick's collar was: Number 100 ...
— Living Alone • Stella Benson
... make other things clean, and be nasty itself; at length, worn to the stumps in the service of the maids, it is either thrown out-of-doors, or condemned to the last use of kindling a fire. When I beheld this I sighed, and said within myself, "Surely mortal man is a broomstick!" Nature sent him into the world strong and lusty, in a thriving condition, wearing his own hair on his head, the proper branches of this reasoning vegetable, till the ax of intemperance has lopped off his green boughs, and left him a withered trunk; he then ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume III (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland I • Francis W. Halsey
... it remained. Anna Apenborg had disappeared amongst the first, and presently a terrific cry was heard from the courtyard, as if not alone the cloister, but the whole world was in flames. Curses, cries, menaces, threats, screams, all mingled together, and shouts of "Run for a broomstick! the accursed witch! the evil hag! let us ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... to apply logic here, as he was attempting to do, was like—not like attacking a fortification with a penknife, for a penknife might win its way through the granite ribs of Cronstadt—it was like attacking an eclipse with a broomstick: there was a solution to the difficulty; but as the difficulty itself was deeper than he knew, so the answer to it lay higher than he could reach—was in fact at once grander and finer than he was yet ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... this, she had provided herself with a long and deadly instrument, with which, in times of peace, the chambermaid was wont to demolish the labours of the industrious spider. In vulgar phrase, she had taken up the broomstick, and was just about to sally from the kitchen, when Jones accosted her with a demand of a gown and other vestments, to cover ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... religion. If he thought the family were out of hearing, he would grow very animated and declamatory. But Rose, who also had hopes, though perhaps faint, for my salvation, would suddenly rush into the room with the carpet broom, and drive him out, with threats of Miss Aglae, and the broomstick. ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke
... over and looking into the darkness, was trying to see whether this awful news was true, he took a broomstick, and with a vigorous dash broke down the pipe of communication—and told me this morning, with great glee, that he was reminded of that 'aisy sthratagem by remembering his dorling Emilie, when she acted the pawrt of Cora in the Plee—and by the bridge in Pezawro, bedad.' I wish ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... for she had not worn it since early in April when there were no cockle-burs. She forthwith nailed a horseshoe on the door to keep the witches out, and she never liked the shawl so well after she had projected a mental picture of a lady wearing it, riding on a broomstick, and sporting also ...
— Down the Ravine • Charles Egbert Craddock (real name: Murfree, Mary Noailles)
... to the Pasiegos, (52) are the best cudgel-players in Spain, and in the world. Francisco held in his hand part of a broomstick, which he had broken in the stable, whence he had just ascended. With the swiftness of lightning he foiled the stroke of Chaleco, and, in another moment, with a dexterous blow, struck the sword out of his hand, sending ...
— The Zincali - An Account of the Gypsies of Spain • George Borrow
... bluff, too. Just as if we didn't know that as soon as the rest of us innocents are quiet and dreaming of blueberries, your window will fly open and off you'll go on a broomstick." ...
— The Opened Shutters • Clara Louise Burnham
... looked triumphantly round at the company. 'Now, guess who wrote that!' he said. Zelter rose from his place beside the pianoforte, and, looking over Felix's shoulder, cried out: 'Why, it is Beethoven's writing! One can see that a mile off! He always writes as if he used a broomstick for a pen, and then wiped his sleeve ...
— Story-Lives of Great Musicians • Francis Jameson Rowbotham
... had done blessing her, a great noise was heard in the courtyard, and word was brought that the thirteenth fairy was come, with a black cap on her head, and black shoes on her feet, and a broomstick in her hand: and presently up she came into the dining-hall. Now, as she had not been asked to the feast she was very angry, and scolded the king and queen very much, and set to work to take her revenge. So she cried out, 'The king's daughter shall, in her fifteenth year, be ...
— Grimms' Fairy Tales • The Brothers Grimm
... general topic of conversation, some one said, "Surely that Vanessa must be an extraordinary woman that could inspire the Dean to write so finely upon her." Mrs. Johnson smiled, and answered that "she thought that point not quite so clear; for it was well known the Dean could write finely upon a broomstick."—JOHNSON: Life ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... when the Dawn"—you remember it? I happen to know all about that. A fellow about town somehow got hold of an idea for a melody; he didn't know a note, but he whistled it to Sykes, and Sykes dotted it down. Now, Sykes knows no more of harmony than a broomstick, so he got another man to harmonise it, and then a fourth fellow wrote an orchestral accompaniment. That's the kind of thing—division of labour ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing
... duty here for the witches' broomstick and the fairies' rush of European tales, but a similar conveyance is, I think, not unknown to ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... Stella heard that Swift had written beautifully regarding her, "That doesn't surprise me," said Mrs. Stella, "for we all know the Dean could write beautifully about a broomstick." A woman—a true woman! Would you have had one ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... house his crest fell, his tail drooped to the ground, or curled between his legs, he sneaked about with a gallows air, casting many a sidelong glance at Dame Van Winkle, and at the least flourish of a broomstick or ladle he would fly to ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... lad; but in mind he remained always at the happy age of two, and therefore continued to play with very small children. The bigger children of the neighborhood, from four to seven years old, did not care to play with him, because he could not learn their songs and games. His favorite toy was a broomstick, which he used as a hobby-horse; and for hours at a time he would ride on that broomstick, up and down the slope in front of my house, with amazing peals of laughter. But at last he became troublesome by reason of his noise; and I had ...
— Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things • Lafcadio Hearn
... went so far as to mount the shining leather seat of his latest purchase and circle the kitchen table (Boof scampering alongside), the priest would look on with genuine interest, though the pretend-bicycle was the same broomstick which, on other occasions, galloped the floor as a ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... a broomstick-steed's assistance? The sturdiest he-goat I would gladly see: The way we take, our ...
— Faust • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe |
