"Catch fire" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... doing something remarkable. Dickie might tumble into a pond and he might save her life—only there was no water deep enough to drown her, and if there were he could not swim. Or the house might catch fire. That would do better. It would be in the night, and Ambrose would be the only one awake, and would have to rouse his father, who slept at the other end of the house. He would wrap himself in a blanket, force his way through smothering smoke and scorching flames, cross ...
— Penelope and the Others - Story of Five Country Children • Amy Walton
... the pitiful part of it. But a terrible lot of fires do start in the woods almost every year. You see, after a hot, dry summer, when there hasn't been much rain, the woods catch fire easily, and a small fire, if it isn't stamped out at once, grows and spreads very fast, so that it soon gets to be almost impossible ...
— The Camp Fire Girls in the Mountains - or Bessie King's Strange Adventure • Jane L. Stewart
... some things that even genius itself don't know how to manage," says E. E., nodding her head, and smiling slyly; "but they can be done. As soon as we get to Washington, all the papers there will catch fire from New York, and the Senate will get up another committee, and vote you a seat in the diplomatic gallery by ballot. We'll break right into the Japanese furore, and carry off the palm," says she, kindling up like a heap of pine shavings when ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens
... boat in case of fire. It's an inheritance from steamboats—pure precedent—and useless, for a submarine cannot catch fire. Why, a few turns of that wheel when in the awash trim would admit enough water in two minutes to sink the boat. I've applied for permission ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson
... yard apart, and were joined together at the top, at which part the oven was hung over a wood fire. This grand cooking machine was, of course, outside the tent. Sometimes I have seen a joint of meat catch fire in one of these ovens, and it is difficult to extinguish it before the fat has burnt itself away, when the meat looks like ...
— A Lady's Visit to the Gold Diggings of Australia in 1852-53. • Mrs. Charles (Ellen) Clacey
... Calico Clown is burning! He will catch fire!" cried the Candy Babbit. "Will no one ...
— The Story of a Bold Tin Soldier • Laura Lee Hope
... Scott and Burns made immortal. It is a character full of curious contrasts, with its strong predilection for theology and metaphysics on one side, and for poetry and romance on the other. Hard, dry and practical in its attitude to the ordinary affairs of life, it is apt to catch fire from a sudden enthusiasm, as if volatility were its dominant note and instability its only fixed attribute. And so it has come about that side by side with tomes of Calvinistic divinity, there has been transmitted to Scotsmen an equally ...
— Scotland's Mark on America • George Fraser Black
... building, the wall built up of clay, and then plastered with a composition made by the boors, which becomes excessively hard in time; after which it is whitewashed. The roof was thatched with a hard sort of rushes, more durable and less likely to catch fire than straw. There was no ceiling under the roof, but the rafters overhead were hung with a motley assemblage of the produce of the chase and farm, as large whips made of rhinoceros-hide, leopard and lion skins, ostrich ...
— The Mission • Frederick Marryat
... new master, was in every respect a great contrast with Mr Gordon. He was not so brilliant in his acquirements, nor so vigorous in his teaching, and therefore clever boys did not catch fire from him so much as from the fourth-form master. But he was a far truer and deeper Christian; and, with no less scrupulous a sense of honour and detestation of every form of moral obliquity, he never yielded to those storms of passionate ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar
... out on the branches to the opposite side— going as far as we could to avoid the smoke. We feared, all the while, that the hanging mass, or even the tree itself, might catch fire, and force us to leap into the midst of our enemies. Fortunately, however, we had clean stripped those branches that hung directly over the blazing heap; and as yet the flames did not mount high enough ...
— The Desert Home - The Adventures of a Lost Family in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... but gradually approaching nearer and nearer, and at length flinging his bare feet around the flaring lights. Round them and over them, in between them and outside them, until it was a mystery how the bare feet were not burnt and the ragged trousers did not catch fire. Over and over again he stopped for breath, until the loud stamping of feet and cries of applause, in which Tudor joined vociferously, encouraged him to begin again. The music waxed faster and faster, and Neddy danced with more marvellous rapidity, until ...
— Garthowen - A Story of a Welsh Homestead • Allen Raine
... the explosive decomposition of picric acid are also deserving of attention in this connection. If a small quantity of picric acid be heated in a moderate fire, in a crucible, or even in an open test tube, it will melt (at 120 deg. C. commercial acid), then give off vapours which catch fire upon contact with air, and burn with a sooty flame, without exploding. If the burning liquid be poured out upon a cold slab, it will soon go out. A small quantity carefully heated in a tube, closed at one end, can even be completely ...
— Nitro-Explosives: A Practical Treatise • P. Gerald Sanford
... woman," he said, "and a bit smitten with me. Begad, these French women have a great deal to recommend them. Thy catch fire at once. A man does not have to spend a month dilly-dallying with them, dancing attendance and looking like a fool while they are as cold as ice all the time. Give me a good full-blooded filly like ...
— The Northern Iron - 1907 • George A. Birmingham
... waste apartment; nor are the vapours of mortality, with which this vault is apt to be filled, if the fire is permitted to become extinct, indifferent to the lungs of the dainty and the healthy, like your worship, though to me they are become habitual. The wood will catch fire, although it is some time ere the damps of the grave are overcome by the drier air, and the warmth ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... best to spare ourselves and you the ignominy of that fib. The doctors will order Donald away for a complete rest for six months, and dad will go with him. When they're gone that Brent house on the Sawdust Pile is going to catch fire—accidently, mysteriously. The man who scuttled the Brent's motor-boat surely will not scruple at such a simple matter as burning the Brent shanty. Come, mother. Jane, for goodness' sake, do buck up! Good-by, dear ...
— Kindred of the Dust • Peter B. Kyne
... this world there is always danger for those who are afraid of it. There's a danger that the house will catch fire in the night; but we shan't sleep any the less ...
— The Devil's Disciple • George Bernard Shaw
... I said. 'But you must begin at the right end. First find the race that fears its priests. It is waiting for you—the Mussulmans of Somaliland and the Abyssinian border and the Blue and White Nile. They would be like dried grasses to catch fire if you used the flint and steel of their religion. Look what the English suffered from a crazy Mullah who ruled only a dozen villages. Once get the flames going and they will lick up the pagans of the west and south. This is the ...
— Greenmantle • John Buchan
... cauterize, sear, burn in; corrode, char, calcine, incinerate; smelt, scorify[obs3]; reduce to ashes; burn to a cinder; commit to the flames, consign to the flames. boil, digest, stew, cook, seethe, scald, parboil, simmer; do to rags. take fire, catch fire; blaze &c. (flame) 382. Adj. heated &c. v.; molten, sodden; rchauff; heating &c. v.; adust[obs3]. inflammable, combustible; diathermal[obs3], diathermanous[obs3]; burnt &c. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... grass and beautiful flowers, we should call it a prairie. In the summer it is a vast sea of waving grass. On the prairie we might find herds of wild horses and cattle, which feed upon the rich grass. If it were late in the summer, when the grass is dry and crisp, it might catch fire, and we might then see a grand sight—a ...
— Home Geography For Primary Grades • C. C. Long
... into the extensive lumber district, but had not caught the dock line. Behind the dock, adjacent to the Spreckels sugar warehouse and wharf, were hundreds of freight cars. Had these been allowed to catch fire, the flames would have swept down the entire water front to ...
— Complete Story of the San Francisco Horror • Richard Linthicum
... left foot at the same movement, to take hold of the map or plan, or upright, or whatever it was, and with out-stretched neck meeting it half way,—to advance it towards her; on which my uncle Toby's passions were sure to catch fire—for he would instantly take hold of the other corner of the map in his left hand, and with the end of his pipe in the ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... if there is a panic where the fire starts. Never throw away a lighted match, it may fall on inflammable material and start fire. Reading in bed is dangerous, as if you go to sleep the bed-clothes may catch fire. If you must dry your clothes by ...
— How Girls Can Help Their Country • Juliette Low
... the charm of which they talk. Warmth, or perhaps heat, is a better word for it. Fortunately I'm proof against it because of what you might call an asbestos temperament; but I've seen it catch fire in a crowd, and it sweeps over an audience like a blaze over a prairie. It is a cheap kind of oratory; yet it is a power in unscrupulous hands—and Vetch ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... through the snow, down to the ground, all over the proposed plot. When a suitable site had been found the snow was then cleared away down to the very moss, in the shape of a circle. When a prolonged stay was contemplated, even the moss was cut up and removed, as it was very liable when dry to catch fire. A quantity of poles were then procured, proportionate in number and length to the size of the tent cloth and the number of persons the tent was intended to contain. Two of the longest poles were tied together at the top and raised to an angle of about 45 degrees from the ground, so that the ...
— Pioneers in Canada • Sir Harry Johnston
... handkerchief carelessly into the left side of his bosom, he took the candle, which by this time had burnt very low, and holding his head back, he applied the flame to the handkerchief, which instantly seemed to catch fire. 'What do you think of that?' said he to the Hungarian. 'Why, that you have ruined me,' said the latter. 'No harm done, I assure you,' said the jockey, who presently, clapping his hand on his bosom, extinguished the fire, ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... picture work," agreed Mr. Sneed, who seemed never to get over his "grouch." Then he went on: "It's dangerous, too. Suppose this barn should catch fire? ...
— The Moving Picture Girls at Oak Farm - or, Queer Happenings While Taking Rural Plays • Laura Lee Hope
... while—almost every day, in fact—the earth trembles and shakes in the Happy Islands. The houses are built mostly of wood and paper, and if the earthquakes tumble them over, they sometimes catch fire, but if the nicest things are safe in the Kura, it doesn't matter so much, if the house is ...
— THE JAPANESE TWINS • Lucy Fitch Perkins
... prepared to meet them in the field. He pertinently asked:—"Will the Bourbons, blind to their own interests, wish the spirit of independence to cross the Atlantic? Can they be exempt from fear, lest their own colonists should catch fire at the doctrine of the unlimited rights of mankind, and prefer them to slavery and digging of gold? And will not great danger arise from the vicinity of powerful states freed from European control?" Finally, it was urged in defence of the speech and address, that the only question which ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... had built, with his own hands, their small, rude home; and it stood deep in the wild wood, whose trees would, at times, catch fire from the sparks thrown from the steam en-gines some miles off. Near the Gar-field home was their field of grain; one day this caught fire, and in trying to save his wheat, the fa-ther of lit-tle James lost his life. It was a hard life to which he left ...
— Lives of the Presidents Told in Words of One Syllable • Jean S. Remy
... heard, firm and imperative. He had long been accustomed to danger, and now he faced it with his indomitable energy, as if such scenes were his proper element:—"Down from your horses," cried he; "let two of you keep them steady. Strip off your shirts, linen, anything that will catch fire; quick, not a minute is to be lost." Saying this, he ignited some tinder with the pan of his pistol, and was soon busy in making a fire with all the clothes we now threw to him. Then we tore up withered grass and Buffalo-dung, and dashed them on ...
— Monsieur Violet • Frederick Marryat
... most fragil pipes. Chimnies of an inch square, made in the thickness of the plaster of ceilings or walls, tubes even of gummed silk would answer this purpose. The end alone of the tube, which, by bringing the inflammable gas into contact with the atmospheric air, allows it to catch fire, and on which the flame reposes, ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... Khuda," said Laili, "to make us both young again, and then we shall be married." So the prince prayed to Khuda, and Khuda said to him, "Touch Laili's clothes and they will catch fire, and when they are on fire, she and you will become young again." When he touched Laili's clothes they caught fire, and she and he became young again. And there were great feasts, and they were married, and travelled to the Phalana country to see ...
— Indian Fairy Tales • Collected by Joseph Jacobs
... location of this rival of the Comstock lode. The aged man was tied hand and foot and beaten and abused the whole night long. In pushing splinters under his toenails, the lamp was upset, kerosene was spilled over his feet to catch fire. A quarrel ensued as to whether the fire should be extinguished or allowed to burn. A fist-fight developed and they abandoned the cabin, leaving Maddy ...
— David Lannarck, Midget - An Adventure Story • George S. Harney
... thoughtfully by every one, especially by heads of families—not only for their own sakes, but for the sake of those whom God has committed to their care. For suppose that, (despite the improbability of such an event), your dwelling really did catch fire, how inconceivable would be the bitterness added to your despair, if, in the midst of gathering smoke and flames—with death staring you in the face, and rescue all but hopeless—you were compelled to feel that you and yours ...
— Personal Reminiscences in Book Making - and Some Short Stories • R.M. Ballantyne
... What can she be to me? I am not afraid of the big child here," and she tapped Dominic's forearm on which he rested his head with a fascinated stare. "With us two it is for life and death, and I am rather pleased that there is something yet in him that can catch fire on occasion. I would have thought less of him if he hadn't been able to get out of hand a little, for something really fine. As for you, Signorino," she turned on me with an unexpected and sarcastic sally, "I am not in love with you yet." She changed her tone from sarcasm to a soft ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... catch fire from the torch and burn before they have flown very far. The following description is for making a tissue-paper balloon about 6 ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics
... Fortune, out of her close-hidden hand, laid down a trump thereon with quiet sneering smile? And she would! He knew, somehow, that he should not thrive. His children would die of the measles, his horses break their knees, his plate be stolen, his house catch fire, and Mark Armsworth die insolvent. What a fool he was, to fancy such nonsense! Here he had been slaving all his life to keep his father: and now he could keep him; why, he would be justified, right, a good son, in doing the thing. How hard, how unjust of those upper Powers in which he ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume II. • Charles Kingsley
... Henry rave about poetry! You used to catch fire like tinder on the subject when you were ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... to say," answered Rooney. "Perhaps he'd blow up or catch fire if he were to try. ...
— Red Rooney - The Last of the Crew • R.M. Ballantyne
... their prospect of a speedy deliverance from captivity. They knew very well, also, that considerable danger must be run should the pirate engage the man-of-war. Shot might enter the cabin, or the ship might catch fire, or blow up, or be sent to the bottom; or the pirates, when they had lost all hope of escaping, might, in their rage, revengefully ...
— The Missing Ship - The Log of the "Ouzel" Galley • W. H. G. Kingston
... that anything I had written could be the means of the least good to you, is worth all the trumpet blowing of a vulgar fame. Oh, of course, I do not exaggerate, though your generosity does. I understand the case as it is. We burn straw and it warms us. My verses catch fire from you as you read them, and so you see them in that light of your own. But it is something to be used to such an end by such a man, and I thank you, thank you, and so does my husband, for the deep pleasure you have given us in the words you ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume II • Elizabeth Barrett Browning
... she will not come. She laughs to scorn all that I say. She stands upon the parapet of the roof, tossing her arms, and crying aloud as she sees building after building catch fire, and the great billows of flame rolling along. Oh, it is terrible to see and to hear her! Methinks she has gone distraught. Prithee, go fetch her down by force, dear father, for I trow that naught ...
— The Sign Of The Red Cross • Evelyn Everett-Green
... the heat was great. Out of a sky burnt almost to white the glare descended into the narrow brick-yards. The packing straw seemed ready to catch fire; the heaps of wet clay, which two boys were shovelling, smoked, emitting as it did so an unpleasant wet odour. On passing the archway they caught sight of three black coats and three soft hats like the one Mr. ...
— A Mummer's Wife • George Moore
... royal qualities abound in that high young Lady; had they left the world, and grown to mere costume elsewhere, you might find certain of them again here. Most brave, high and pious-minded; beautiful too, and radiant with good-nature, though of temper that will easily catch fire: there is perhaps no nobler woman then living. And she fronts the roaring elements in a truly grand feminine manner; as if Heaven itself and the voice of Duty called her: "The Inheritances which my Fathers left me, we will ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... enjoyed my father's wealth, had all sorts of people ready to do his will. Only for him to hint at a thing, and his satellites would do it. Thus, one day a herd of cattle would get into a cornfield and destroy it; and on another, without any apparent reason, a corn-mow would catch fire. We could never trace it to them, but we always knew by the jeering laugh on Tresidder's face when he passed us who was the ...
— The Birthright • Joseph Hocking
... next astern, at once fired a torpedo at the second ship in the German line, a four-funnelled cruiser, and hit her between the second funnel and the mainmast, when "she appeared to catch fire fore and aft simultaneously, heeled right over to starboard, and undoubtedly sank." Eblis loosed off a second torpedo and turned aside to reload, firing at the same time to distract the enemy's attention from Gehenna, who was now ablaze fore and ...
— Sea Warfare • Rudyard Kipling
... glimm'ring o'er the green, All die away.—— For now the sun, slow moving in his grandeur, Above the eastern mountains lifts his head. The webs of dew spread o'er the hoary lawn, The smooth clear bosom of the settled pool, The polish'd ploughshare on the distant field, Catch fire from him, and dart their new got ...
— Poems, &c. (1790) • Joanna Baillie
... sentiment-proof overall, a species of mistrust of the emotional or lyrical, a kind of contempt of sympathy and feeling. And every day he was more and more tempted to lay rude hands on this garment; to see whether he could not make her catch fire, and flare up with some emotion or idea. In spite of her tantalizing, youthful self-possession, he saw that she felt this longing in him, and now and then he caught a glimpse of a streak of recklessness in ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... required an incredibly long time to make them catch fire; and M. Saint Pavin, kneeling before the hearth, was stirring them up, and scattering them, to ...
— Other People's Money • Emile Gaboriau
... take and dig a hole and stick sticks up in it. Then they'd make up the dirt and put water in it and pull grass and mix it in the dirt. They'd build a frame on the sticks and then put the mud on. The chimney couldn't catch fire till the house got old and the mud would fall off. When it got old and the mud got to fallin off, then they would be a fire. I've seen that since I ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume II, Arkansas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... peculiar that so many of my opponents catch fire. The others, in jest, say it is mental suggestion; they say all I need do is attack one of the enemy and he catches fire or, at ...
— An Aviator's Field Book - Being the field reports of Oswald Boelcke, from August 1, - 1914 to October 28, 1916 • Oswald Boelcke
... clothes should catch fire, do not run; the wind you make will only fan the flames, so that they burn faster. Lie down and roll over and over, as fast as you can. If there is a rug or a quilt handy, wrap yourself up tight in it. My youngest brother once saved ...
— The Child's Day • Woods Hutchinson
... which fire sends forth fall harmlessly upon all other bodies, merely imparting to them light and heat; but when they meet with such as have an oily, dry humour, and thereby have a sympathy with the nature of fire, they easily cause them to catch fire. It is a disputed question, however, how the naphtha is produced, though most writers conceive its combustible principle to be supplied by the greasy and fiery nature of the soil; for all the district of Babylonia is fiery hot, so that often barley is cast up out of the ground ...
— Plutarch's Lives Volume III. • Plutarch
... water it passes through hath been observed in Mr. Hawkley's ground, about a mile from the town of Wigan, in Lancashire, which vapor, by the application of a lighted candle, paper; or the like, catches fire and flames vigorously. Whether or not this vapor at Peroul would in like manner catch fire and burn I cannot say, it coming not in our minds to make the experiment.... At Gabian, about a day's journey from Montpelier, in the way to Beziers, is a fountain of petroleum. It burns like oil, is of a pungent scent, and a blackish color. It ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 497, July 11, 1885 • Various
... will be bestowed is the last thought of this magnificent summons. The prophet dilates on that assurance to the end of the chapter. He seems to catch fire, as it were, from the introduction of that grand figure of the lofty heavens domed above the flat earth. In effect, what he says is: They are high and inaccessible, but think what pours down from them, and how all fertility depends on their gifts of rain and snow, and how the ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... myself I took the head out of one keg, and emptied it by the others, and made a train to where I've set a candle burning; and when that candle's burnt out, it will set light to another; and that will have to burn out, when some wooden chips will catch fire, and they'll blaze a good deal, and one way and another there'll be enough to burn to last till, say, eight o'clock this morning, by which time the beauties will have got into the place; and then let 'em look out ...
— Begumbagh - A Tale of the Indian Mutiny • George Manville Fenn
... trembled. She glanced at Ciccio. Fortunately he was turning round talking to another man. She rose and went to the ruddy brazier, as if to warm her hands. She threw on the screwed-up letter. The old crone said something unintelligible to her. She watched the letter catch fire—glanced at the peasants at the table—and out at the wide, wild valley. The world beyond could not help, but it still had the power to injure one here. She felt she had received a bitter blow. A black hatred for the Mitchells ...
— The Lost Girl • D. H. Lawrence
... it. The sweat ran down his cheeks, but every time the wood was about to catch fire his strength would give out, and he was obliged to rest, and when he began again the ...
— An American Robinson Crusoe • Samuel B. Allison
... with wine. Then I thrust in that stake under the deep ashes, until it should grow hot, and I spake to my companions comfortable words, lest any should hang back from me in fear. But when that bar of olive wood was just about to catch fire in the flame, green though it was, and began to glow terribly, even then I came nigh, and drew it from the coals, and my fellows gathered about me, and some god breathed great courage into us. For their part they seized the bar of olive wood, that was sharpened at ...
— DONE INTO ENGLISH PROSE • S. H. BUTCHER, M.A.
... followed Keith up into that land of ice and snow and gibbering Eskimos, and from that moment he was no longer Keith but spoke with the lips of Conniston. He described the sunless weeks and months of madness until the girl's eyes seemed to catch fire, and when at last he came to the little cabin in which Conniston had died, he was again John Keith. He could not have talked about himself as he did about the Englishman. And when he came to the point where he buried Conniston under the floor, a dry, broken sob broke ...
— The River's End • James Oliver Curwood
... along without such assistance. Do you owe anything, any return service, for what you receive and use? If Crusoe's hut had taken fire, what would have happened? What would happen if your home should catch fire? Who would pay for the help given you? If Crusoe had been attacked by robbers, what would have happened? What keeps you safe at night? If Crusoe had wished to go on a long journey, what would have been ...
— The Elson Readers, Book 5 • William H. Elson and Christine M. Keck
... thing that on occasions the workings and walls themselves of a coal-mine catch fire and burn incessantly. Yet such is the case. Years ago this happened in the case of an old colliery near Dudley, at the surface of which, by means of the heat and steam thus afforded, early potatoes for the London market, we are told, were grown; and it was no ...
— The Story of a Piece of Coal - What It Is, Whence It Comes, and Whither It Goes • Edward A. Martin
... to light the lamp. I scratched a match. It did not catch fire, the phosphorous end breaking off. I threw it away and waited a ...
— The Inferno • Henri Barbusse
... unutterable," replied Lambourne, "especially when a handsome young merchant bears the pack himself; for the ladies of that clime are bona-robas, and being themselves somewhat sunburnt, they catch fire like tinder at a fresh complexion like thine, with a head of ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... pride and passion!" said the unfortunate youth; "but when saw you them supported by the resolution that should have backed them? The sparks you speak of fell on my dastardly heart as on a piece of ice which could catch fire from nothing: if my offended pride urged me to strike, my weakness of mind prompted me the ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott |
