"Duck" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... that not yet do I disdain cushions. The down of that pr-rovident bird, the eider duck, makes a substitute for the flesh that ought to pad my poor bones. Thank you, Uncle Yimmy," to the old negro, who had just set down the tea-tray, "thank you, yes, one more ...
— A Tar-Heel Baron • Mabell Shippie Clarke Pelton
... revelations, for the first thing they beheld upon opening their packs was a pair of rubber boots for each. They were ladies' knee-boots, the smallest size in stock, but the Gales entered them bodily, so to speak, moccasins and all, clear to their hips, like the waders that duck-hunters use. When they ran they fell down and out of them, but their pride remained upright and serene, for were not these like the boots that Poleon wore, and not of Indian make, with foolish beads on them? Next, the youthful heir had found a straw hat of strange and wondrous ...
— The Barrier • Rex Beach
... past the spot where stood the affrighted girl. In another instant his black head, with the long dark hair trailing behind it, appeared in close juxtaposition to the opened jaws of the reptile. Then the head was seen suddenly to duck beneath the surface, while at the same time a brown-skinned arm and hand rose above it with a pointed stake in its grasp—like the emblematic representation seen upon some ancient crest. Then was seen an adroit turning of ...
— The Castaways • Captain Mayne Reid
... despicable even from a literary point of view. The only person he, on his part, was afraid of, was his own wife; for upon her, from lack of apprehension, his keenest irony fell, as he said, like water on a duck's back, and in respect of her he had, therefore, no weapon of offence to strike terror withal. Her dulness was her defence. He liked Robert. When he saw him, he wakened up, laid hold of him by the button, and drew ...
— Robert Falconer • George MacDonald
... very proud and big then, that he was able to help his mother, and he worked even more carefully and faithfully than before, so that the boss should find no fault. The shouts of the boys in the block, playing duck-on-a-rock down in the street, came in through the open window, and he laughed as he heard them. He did not envy them, though he liked well enough to romp with the others. His was a sunny temper, content with what came; besides, his supper was at stake, and ...
— Children of the Tenements • Jacob A. Riis
... Now if there is any created thing that makes me mad, it is to have a feller look admiren at me, when I utter a piece of plain common sense like that, and turn up the whites of his eyes like a duck in thunder, as much as to say, what a pity it is you weren't broughten up a preacher. It ryles me ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... title hovered in his brain, and being a man of resource, he hit upon an ingenious method of converting them into realities. Close to his house there was an extensive bil (marsh) peopled in season by swarms of wild-duck, teal and snipe. It was visited occasionally by Europeans from Calcutta, who are always on the alert for a day's sport, but they were inconvenienced by the total lack of accommodation. So Samarendra built a neat bungalow, equipped it with European furniture, ...
— Tales of Bengal • S. B. Banerjea
... jumped over a chair on Billy's back. "You said yourself you ought always to give a person a thing you'd like to have, and I'd like those tools. They're the bulliest set in Yorkburg. I'm going to give mother a little yellow duck. ...
— Mary Cary - "Frequently Martha" • Kate Langley Bosher
... O Tantlatch, that the wild goose and the swan and the little ringed duck be born here in the low-lying lands. It be known that they go away before the face of the frost to unknown places. And it be known, likewise, that always do they return when the sun is in the land and the waterways ...
— Children of the Frost • Jack London
... right out on the sea in a boat, and there wan't anything to eat till Robert Penfold—oh, HE was the smart one; he'd find anything, that man!—he found the barnacles on the bottom of the boat, just the same as he found out how to diffuse intelligence tied onto a duck's leg over land knows how many legs—leagues, I mean—of ocean. But that come later. Don't ...
— The Portygee • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... had managed in turn to exchange him with some unsuspecting newly appointed O.C. Company for something more tractable. This last process, indeed, accounted for my having to take him over instead of the mild creature with the duck-waddle action which my predecessor had ridden or, let me ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, March 8, 1916 • Various
... said Cousin Magdalen, gravely. "So perhaps when you know me better, if you think me very nice, you'll call me a duck. Will you, Duke? Even though really, you know, I'm an ...
— Hoodie • Mary Louisa Stewart Molesworth
... stifled as a sonnet; Upon her wire-tight hair a duck-shaped bonnet Nests, nodding with a ...
— Carolina Chansons - Legends of the Low Country • DuBose Heyward and Hervey Allen
... swim and were sent to dancing-school; they played a rudimentary game of baseball, football, and hockey; a few could sail a boat; still fewer had been out with a gun to shoot yellow-legs or a stray wild duck; one or two may have learned something of natural history if they came from the neighborhood of Concord; none could ride across country, or knew what shooting with dogs meant. Sport as a pursuit was unknown. Boat-racing came after 1850. ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams
... headland, and, if there is any wind, getting a tossing for a few minutes, the fjord just here being wide and open. The head of a seal may occasionally be seen bobbing up and down, and large flocks of duck are always swimming about at a respectful distance from the steamer. And what a view we have across the expanse of water! The never-ending mountains stretch away one behind the other, to be crowned in the distance ...
— Peeps at Many Lands: Norway • A.F. Mockler-Ferryman
... tar, bilge water, tobacco and rum warned him that his expected visitor was approaching. And an instant after the door was opened, and a short, stout, dark man in a weather-proof jacket, duck trousers, cow-hide shoes, and tarpaulin ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... this fit of sickness, his thoughts were quite altered about his wife; I say his thoughts, so far as could be judged by his words and carriages to her. For now she was his good wife, his godly wife, his honest wife, his duck and dear, and all. Now he told her that she had the best of it; she having a good life to stand by her, while his debaucheries and ungodly life did always stare him in the face. Now he told her the counsel that she often gave him was good; though he was so bad as not ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... with the ebb tide through the canals to the ocean. Herds of cattle were feeding among the bright verdure. From time to time, we passed some pleasant country-seat, the walls bright with paint, and the grounds surrounded by a ditch, call it a moat if you please, the surface of which was green with duck-weed. But within this watery inclosure, were little artificial elevations covered with a closely-shaven turf, and plantations of shrubbery, and in the more extensive and ostentatious of them, were what ...
— Letters of a Traveller - Notes of Things Seen in Europe and America • William Cullen Bryant
... only fit for duck and crocodile. Human should remember uncontrollable forces of nature and wait till winter come in due course, when quagmire ...
— The Yellow God - An Idol of Africa • H. Rider Haggard
... with us, and Jenny keeps him company, and Hargrave, with a little hauteur condescends to do the same. All sorts of pranks go on between Smart and the boys during dinner. Felix trying to upset his solemn gravity, while Oscar sends him with preserved ginger to Schillie's duck, roasted potatoes to Madame's tapioca pudding, whereby he gets very shamefaced, as Schillie, with blunt sincerity, points out his mistake. Then behind us he shakes his fist at the boys, while they invent fresh nonsense to tease him. In the meantime the dispute runs ...
— Yr Ynys Unyg - The Lonely Island • Julia de Winton
... the bushes where the swan had fallen. I did not blame them much, for when the big bird came down, it seemed as if the very heavens were falling. We supplied our friends with ducks several days, and upon our own dinner table duck was served ten successive days. And it was just as acceptable the last day as the first, for almost every time there was a different variety, the cinnamon, perhaps, being ...
— Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 • Frances M.A. Roe
... with his head hanging downwards; and a nun with children about her. The inside of the arch is painted blue, and adorned with stars, to signify the power and influence of the stars. This prophecy was writ in parchment, and hung in a table on one of those pillars, before the civil wars. Dr. Duck (who was chancellor of Wells) said, that he had seen a copy of it among the records of the tower at London. It was prophesied 300 years before the reformation. Bishop Knight was Bishop here at the reformation, and the picture (they say) did ...
— Miscellanies upon Various Subjects • John Aubrey
... own words, Joe was "taking to the circus life as a duck does to water." He seemed to fit right in. He made some new friends, but of all the men or youths in the show he liked best Benny Turton and the ring-master. Joe and the Lascalla Brothers got along well, but there was not ...
— Joe Strong on the Trapeze - or The Daring Feats of a Young Circus Performer • Vance Barnum
... temple itself, and from ornamental pedestals spring conventional representations of the sacred tree of Buddha, delicately wrought in iron. Tall flagstaffs, 60 or 80 feet high, surmounted by emblematical figures or representations of the Brahminy duck, float their long streamers in the wind, while the sound of tinkling bells descends from the "tis" with which every pinnacle is crowned. Surrounding all is a broad platform fringed with shops and other buildings, for the Burmese love their pagoda, ...
— Burma - Peeps at Many Lands • R.Talbot Kelly
... Joe Harris, as Tom Leslie was leading her over the line of plank, when they were about half way across, and when, from the instability of a part of the structure, there seemed a fair prospect of taking a duck in the river. ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford
... part cherry-like; her pomegranate-like teeth conceal a fragrant breath. Her slender waist, so beauteous to look at, is like the skipping snow wafted by a gust of wind; the sheen of her pearls and kingfisher trinkets abounds with splendour, green as the feathers of a duck, and yellow as the plumes of a goose; Now she issues to view, and now is hidden among the flowers; beautiful she is when displeased, beautiful when in high spirits; with lissome step, she treads along the pond, as if she soars on wings or sways in the air. Her eyebrows ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... slipped past, bobbing down the track like a duck sailing over ripples. A local train clanged down to the depot and stood jangling its bell while it disgorged passengers for the last boat to the City whose wall of stars was hidden behind the drizzle and the clinging fog. People came straggling down ...
— Cabin Fever • B. M. Bower
... the story of Jemima Puddle-duck, who was annoyed because the farmer's wife would not let her ...
— The Tale of Jemima Puddle-Duck • Beatrix Potter
... a race between a widow and a girl for a man is about like one between a young duck and a spring chicken, across a mill-pond—girl and chicken lose—hey? But let Sallie have him, since you don't need him. I've got to go home and listen to Augusta talk about my business, that she knows nothing in the world about, or I won't ...
— The Tinder-Box • Maria Thompson Daviess
... years old. He was small, thin, a little crooked, with long hands resembling the claws of a crab. His faded hair, scanty and slight, like the down on a young duck, allowed his scalp to be plainly seen. The brown, crimpled skin of his neck showed the big veins which sank under his jaws and reappeared at his temples. He was regarded in the district as a miser and a hard ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant
... charming hostess, and greeted Warble with a shriek of welcome. "You duck," she cried; "how heavenly of you to ...
— Ptomaine Street • Carolyn Wells
... indeed for a goodly number to follow. But within a week of his visit to the White Bear, when the sharp edge of his grandmother's words had been a little blunted by time, and the cares of other things had entered in, Aubrey again made his way to the lodgings occupied by Winter at the sign of the Duck, in the Strand, "hard by ...
— It Might Have Been - The Story of the Gunpowder Plot • Emily Sarah Holt
... catch me, if I can swallow that pill," said Henry Smith, "how well soever it may be gilded. The knave has a shrewd eye for a kirtle, and knows a wild duck from a tame as well as e'er a man in Perth. He were the last in the Fair City to take sour plums for pears, or my roundabout cousin Joan for this piece of fantastic vanity. I fancy his bearing was as much as to say, 'I ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... you hit the nail on the head! You rank Phillips's book higher than I do, or than Lyell does, who thinks it fearfully retrograde. I amused myself by parodying Phillips's argument as applied to domestic variation; and you might thus prove that the duck or pigeon has not varied because the goose has not, though more anciently domesticated, and no good reason can be assigned why it has ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume II • Francis Darwin
... like all gossip, this statement was subject to correction as to details in favor of the exact fact. It is true that the governor, his gigantic figure clad in sportsmanlike brown duck, might have been seen boarding the train on the Monday evening; and in addition to the ample hand-bag there were rod and gun cases to bear out the newspaper notices. None the less, it was equally true that the keeper of the Gun Club shooting-box ...
— The Grafters • Francis Lynde
... behooved him to play "lame duck," just as the mother mallard does in order to deceive the wandering egg hunter, and lead him away ...
— Canoe Mates in Canada - Three Boys Afloat on the Saskatchewan • St. George Rathborne
... duck!" he guffawed. "If only I'd ha' knowed, I could have told my missus. It would have cheered her up for a week. Never mind. We've a few minutes in Dover. I'll send her a picture postcard. It'll 'arf tickle ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy
... good housewives of those days were a kind of amphibious animal, delighting exceedingly to be dabbling in water—insomuch that an historian of the day gravely tells us, that many of his townswomen grew to have webbed fingers like unto a duck; and some of them, he had little doubt, could the matter be examined into, would be found to have the tails of mermaids; but this I look upon to be a mere sport of fancy, or, what ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... the touch, or Bourne would lose. "Listen carefully, young 'un. You're jolly game, and that's a fact, but there's no good hammering on the fool's face—he can't feel. You must try another trick. It's the last in your box, too, Bourne, so make no mistake. St. Amory's for ever! When he swings, duck. Don't try to ward him off—he'll beat you down. Then, for all you're worth, drive home with your left on the jaw. On the jaw for all you're worth. You've seen the sergeant do it dozens of times in the gym. Keep cool, and look when you hit—on the ...
— Acton's Feud - A Public School Story • Frederick Swainson
... catch up with that duck and march him back to camp, along with his feathered messengers," Jack grumbled disappointedly. "Somehow I hate and despise a spy above all ...
— Air Service Boys Over The Enemy's Lines - The German Spy's Secret • Charles Amory Beach
... the surface of a continually rolling sea. The little groves of timber, scattered here and there, sheltered from the summer sun the wild cattle of the plains. The shorter grasses hid the coveys of the prairie hens, and on the marsh-grown bayou banks the wild duck led her brood. A great land, a rich, a fruitful one, was this that lay ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough
... on the neighboring claims plowed noiselessly, as figures in a dream. The whistle of gophers, the faint, wailing, fluttering cry of the falling plover, the whir of the swift-winged prairie pigeon, or the quack of a lonely duck, came through the shimmering air. The lark's infrequent whistle, piercingly sweet, broke from the longer grass m the swales nearby. No other climate, sky, plain, could produce the same unnamable weird charm. No tree to wave, no grass ...
— Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... Squier and Davis) was, it is said, "probably intended to represent a turkey buzzard." If so, the suggestion is a very vague one. The notches cut in the mandibles, as in the case of the carving of the wood duck (Fig. 168, Ancient Monuments), are perhaps meant for serrations, of which there is no trace in the bill of the buzzard. As suggested by Mr. Ridgway, it is perhaps nearer the cormorant than anything else, although not executed with the detail ...
— Animal Carvings from Mounds of the Mississippi Valley • Henry W. Henshaw
... eyes suddenly, and saw the lake in a dazzle of light, and Silver How, all purple, as of old; yet another family of wild duck swimming where the river issued from the lake; and just beyond, the white corner of the house where she and George had spent their few days of bliss. Slowly, the eyes filled with brimming tears. She threw off her hat and ...
— Missing • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... A duck flew past, dropping into the water a little way above our camp, and George sprang for a rifle. He shot, but missed, which I assured him was only proper punishment for the slighting insinuations he had made in regard to my shooting. ...
— A Woman's Way Through Unknown Labrador • Mina Benson Hubbard (Mrs. Leonidas Hubbard, Junior)
... nothin' about them crawls," answered Pete, "but he's swimmin' like a duck. He'll reach that point below us long before ...
— The Go Ahead Boys and Simon's Mine • Ross Kay
... going to start with caviare? I am," confided Lady Drakmanton, and the Smithly-Dubbs started with caviare. The subsequent dishes were chosen in the same ambitious spirit, and by the time they had arrived at the wild duck course it was beginning to ...
— The Toys of Peace • Saki
... duck, the wives of all the citizens and magistrates would swoon with envy, and the alderman's lady would instantly die of that husky cough which has ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger
... girl is of the old rebel Milburn stock, I know. She takes it all in like a wild duck ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend
... are of white mahogany in special designs, elaborately carved, and the upholstery is in white and gold tapestry. A superb mantel of Mexican onyx with gold decoration adorns the south wall, and before the hearth is a large rug composed entirely of skins of the eider-down duck, brought from the Arctic regions. Pictures and bric-a-brac everywhere suggest the tribute of loving friends. One of the two alcoves is a retiring-room and the other a lavatory in which the plumbing is all ...
— Pulpit and Press • Mary Baker Eddy
... a large duck. Cut it up, and put it into a stew-pan with a pint of beef-gravy, or dripping of roast-beef. Have ready two boiled onions, half a handful of sage leaves, and two leaves of mint, all chopped very ...
— Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches • Eliza Leslie
... sixteen, or thereabouts, selected from the hands on the plantation with reference to their size and muscular development. They were clothed in white duck pants, blue cotton frocks, trimmed with white, and wore uniform straw hats, encircled by black bands, upon which was inscribed, in gilt letters, the name of the boat, "Edith," in compliment to the young ...
— Watch and Wait - or The Young Fugitives • Oliver Optic
... these woods, and perhaps wolves and boars? There must be wild duck on the firth, and buzzards in the rocks. Instead of challenging the barbarians to a foolish trial of strength, why not make them your companions, ...
— Hypolympia - Or, The Gods in the Island, an Ironic Fantasy • Edmund Gosse
... we poor, innocent citizens are just as quiet, just as peaceable, just as confident in our own laws, just as capable of taking care of ourselves on Saturday evening as on Friday morning. Only some frightened innocents, like the goose, the duck and the turkey in the fable, say the sky is falling, and they must go and ...
— Report of the Proceedings at the Examination of Charles G. Davis, Esq., on the Charge of Aiding and Abetting in the Rescue of a Fugitive Slave • Various
... the woman was unmistakably hungry. But the boy's steady look drew the pie from her lips, and she suddenly held out the plate to him, saying, "There, honey,—take that. May-be ne'er a morsel's passed yer lips the day." The boy seized the unexpected boon greedily, but did not forget to give a duck of his head, by way of acknowledgment. The woman leaned her elbows on her knees, and watched him while ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 6, April, 1858 • Various
... despises a Christian who refuses to black-slide. A man with the slightest hint of spirit would have resented their insults, heaped so lavishly and frequently, but he was as impervious to the names, epithets, growling, and swearing as a duck's back is to water. ...
— Bamboo Tales • Ira L. Reeves
... coloring has the peculiarity that artificial light wholly changes its character, whereas Cranch's paintings, previous to 1875, appear much the same by electric light that they do in daytime. It is called the "Home of the Wood Duck." ...
— Cambridge Sketches • Frank Preston Stearns
... surface. But though every eye was on the look-out, and every arm raised; though the hounds were as eager as their masters, and yelling fiercely, swam round the pool, ready to pounce upon the swimmer as upon a duck, all were disappointed; for, even after a longer interval than their patience could ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... November the summit of the Peak was draped in white, and a slight sprinkling of snow sparkled on the plain. Frost was hard enough to freeze the duck-pond and the horse-trough. Winter had begun. It was very cold; Lucy shivered over her dressing every morning in her little attic chamber, and had just to work to get warm, as Aunt Hepsy permitted no sitting over the stove. Tom had to turn out of doors at six every morning, and feed a ...
— Thankful Rest • Annie S. Swan
... this a little bit," commented Katz. "I allow we'd better duck—and do it pronto. If Hill is really trailin' us, maybe he has sent a telegraft message to the sheriff, back in Phoenix. We got to look sharp, ...
— Owen Clancy's Happy Trail - or, The Motor Wizard in California • Burt L. Standish
... out of the room, my first thought was to escape from behind the lounge, and get upstairs to my own quarters. But just as I had sat up, very cramped and wretched, with one foot and one arm asleep, Lord Mountstuart came in again, and down I had to duck. ...
— The Powers and Maxine • Charles Norris Williamson
... reliable duck shots we have," said Bobby's neighbour to the stranger. "He shoots just like that, always. Never in a hurry; but he seems to get there. Kills a lot of game in ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White
... was not the wing of a duck, nor was it the croak of a loon far up the shore, or a fish leaping in the still water. It ...
— The Country Beyond - A Romance of the Wilderness • James Oliver Curwood
... ninth day of this expedition about twenty-five men went out on a hunt for porkers. Six very good-sized ones were secured by this party, to which I belonged. Another expedition went duck hunting and bagged eighty fine ones. Great numbers of chickens were everywhere in the woods and towns. They belonged to the natives. A party of soldiers caught fifteen of these while the hogs and ducks were being secured. ...
— A Soldier in the Philippines • Needom N. Freeman
... said Kathleen. "I'd have loved her just as much if she hadn't put a penny in. She is a duck, though! I can't think why I care so much about her, ...
— The School Queens • L. T. Meade
... from sorting and washing to ironing the white shirts, collars and cuffs, and the "fancy starch" of the wives of the professors. We worked like tigers, especially as summer came on and the academy boys took to the wearing of duck trousers. It consumes a dreadful lot of time to iron one pair of duck trousers. And there were so many pairs of them. We sweated our way through long sizzling weeks at a task that was never done; and many a night, ...
— John Barleycorn • Jack London
... out and looked up. The gunboat was struggling to regain her equilibrium, and the aircar had vanished in a fireball. They both emerged, straightening. His father was brushing himself with his hands and saying something about always having to duck under something when he ...
— The Cosmic Computer • Henry Beam Piper
... life than Chesapeake Bay, unless it was the jungles of the South Pacific. Books, guides to eastern land and water birds, regional fish and reptiles, rested on the cabin top before him, along with a pair of binoculars. He had used them all repeatedly, identifying eagles, wild swans, ospreys, wild duck and geese, terrapin, snapping turtles and water snakes, as well as a horde of lesser creatures. Trailing lines over the houseboat stern had captured striped sea bass, called "rockfish" locally, a ...
— The Flying Stingaree • Harold Leland Goodwin
... me your friend, the Cook guy, got plugged down in the Gap when he tried to duck this afternoon," ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... birth as a vile vermin. By stealing a piece of silken cloth, one becomes a Krikara. By stealing a piece of cloth made of red silk, one becomes a Vartaka.[515] By stealing a piece of muslin one becomes a parrot. By stealing a piece of cloth that is of fine texture, one becomes a duck after casting off one's human body. By stealing a piece of cloth made of cotton, one becomes a crane. By stealing a piece of cloth made of jute, one becomes a sheep in one's next life. By stealing a piece of linen, one has to take birth as a hare. By stealing different kinds ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... expense. In addition to the food provided for these fowl with public money, visitors to the park used to bring them bags of biscuits and bread crusts. When the ducks and geese were nicely fattened the Brigands used to carry them off and devour them at home. When they became tired of eating duck or goose, some of the Councillors made arrangements with certain butchers and traded away ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell
... Hattie went with him to the duck-pond to see him sail the boat. But soon she grew tired, and ...
— Our Young Folks at Home and Abroad • Various
... tell you what they were for," answered Little. "We were going to have some fun, pelting them with stones, just as we used to play duck on shore, you know; but we concluded not to do so, lest the stewards in the kitchen should hear the noise, and make ...
— Down the Rhine - Young America in Germany • Oliver Optic
... our tables likewise fastened by ropes, the captain and myself took our meal with some difficulty, and swallowed a little of our broth, for we spilt much the greater part. The remainder of our dinner being an old, lean, tame duck roasted, I regretted but little the loss of, my teeth not being good ...
— Journal of A Voyage to Lisbon • Henry Fielding
... will be to these southern seas that the millionaire brings his yacht for a winter cruise; it will be in these forests that he hunts for wild boar and deer, or shoots woodcock, duck, snipe, pigeons, and pheasants; in these waters that he fishes for the iridescent silver beauties that here abound. It will be on these sunlit shores invalids seeking health will find it, and here that huge sanitariums should be built, for despite ...
— A Woman's Journey through the Philippines - On a Cable Ship that Linked Together the Strange Lands Seen En Route • Florence Kimball Russel
... of the country. Johanna Vavrika had been deeply scarred by smallpox in the old country. She was short and fat, homely and jolly and sentimental. She was so broad, and took such short steps when she walked, that her brother, Joe Vavrika, always called her his duck. She adored her niece because of her talent, because of her good looks and masterful ways, but most of all because of ...
— The Troll Garden and Selected Stories • Willa Cather
... Osbourne's sisters, Cora Van de Grift, I find this entry: "This is the hardest place I ever struck. I saw two men killed to-day in a gambling fight." Men engaged at their work or passing along the streets were quite often compelled to duck and dodge to escape sudden fusillades of bullets. There was little regard for the law, and "killings" ...
— The Life of Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson • Nellie Van de Grift Sanchez
... now I may Steal a prisoner's holiday, Slip, when all is worst, the bands, Hurry back, and duck beneath Time's old tyrannous groping hands, Speed away with laughing breath Back to all I'll never know, Back to ...
— The Collected Poems of Rupert Brooke • Rupert Brooke
... most provoking thing is, that no failures knock them up, or make them hold their hands, or think you, or me, or other sane people in the right. Failures slide off them like July rain off a duck's back feathers. Jem and his whole family turn out bad, and cheat them one week, and the next they are doing the same thing for Jack; and when he goes to the treadmill, and his wife and children to the workhouse, they will be on the lookout for ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes
... "I can't shoot them down in cold blood, I'll have to give them a chance. Here!" he motioned to one of his men and the latter approached. "Take this gun," the lad commanded. "I'm going to give these fellows a chance to surrender. If they refuse I'll duck back here and you let them have it. I'll keep out of range, but don't turn this gun until ...
— The Boy Allies At Verdun • Clair W. Hayes
... performance with a carriage of the head which, for superciliousness, I never have seen equaled in man, woman, or beast. His war-cry was a tinny bleat: the cry of a soul bursting with sardonic merriment. It was like the Falstaffian laughter of the duck, ...
— Red Saunders' Pets and Other Critters • Henry Wallace Phillips
... between him and his washerwoman. He was got up wonderfully, and was prepared at all points for the day's work. He had on a pseudo-sailor's jacket, very liberally ornamented with brass buttons, which displayed with great judgement the exquisite shapes of his pseudo-sailor's duck trousers. Beneath them there was a pair of very shiny patent-leather shoes, well adapted for dancing on the sand, presuming him to be anxious of doing so, as Venus offered to do, without leaving any footmarks. His waistcoat was of a delicate white fabric, ornamented ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... storeroom. The new hero had here certain paraphernalia of his delightful calling—a punching bag, small dumb-bells, a skipping rope, boxing gloves. Here the neophyte had been taught the niceties of feint and guard and lead, of the right cross, the uppercut, the straight left, to duck, to side-step, to shift lightly on his feet, to stop protruding his jaw in cordial invitation, to keep his stomach covered. He proved attentive and willing and quick. He was soon chewing gum as Spike Brennon chewed it, and had his hair clipped ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson
... course, from below, and came to the surface to see the "damned Yankee" sink, only to find the rudderless, sternless boat steaming full speed in a circle with her one remaining propeller, and to be greeted by a salvo of four-inch shells that made her duck promptly. The man killed saw the torpedo coming and ran aft to throw overboard some high explosives stowed there—but he didn't ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various
... undulating. During the afternoon several crows came to feed on the plain. They came from an east-north-east direction, no doubt from a portion of the creek that flows through the forest that we left on our right. In the morning, as we were loading, a duck passed over, but it was too dark to see which way ...
— Successful Exploration Through the Interior of Australia • William John Wills
... and somewhat offended air. "If that's how the land lies," she thought, "it's absolutely no matter to me; I see, my good fellow, it's all like water on a duck's back for you; any other man would have wasted away with grief, but you've grown fat on it." Marya Dmitrievna did not mince matters in her own mind; she expressed herself with more ...
— A House of Gentlefolk • Ivan Turgenev
... looking at the familiar shore, as we approached Fort Point, when I heard a sort of cry, and felt the schooner going over. As we got into the throat of the "Heads," the force of the wind, meeting a strong ebb-tide, drove the nose of the schooner under water; she dove like a duck, went over on her side, and began, to drift out with the tide. I found myself in the water, mixed up with pieces of plank and ropes; struck out, swam round to the stern, got on the keel, and clambered up on the side. Satisfied that she could not sink, by reason of her cargo, I was not in the ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... and the Goose, they settled themselves down in a corner, but the Cock and Hen flew up on a post. So when the Goose and Duck were well asleep, the Fox, took the Goose and laid him on the embers, and roasted him. The Hen smelt the strong roast meat, and sprang up to a higher peg, and said, ...
— Popular Tales from the Norse • Sir George Webbe Dasent
... sun, measured, in the extreme, eight feet long by six high. Where any flesh still adhered, Joe boldly scored it with his knife to lay it open to the sun. It now appeared somewhat spotted and injured by the duck shot. You may see the old frames on which hides have been stretched at many camping-places in ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 10, August, 1858 • Various
... about forty species, among which are two Swans and five Geese. Among the Ducks, the Canvas-Back is found; but, owing to the want of its favorite food in the Chesapeake, the Vallisneria, it is, in our waters, a very ordinary duck, as an article ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 43, May, 1861 • Various
... somehow and rolls it into a small ball like pulp. This he places on his fan and tosses up into the air several times while it gradually assumes the shape of an egg. After some few seconds it has become a large duck's egg which he places in an egg cup on the table in full view of the audience. This little trick is very effective, easy to do, and can be purchased for half-a-crown at ...
— Indian Conjuring • L. H. Branson
... fond of chicken and other fowl; so they served chicken soup and roasted turkey and stewed duck and fried grouse and broiled quail and goose pie, and as the cooking was excellent the King's guests enjoyed the meal and ate heartily of the ...
— The Road to Oz • L. Frank Baum
... escaped from the pirates, and landed on the coast of Brazil, they were clothed in sailor-like costume, namely, white duck trousers, coloured flannel shirts, blue jackets, round straw-hats, and strong shoes. This costume was not very suitable for the warm climate, in which they now found themselves, so their hospitable friend the ...
— Martin Rattler • R.M. Ballantyne
... "Do stumps move, and duck their heads up and down?" asked Corney, indignantly; "well, that's what this one is doing right now. Don't you ...
— Fred Fenton on the Crew - or, The Young Oarsmen of Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... having cured a soldier by the use of two quarts of Dog and Duck water daily: a French translator specifies it as an excellent broth made of a duck and a dog! In a recent catalogue compiled by a French writer of Works on Natural History, he has inserted the well-known "Essay on Irish Bulls" by the Edgeworths. The proof, ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... slumbered peacefully. The little girls sang lullabies to their dolls in soft, maternal murmers. The sharp-nosed pedestrian marched steadily on, with the blue cloak streaming out behind him like a banner; and the lively infant splashed through the puddles with a duck-like satisfaction pleasant to behold. ...
— Humorous Masterpieces from American Literature • Various
... fat duck skin is to be prepared the inside layer of skin over the fat tracts must be sheared off carefully with scissors and the fat then removed with a skin scraper or dull knife blade, care being exercised not to tear the ...
— Taxidermy • Leon Luther Pray
... returned again to the workshop and the loom. The very mayor and alderman went forth, at five o'clock on the summer's morning, with hawk and leaping-pole, after a duck and heron; or hunted the hare in state, probably in the full glory of furred gown and gold chain; and then returned to breakfast, and doubtless transacted their day's business all the better for their morning's ...
— Sanitary and Social Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... of our voyage happened when a mother-duck was leading her little fleet of five ducklings across the river, just as our steamer went swaggering by, stirring the quiet stream into great waves that lashed the banks on either side. I saw the imminence of the ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... is larger than I expected, and the stores seemed well furnished with dry goods of all kinds, besides tinned meats, vegetables, and fruit; but there are no fresh provisions. A few goslings, very like our wild geese, but not so big as a good-sized duck, were running about, for which the owners asked 30s. apiece! There were also some chickens to be bought for 10s. each. Some of the houses are really not unsightly when seen from a distance, but when you approach them the adjacent ground is found to be strewn with straw, ...
— The Last Voyage - to India and Australia, in the 'Sunbeam' • Lady (Annie Allnutt) Brassey
... To guess the cause of it all, in a twinkling: No sooner our friend had got an inkling Of treasure hid in the Holy Bible, (Whene'er 'twas the thought first struck him, How death, at unawares, might duck him Deeper than the grave, and quench The gin-shop's light in hell's grim drench) Than he handled it so, in fine irreverence, As to hug the book of books to pieces: And, a patchwork of chapters and texts in severance, Not improved by ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... greedily as a duck to water in later times, as all the world knows; and in the light of subsequent events it is delightful to remember that the Freeman stated, 'All condemn this dastardly act, for Mr. Hussey ...
— The Reminiscences of an Irish Land Agent • S.M. Hussey
... machine within. He grasped that A. V. stood for Alfred Vernon, the girl's cousin, a young man recently from England. . . . Yes, A. V. had occasionally gone into the jungle with a light rifle. Sometimes he had brought in a wild duck, or a grey marhatta hare; once a black-horned gazelle, but usually a parrot, a peacock or a jay. . . . Yes, sometimes he had been gone for hours. . . . Yes, she had told him about the evil and also the danger of ...
— Son of Power • Will Levington Comfort and Zamin Ki Dost
... we were ducking missiles from an enemy, I'd get orders from the commander. But to duck asteroids, there's no problem. I go over them by firing the steam tubes along the bottom of the ship. That way, you feel the acceleration on your feet. If I fired the top tubes, the ship would drop out from under those who were standing. They'd all ...
— Rip Foster in Ride the Gray Planet • Harold Leland Goodwin
... exemplified most strikingly in the Dakota's Woman's Department, arranged by Mrs. J. M. Melton of Fargo. Among the industrial exhibits was a carriage robe sent from a leading furrier to represent the skilled work of women in his employ. There were also bird fans, a curtain of duck skins and cases of taxidermy, all prepared and cured by women, and a case of work from women employed in the printing office of the Fargo Argus. Four thousand bouquets of grasses were distributed on Dakota Day and carried away as curious ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... the list of privy councillors. The enmity was not confined to the King and to the parasites who sought to please the King. Dr. Johnson declared that if he were the monarch he would have sent half a dozen footmen to duck Wilkes for daring to censure his royal master or his royal master's ministers. In the House of Commons the hostility was at its height. When Parliament met Wilkes sought to call the attention of the House ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume III (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy
... back, darling; I can't reach. If I'm a little late to-night go to sleep like a duck. You think Mr. Jasper's nice, don't you? So does mother. But you mustn't let him give you any more money. ...
— Linda Condon • Joseph Hergesheimer
... admire also the provision of nature in the case of those aquatic animals which are generated on land, such as crocodiles, river-tortoises, and a certain kind of serpents, which seek the water as soon as they are able to drag themselves along. We frequently put duck-eggs under hens, by which, as by their true mothers, the ducklings are at first hatched and nourished; but when they see the water, they forsake them and run to it, as to their natural abode: so strong is the impression of nature in animals for ...
— Cicero's Tusculan Disputations - Also, Treatises On The Nature Of The Gods, And On The Commonwealth • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... my wing; and the published reward must be mine. This cold-hearted brute may have had a hand in it. I'll watch him night and day, and let the boy get over all his fears. Inside of a month I'll find that woman, the hack-driver, and perhaps this lame duck caught in the meshes. I'll lay low for a week, but that boy and that woman shall tell their story to me alone, and it's worth a fortune. I fancy I see daylight. It's a case of soft and easy. Once the boy would be frightened, I would lose this ...
— The Midnight Passenger • Richard Henry Savage
... distance, as, like all these places, it was occupied by a plentiful stock of fleas. At this place we observed a number of fowl, among which we killed a goose and two ducks exactly resembling in appearance and flavour the canvas-back duck of the Susquehanna. After dinner we took advantage of the returning tide to go about three miles to a point on the right, eight miles distant from our camp; but here the water ran so high and washed about our canoe so much that several of the men ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: Explorers • Various
... with questions, and his wife, in front, telling Lieutenant Durand all the rumors of the day. Her scant hair was of a scorched red tone, she was freckled down into her collar, her elbows waggled to the mare's jog, and her voice was as flat as a duck's. Her nag had trouble to keep up, and her tiny faded bonnet had even more to keep on. Yet the day was near when the touch of those freckled hands was to seem to me kinder than the breath of flowers, ...
— The Cavalier • George Washington Cable
... for the silly story (copied into the Diet. Nat. Biog. from a local historian, J. Cole, Wellingborough, 1838) that Henry Chicheley was picked up by William of Wykeham when he was a poor ploughboy "eating his scanty meal off his mother's lap," whatever that means. The story was unknown to Arthur Duck, fellow of All Souls, who wrote Chicheley's life in 1617. It is only the usual attempt, as in the cases of Whittington, Wolsey and Gresham, to exaggerate the rise of a successful man. The first recorded appearance of Henry Chicheley himself is at New College, ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... loss to divine Sherman's purpose, hastened on into Tennessee amidst weather which would have stopped most troops. Schofield met him on the Duck river, while Thomas was shaping his army in rear. Hood manoeuvred Schofield out of his lines and pushed on once more. At Franklin Schofield had to accept battle, and thirteen distinct assaults on his works were made, all pushed with extraordinary fury and lasting far into ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... To question what Ulysses got, But closed the bargain on the spot. A nice machine the birds devise To bear their pilgrim through the skies.— Athwart her mouth a stick they throw: 'Now bite it hard, and don't let go,' They say, and seize each duck an end, And, swiftly flying, upward tend. It made the people gape and stare Beyond the expressive power of words, To see a tortoise cut the air, Exactly poised between two birds. 'A miracle,' they cried, 'is seen! There goes the flying tortoise queen!' 'The queen!' ('twas thus the tortoise ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine
... Conroy's Gap to Castlereagh, there's none can ride like me. I'm good all round at everything, as everybody knows, Although I'm not the one to talk — I HATE a man that blows. But riding is my special gift, my chiefest, sole delight; Just ask a wild duck can it swim, a wild cat can it fight. There's nothing clothed in hair or hide, or built of flesh or steel, There's nothing walks or jumps, or runs, on axle, hoof, or wheel, But what I'll sit, while hide will hold and girths ...
— Rio Grande's Last Race and Other Verses • Andrew Barton 'Banjo' Paterson
... the black, bare-legged policemen in khaki with great numerals on their chests, of Benin, Sierra Leone, or Zanzibar. After he had noted these and the German, French, and English merchants in white duck, and the Dutch man-of-warsmen, who look like ship's stewards, the French marines in coal-scuttle helmets, the British Jack-tars in their bare feet, and the native Kaffir women, each wrapped in a single, ...
— The Congo and Coasts of Africa • Richard Harding Davis
... lamb, kid, pork, veal, fowls, with various sorts of bread, some of wheat and some of barley. When, as an act of courtesy, any one wished to drink his neighbour's health, he would drag him to the big bowl, and when there, he must duck his head and take a long pull, drinking like an ox. The headman, they insisted everywhere, must accept as a present whatever he liked to have. But he would accept nothing, except where he espied ...
— Anabasis • Xenophon
... mediaeval paintings and sculptures with a short bill, instead of the enormous bill and pouch which is the especial mark of the "Onocrotalus" of the ancients, now miscalled pelican, be not actually the eider-duck itself, confounded with the true pelecanus, which was the mediaeval, and is still the scientific, name of the cormorant. Be that as it may, ill befell any one who dare touch one of St. Cuthbert's birds, as was proved in ...
— The Hermits • Charles Kingsley
... to it like a duck does to water," added Slim. "But it's a shame to mention ducks in the same chapter with this atmosphere! Zow hippy! But it's hot an' dusty an' thirsty! Come along there, you old hunk of jerked beef!" he added to his pony, giving a gentle reminder ...
— The Boy Ranchers - or Solving the Mystery at Diamond X • Willard F. Baker
... the duck, according to the Kalevala, the eagle, according to other traditions, lays the mundane egg, thus taking part in the creation of the world. Puhuri, the north-wind, the father of Pakkanen (frost) is sometimes personified ...
— The Kalevala (complete) • John Martin Crawford, trans.
... believe, no difference in the feathers of the birds," replied Mr Swinton; "but all aquatic birds are provided with a small reservoir, containing oil, with which they anoint their feathers, which renders them water-proof. If you will watch a duck pluming and dressing itself, you will find it continually turns its bill round to the end of its back, just above the insertion of the tail; it is to procure this oil, which, as it dresses its feathers that they may carefully overlap each other, ...
— The Mission; or Scenes in Africa • Captain Frederick Marryat
... small, ingenuous-looking creature in those days, light-haired and blue-eyed; and when a little later he became a steerer of one of the boats, he looked very attractive in his Fourth of June dress, as a middy, with a dirk and white duck trousers, dangling an enormous bouquet from his neck. At Eton he did very little in the way of work, and his intellect must have been much in abeyance; because so poor was his performance, that it became a matter of surprise among his companions ...
— Hugh - Memoirs of a Brother • Arthur Christopher Benson
... near me, moustaches or no moustaches! (Smiling into the glass.) And what a lot of 'em swarm round me. And yet I don't care for any of them as much as for that Tnya. And she only a lady's-maid! Ah well, she's nicer than any young lady. (Smiles.) She's a duck! (Listening.) Ah, here she comes. (Smiles.) Yes, that's her, clattering with her little ...
— Redemption and Two Other Plays • Leo Tolstoy et al
... fens, where with nets and snares he caught the fish which swarmed in the sluggish waters; or, having covered his boat with a leafy bower until it resembled a floating bush, drifted close to the flocks of wild-fowl, and with his bow and arrows obtained many a plump wild duck. Smaller birds were caught in snares or traps, or with bird-lime smeared on twigs. Eldred seldom joined his son in his hunting excursions, as he was busied with his brother the abbot in concerting the measures of defence and ...
— The Dragon and the Raven - or, The Days of King Alfred • G. A. Henty
... little black duck, One little gray, Six little white ducks Running out to play. One white lady-duck, motherly and trim, Eight little baby-ducks bound for a swim. One little white duck Running from the water, One very fat duck— Pretty little daughter; One very grave duck, swimming off ...
— Baby Chatterbox • Anonymous
... sprig-tail swooped dawn, hovering above the stool. He picked his bird, and dropped two with the first barrel, and another responded to the discharge of the second. They came tumbling down into the water—dead. One could not easily imagine a duck's head capable of expression, but when they come lively, alight among the dummies, and hear no quack of recognition, they soon discover the fraud, and the frightened haste with which they gather themselves up and attempt to ...
— Nick Baba's Last Drink and Other Sketches • George P. Goff
... than a white duck frock, or rather shirt: which, laying on deck, I folded double at the bosom, and by then making a continuation of the slit there, opened it lengthwise—much as you would cut a leaf in the last new novel. ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... down the bay in the superbly appointed launch flying an Admiral's flag and manned by a picked crew in snowy duck, Ridge sat silent, in a very confused frame of mind, and paying scant attention to the gay conversation carried on by the other members of the party. He had been overcome by the courtesy of his reception in Santiago, and was feeling keenly ...
— "Forward, March" - A Tale of the Spanish-American War • Kirk Munroe
... be expressed by a portrait of a humming-bird, or a flamingo, my readers because of my inexpert handling of my tools would hardly be able to distinguish the creature I should limn from an albatross, a red-head duck, or a June-Bug, which would lead to a great deal of obscurity, and in some cases might cause me to say things that I should not care to be held responsible for. There is left me then only a choice between English and Esperanto, and I incline to the ...
— The Autobiography of Methuselah • John Kendrick Bangs
... to duck. There'll be no trouble of my making. But if he starts any I'll be there. Macdonald doesn't own the earth, you know. I've been sent up here by Uncle Sam on business, and you can bet your last dollar I'll stay on the ...
— The Yukon Trail - A Tale of the North • William MacLeod Raine
... the particular cross of parents that when the child grows up and becomes himself instead of that pale ideal they had preconceived, they must accuse their own harshness or indulgence for this natural result. They have all been like the duck and hatched swan's eggs, or the other way about; yet they tell themselves with miserable penitence that the blame lies with them; and had they sat more closely, the swan would have been a duck, and home-keeping, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the utmost, I was enabled to "duck" my head. In this painful position I contrived to get a couple of swallows; but I should think I took in quite as much at ...
— The Rifle Rangers • Captain Mayne Reid
... Bertha went on, "my folks have always been purty poor, and I've lived in jay towns all my life; and when I came here I didn't know any more about life in a city than a duck does of mining. I had it all to learn, and they's a whole lot yet that I don't know." She smiled quaintly, then grew sober. "And what's worse, I haven't any one to tell me—except Mr. Congdon, and he's ...
— Money Magic - A Novel • Hamlin Garland |
