"Duster" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Will yuh come to arth, yuh rascal?" shouted the irate woman who was garbed in a man's farm hat and a long duster. ...
— Girl Scouts in the Adirondacks • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... could write your name with your finger in the dust or blacks. The other side of the "things" is therefore now evenly dirtied or dusted. The housemaid then flaps every thing, or some things, not out of her reach, with a thing called a duster—the dust flies up, then re-settles more equally than it lay before the operation. The room has ...
— Notes on Nursing - What It Is, and What It Is Not • Florence Nightingale
... dear," he would say with imperturbable good-nature,—"really, I am too forgetful. I must have a self-regulating machine attached to my movements,—a portable duster and hat-catcher. But, the blessed freedom of home. It constitutes half its joy. Dear me! I would not exchange the privilege of doing as I please for the ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... opening my eyes the next morning, saw the sunlight shining into the squalid room. Evidently it had been empty on my arrival at the house, and Mrs. Loveridge had flung these things on the floor, and placed a basin and what looked like a duster on a broken-backed chair, and considered the room furnished. Not aware of the time, but believing it to be quite early, I got up and said my prayers and began my toilet, with the intention of going downstairs to explore the house. Having lain ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... recitations for the day. Once Tom found him there hunched up in a corner of the window-seat while the chambermaid, viewing his presence distastefully, draped the furniture with bedding and did her best with broom and duster to discourage him from a repetition of the outrage. Between ten and eleven on three days a week Steve put in an hour of study in the room. On other days he managed to snatch two half-hour periods in the library between recitations. At six he was almost invariably awaiting ...
— Left End Edwards • Ralph Henry Barbour
... servant was late one morning, and I was greatly annoyed at his delay. He came up and stood before me with his usual salaam, and with a slight catch in his voice explained that his eight-year-old daughter had died last night. Then, with his duster, he set to ...
— Glimpses of Bengal • Sir Rabindranath Tagore
... achievements. But to be a mix-muddle, to both mix and muddle, to morally fumble without tact, and display a totally imbecile wandering; I shall get mixed myself if I try to describe such a state. Mixed in this sense is American too. Take a duster, dexterously swing it, and remove a fleck of dust from a table or books, and you will understand the verb to "flirk," which is nearly the same as to ...
— The Life of the Fields • Richard Jefferies
... minutes one could do a great deal if one tried; so back again she hurried, and set to work dusting the furniture with an old cotton jacket of Peter's, because she could find no duster. The buttons got in the way sometimes, but that was a minor detail, and it did not do to be over-particular about trifles when one was in a hurry. The dusting was done, and she had started work on the dirty dishes, when the door of the inner room came open with a jerk, and ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant
... home about eleven o'clock, and when they reached the house were dismayed to find two furniture wagons, in front of the gate, already partly filled! Mrs. Peterkin was walking in and out of the open door, a large book in one hand, and a duster in the other, and she came to meet them in an agony of anxiety. What should they do? The furniture carts had appeared soon after the rest had left for Boston, and the men had insisted upon beginning ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, May, 1878, No. 7. - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... was in a decline, used to have snail-oil rubbed into her back," said Luce, the maid, who had been standing in the doorway with a duster. ...
— Amaryllis at the Fair • Richard Jefferies
... unexpectedly; the kicking basket escaped from her arms, the lid burst open, and an extraordinarily large, healthy and indignant cat flew out, tail as big as a duster, and fled east on ...
— The Green Mouse • Robert W. Chambers
... room assigned to him, he at once began a minute examination of it. He found a window looking on the small courtyard, two doors, a bed, a chest, two chairs, a jar, a broom and duster; further, a shelf in the corner covered with oilcloth, on which stood a glass, a tin basin, a clothesbrush and a New Testament. He felt the stout bedclothes, tried the brush on his hat, held up glass and basin critically to the light, sat down experimentally ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... of the car. In the glare of the lamps Peter made out a man as tall as himself, in a linen duster that came to his heels, and with an automobile cap and goggles concealing most of his face. The stranger jerked the gate open, and a moment later Peter was confronting ...
— The Purple Heights • Marie Conway Oemler
... Miss North; "but never mind; stay, if you want to." She tried to smile, but she looked at the duster which she had put down ...
— Quaint Courtships • Howells & Alden, Editors
... in my study. It is very cold; Madame Menin, my housekeeper, has let the fire out. Hallo! she has left her duster, too, lying on the manuscript ...
— The Ink-Stain, Complete • Rene Bazin
... the little room on the right, whose walls were decorated with various sporting prints chiefly illustrative of steeple-chases, with here and there a stunted fox-brush, tossing about as a duster. The ill-ventilated room reeked with the effluvia of stale smoke, and the faded green baize of a little round table in the centre was covered with filbert-shells and empty ale-glasses. The whole furniture of the room ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... eat, anyhow," he said aloud as he recovered his balance with the aid of the dashboard, disentangled his feet from the long skirts of his linen duster and sprang over the wheel with the alacrity of a man who took a keen interest ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... roses fair, A duster of pink and white, Roses that nod to the music low, The flowers ...
— Cap and Gown - A Treasury of College Verse • Selected by Frederic Knowles
... alongside—a fierce blast it has, and it will be needed if there is bad weather, for then sometimes as a heavy sea is coming the kitchen is hastily closed lest the waves should invade it, but the lamp may still be heard roaring away inside all the same. An iron enamelled plate and a duster complete the furniture of our little scullery, all the rest of the things we started with having been improved out of existence, for simplicity is the heart of invention as brevity ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... Roger and splendidly proportioned, huge of shoulder, broad of hip, but without an ounce of fat upon her. Her face was gaunt and brown: thin lips, long thin nose, gray eyes set deep, iron gray hair straggling over her forehead from under a dusty pink sunbonnet. She wore a linen duster buttoned close to ...
— The Forbidden Trail • Honore Willsie
... provide bread and jam for you, indeed! Well, we'll very soon see! Take that!" and he struck the flies such a heavy blow with a duster that no fewer than seven lay dead upon the table, while the others flew up to the ...
— Childhood's Favorites and Fairy Stories - The Young Folks Treasury, Volume 1 • Various
... drawn up, and a converted gypsy was alternately pretending to repair an imaginary break and relieving his nerve-strain by pacing the road. Balthazar's fantastic garments had given way to a plain sack suit and motor duster, but the profit of his employment by Raymond Owen was worth ...
— The Perils of Pauline • Charles Goddard
... questions, talking to the teachers and children, enlivening all by his encouragement and cheerfulness. He was a martinet on one question, and that was cleanliness, and its kindred virtue, orderliness. He was never above working with mop, broom and duster indoors, and shovel and rake in the garden; and this trait added much to the appearance of things as well as to the comfort of all concerned in the use of ...
— Life of Father Hecker • Walter Elliott
... miss, this way,' she whispered to Aster. 'We shall keep in shelter of that duster of cedars yonder. The robber chief comes this way.' Aster followed her guide without question; but she turned her head every few minutes to look for Roland. He was now far in the rear, but he was following the lead of ...
— The Four Canadian Highwaymen • Joseph Edmund Collins
... town. If I were you I'd choose a tan; a veiling gown, like this first one we showed you, only tan. Then you could put the difference in price into a coat;—we have some smart ones in tan,—with a light pongee duster to slip over it all, if she's driving ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... house-dust should be avoided. The dust should be removed—not by the old-fashioned feather duster which scatters the dust into the air—but by a damp or oiled cloth. Dust-catching furniture and hangings of plush, lace, etc., are not hygienic. A carpet-sweeper is more hygienic than a broom, and a vacuum cleaner ...
— How to Live - Rules for Healthful Living Based on Modern Science • Irving Fisher and Eugene Fisk
... one can see you was born a gentleman; and I am a deal prouder to have you and your washing than I should him as pays you your wages. Pale eyes—pale hair—pale eyebrows—I wouldn't trust him to mangle a duster." ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade
... his allegation at the point of the—knuckle! That hulking, ugly youth is Braddy, the bully, the terror of the Guinea-pigs, and the laughing-stock of his own class-mates. The boy who is fastening a chalk duster on to the collar of Braddy's coat is Tom Senior, the Doctor's eldest son, who, one would have imagined, might have learned better manners. Last, not least (for we need not re-introduce Messrs. Ricketts ...
— The Fifth Form at Saint Dominic's - A School Story • Talbot Baines Reed
... or other, intrusted the keys of the wine-cellar to one of the house-maids; and that that industrious person had seized the opportunity to tilt up all the port-wine she could lay her hands on in order to polish the bottles with a duster. ...
— Sunrise • William Black
... to the railroad depot to meet Lincoln at the train. It was in the afternoon, towards night. The day had been quite warm, and the road was dry and dusty. He found Lincoln just emerging from the depot. He had on a thin suit of summer clothes, his coat being a linen duster, much soiled. His whole appearance was decidedly shabby. He carried in his hand an old-fashioned carpet-sack, which added to the oddity of his appearance. Major Wilcox says if it had been anybody else he would have been rather ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... of Foster's habitual attire under all circumstances in warm weather was a long linen duster, and it is a defect of ursine perception to confound a man with his clothes. When the napping skirt of Foster's duster seemed to be within reach, the over-eager bear made a grab for it, and released his grasp of the tree. The ...
— Bears I Have Met—and Others • Allen Kelly
... all things to match in with the image: Thus, for example, the tall palms with their feather-duster tops, bending seaward, turned into broad elms standing in regular double rank, like Yankee militiamen on a muster day. And night times, when through his windows there came floating in the soft vowelsome voices of native fishermen paddling their canoes ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... sound that Alice, though she was dusting in the front-room, did not hear it. She heard nothing till the bell discreetly tinkled. Justifiably assuming that the tinkler was the butcher's boy, she went to the door with her apron on, and even with the duster in her hand. A handsome, smooth man stood on the step, and the electric carriage made a background for him. He was a dark man, with curly black hair, and a moustache to match, and black eyes. His silk hat, of an incredible ...
— Buried Alive: A Tale of These Days • Arnold Bennett
... hundred and fifty disciplined soldiers. I still nominally command that company, but they have developed into a heterogeneous mob of specialists. If I detail one of my subalterns to do a job of work, he reminds me that he is a bomb-expert, or a professor of sandbagging, or director of the knuckle-duster section, or Lord High Thrower of Stink-pots, and as such has no time to play about with such a common thing as a platoon. As for the men, they simply laugh in the sergeant-major's face. They are 'experts,' if you please, and are struck off all fatigues and company duty! It was ...
— The First Hundred Thousand • Ian Hay
... up her duster. "Well, lad, thee says so. Daily savin' of the cents got it. Maybe thee thought me a hard woman?"—with an anxious look. "I kept all the accounts of it in that blue book I burned to-night. Nobody must know what it cost. No. Thee'd best go to sleep, lad. I've an hour's ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 74, December, 1863 • Various
... green grass courtyard. Seated before a rude table, sipping aguardiente, was his countryman Winslow and two traders of the pueblo. They were evidently of the number already indicated who had adopted the American fashions. Senor Ruiz wore a linen "duster" in place of his embroidered jacket, and Senor Martinez had an American beard, or "goatee," in imitation of Mr. Banks. The air was yellow with the fumes of tobacco, through which the shrewd ...
— The Crusade of the Excelsior • Bret Harte
... of Salvation. The Codpiece of the Law. The Slipshoe of the Decretals. The Pomegranate of Vice. The Clew-bottom of Theology. The Duster or Foxtail-flap of Preachers, composed by Turlupin. The Churning Ballock of the Valiant. The Henbane of the Bishops. Marmotretus de baboonis et apis, cum Commento Dorbellis. Decretum Universitatis Parisiensis super gorgiasitate muliercularum ad placitum. The Apparition of Sancte ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... tied a knot to mark the length. Then she went back and crossed the room, and again make a knot to mark the width. Then she hastily gathered up the string, pulled the brad awl from the woodwork, and put them in her pocket. While she had been carrying this out she retained a duster in one hand, and dusted the wood work as she moved along, trusting that if Miss Penfold should look in, the string, which was of a dark color, would be unnoticed by her. However she gave a sigh of relief when the operation was complete, ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty
... the drawing-room, where a servant in striped print was languidly caressing the glass of a bookcase with a duster. "You can leave this a bit," Edwin said curtly to the girl, who obsequiously acquiesced and fled, forgetting ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... impatient after domestic experiences which would have gone far towards cowing the generation of women before her. Her mother had bowed beneath such experiences without so much as an inquiry or expostulation. As Marie hurried about with brush and duster, with black-lead and fire-fuel, as she stood over the purring stove, and watched toast and eggs and coffee come to their various perfections, each over its ring of flame, she ...
— Married Life - The True Romance • May Edginton
... come in," he said; and jumping up he got out a feather duster and whisked off a chair for Rosalind, remarking that dust didn't ...
— Mr. Pat's Little Girl - A Story of the Arden Foresters • Mary F. Leonard
... heard Clump's report, her distress was very great. As she groaned, and wiped her wet, shrivelled eyes with a duster, she said— ...
— Captain Mugford - Our Salt and Fresh Water Tutors • W.H.G. Kingston
... point as to put a stop to all Winter soldiering, so that a fellow could go home as soon as cold weather began, sit around a comfortable stove in a country store; and tell camp stories until the Spring was far enough advanced to let him go back to the front wearing a straw hat and a linen duster. ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... his visitor returned from their trip in the mountains, that evening, tired, dusty, and exultant. The professor's linen duster had acquired several of those triangular rents which have the merit of being beyond masculine repair, and may therefore be conscientiously endured. He sat on the camp-chair at Palmerston's tent door, his finger-tips together and his head thrown back in ...
— The Wizard's Daughter and Other Stories • Margaret Collier Graham
... advantage that the work should be done thus cleanly, because if a spot of wax is dropped on the surface of the glass that is to be painted on, the spot must be carefully scraped off and every vestige of it removed with a wet duster dipped in a little grit of some kind—pigment does well—otherwise the glass is greasy and the painting ...
— Stained Glass Work - A text-book for students and workers in glass • C. W. Whall
... consciousness that there was something askew in their way of living. She longed to put it right, but did not know how. Now and then she dusted the furniture—but it was so seldom she could find the duster because it was never in the same place twice. And when the clothes-brush was to be found she tried to brush her father's best suit on Saturdays, and once sewed on a missing button with coarse white thread. When Mr. Meredith went to church next day every female eye saw that button and ...
— Rainbow Valley • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... in my presence. "To think that a thinking being has to be beholden to a thing like that for his weekly income! Somebody ought to tap him with a feather-duster and ...
— Twelve Men • Theodore Dreiser
... rushing in and carrying it away on their heads. Aunt Pullet, too, appeared at the doorway, and as soon as her sister was within hearing said, "Stop the children, for God's sake! Bessy; don't let 'em come up the door-steps; Sally's bringing the old mat and the duster, ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... it the ashes from the stove, and, leaving a cloud of dust to settle everywhere upon tables and chairs, ran down with his pail and back again with kindling and firewood and had a fire going in an extraordinarily short time. He then caught up an ancient antimacassar, used it as a duster upon chairs and tables, flung it back again in its place over the rickety sofa and rushed for the station to find that the train had already pulled in, had come to a standstill and was disgorging ...
— The Patrol of the Sun Dance Trail • Ralph Connor
... chum and me took hold of the legs and Pa took hold of the summer kitchen, and we rung the water out. Pa want so sociable after that, and he went back in the woods with his knife; with nothing on but a linen duster and a neck-tie, while his pants were drying on a tree, to cut a switch, and we hollered to him that a party of picnicers from Lake Side were coming ashore right where his pants were, to pic-nic, and Pa he run into ...
— Peck's Bad Boy and His Pa - 1883 • George W. Peck
... rooms in the house—especially upon the topmost floor—into which even the servants seldom went. There were vacant rooms which never knew broom nor duster. The dwelling, indeed, was altogether too large for the needs of Mr. Starkweather and his ...
— The Girl from Sunset Ranch - Alone in a Great City • Amy Bell Marlowe
... come, kids, come! "With a bim! bam! bum! Here's little Billy bangin' on his big bass drum! He's a-marchin' round the room, With his feather-duster plume A-noddin' an' a-bobbin' ...
— The Book of Joyous Children • James Whitcomb Riley
... dropping her aitches and stumbling over them on her first entrance in order merely to win a laugh and so lift her little role from the common rut of "lines" to the dignity of "a bit." For another, she seldom if ever brandished that age-honoured wand of her office, a bedraggled feather-duster. Nor was she by any means in love with ...
— The Bandbox • Louis Joseph Vance
... to it and thought about it very earnestly. If by any chance he could get two suits of clothes, he would then feel that he had a head worth having. "What would you say," he said, presently, "if when I wanted to smoke I was to put on a long duster—I guess Mr. Himes had dusters—and a nightcap and rubbers? I'd agree to hang the duster and the cap in the shed here and never smoke without putting 'em on." There was a deep purpose in this proposition, for, enveloped in the long duster, he might sit with Thomas ...
— A Chosen Few - Short Stories • Frank R. Stockton
... on Furniture.—A mixture composed of equal parts of turpentine and linseed oil will remove the white marks on furniture caused by water. Rub it on with a soft rag and wipe off with a perfectly clean duster. ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... it!" declared Molly; "if I only had a decent broom instead of this old stub! Now, I'll sweep, Mopsy, and you find something that'll do for a duster, and we'll straighten up the place ...
— Marjorie's Vacation • Carolyn Wells
... in the need for "putting the gentlemen's rooms straight," against the arrival of the two families to-morrow. Duster in hand, and by the light of a single candle that barely survived the draught from the open window, she moved to and fro about the Duke's room, a wan and listless figure, casting queerest shadows on the ceiling. There were other candles ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm
... sorts are next to worthless, but a few of the brands especially prepared for this work (and sold usually at $3 per hundred pounds, which will last two ordinary home gardens a whole season) are very convenient to use, and effective. Apply with a duster, like that described ...
— Home Vegetable Gardening • F. F. Rockwell
... her head in through the portieres again, and follows it with her arm and hand, in which is a feather duster, which she waves wildly in an endeavor to ...
— The Bicyclers and Three Other Farces • John Kendrick Bangs
... participation went—than if she had been only a faithful old housekeeper; she could only grieve and lament that such discord had come between the two whom she loved, and that in herself was no power even to solace their distresses. Marian found her standing in the passage, with a duster in one hand and a hearth-brush in ...
— New Grub Street • George Gissing
... heard her go into the hall and say, "Please send me down a clean duster, Laura. Joe, you get it." I would run gayly up the steps, and then would come Billy's turn. "Billy, I have forgotten my keys. Go ...
— Beautiful Joe - An Autobiography of a Dog • by Marshall Saunders
... obituary set up by his own hand, conveying the impression that at last the end had come to a misspent life. Then there was J. N. Free—the "Immortal J. N.," as he called himself, a gaunt, cadaverous figure in broad hat and linen duster, with hair flowing over his shoulders, who stalked into the offices at unseemly hours to "raise the veil" of ignorance and error, and "relieve the pressure" of psychic congestion in a town by turning upon it the ...
— In Our Town • William Allen White
... presently passed into an inner room and fetched therefrom a tin box, upon which were painted in dingy white the letters "J. E. M. A.," and underneath "Stagholme Estate." This the embryo lawyer carefully wiped with a duster, and set it up on some of its fellows immediately behind ...
— From One Generation to Another • Henry Seton Merriman
... common enough in New York—"Perhaps I did not have that amount," for "perhaps I had not," etc. The work revels in that buff binding which has given to the Leisure Hour Series the popular sobriquet of the "Linen Duster Series," a livery now well known as the certain indication of ...
— Lippincott's Magazine. Vol. XII, No. 33. December, 1873. • Various
... fetched a duster and rubbed the little window bright and clear. It was a small office she had often performed for ...
— White Lilac; or the Queen of the May • Amy Walton
... questioning the right of the senior of the two officers who had alighted at Sancho's to the title of colonel. Soldier stood out all over him, even though his garb was concealed by a nondescript duster. His face, lined, thin-lipped and resolute, was tanned by desert suns and winds. His hair, once brown, was almost white. His beard, once flowing and silky, was cropped to a gray stubble. His steely blue eyes snapped under their heavy thatch, his head was ...
— A Wounded Name • Charles King
... a severe and uncharitable look, but a row of them suggests the antique and pleasing pomp and ceremony of their early days, before the sideboard cupboards were only used to keep the boxes of strings and nails and the duster; and the best decanters were put on a high shelf, while the plain ones were used for vinegar in the kitchen closet. There is far less social visiting from house to house than there used to be. People in the smaller towns have more acquaintances who live at a distance ...
— Deephaven and Selected Stories & Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... at me, "I'm comparatively safe for the moment, and so is the matting. But before we do anything more, get a duster—a person like you is sure to have a duster in a drawer. Just so, there it is. Now wipe up the marks of my muddy feet in the room we first came into as well as this, and then see to the paint of the window. I have probably smirched it. Then roll up the Times tight, ...
— The Lowest Rung - Together with The Hand on the Latch, St. Luke's Summer and The Understudy • Mary Cholmondeley
... difficulty in finding my aunt. She was the last of the passengers to alight, and it was not until I got her into the carriage that she seemed really to recognize me. She had come all the way in a day coach; her linen duster had become black with soot, and her black bonnet gray with dust, during the journey. When we arrived at my boardinghouse the landlady put her to bed at once and I did not see her again ...
— The Troll Garden and Selected Stories • Willa Cather
... dingy appearance inseparable from age in a letter is accentuated by rubbing it lightly with a dirty duster. The effect is usually obvious under a strong glass, the passage of the dirty cloth revealing ...
— The Detection of Forgery • Douglas Blackburn
... morning's work with a feather duster. Occasionally he straightened a row of books. The bell tinkled, and Phyllis, in her brown coat and hat, stood, hesitant, at the ...
— Old Valentines - A Love Story • Munson Aldrich Havens
... while tidying one of the rooms in a villa formerly occupied by the Wagner family in summer, perceived an enormous halo shining persistently over a certain bedstead standing against the wall, the said halo absolutely refusing to remove itself when attacked with a feather- duster. The housemaid thought at first that it was simply an effect of the sunlight, but observed subsequently that the halo was just as large, fine yellow, opaque, and circular on dark days as on bright ones; ...
— Bluebeard • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... you tremble, child!" she cried. "Do you like old Colonial blue ware as well as that? If you do, you shall have this piece. Charity, bring a duster, or, better, a damp cloth. You shall have it, ...
— The Mayor's Wife • Anna Katharine Green
... brute he was, ugh!" she said, re-tying the ribbons of her bonnet under her square chin, and smoothing out her linen duster. ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte
... of the automobile that spoke, and in vain did his fair companion clutch at the tails of the linen duster that he wore; he was in the full tide of eloquence ...
— Potash & Perlmutter - Their Copartnership Ventures and Adventures • Montague Glass
... every morning, patting and stroking it till she had got it perfectly smooth and flat. Then she went about the room downstairs, put each chair back in its place, and if she found anything lying about she put it in the cupboard. After that she fetched a duster, climbed on a chair, and rubbed the table till it shone again. When the grandfather came in later he would look round well pleased and say to himself, "We look like Sunday every day now; Heidi did ...
— Heidi • Johanna Spyri
... I suggest that you be in a hurry about it!" said Archie, seeing that the woman had risen and was now moving rapidly toward them. The Governor stepped jauntily from the running board, with his hands thrust into the pockets of his duster. There was a twinkle in his eyes as he noted Archie's trepidation. He glanced toward the woman indifferently, removed his cap and addressed the little girl, who stood beside the pony with her hand on the bridle. A second car drew up just behind the Governor's machine. ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson
... like this 79-cent pastel art stuff you see in the Sixth Avenue department stores. The water looks like it had been laid on by Bohemian glass blowers who didn't care how many colors they used. The little islands near by, with clumps of feather-duster palms stickin' up from 'em, was a bit stagey and artificial. The far-off shores was too vivid a green to be true, and the high white clouds was the impossible kind that Maxfield Parrish puts on magazine covers. And, with that dazzlin' ...
— Wilt Thou Torchy • Sewell Ford
... rose-coloured lot that Mr. Lyman B. Rattray offered her, sitting in her father's study, with his hair very much brushed up on one side and very much flattened down on the other, a white tie and light-yellow duster adorning his ...
— Crowded Out! and Other Sketches • Susie F. Harrison
... second glance to see that he was her brother, not only on account of the family resemblance between them, but also because he allowed her to get into the buggy without offering the slightest assistance, which, indeed, was not needed, and graciously permitted her to place the duster that covered his knees over her own lap as well. The restive team trotted rapidly down the road for a few rods, until they came to a wide place in the highway, and then whirled around, seemingly within an ace of upsetting the buggy; but the young man evidently knew his business, ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr
... the private office of the editor of "The Financial Pilot" had fallen into a state of sordid dilapidation. If the janitor had received orders never to use a broom or a duster there, he obeyed them strictly. Disorder and dirt reigned supreme. Papers and manuscripts lay in all directions; and on the broad sofas the mud from the boots of all those who had lounged upon them had been drying for months. On the mantel-piece, ...
— Other People's Money • Emile Gaboriau
... aren't any of us annexationists," said a middle-aged woman from Toronto in a duster, and ...
— A Voyage of Consolation - (being in the nature of a sequel to the experiences of 'An - American girl in London') • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... irritation, and she looked sullenly at the enormous wardrobe and dressing-table with their speckled mirrors. These had delighted her at first, but in her heart she preferred the battered, makeshift furniture of Cardigan Street. A few licks with the duster and her work was done; but here the least speck of dust showed on the polished surface. Jonah, too, had got into a nasty habit of writing insulting words on the ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone
... for one expensive week, China (guaranteed antique)— Derby, Sevres and Lustre— Charmed her, till our Abigail Washed them in a kitchen pail, Dried them with a duster! ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, April 22, 1914 • Various
... never wash the chimneys of a lamp, as it causes them to crack when they become hot. Small sticks, covered with wash-leather pads, are the best things to use for cleaning the glasses inside, and a clean duster for polishing the outside. The globe of a moderator lamp should be occasionally washed in warm soap-and-water, then well rinsed in cold water, and either wiped dry or left to drain. Where candle-lamps are used, take out the springs ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... felt hat; A Coptic priest from Ararat; An English girl with cheeks of rose; A Nihilist with Socratic nose; Paddy from Cork with baggage light And pockets stuffed with dynamite; A haughty Southern Readjuster, Wrapped in his pride and linen duster; Two noisy New York stockbrokers, And twenty British globe-trotters. To my disgust and vast surprise, They turned on me lack-lustre eyes, And each with dropped and wagging jaw Burst out into a wild guffaw: They laughed with huge mouths opened wide; ...
— Pike County Ballads and Other Poems • John Hay
... you did not, for a duster would have swept away these shreds of varnish. Who has the key of ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes - Magazine Edition • Arthur Conan Doyle
... finger-rings set with sham diamonds—altogether the sort of outfit that its owner would probably have described as "rather nobby." Feeling that just now it needed a few repairs, he opened the bag, pulled out a duster and flicked away for half-a-minute at his brown boots. Next with a handkerchief he mopped his face and wiped round the inner edge first of his straw hat, and then of his collar and cuffs. After this he stood up, shook his trousers till ...
— The Delectable Duchy • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... Sharp, who had caused a magnificent cradle and baby-wardrobe to be got ready at his own expense, was most unmercifully scored. The infant was caricatured with a long gray beard and spectacles, with Sharp in a duster carefully rocking him to sleep, while Joanna the Prophetess treated the engraver to some "cuts" in her own style, ...
— The Humbugs of the World • P. T. Barnum
... Aunt Selina said, from the head of the stairs, "I sent those towels over from Ireland. Tell her to wash and bleach the one Mrs. What's-her-name Brown used as a duster." ...
— When a Man Marries • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... asked, and then she described to me this great bird nearly as big as a house, that you saw out miles away from any land, sleeping above the vast and desolate ocean. She told me that the Ancient Mariner was all about one; and quoted with great verve (she had a duster ...
— The Life of Robert Louis Stevenson for Boys and Girls • Jacqueline M. Overton
... The end of it was that, after pawning my revolver and my top-boots, the only valuable possessions I had left, to pay for my lodging, I was thrown on the street, and told to come back when I had more money. That night I wandered about New York with a gripsack that had only a linen duster and a pair of socks in it, turning over in my mind what to do next. Toward midnight I passed a house in Clinton Place that was lighted up festively. Laughter and the hum of many voices came from within. I listened. They spoke French. A society ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume IV (of 6) - Authors and Journalists • Various
... we cast out evil? Satan cannot cast out Satan. No one can clean a room with a filthy duster. The surgeon cannot cut out the disease if his instruments are defiled. While he removed one ill-growth he would sow the seed of another. It must be health which fights disease. It will demand a good temper to overcome the ...
— My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year • John Henry Jowett
... Mickey drew the duster he handled between vacuum days across a table and steadily watched first Douglas, then Leslie, both of whom ...
— Michael O'Halloran • Gene Stratton-Porter
... strike in the house. Pauline, retracing her steps, went slowly past her sisters and Miss Tredgold. Miss Tredgold slightly raised her voice as the culprit appeared. She read aloud with more determination than ever. Penelope flung down the duster she was hemming ...
— Girls of the Forest • L. T. Meade
... hair dressing number I inhale about $4 worth of breakfast and then lounge about my little nest. I call it my little nest because it is finished in birdseye maple. I always have eggs for breakfast, and Estelle puts on the finishing touches with a feather duster and I boss the job, smoking a cigarette. I always was strong for having things harmonize. I suppose it is my artistic temperament. I always drink cordials the same color as my hat. After that everything is fixed to my entire satisfaction, and I won't ...
— The Sorrows of a Show Girl • Kenneth McGaffey
... she's ben here many days. I've bought a piece of unbleached muslin and a piece o' brown gingham for her to make up; that'll keep her busy. Of course she won't pick up anything after herself; she probably never see a duster, and she'll be as hard to train into our ways as if she ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... would Sara Teasdale be beside Edwin Markham? Is there not danger that the poet, once launched on a career as an agitator, will no longer have time to dream dreams? If he bases his claims of worth on his ability as a "carpet-duster," [Footnote: See Aurora Leigh.] as Mrs. Browning calls the agitator, he is merely unsettling society,—for what end? He himself will soon have forgotten—will have become as salt that has lost its savor. Nothing ...
— The Poet's Poet • Elizabeth Atkins
... invited me into his room. He is exceedingly kind and generous, though, I am sorry to say it, a friend of oppression. He gave me a splendid apple, the first which I had seen for the season. He dusted my coat with his feather-duster, and he even dusted my boots. He asked me how far I had been walking. I told him all which I had said and done, thinking that it would profitably remind him of the great subject. He roared with laughter. "Three cheers for Gustavus;" "isn't that rich;"—waving, all the ...
— The Sable Cloud - A Southern Tale With Northern Comments (1861) • Nehemiah Adams
... having a pair of handcuffs which are too small or too large; and when the latter is the case, and the prisoner gets the "bracelets" in his hands instead of on his wrists, he is then in possession of a knuckle-duster from which the bravest would not ...
— The Strand Magazine: Volume VII, Issue 37. January, 1894. - An Illustrated Monthly • Edited by George Newnes
... fat country man with a linen duster and whiskers and baggy umbrella. Patsy Moriarty (Patrici really. Did you ever hear such a name? Mrs. Lippett couldn't have done better) who is tall and thin was Julia's wife in a absurd green bonnet over one ear. Waves of laughter followed them the whole length of the course. Julia played ...
— Daddy-Long-Legs • Jean Webster
... breakfasted, Maria Clara consumed her impatience in working at a silk purse while her aunt was trying to clean up the traces of the former night's revelry by swinging a feather duster about. Capitan Tiago was busy looking over some papers. Every noise in the street, every carriage that passed, caused the maiden to tremble and quickened the beatings of her heart. Now she wished that she were back in the quiet convent ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... the same race is fast dying out; indeed, the time is not far distant when all the varieties of young woman will have vanished from New England, as the dodo has perished in the Mauritius. The young lady is all that we shall have left, and the mop and duster of the last Almira or Loizy will be stared at by generations of Bridgets and Noras as that famous head and foot of the lost bird are stared at in ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 31, May, 1860 • Various
... call you over in Australia," ses Ginger; "my name is Dick Duster, likewise known as the Sydney Puncher. I've killed three men in the ring and 'ave never 'ad ...
— Odd Craft, Complete • W.W. Jacobs
... round her forehead, was busily polishing the stair-rods, while Cousin Matilda was in the kitchen washing the drawing-room ornaments in a lather, her sleeves rolled back on her thin arms, and her head tied up oddly and coquettishly in a duster. ...
— England, My England • D.H. Lawrence
... can see him now if you want to. Why did you go and ride that little devil Knuckle-Duster when I told ...
— Charles Rex • Ethel M. Dell
... Sweeping the matting in the center of the corridor before breakfast, or sweeping the bare 'sides' of this matting after breakfast, were tasks that developed into sinecures. The girl who went with long-handled feather duster to dust the statuary enjoyed a distinction equal to Don Quixote's in tilting at windmills. Filling the student-lamps, serving in a department where clerical work was to be done, or, as in science, where materials and specimens had to be prepared, were on the list of possibilities. ...
— The Story of Wellesley • Florence Converse
... now took her turn at looking disapproval. She exclaimed: "Why, the dress is as good as new; much too good to travel in. You ought to have worn a linen duster over ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips
... contributed to removing any serious feelings with his chatter and his jokes. Being familiar with these tombs, he had lost respect for them, as sacristans lose it for the saints they brush the dust off of with a feather-duster. Moreover, he judged everything by an esthetic criterion, completely devoid of respect; for him there were only sepulchres with artistic character, or without it; of a good or a poor period; and the latter sort he struck contemptuously ...
— Caesar or Nothing • Pio Baroja Baroja
... Duster," muttered the scout. "Did you ever see a skunk-trap? Oughts is for mush-rats, and number ones is mostly used for 'coons and 'possums, and I guess they'd do for a skunk. But you and we'll call this here trap a number two, Duster, for the skunk I'm after is a big one. All ...
— The Jimmyjohn Boss and Other Stories • Owen Wister
... mistake or negligence or forgetfulness in an office is remedied and forgotten. Mrs. Omicron—my dear Mr. Omicron—never hears of it. Not so with Mrs. Omicron's office, as your aroused imagination will tell you. Mrs. Omicron's parlourmaid's duster fails to make contact with one small portion of the hall-table. Mr. Omicron walks in, and his godlike glance drops instantly on the dusty place, and Mr. Omicron ejaculates sardonically: "H'm! Four women in the house, and they can't even keep ...
— The Plain Man and His Wife • Arnold Bennett
... b'iled egg done up in another napkin, a cup an' saucer, a little chiney coffee-pot, a little pitcher of cream, some loaf sugar in a silver dish, a little pancake of butter, a silver knife, two little spoons like what the childern play with, a silver pepper duster an' salt dish, an' an orange. Oh, yes, the' was another contraption—a sort of a chiney wineglass. The feller set down the tray an' says, 'Anythin' else ...
— David Harum - A Story of American Life • Edward Noyes Westcott |
