"Every inch" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... He must get out of this. But how? Flash-light in hand, he made the short tour of the cellar, examining and tapping every inch of the wall, the masonry, and the floor-work. Could he pile up the furniture and so reach the door in the ceiling? He could not. The articles consisted of the small, battered trunk, a legless, broken-springed ...
— The Girl in the Mirror • Elizabeth Garver Jordan
... Club of Oakland gave them a breakfast at 11:30; at 2 P. M. they addressed the Alameda County Auxiliary of the Woman's Congress, Rev. Eliza Tupper Wilkes, president. The audience filled every inch of space in the Unitarian church, the most prominent ladies of Oakland occupied seats on the platform, and a large reception in the parlors followed the speaking. The evening session was held in the Congregational church, an enthusiastic crowd in attendance. The next ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 2 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... my leisure time in exploring this mysterious underwater world. Her guns were of the heaviest calibre. Her steel walls were decorated with ponderous Pallasier shot and shell. I was struck with the marvellous cleanliness. Her decks were white. Every inch of brasswork was shining; everything in order; everything trim and neat; neither slovenly men ...
— From the Bottom Up - The Life Story of Alexander Irvine • Alexander Irvine
... was so nearly in despair that I could not help bursting in tears, and I was not ashamed of the weakness. Finally Rogers said, "Come Lewis" and I gently pulled the rope, calling the little animal, to make a trial. She smelled all around and looked over every inch of the strong ledge, then took one careful step after another over the dangerous place. Looking back I saw Rogers with a very large stone in his hand, ready to "holler" and perhaps kill the poor beast if she stopped. But she crept along trusting to the rope to balance, till she was ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly
... others he would ask for. His long, half-round steel butter probe or tryer was thrust down the centre of the firkin to the bottom, given a turn or two, and withdrawn, its tapering cavity filled with a sample of every inch of butter in the firkin. Dowie would pass it rapidly to and fro under his nose, maybe sometimes tasting it, then push the tryer back into the hole, then withdrawing it, leaving its core of butter where it found ...
— My Boyhood • John Burroughs
... need to be confident in the skill of their lither lad. His facer looked granite. Fronting that mass, Kit you might—not to lash about for comparisons—call a bundle of bamboo. Ay, but well knitted, springy, alive every inch of him; crafty, too, as you will soon bear witness. He knows he has got his task, and he's the man to ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... the trip to and from Earth with patterns, and with metal, with supplies and with apparatus. But she had to dodge and fight every inch of the way as the Miran ships swooped down angrily at her. A fighting craft could get through when the Miran fleet was withdrawn to some distance, but the Mirans were careful that no heavy-loaded freighter bearing power ...
— The Ultimate Weapon • John Wood Campbell
... brother's Kick where honor's lodged Kid, the leopard lie down with the Kin, makes the whole world Kin, a little more than Kind, fellow-feeling makes one wondrous Kindness, too full of the milk of human King, every inch a —, catch the conscience of the —, here lies our sovereign lord, the —himself has followed her Kingdom, my mind to me a Kings it makes gods Kiss, one kind, before we part —, my whole soul through a —snatched hasty ...
— Familiar Quotations • Various
... were any news yet. He drew a piece of paper from his pocket, on which he had scribbled the latest bulletin before the "Banner" office, and read as follows: "The battle opened with a vigorous attack by our right. The enemy was forced back, stubbornly contesting every inch of ground. General ———'s division is now bearing the brunt of the fight and is suffering heavily. The result is ...
— An Echo Of Antietam - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... beeswax until it shone. The fireplaces were lined with Dutch tiles; the flooring was of oak, polished as brightly as the furniture. The appointments from roof to floor were Dutch; and no wonder that this was so, for every inch of wood in its framework and beams, floor and furniture, and had been brought across from Friesland by William Martin in his ship, the Good Venture. It had been the dowry he received with his pretty ...
— By Pike and Dyke: A Tale of the Rise of the Dutch Republic • G.A. Henty
... invading the great company of mountains, penetrating brazenly to the very threshold of their silent councils, seemed but a pitiful ant-hill at the mercy of some possible giant tread. The ill-adjusted family, disputing every inch of ground with the wilderness, became invested with a dignity quite out of keeping with its achievements. Their very weaknesses and vanities, old Sally still clinging to her sun-bonnet and her limp rose-colored skirts, an eternal requiem for ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning
... a different, and, as a whole, an inferior man; but a man every inch of him, and an Englishman too, in his thoughts, and in his fine mother wit and tongue. He has, in the midst of all his confusion and passionateness, the true instinct of philosophy—the true venatic sense of objective truth. We know nothing ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown
... gardener gets here, he can hardly tear himself away; every inch of ground is utilized, or serves to beautify the place. The tobacco grown here has the most exquisite aroma, and, when properly treated, is a first-class product; the bee-hives look from a distance like a small town, with one-storied houses ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... the gallant captain of the Thunderer, who is said to be one of the best disciplinarians in the service, and to have done many a deed of daring in the course of his adventurous career, received me very kindly. He is every inch a sailor, and as there are full seventy-three inches of him, I may be excused for styling him a splendid specimen. In consequence of my being a friend of a friend of his, the captain invited me to spend several days on board. During my stay I inhabited the captain's 'fighting cabin,'—and ...
— In the Track of the Troops • R.M. Ballantyne
... became partners; for while a lawmaker can be highly useful to a man of energy outside the halls of legislation, the converse is every inch as true. They must be folk of course who know and trust one another; and, aside from marrying sisters—a fact calculated to quickly teach two gentlemen the worst and the best about each other—John Harley and Senator Hanway ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... gone; first winds are failing, and weight and numbers beginning to tell. Yard by yard the School-house have been driven back, contesting every inch of ground. The bull-dogs are the colour of mother earth from shoulder to ankle, except young Brooke, who has a marvellous knack of keeping his legs. The School-house are being penned in their turn, ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes
... he continued the search, until it really seemed that every inch of ground had been examined. It was all without result—Margaret Dornham and her little foster-child seemed ...
— Wife in Name Only • Charlotte M. Braeme (Bertha M. Clay)
... with keen gray eyes under straight brows, narrow temples, a sunburnt face, and alert, upright bearing and quick step, William Ferrars was every inch a soldier; but nothing so much struck Mr. and Mrs. Kendal as the likeness to their little Maurice, though it consisted more in air and gesture than in feature. His speech was brief and to the point, softened into delicately-polished courtesy towards womankind, in ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... muscles as to their fitness; as he drew in deep breaths of the soft air and let the tautened sinews relax again there was no alien note in the symphony of his being—all felt as sound and strong as ever; now he was standing the twinge did not bother him—he told himself that in every inch of him he was still the man he was. Yet he knew he no longer felt the twang of some divine-strung cord within that had been wont to thrill ...
— Secret Bread • F. Tennyson Jesse
... stood out from his face, making him look as if sadly in need of shaving, while on almost every inch of his body there was one of these natural weapons, giving him a ...
— Mr. Stubbs's Brother - A Sequel to 'Toby Tyler' • James Otis
... army fatigue uniform, its strict sombreness being relieved only by the two gleaming silver stars on his shoulder straps. General Miles, the commanding general, was in conventional tuxedo dress, and looked every inch the gallant soldier and gentleman that he is. From the little telegraph instrument on the table ran a single strand of copper wire, out in the dark night, over the pine tops of Florida and Georgia, over the mountains of the Carolinas, and hills and vales of Virginia, into the Executive Mansion ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... reasonable sum of money. If I know anything about vessels, she is a Cuban trader bound to New York. Ease the Osprey up a bit. Don't crowd her so heavy, and the chase will pass by within half a mile of us. But we mustn't let her get by, for she is a trotter, and every inch of ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon
... right!" gritted Rolfe, squirming in every inch of his skin with the tremendous responsibility confronting him. None knew better than he what the consequences must be of attacking a party of Government sailors. But the sight he saw—the sounds ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle
... girl, she is a lady every inch. But she is in love with that Penfold. I'm afraid it ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade
... in white marble (with inlayings of gold and the most delicately pierced marble gratings) through which a stream of water used to run (and it ran again at the Coronation Durbar in 1911, when the Royal Baths were again made to "function") that must be one of the most magical of the works of man. Every inch is charming and distinguished. All these rooms are built along the high wall which in the time of Shah Jahan and his many lady loves was washed by the Jumna. But to-day the river has receded and a broad strip ...
— Roving East and Roving West • E.V. Lucas
... broad lace collar were most becoming, and she looked every inch the gentlewoman that she really was. She had once been Mrs. Dainty's governess, and now, as mistress of a thriving private school, she was independent and happy. The class was not a large one, but the little pupils belonged ...
— Dorothy Dainty's Gay Times • Amy Brooks
... And I shall run around in the twilight, whether it is morn or eve, and see all the spots I love. Do you remember how badly I felt when I left our little House of Dreams, Susan? I thought I could never love Ingleside so well. But I do. I love every inch of the ground and every stick and ...
— Rainbow Valley • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... clothes, unshaven, betraying continually the class from which they had risen. Culvera dropped in after a few minutes. He had discarded his uniform and was in the picturesque regalia of the young Mexican cavalier. From jingling silver spurs to the costly gold-laced sombrero he was every inch the dandy. His manners were the pink of urbanity. Nothing was lacking in particular to the affectionate deference he showed his chief. It suggested somehow the love of a son and the admiration of ...
— Steve Yeager • William MacLeod Raine
... has not the same wit, because I lately saw a black snake in the woods trying to swallow the garter snake, and he had made some headway, though the little snake was fighting every inch of the ground, hooking his tail about sticks and bushes, and pulling back with all his might, apparently not liking the look of things down there at all. I thought it well to let him have a good taste of his own doctrines, when I put my foot down ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... dream, the whole making a picture for the brush of the greatest painter. 'We want to see the chief who tramples the British to death and sweeps their forts off the face of the earth.' Montcalm, though every inch a soldier, was rather short than tall; and at first the Ottawa chief looked surprised. 'We thought your head would be lost in the clouds,' he said. But then, as he caught Montcalm's piercing glance, he added: 'Yet when we look into your eyes, we see the height ...
— The Passing of New France - A Chronicle of Montcalm • William Wood
... watched every inch of the road, to steer to the best advantage. His hands gripped the wheel until his knuckles showed white with the strain, and, every now and then his right hand adjusted the speed lever or the controller handle, while his foot was on the emergency brake, ready to stop the car at the ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Runabout - or, The Speediest Car on the Road • Victor Appleton
... their paddles under the thwarts of the canoes and raising the blades on their shoulders, balanced the canoes and trotted swiftly over the carry. Nothing seemed any trouble that glorious, beautiful day—nothing too heavy, nothing too hard. Betty and Hope could have skipped over every inch of the trail, and they were quite sure that they could have done all the paddling, too. And Betty did learn, in after years, not only to paddle, but also to carry her own canoe, for she grew to be a big, strong, athletic girl, with rosy cheeks ...
— Little Busybodies - The Life of Crickets, Ants, Bees, Beetles, and Other Busybodies • Jeanette Augustus Marks and Julia Moody
... to the pain and agony, the horror and the death, which are as real parts of it as brightness and beauty, love and life. Every little valley that lies in lovely loneliness has its scenes of desolation, and tempest has broken over the fairest scenes. Every river has drowned its man. Over every inch of blue sky the thunder cloud has rolled. Every summer has its winter, every day its night, every life its death. All stars set, all moons wane. 'Bare ruined choirs where late the sweet birds sang' come after ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... money, in peace, in reputation. These things will leave a stigma which will outlast you. It will arouse suspicion of your ability and skill among your private patients who now trust you. You'll have to fight every inch of the road to retain your ground, or any part of it, against the new and abler physicians who must come with the growth of the country. You'll not be wanted by your best friends when it comes to a case of life and death. You'll become only ...
— The Lady Doc • Caroline Lockhart
... supposed that Lady Eustace, during these summer weeks, was living the life of a recluse. The London season was in its full splendour, and she was by no means a recluse. During the first year of her widowhood she had been every inch a widow,—as far as crape would go, and a quiet life either at Bobsborough or Portray Castle. During this year her child was born,—and she was in every way thrown upon her good behaviour, living with bishops' wives and deans' daughters. Two years of retreat from the world is generally thought ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... so much as Watty," continued Frieshardt. "He has grown a tall, sensible fellow now, and I know he is honest, every inch of him." ...
— Harper's Young People, December 9, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... and rare that you can detect even the faint scent of the wild-grape blossoms or the buttercups in it in spring. The wagon to which the horse was fastened had no business there in the cedar-hills or slow-going road; it belonged to town, every inch, from hub to cover,—was square-built, shiningly clean, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 74, December, 1863 • Various
... Italians. And there were stranger uniforms in varieties inexhaustible—the schapska-shaped head-gear of Polish officers, the beret of Czecho-Slovaks. And everywhere, too, the gay and well-known red pom-pon bobbed on the caps of French blue-jackets, and British marines stalked in pairs, looking every inch the soldier with their swagger sticks and their ...
— The Crimson Tide • Robert W. Chambers
... when a tall gentleman of grave demeanor and sober dress rose from his seat on the porch, and I recognized my friend of Cahokia days, Monsieur Gratiot. He was a little more portly, his hair was dressed now in an eelskin, and he looked every inch the man of affairs that he was. He greeted us kindly and bade us come up on the porch, where he read ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... no one, your Highness; yet I have left my men to search again, though in truth we have inspected every inch of all the rooms.' ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay
... Over every inch of its heavy barrel and polished walnut stock he rubbed a piece of greased linen with loving care, drew back the flint-lock and greased carefully every nook and turn of its mechanism, lifted the gun finally to his shoulder and drew an imaginary ...
— The Southerner - A Romance of the Real Lincoln • Thomas Dixon
... of the violation. But let him carefully remember also that the Spaniards are not and never have been a despicable people. If Spain has produced one of the lowest characters in history, she has also produced one of the highest. That man was every inch a Spaniard who, maimed, diseased, and poor, broken down by long captivity, and harassed by malignant persecution, lived nevertheless a life of grandeur and beauty fit to be a pattern for coming generations,—the author of a book which has had a wider fame than any ...
— The Unseen World and Other Essays • John Fiske
... said eagerly, "I outfitted there for hunting more than once. It is best for me to lead, as I know well every inch of the path, and have grown ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... plundered by the wickedness of men, had never allowed himself to be discouraged from aspiring to the stars, even in this miserable hole into which adverse fate had let him sink. And he knitted his brows and ruffled his hair, every inch of him ...
— Dame Care • Hermann Sudermann
... Trevennack leaned back and drew himself up proudly to his full height, like a soldier. He looked majestic as he sat there—every inch a St. Michael. "Well, it's hard to keep such a secret," he answered, laying his free hand on his breast, "hard to keep such a secret; and I own, when they were talking about it, I longed to tell them. But for Cleer's sake I ...
— Michael's Crag • Grant Allen
... must wait. You promised. I thought about it with every inch of my brain last night, an' I got a sort of feeling—I caan't explain, but wait. I've trusted you all my life long an' allus shall; now 't is your turn to trust me, just this wance. I've got great thoughts. I see the way; I may ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts
... kissed his fingers to the girl. Then he led the way out of the room, fine and gallant and debonair, a villain every inch of him. ...
— A Daughter of Raasay - A Tale of the '45 • William MacLeod Raine
... when he was so hard pushed as to be driven over the bridge of Athlone in a coffin to avoid the coroner,[4] didn't he, and in less than a twelvemonth too, bring over a sugar-baker's daughter, pay off encumbrances, and live and die like a gentleman as he was every inch? I have not much to leave you but some advice, Frank dear, and after I slip my girths remember what I say. When you're likely to get into trouble, always take the bull by the horns, and when you're in ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. 1, No. 5, July 29, 1850 • Various
... thankful with all my heart and soul that the people have at last consented to the enfranchisement of two millions of black men. I recognize that, as the load is raised one inch, we must work by degrees, accepting every inch, every hair's breadth gained toward the right. I welcome the enfranchisement of the negro as a step toward ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... life, no one knew where; and earned his money, no one knew how. Travel-worn and careworn, he was prematurely aged, and at fifty might well have been mistaken for a man of sixty-five or seventy. Poor and broken as he was, however, Monsieur de Sainte Aulaire was every inch a gentleman of the old school; and his little girl was proud of him, when he came to the school to see her. This, however, was very seldom—never oftener than twice or three times in the year. When she saw him for the last time, Hortense was about thirteen years of ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... opened the door to her, and treated her as if she had been a lady every inch, handing her a chair and speaking quite as if she were ...
— Exit Betty • Grace Livingston Hill
... Caesar—and lost. There was France, scene of the bloodiest revolution that has ever dyed red the pages of history—a revolution that proved supreme the tremendous, onrushing power of the masses. And there was Rome itself, where every inch of soil, where every nook and cranny of the famous catacombs marked some great historic drama played in the days when "to be a Roman ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield
... man in knickerbockers greeted her: Squire Brand, who owned a famous property a few miles away, and who had the reputation of never missing a meet, although he did not ride. He knew every inch of the country; it was said that he could boast, at the end of a season, that he had, on the whole, seen more of the runs than any one else except the Master. He was a tireless runner, with an extraordinarily ...
— Captain Jim • Mary Grant Bruce
... pilgrims sat and studied the wonderful facade, or walked round the outside, examining the rich carvings that covered every inch of the walls. Twilight fell before they had thought of entering, and feeling that they had seen enough for that night, they went thoughtfully home to dream of solemn shadows and saintly faces, for the cathedral haunted ...
— Shawl-Straps - A Second Series of Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott
... which desolates the country and corrupts the winds of heaven," resolved to quit the field of argument and to take arms as a Military Association. For nothing could be so effective as "the decided and awful plan of the whole Nation rising in a mass of Volunteers, determined to dispute every inch of ground with their daring aggressors and to spill the last drop of their blood in defence of their religion and their laws." They beg Edward Carver to command them; they will choose their uniform, will arrange themselves as grenadiers and light infantry; and, "to preserve the coup ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... tone of voice—the flashing eye—the occasion, and the mighty shout of the multitude, cannot be impressed; but still Prentiss has left enough in his brilliant career, if treasured up, to show posterity that he was every inch a man. Let his fragmentary printed speeches—let the reminiscences of his friends that treat of his power as an orator, be brought together, and unsatisfactory as they may be, there will be found left ...
— The International Weekly Miscellany, Volume I. No. 9. - Of Literature, Art, and Science, August 26, 1850 • Various
... impossible to resist a feeling of depression upon strolling around the environs of the town and regarding the barren aspect of the distant country. Every inch of this fertile plain should be cultivated, and numerous villages should be dotted upon the extensive surface. "Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth" was a curse that appeared ...
— Cyprus, as I Saw it in 1879 • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... stepping-stone; he was not made for the desk of a counting-house. No heights dazzled him; he saw himself being made a peer or a prince, being granted wide domains by a grateful monarch. He was not too low to aspire to the hand of a king's fair daughter; he was a hero, every inch a hero. Great is the power of beer. Avaunt! ye sallow teetotalers, ye ...
— Orientations • William Somerset Maugham
... what is likely to contribute to the better cultivation of the greater part of his dominions. The attention of the landlord is a particular and minute consideration of what is likely to be the most advantageous application of every inch of ground upon his estate. The principal attention of the sovereign ought to be, to encourage, by every means in his power, the attention both of the landlord and of the farmer, by allowing both to pursue ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... apologies. 'He must overlook the unkempt condition of the fields. . . . Boisveyrac was not wont to make so poor a show . . . the estate, in fact, though not rich, had always been well kept up . . . the stonework was noted throughout New France, and every inch of timber (would M. le General observe?) thoroughly well seasoned. . . . Yes, those were the arms above the entrance—Noel quartering Tilly—two of the oldest families in the province . . . If M. le General took an interest in heraldry, these other quarterings were worth perusal . ...
— Fort Amity • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... man inside here that knows the tunnel just as well as I do,—every inch of it,—and he's up near the other end now. If a company begins coming in, my man will run back without being seen and let us know. Now, sir, shall I timber this end, or shall we deal with them at the top of the stair one by one as they come up. One good swordsman at the ...
— The O'Ruddy - A Romance • Stephen Crane
... welcome him either. Why here is BROWN on the platform—do him a last good turn—describe STANLEY. I tell him that the great explorer looks younger than ever, wears big cap, white suit, revolver and field-glasses. Every inch a portrait in the Daily Graphic! BROWN says, "That's strange, as he didn't look like that when he saw him!" Appears BROWN put off trip to Canada to welcome him. Can't be helped! Shall meet STANLEY somewhere (movements advertised daily ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, May 3, 1890. • Various
... one of these experimenters in the quivering tissues of the helpless dog or rabbit or guinea-pig, let him insert a lancet one-eighth of an inch into his own skin, and for every inch more he cuts let him advance the lancet another one-eight of an inch; and whenever he seizes, with ragged forceps, a nerve or spinal marrow, the seat of all that is concentrated and exquisite in agony, or literally tears out nerves by ...
— An Ethical Problem - Or, Sidelights upon Scientific Experimentation on Man and Animals • Albert Leffingwell
... bargain and sale. I have done my duty in proposing it to you. I have, indeed, tired you by a long discourse; but this is the misfortune of those to whose influence nothing will be conceded, and who must win every inch of their ground by argument. You have heard me with goodness. May you decide with wisdom! For my part, I feel my mind greatly disburdened by what I have done to-day. I have been the less fearful of trying your patience, because on this subject I ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... more dresses, of some sheeny stuff,—alapaca, Ma called it,—black, purple and brown, that took every inch of dander out of Polly. She wiped her hands extra clean, and came and twisted them this way and that, and crinkled them and smoothed them, and puckered the ends into folds, and laying them across the ironing-table, backed toward the wall with ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, January 1878, No. 3 • Various
... served on a huge china plate that had been packed over the mountains with much trouble and when every inch of room was needed for the bare necessities. Thus tenacious were the women in coming to this raw country to preserve their womanliness. I might have thought I was being favored had not Mrs. Davis frankly informed me that her few pieces of china were ...
— A Virginia Scout • Hugh Pendexter
... GENERAL BENTHORNHAM was every inch a gentleman, and though he had what the vulgar call a very ugly conk nose, the ladies held him in high favor, and doubtless had never seen him except in full uniform, when he appeared to excellent advantage, for the point of his hat aided to detract from ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"
... and hoarse, leaned forward, patted Stowell on the thigh, caught the ball, passed it quickly to Mason as that youth plunged for the line, and then threw himself into the breach, pushing, heaving, fighting for every inch that gave under ...
— Behind the Line • Ralph Henry Barbour
... in being not only perched each upon a solitary hillock in a vast level or marsh, but in being hillocks in themselves. In the case of Winchelsea there are trees and green spaces to boot, but Rye and its hillock are one; every inch is given over to red brick and grey stone. They are true cities of the plain. Between them are three miles of flat meadow, where, among thousands of sheep, stands the grey rotundity of Camber Castle. All this land is polder, as the Dutch call it, yet not reclaimed from the ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... every inch of that old tower—haunted room and all—before I am a week older," declares Florence defiantly. After which she smiles at Adrian again, and follows the maid up the broad staircase ...
— The Haunted Chamber - A Novel • "The Duchess"
... Scarecrow searched in his pocket for the pepper-box containing the two silver Wishing Pills, it was not to be found. Filled with anxiety, the voyagers hunted throughout every inch of the ...
— The Marvelous Land of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... underbrush, crossed and recrossed by barbed wire, under heavy and almost plunging fire from the Spanish works, while attacking with small arms an enemy strongly posted in intrenchments and blockhouses, supported by artillery, and who stubbornly contested every inch of ground gained ...
— The Colored Regulars in the United States Army • T. G. Steward
... request the mayor to hold his police force in readiness to protect the meeting in case of need. The day passed quietly. Long before the time announced for the meeting, the hall, capable of containing three thousand people, was thronged, and, by the time the speakers arrived, every seat was filled, every inch of standing room was occupied, and thousands went away from the doors unable to obtain admittance. The audience was for the most part a highly respectable and intelligent one, and, notwithstanding the great crowd, was exceedingly quiet. William Lloyd Garrison ...
— The Grimke Sisters - Sarah and Angelina Grimke: The First American Women Advocates of - Abolition and Woman's Rights • Catherine H. Birney
... traveller smiled back in return. "Similia similibus,"—he believed in homoeopathy. Puns, horse-laugh, monkish face, skin of a friar, true Rabelaisian exterior, clothing, body, mind, and features, all pulled together to put a devil-may-care jollity into every inch of his person. Free-handed and easy-going, he might be recognized at once as the favorite of grisettes, the man who jumps lightly to the top of a stage-coach, gives a hand to the timid lady who fears to step down, jokes with the postillion about his neckerchief ...
— Parisians in the Country - The Illustrious Gaudissart, and The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac
... Battle Abbey in my memory, and the ideal of a baronial hall in my mind, I was quite taken aback at the smallness and narrowness and lowness of this; which, however, is a very fine one, on its own little scale. In truth, it is not much more than a vestibule. The ceiling is carved; and every inch of the walls is covered with claymores, targets, and other weapons and armor, or old-time curiosities, tastefully arranged, many of which, no doubt, have a history attached to them,—or had, in Sir Walter's own mind. Our attendant was a very intelligent person, ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... peculiarly unable to get out of my head that little adage apropos the fact that when the blind shall lead the blind both shall fall into a ditch! But Chinese decorum forbade my falling behind. I had determined to walk across China, every inch of the way or not at all; and the chair coolies, unaware of my intentions presumably, thought it a great joke when at the western gate, through which I departed, I gave instructions that one hundred cash be doled ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle
... remember the day when I could hardly induce you to enter it! I just had to pull you in, and you disputed every inch ...
— The Boarded-Up House • Augusta Huiell Seaman
... consideration that Edward Nicholas, whose voice was now heard continually giving words of command, had drawn his party to this point where the broken ground neutralized in a great measure the advantages of the dragoons. He was now upon ground every inch of which he knew; in which respect he had greatly the advantage of Sir Charles Davenant; and he availed himself of it so as to draw off his own party, and to distress the cavalry. From the point at which they had just been skirmishing, a long range of rocky and sylvan scenery commenced which ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. II. • Thomas De Quincey
... legislatures is absolutely taken away during its territorial condition. In effect, there is to be no law for slavery, its permanency and existence being provided for, except the will of the master and the present odious slave code of New Mexico. These are fastened upon every inch of the soil of that immense region, beyond even the power of the people to remove them, however much they may desire to do so, prior to the formation of a State government. Slavery must therefore be the normal condition of the territory, while the State is in the process of formation and organization; ...
— A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention • Lucius Eugene Chittenden
... to speak, in the face of slave-breeding Virginia, this most intense focus of treason; it ought to be done here, that the loyal freemen of Virginia's soil be enabled to fight and crush the F. F. V's, the progeny of hell; it ought to be done here on every inch of soil covered with shattered shackles; and not partially on the outskirts, in the Carolinas and Louisiana. Stanton, alone, and Welles among the helmsmen, are so inspired; but alas, for the ...
— Diary from November 12, 1862, to October 18, 1863 • Adam Gurowski
... had been in the world of affairs, he wondered where were these choked avenues, these struggling masses, these competitors for every inch of vantage. Then he gradually discovered that ...
— The Americanization of Edward Bok - The Autobiography of a Dutch Boy Fifty Years After • Edward William Bok
... tried a sanitarium; he was apt to try anything suggested, being credulous about such matters. But his strength of body slowly faded away. He was more disturbed than surprised at this, and fought for life every inch of ...
— Life of Father Hecker • Walter Elliott
... mandioca, when ripe, looks something like a nursery of young plants. Each plant grows by itself, with a few palmated leaves only at the top. The stem is about an inch in diameter at the base, and six or seven feet long. A bud appears at nearly every inch of the otherwise smooth stem. These plants give forth tubers of irregular shape, in substance like a parsnip, about six inches long and four thick. The tubers, after being scraped and rinsed, are ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston
... felt the cover of the wickerwork trunk bend slightly and heard it creak. For a moment, he thought the two men were about to open his prison. He had his revolver ready: every inch of him was on the defensive! Then he realised that his captors had merely seated themselves on the trunk ...
— Messengers of Evil - Being a Further Account of the Lures and Devices of Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... barca and two gondolas to pass—this canal of mine. Only deep enough to let a wine barge through; so narrow you must go all the way back to the lagoon if you would turn your gondola; so short you can row through it in five minutes; every inch of its water surface part of everything about it, so clear are the reflections; full of moods, whims, and fancies, this wave space—one moment in a broad laugh coquetting with a bit of blue sky peeping from behind a cloud, its cheeks ...
— The Veiled Lady - and Other Men and Women • F. Hopkinson Smith
... shoulders that slope into delicious arms; the Japanese group, blowing tiny, gem-like buds with puffed-out cheeks; the rhythmic female on tiptoe offering her mantle to Venus; and enveloping them all vernal breezes, unseen, yet sensed on every inch of the canvas—what are these things but the music of an art original at its birth and never since reborn? The larger rhythms of the greater men do not sweep us along with them in Botticelli. But ...
— Promenades of an Impressionist • James Huneker
... It is certain that she objected to the marriage of the clergy, and showed scant courtesy to the wife of her own favourite Archbishop Parker. Nor would she suffer the Bishops, except as Peers, to meddle in affairs of State. A magnificent princess, every inch a queen, she could not forget that the English people had saved her life from the clutches of her sister, and it was for them, not for any Minister, courtier, or ...
— The Life of Froude • Herbert Paul
... wiry mass of bone and sinew which went to make the police dog every inch a warrior, and doubted it. The child had finished her task, and started the stew to heating again over the fire, and now she turned, swept back the mass of curls from her heated face with a graceful motion ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... ivory, painted vermillion, seated colossally on a colossal throne, a sceptre in one hand, a thunderbolt in the other, a radiating gold crown on his august head, and, about his limbs, a shawl of Tyrian purple, he looked every inch the god. ...
— The Lords of the Ghostland - A History of the Ideal • Edgar Saltus
... are dead, and all efforts to revive them have been futile. These operas had sprung into sudden popularity, whereas "Fidelio," "Euryanthe," "Lohengrin," and "Tannhaeuser," which for years had to fight for every inch of ground, are now masters of the situation, and gaining in popularity every year. And this brings us to the second lesson taught by the history of the opera—that the works that thus had to fight their way into the hearts of the public are the immortal operas that are sure ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck
... and domestic quarrels See heartless Henry lies by headless Charles; Between them stands another sceptred thing, It lives, it reigns—"aye, every inch a king." Charles to his people, Henry to his wife, In him the double tyrant starts to life: Justice and Death have mixed their dust in vain. The royal Vampires join and rise again. What now can tombs avail, since these disgorge The blood and dirt[55] ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron
... brilliant and radiant. But now, from what little I've seen of them, they strike me as a pack of ninnies, most of them, and ninety percent of the remainder as bores. Now there's Professor Caldwell—he's different. He's a man, every inch of him and every atom of his ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... they find quarters, and rest from the nerve-racking, soul-shaking clamor of guns and buzz of bullets. The trenches were wonderful. Zaidos and Velo, the Red Cross badges on their arms giving them free passage, soon explored every inch until they were perfectly familiar with them all. Zaidos drew a sketch of the plan to send to the ...
— Shelled by an Unseen Foe • James Fiske
... only be able to get at it once in the twenty-four hours. It was necessary to have it accessible at all times. So when not using it, he was obliged to hide it out of sight, where he could. And of all places in the world, a ship of war, above her hold, least abounds in secret nooks. Almost every inch is occupied; almost every inch is in plain sight; and almost every inch is continually being visited and explored. Added to all this, was the deadly hostility of the whole tribe of ship-underlings—master-at-arms, ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... a guard, stood near one of the windows, and the secretary was ready with his ink and goose quills to write down whatever he might be ordered to write. Alvarez and Braxton Wyatt were visibly uneasy. Bernardo Galvez sat upright, his face stern, his look commanding. He was every inch of him a ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler
... importance and hence his ranking in society is much higher. In Japan to-day farming absorbs 60 per cent. of the population. The system of tillage, in many respects primitive, is yet very thorough, and by means of skilful manuring makes one plot of ground yield two or three crops per annum.[981] Every inch of arable land is cultivated in grain, vegetables and fruits. Mountains and hills are terraced and tilled far up their slopes. Meadows are conspicuously absent, as are also fallow fields. Land is too valuable to lie idle. Labor is chiefly manual and is ...
— Influences of Geographic Environment - On the Basis of Ratzel's System of Anthropo-Geography • Ellen Churchill Semple
... been into the town of Wayneburg, not many miles distant, with Harry. Charley didn't often have a chance to go to town, and you may be sure he made the best use of his eyes. The one thing which he remembered above everything else was the big poster-board near the market, covered over every inch of it with bright-colored pictures of leaping horses, trick mules, flying riders jumping through hoops, comical clowns, and, above all, a big balloon just rising out of the ...
— Harper's Young People, June 15, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... struggle while in it, and the air in your lungs will keep you afloat while you learn to make the movements that will carry you along. You will not sink if you are quite calm and move only your hands under water with a slight paddling movement. Keep in mind that every inch above water but adds so much to the weight to sink you lower. To throw up your arms is the surest way of going straight to the bottom. Do not be afraid to allow the water to come up and partially cover ...
— On the Trail - An Outdoor Book for Girls • Lina Beard and Adelia Belle Beard
... myself unseen, except in the identical pavillion already alluded to—here, however, I was quite secure, and had abundant time also, for I was not to appear till scene the second, when I was to come forward in full Spanish costume, "every inch a Hidalgo." ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... fell in love with the girl, and intends to make her his wife, as he says. As for the youth, I have pitched on him to be my son-in-law. To-day we both design to talk to the father, one Diego de la Llana, who is a gentleman, and an old Christian every inch of him. ...
— Wit and Wisdom of Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... Pinch you but in one vice, away you fly To some new frisk of contrariety. You roll like snow-balls, gathering as you run, 20 And get seven devils, when dispossess'd of one. Your Venus once was a Platonic queen; Nothing of love beside the face was seen; But every inch of her you now uncase, And clap a vizard-mask upon the face. For sins like these, the zealous of the land, With little hair, and little or no band, Declare how circulating pestilences Watch, every twenty years, ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol II - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... than one yard, which was marked with sticks all around the shed. It was funny to see the snake-doctor lean across the dead-line and crane his sweet little neck to try to hear and see Tony inside the shed. And after Tony had squinted at and touched and nosed almost every inch of the shed, he came out with his hands ...
— Phyllis • Maria Thompson Daviess
... oyster-can in her hand when she met the two gentlemen. She had grown undeniably thinner since summer, but she was charming. Her short black skirt and her coarse gray jacket fitted her as well as if they had been tailor-made. There was nothing tawdry or slatternly about her. She looked every inch a lady, even with the drawback of an oyster-can, ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... nearer by. It did not disappoint me, nor change the impression produced by the first view. What a homely face! but I thought withal, what a fine face! Rugged, and soft; gentle, and shrewd; Miss Cardigan's "Yon's a mon!" recurred to me often. A man, every inch of him; self- respecting, self-dependent, having a sturdy mind of his own; but wise also to bide his time; strong to wait and endure; modest, to receive from others all they could give him of aid and counsel. But the honest, keen, kindly eyes won ...
— Daisy in the Field • Elizabeth Wetherell
... Chadwick Buford jogged along the turnpike from the Ohio to the heart of the Bluegrass. He had filled his empty shoulder-straps with two bars. He had a bullet wound through one shoulder and there was a beautiful sabre cut across his right cheek. He looked the soldier every inch of him; he was, in truth, what he looked; and he was, moreover, a man. Naturally, his face was stern and resolute, if only from habit of authority, but he had known no passion during the war that might have ...
— The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come • John Fox
... his dress, you could see he was a gentleman, every inch his father's son. For it is not to be supposed, as some might hastily and ignorantly suppose, that Alan Campbell was not a gentleman, because ...
— Wilton School - or, Harry Campbell's Revenge • Fred E. Weatherly
... vote. The gathering increased every moment, and soon the Doctors in their scarlet began to dot the seats around the Vice-Chancellor's chair. Prince Leopold, by right of his royalty, entered the sacred enclosure with Dr. Acland, and afterwards took his seat among the Doctors. Before two o'clock every inch of the floor was full, the occupants standing in anticipation of the coming encounter. "Still they gravitated towards their respective voting-doors, and on the Placet side one descried the scholarly face of Professor ...
— Fifteen Chapters of Autobiography • George William Erskine Russell
... rock, and the making of that rock is so honestly and minutely recorded by nature that even those who take alarm at the word "geology" may read this record with ease. These rocky ledges that stare so proudly across the sea underlie, also, every inch of soil, and are of the same kind everywhere—granite. Granite is a rock which is formed under immense pressure and in the presence of confined moisture, needing a weight of fifteen thousand pounds ...
— The Old Coast Road - From Boston to Plymouth • Agnes Rothery
... said Mrs. Peck. "What made him ask you? There's Adam knows every inch of the shore better ...
— The Tidal Wave and Other Stories • Ethel May Dell
... she, 'I will make it all quite clear to you. There is an old immortal who lives under the sea hereabouts and whose name is Proteus. He is an Egyptian, and people say he is my father; he is Neptune's head man and knows every inch of ground all over the bottom of the sea. If you can snare him and hold him tight, he will tell you about your voyage, what courses you are to take, and how you are to sail the sea so as to reach your home. He will also tell you, if you so will, all that has been going on at your house ...
— The Odyssey • Homer
... Ratoneau looked every inch a soldier, broad, sturdy, and swaggering, as he clanked across the square. Simon noticed with surprise that his face was bright ...
— Angelot - A Story of the First Empire • Eleanor Price
... harbour—as yet quite undeveloped—which is known as the 'Blue Mouth.' Since our aerial journey I have been to it by sea with Admiral Rooke in The Lady, and then on land with the Vladika, who was born on its shores, and who knows every inch ...
— The Lady of the Shroud • Bram Stoker
... The war had come and dragged him out. Across his quiet, ordered path its red trail had stretched and to go forward it had been necessary to go through. The Spences always went through. But Nature, every inch a woman, had made him pay for scorning her. She had killed no fatted calf ...
— The Window-Gazer • Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
... and cripple after cripple, hurried into the shop, to congratulate the angry widow on "masther Martin's luck; and warn't he worthy of it, the handsome jewel—and wouldn't he look the gintleman, every inch of him?" and Sally expatiated greatly on it in the kitchen, and drank both their healths in an extra pot of tea, and Kate grinned her delight, and Jack the ostler, who took care of Martin's horse, boasted loudly of it in the street, declaring that "it was ...
— The Kellys and the O'Kellys • Anthony Trollope
... to be a hard taskmaster. Before the end of the week Jim realized that he would not get out of Tuck's hands until he knew every inch of the design of the great dam from the sluice gates and the drainage holes to the complete vertical section. He had no patience with mistakes and Jim took his grilling in silence, for the fat little man showed a deep knowledge of the technical side of dam building that ...
— Still Jim • Honore Willsie Morrow
... dispatches reveal that, while occasional and local retirements had been considered, such a sweeping retreat was far from contemplated by Generals Joffre and French. German official dispatches bear testimony to the intrepid character of the defenders sullenly falling back and contesting every inch of the way, as much as they do to the daring and the vivid bravery of the German attackers who hurled themselves steadily, day after day, upon positions hastily taken up in the retreat where the retirement could be partly repaid by the ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume III (of 12) - The War Begins, Invasion of Belgium, Battle of the Marne • Francis J. Reynolds, Allen L. Churchill, and Francis Trevelyan
... tenderly in a woman's arms, his own scurry among the booths to find the milk so peremptorily ordered, and the smile of thanks that had been his reward! He had run away when he should have hung on. He should have fought every inch of the way.... ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath
... indignation, subtlety and simplicity, personal appeal and political reasoning, were the alternate weapons with which she fought against all odds of evidence or inference, and disputed step by step every inch of debatable ground. She repeatedly insisted on the production of proof in her own handwriting as to her complicity with the project of the assassins who had expiated their crime on the 20th and 21st of the month preceding. ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various
... to hope that he was now about to enter into a free land, a land delicious with milk which he himself might quaff, and honey which would not tantalise him by being only honey to the eye. When Mrs Proudie banged the door, as she left his room, he felt himself every inch a bishop. To be sure his spirit had been a little cowed by his chaplain's subsequent lecture; but on the whole he was highly pleased with himself, and flattered himself that the worst was over. 'Ce n'est que le premier pas qui coute', he reflected; and now that his first step had ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... curtains were drawn aside, and Claudius himself came into the beautiful apartment. Livia ran to greet him; she was a child of ten years old, bright and winning in her ways, in beauty and bearing every inch the child of a patrician. She was dressed in ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... that officer, the whole of the storming columns from the three regiments rapidly following and gaining an entrance, as quick as it was possible to do so, under a heavy fire from the works and from the interior, the enemy making a most gallant and determined resistance, disputing every inch of ground up to the walls of ...
— Campaign of the Indus • T.W.E. Holdsworth
... of fine literary taste and culture, proud of his Knickerbocker ancestry. Physically as well as intellectually he was every inch a man, with his bright eye, fine face and, in later years, a snow-white beard. Even in his three score years and ten a decline was hardly perceptible until in the fall of 1887 the companion of his lifetime and partner of his literary ...
— The Kirk on Rutgers Farm • Frederick Bruckbauer |
