"Flop" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... brother's "little girl" Fleur frankly puzzled Winifred. The child was as restless as any of these modern young women—"She's a small flame in a draught," Prosper Profond had said one day after dinner—but she did not flop, or talk at the top of her voice. The steady Forsyteism in Winifred's own character instinctively resented the feeling in the air, the modern girl's habits and her motto: "All's much of a muchness! Spend, to-morrow we ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... the bulwarks let the stream from the hose flop overboard, where it ran out into a stream of bubbles ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne
... will marry, makes the spirited reply—"Faith, kind uncle, when men abandon jealousy, forsake taking of tobacco, and cease to wear their beards so rudely long. Oh, to have a husband with a mouth continually smoking, with a bush of furs on the ridge of his chin, readie still to flop into his foaming chops, 'tis more than most intolerable;" and similar indications of dislike to smoking could be quoted from ...
— The Social History of Smoking • G. L. Apperson
... to bear. His hair was always brushed straight up, his eyes were always very wide open,—and he usually carried a big letter-book with him, keeping in it a certain place with his finger. This book was almost too much for his strength, and he would flop it down, now on this man's desk and now on that man's, and in along career of such floppings had made himself to be very much hated. On the score of some old grudge he and Mr Love did not speak to each other; and for this reason, on all occasions ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... an intending occupant might well recoil. A plank, by way of flying drawbridge, joined it to the shore. And it was a dreary moment for Jimson when he pulled this after him and found himself alone on this unwholesome fortress. He could hear the rats scuttle and flop in the abhorred interior; the key cried among the wards like a thing in pain; the sitting-room was deep in dust, and smelt strong of bilge-water. It could not be called a cheerful spot, even for a composer absorbed in beloved toil; how much less for a young gentleman ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... not one of the hundred sounds which make night hideous in the city. What bliss to lie there, hour after hour, in a delicious half-waking, half-sleeping, wholly exquisite stupor, only rousing myself to swallow egg-nogg No. 426, and then to flop back again on the ...
— Dawn O'Hara, The Girl Who Laughed • Edna Ferber
... run the action of the drug had ceased. It was the business of a minute fraction of a second. The effect of the New Accelerator passed like the drawing of a curtain, vanished in the movement of a hand. I heard Gibberne's voice in infinite alarm. "Sit down," he said, and flop, down upon the turf at the edge of the Leas I sat—scorching as I sat. There is a patch of burnt grass there still where I sat down. The whole stagnation seemed to wake up as I did so, the disarticulated vibration of the band rushed together into a blast of music, the promenaders ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... it is! I say I saw the Devil himself fly off Drachenfels, and flop into Cologne. Fritz here, and Frankenbauch, saw him too. They'll swear to him: so 'll I. Hell's thunder! will we. Yonder fellows will have it 'twas a flash o' lightning, as if I didn't see him, horns, tail, and claws, and a mighty sight 'twas, as ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... seem to get time to write a real letter. All hands, including your husband, are so dead tired when off watch that there is nothing to do but flop down on your bunk—or on the deck sometimes—and sleep. The captain and I take watch on the bridge day and night, and outside of this I do my own navigating and other duties, so time does not go a-begging with me. However, we are still unsunk, ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various
... did," said Sue sleepily to Bunny when they were talking about this, as they lay close to the big dog in their blankets, "even if any fish did flop up, Bunny, Splash would catch ...
— Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue at Camp Rest-A-While • Laura Lee Hope
... from Harry's bolster; and then at it went Harry and Phil—the latter being armed with a pillow, down whose front a ghastly slit soon showed itself; but Philip fought well, and Harry was getting worsted and driven into the corner amongst the boots, where the footing was rather bad for bare feet "Flop!" Harry caught it then and staggered back. "Flop" again, for Philip was surpassing himself, and Harry having received the last blow full upon the top of his head went down upon one knee; but he rallied ...
— Hollowdell Grange - Holiday Hours in a Country Home • George Manville Fenn
... the tattered soldier continued to talk. "Besides, if I died, I wouldn't die th' way that feller did. That was th' funniest thing. I'd jest flop down, I would. I never seen a feller die ...
— The Red Badge of Courage - An Episode of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane
... to watch the bannock bake — how restful is the air! You'd little think that we were somewhere north of Sixty-three, Though where I don't exactly know, and don't precisely care. The man-size mountains palisade us round on every side; The river is a-flop with fish, and ripples silver-clear; The midnight sunshine brims yon cleft — we think it's the Divide; We'll get there in a month, maybe, or maybe in ...
— Rhymes of a Rolling Stone • Robert W. Service
... taken unaware by the onslaught. When he started to run Stopper was already passing him, turning sharply to the right again so that the rope raked the horse's front legs. Two jumps and Stopper had stopped, faced the horse and stood braced again, his ears perked knowingly while he waited for the flop. ...
— Cow-Country • B. M. Bower
... River and hunting outlets some more, took our time. Ran across geese this A.M. I went ashore and George and Wallace chased them close by. Shot leader with rifle. Then two young ones head close in shore. I killed one with pistol and two others started to flop away on top of water. Missed one with pistol, and killed other. While exploring a bay to N.W., we landed to climb ridge. George found three partridges. I shot one, wounded another, pistol. Camped to- night cheerful but desperate. All firm for progress ...
— A Woman's Way Through Unknown Labrador • Mina Benson Hubbard (Mrs. Leonidas Hubbard, Junior)
... know what he's doing with the curling iron, but I think—wait a minute till I can speak—oh, oh, oh—I think he tripped over the apron while he was trying to flop an omelet and the omelet came down on his head. Don't speak ...
— Roy Blakeley's Camp on Wheels • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... retrogression, retrograduation[obs3], retroaction; reculade[obs3]; retreat, withdrawal, retirement, remigration[obs3]; recession &c. (motion from) 287; recess; crab-like motion. refluence[obs3], reflux; backwater, regurgitation, ebb, return; resilience reflection, reflexion (recoil) 277[Brit]; flip-flop, volte- face[Fr]. counter motion, retrograde motion, backward movement, motion in reverse, counter movement, counter march; veering, tergiversation, recidivation|, backsliding, fall; deterioration &c. 659; recidivism, recidivity[obs3]. reversal, relapse, turning point &c.(reversion) ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... put on brakes. According to the radar, its original speed was close to mach 3, thirty-nine miles a minute. Then it checked swiftly. It came to a complete stop. Then it hurtled backward along the line it had followed. It wabbled momentarily as if it had done a flip-flop four miles above the ground. It dived. It stopped dead in mid-air for a full second and abruptly began to rise once more in an insane, corkscrew course which ended abruptly in a ...
— Long Ago, Far Away • William Fitzgerald Jenkins AKA Murray Leinster
... watch the anchor flop overboard," she announced, springing up from a deck chair. "I think I shall accompany ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy
... wouldn't have hurt you. None of these flop-over Janes for me!... An' I'll give you a hunch, Pretty Eyes. You might have run acrost a fellar thet was ...
— The Call of the Canyon • Zane Grey
... unclose. But what slippery stalks they had. Aunt Emma held Milly, and father held Olly, while they dived their hands under the water and pulled hard. And some of the lilies came out with such short bits of stalk you could scarcely hold them, and sometimes, flop! out came a long green stalk, like a long green snake curling and twisting about in the boat. The children dabbled, and splashed, and pulled, to their hearts' content, till at last Mr. Norton told them they had got enough and now they must sit ...
— Milly and Olly • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Heman Fitts knocks the ball over into Aunt Dorcas Eastman's yard, and Aunt Dorcas comes out an' picks up the ball an' takes it into the house, an' we have to stop playin'. Then Phineas Owen allows he can flop any boy in Belchertown, an' Moses Baker takes him up, an' they wrassle like two tartars, till at last Moses tuckers Phineas out an' downs him ...
— Good Cheer Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... and thrown back into the water, to survive or die as the water-fates should will. It turned on one side, revealing its white belly and torn gills; then, feeling itself washed ashore by the eddy, it gave one more feeble flop in the effort to regain the safe deeps. At this moment the raccoon, pouncing with a light splash into the shallows, seized it, and with a nip through the ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts
... necessary to keep the masses from sinking. A man who really thinks, will think his way into light. He may turn many a somersault, but he will come right side up at last. But people in general do not think, and if they refuse to be walled in by other people's thoughts, they inevitably flop and flounder into pitiable prostration. So important is it, that a poor creed is better than none at all. Truth, even adulterated as we get it, is a tonic. Bring forward something tangible, something positive, something that means something, and it will do. But this flowery, misty, dreamy ...
— Gala-days • Gail Hamilton
... their dresses, the heavy flop of the side Cloister door as it closed behind them, and then silence once more and the thin angry voice of Canon ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... and thrust them away from her so that they went sliding one after the other on to the floor. For some long-drawn moments there was no sound in the room but the slowly accelerated slide and flop of one sheet ...
— Soul of a Bishop • H. G. Wells
... said. "I reckon ez how that settles it. Old Eph Yeates'll share fair, powder and lead, parched corn and pan-meat with the man that can flop him that-away. Whilst ye're a-needing a friend in the big woods—a raw-meat-eating Injun-skinner that can jest or'narily whop his weight in wildcats—why, old Eph's your man; from now on, if not sooner." And in this wise began an alliance the like of which, for true-blue loyalty on this ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... Parkmaze Pool. I was a-bearing across towards Bloom's End, and lo and behold, there was a man just brought out o' the Pool, dead; he had un'rayed for a dip, but not being able to pitch it just there had gone in flop over his head. Men looked at en; women looked at en; children looked at en; nobody knowed en. He was covered wi' a sheet; but I catched sight of his voot, just showing out as they carried en along. 'I don't care what name that ...
— Under the Greenwood Tree • Thomas Hardy
... "Flop!" went the fish, and Snoop awakened with a jump. Up to her feet she leaped like a flash, and then she saw the fish. Snoop was very fond of fish, and made a spring for the one Bert had caught. But the fish was wet ...
— The Bobbsey Twins on a Houseboat • Laura Lee Hope
... advantageous position, it was necessary to shoot with extreme accuracy. A bullet directly through the back of the head would kill cleanly. A hit anywhere else was practically useless, for even in death the animals seemed to retain enough blind instinctive vitality to flop them into the water. There they ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... to be dragged out of the stern of the skiff, struggle to clasp his writhing legs about the pushpole that stood at an oblique angle, caught firmly in the tenacious mud, and then releasing his hold, flop with a great splash into the dark-colored ...
— Afloat - or, Adventures on Watery Trails • Alan Douglas
... vases. The heavy chairs had disappeared, and nice light elegant chairs were bought, insufficient, however, for heavy weights, for one of Mr. Furze's affluent customers being brought to the Terrace as a special mark of respect, and sitting down with a flop, as was his wont, smashed the work of art like card-board and went down on the door with a curse, vowing inwardly never again to set foot in Furze's Folly, as he called it. The pictures, too, were all renewed. The "Virgin ...
— Catharine Furze • Mark Rutherford
... and the harness in the other, you single out the cur you are after, make proper advances, and when he comes sniffling and snuffling and all the time keeping at a safe distance, you drop the sheet-iron on the snow, the brute makes a dive, and you make a flop, you grab the nearest thing grabable—ear, leg, or bunch of hair—and do your best to catch his throat, after which, everything is easy. Slip the harness over the head, push the fore-paws through, and there you are, one dog hooked up and harnessed. After licking the bites and sucking the blood, ...
— A Negro Explorer at the North Pole • Matthew A. Henson
... tread, characterised by the emphasis and deliberation of age, descending by the narrow staircase from above; and, what made the sound more singular, it was plain that the feet which produced it were perfectly bare, measuring the descent with something between a pound and a flop, very ugly ...
— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 1 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... he had run flop into the arms of Mrs Stratton, who was carrying in her hands a small basket of ...
— The Cock-House at Fellsgarth • Talbot Baines Reed
... got to think about it any more, thank goodness," Jane exclaimed, rising from the grass and laying a hand on the bag. "Let's put an end to the whole thing now and go home. Take a holt of the other end, and we'll flop it in." ...
— The Wall Between • Sara Ware Bassett
... was a grasshopper lived in a palm-tree, Silver-voiced as a frog in June; Was not pleas'd with his situation, Thought he'd like to go to the moon. Oh! Heigh-ho! . . . How shall I get there? oh! . . . A hop and a skip and a flop and a flip, and ...
— The Nursery, April 1878, Vol. XXIII. No. 4 - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest Readers • Various
... sixpence. By the way I'll show you the advantage of having a bit of whalebone in one's composition;" and with these words the Whale curled himself up, then flattened out suddenly with a tremendous flop, and, shooting through the air like a flying elephant, disappeared with a ...
— Davy and The Goblin - What Followed Reading 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' • Charles E. Carryl
... Flop! The canoe's port rail was under water. She filled and sank, carrying a lot of excited high school boys down ...
— The High School Boys' Canoe Club • H. Irving Hancock
... certain element of mystery. In a flash unsensational ponderings were displaced by a picture of a steamer in distress far away. Had I not on a similar occasion of a secret-disclosing tide heard through seven miles of insulted and sullen air the flop of an inch or so of dynamite exploded by a heartless barbarian for the illicit destruction of vivacious fish? Had I not listened with amazement to the buzz of a steamer's propeller and the throb of her engines ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield
... boy at the tiller. "Fred groans every time I put a worm on the hook, and squeals when the fish flop round in the bottom of the boat, especially if they come anywhere near ...
— Flint - His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes • Maud Wilder Goodwin
... table, where it spread itself like a small, irregular pond. At once the workman in charge took up a steel bar not unlike a metal yardstick and began pressing down the mass to a uniform thickness. This done he ran the bar deftly beneath and turned the vast piece over just as one would flop over some gigantic griddle-cake. He continued to change it from side to side, pressing it down in any spot where it was too thick, but never once touching it with his hands. He then cut off a long ...
— The Story of Sugar • Sara Ware Bassett
... sweeping away her traces with the broom. She dashed up to the fiery river, gave a glance, and said, 'A capital bridge!' She drove on to the bridge, but had only got half-way when the bridge broke in two, and the Baba Yaga went flop into the river. There truly did she meet with ...
— The Red Fairy Book • Various
... telegram. It was a pitchy black night, as stifling as a June night can be, and the loo, the red-hot wind from the westward, was booming among the tinder-dry trees and pretending that the rain was on its heels. Now and again a spot of almost boiling water would fall on the dust with the flop of a frog, but all our weary world knew that was only pretence. It was a shade cooler in the press-room than the office, so I sat there, while the type ticked and clicked, and the night-jars hooted at the windows, and ...
— The Man Who Would Be King • Rudyard Kipling
... that Martin was almost lifted off the ground. He screamed and gave a jump; but it was nothing to the jump the ostrich gave when he discovered that the button belonged to a living boy. He jumped six feet high into the air and came down with a great flop; then feeling rather ashamed of himself for being frightened at such an insignificant thing as Martin, he stalked majestically away, glancing back, first over one shoulder then the other, and kicking up his heels behind him in ...
— A Little Boy Lost • Hudson, W. H.
... catch, but when his hoss set back the rope busted plumb in two. Now, Shorty, he had an idea that he could ease the work of his hoss a whole pile if he laid holts on the rope whenever his hoss set down to flop a cow. So Shorty, he had holt on this rope and was pulling back hard when the rope busted, and Shorty, he spilled backwards out'n that saddle like ...
— The Night Horseman • Max Brand
... and he began to flop about in the wildest and most unreasonable manner. I threw him a board, but he did not seem to have sense enough to grasp it. I saw that he would be drowned in a moment more, unless he received more efficient help. I was fearfully alarmed for his safety; and, though ...
— Down The River - Buck Bradford and His Tyrants • Oliver Optic
... rapidly away, leaving her parasol, which she had again thrust into the ground, flopping in the breeze which had just sprung up, and each flop seemed to mock the discomfited Tom, who, greatly astonished but not at all out of conceit with himself, sat staring blankly after her, and with her head and shoulders more erect than usual, if possible, she went on almost upon a run until ...
— Tracy Park • Mary Jane Holmes
... before a shower came on; but somehow he never could manage it. He liked most, though, to see them rising at the flies, as they sailed round and round under the shadow of the great oak, where the beetles fell flop into the water, and the green caterpillars let themselves down from the boughs by silk ropes for no reason at all; and then changed their foolish minds for no reason at all, either; and hauled themselves up again into the tree, rolling up the rope ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V2 • Charles H. Sylvester
... and trousers, his collar open, and his sleeves rolled right up to his shoulders. "Hooray!" he cried; and forgetting all his dignity as second officer in command of Her Majesty's ship, he indulged in a kind of triumphal dance, which ended with a flop, caused by his bringing one foot down ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... get down on your faces—flop!" broke in the leader of the ruffians. "That's what ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Sergeants - or, Handling Their First Real Commands • H. Irving Hancock
... cotton with only its queer little wizened face and blue eyes visible it had a startling resemblance to a human baby until its long tail would suddenly flop into sight and dispel the illusion. It lived only four days in spite of ...
— Camps and Trails in China - A Narrative of Exploration, Adventure, and Sport in Little-Known China • Roy Chapman Andrews and Yvette Borup Andrews
... to a stump of willow, caught up a stick lying on the bank with the other, and, hanging over the stream, tried to head back the truant. All that happened was that her foot slipping on a pebble went flop into the shallow water, and part of her dress ...
— The Mating of Lydia • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... this crude lab that spawned a dud. Their necks to Truman's ax uncurled Lo, the embattled savants stood, and fired the flop ...
— Trinity [Atomic Test] Site - The 50th Anniversary of the Atomic Bomb • The National Atomic Museum
... as his friend fired and saw the Indian flop down and crawl aimlessly about on hands and knees. "What's he ...
— Bar-20 Days • Clarence E. Mulford
... make the fortune of the play, and it would give Godolphin a chance to show his noble frame in something like the majesty of nature. Godolphin would like nothing better. We could have Atland rescue Salome, and Godolphin could flop round among the canvas breakers for ten minutes, and come on for a recall with the heroine, both dripping real water all ...
— The Story of a Play - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... know we're off, an' once we're tied up at the dock and we hear Mac's been talkin' we'll just spread the word that he was so soused he jumped overboard an' swum ashore without waitin' to see if we could back off. Lordy, Gib, don't work me to death. I'm that weary I could flop on this wet deck an' be off to sleep in ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... point, though," persisted Phillida, who was a zealous convert. "The dances are to make you graceful always. You so get into the poetry of motion that it's quite impossible for you ever to flop again!" ...
— The Princess of the School • Angela Brazil
... massive, heavily braced, and well upholstered. It had to be; Mike the Angel liked to flop into chairs, and his two hundred and sixty pounds gave chairs a lot ...
— Unwise Child • Gordon Randall Garrett
... hotcakes with a vicious flop that spattered more batter on the stove. He had been a father only a month or so, but that was long enough to learn many things about babies which he had never known before. He knew, for instance, that the ...
— Cabin Fever • B. M. Bower
... corner after Chappell made one cap. To make matters more binding, I came up and lost $1,200. Then the ball opened, and it was not more than half and hour before we had downed the party. Then the devil was to pay. One of the party said: "Look here; I must have my money back, or h—l will flop around here mighty quick." Then they all joined in and made a big kick; and as I saw fun brewing, I slipped into the baggage-car, changed hats and coats with the baggage-master, got his badge and my double-barrelled shotgun. Then I rushed ...
— Forty Years a Gambler on the Mississippi • George H. Devol
... it hung down its pendant head, that aunt had at all events allayed its stiffness. He desired aunt to rise also, but I felt by her throbbing cunt, and the pressure she put on my prick, as she rose from it, so that it came out with a loud flop, that she would fain once more have done me the service of allaying any stiffness that might re-arise. However, it was much limper than before, although still of a goodly thickness. When she got on her legs, she stooped forward, kissed it, took it in her mouth, and most lovingly ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... can supply the wants of His creatures, even in such a situation as ours; for during the forenoon a shoal of flying-fish rose out of the water alongside, and passed directly over the raft, nearly a score being intercepted in their flight by our sail, and caught before they were able to flop off into the water again. I thought that any attempt to preserve them would be sure to end in failure by their quickly becoming unfit for human food, and therefore proposed that they should be at once eaten, which proposition, I need scarcely say, met with ...
— Under the Meteor Flag - Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War • Harry Collingwood
... A peremptory order to halt, coupled with a threat to fire, rang out sharply—and Jimmie Dale flung himself flat in the bottom of the boat. The wharf edge seemed to open in little, crackling jets of flame, came the roar of reports like a miniature battery in action, then the FLOP, FLOP, FLOP, as the lead tore up the water around him, the duller thud as a bullet buried its nose in the boat's side, and the curious rip and squeak as a splinter flew. Then Mittel's voice, high-pitched, as though ...
— The Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... don't be a tightwad. Swell car—poor man with no eats, not even a two-bits flop for tonight. Could yuh loosen up and slip ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis
... and the audience gets time to take in the situation. They say, chuckling to themselves, 'that villain's got his dose at last, and serve him right too.' They want to enjoy his struggles, while the heroine stands grimly at the door taking care that he doesn't get away. Then when my fist comes down flop on the stage and they realise that I am indeed done for, the yell of triumph that goes up is something delicious ...
— Revenge! • by Robert Barr
... dipping paddles made no noise, though sometimes there was a gurgle, as though a fish had broken the water behind them; sometimes, in the shining pools ahead, she saw the trout leap out. At every startling flop Delphin would exclaim: "Un gros!" From an upper branch of a spruce a kingfisher darted like an arrow into the water, making a splash like a falling stone. Once, after they had passed through the breach of a beaver dam, Herve nodded his ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... a feller'd ort 'o jes' to-day Git down and roll and waller, don't you know, In that-air stubble, and flop up and crow, Seein' sich craps! I'll undertake to say There're no wheat's ever turned out thataway Afore this season!—Folks is keerless tho', And too fergitful—'caze we'd ort 'o show More thankfulness!—Jes' looky hyonder, hey?— And watch that little reaper wadin' ...
— Green Fields and Running Brooks, and Other Poems • James Whitcomb Riley
... evolution into bathers who would be drownable, and translation into unaccustomed situations—with the peril of a week's notice. Wherefore let the seal perpetuate his race—his obstacle race, as one might say, seeing him flounder and flop. ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 26, February 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... already." His voice was dryly sarcastic. "It's too bad you rode this far for nothing; can't even get a look at me. But it's no time to visit a man, anyway. You and your boys flop outside. We'll swap palaver in the morning. ...
— The Trail to Yesterday • Charles Alden Seltzer |
