"Latch" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... until they reached a spot which was not much wider than an ordinary corridor. Here, however, it was so dark that it was barely possible to see a small door in the right-hand wall before which they halted. Lifting a latch the hermit threw the door wide open, and a glare of dazzling ...
— Blown to Bits - or, The Lonely Man of Rakata • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... babbling streams—each of which gave new occasion for the colonel to show his ingenuity in getting over dry shod, and so sparing his threatening rheumatism—the cry of "Sausipata!" was uttered by Pepe Garcia. Two neat mud cabins, each provided with a door furnished with the unusual luxury of a wooden latch, marked the plantation of Sausipata. The situation was level, and within the enclosing walls of the forest could be seen a plantation of bananas, a field of sugar-cane, with groves of coffee, orange-orchards and gardens of sweet potato and pineapple. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 11, - No. 22, January, 1873 • Various
... consent, as it appeared, the girls rose and crowded round the entrance. Ellenor lifted the latch, and, flinging the door wide open, she stood on the threshold and looked out into the inky blackness of the night. The wind howled and moaned as it entered the kitchen; and a flash of lightning tore open, for one second, the darkness of the sky. After the crash of ...
— Where Deep Seas Moan • E. Gallienne-Robin
... hand unhesitatingly on the latch of this apparently sacred domain of a private house, opened the gate, and passed in; I followed her inwardly fearful of ...
— Five Nights • Victoria Cross
... Darkness stole into the quiet room. The lodgers returned to their dens one after one, tramping or slipping or hobbling up the stairs and along the passage. Bobby bristled and froze, on guard, when a stealthy hand tried the latch. Then there were sounds of fighting, of crying women, and the long, low wailing of-wretched children. The evening drum and bugle were heard from the Castle, and hour after hour was struck from the clock of St. Giles while Bobby ...
— Greyfriars Bobby • Eleanor Atkinson
... dropped as we walked rapidly along. I was much occupied with my own thoughts and Dr. Armitage was noted for his long periods of silence. At last we reached my doorstep. I fumbled for my latch-key, found it, and wished my friend good-night. ...
— A Girl Among the Anarchists • Isabel Meredith
... pulled himself together, and, with fingers that trembled in spite of himself, he touched the old-fashioned latch and slowly, very slowly, raised it, pulling the door gently toward him ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... and latch-key on the circle beneath the handle predict a fortunate and unexpected gain in the near future. This consultant may look forward with confidence to the pleasures which fate has ...
— Telling Fortunes By Tea Leaves • Cicely Kent
... the door—he hem'd twice—a portion of my uncle Toby's most modest spirits fled, at each expulsion, towards the corporal; he stood with the rapper of the door suspended for a full minute in his hand, he scarce knew why. Bridget stood perdue within, with her finger and her thumb upon the latch, benumb'd with expectation; and Mrs. Wadman, with an eye ready to be deflowered again, sat breathless behind the window-curtain of her ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... Each of the forms shown has a ball thrust bearing between the pinion and frame. The breast plate may be adjusted to suit and is locked by a set screw. The spindle is kept from turning while changing drills, by means of the latch mounted on the frame, and readily engaging with the pinion. The crank is pierced in three places so that the handle can be set for three different sweeps, depending on the character ...
— Carpentry for Boys • J. S. Zerbe
... the door brought him to his feet, and he opened the latch to find the ragged little girl, who generally acted as telegraph boy, holding out a yellow envelope. "Any ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt
... words stung like lash of whip; With gasping breath and ashen lip She strove to speak, but he was gone She kneeled and pressed her mouth upon The latch his hand had touched, the floor His foot had trod, and o'er and o'er She sobbed his name, as children moan A ...
— Poems of Sentiment • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... act as if you were afraid," whispered Madame, as she put her hand on the latch of the door. "Go out naturally. Remember I am my cousin, and you ...
— A Romance of the Republic • Lydia Maria Francis Child
... of wailing and lamentation before it passed into the valley. For a moment it saddened them, though there was nothing unusual in the tones. But the family were glad again when they perceived that the latch was lifted by some traveler whose footsteps had been unheard amid the dreary blast which heralded his approach and waited as he was entering and went moaning ...
— Short Story Writing - A Practical Treatise on the Art of The Short Story • Charles Raymond Barrett
... "Secure the latch bar of this door from the outside, fellas," he said. "Then go to the gallery around the ...
— The Planet Strappers • Raymond Zinke Gallun
... Viscount led Barnabas across the yard to a certain wing or off-shoot of the inn, where beneath a deep, shadowy gable was a door. Yet here he must needs pause a moment to glance down at himself to settle a ruffle and adjust his hat ere, lifting the latch, he ...
— The Amateur Gentleman • Jeffery Farnol et al
... June, when John Avery sat at the table making professional notes from a legal folio before him, and Isoult, at work beside him, was beginning to wonder why Barbara had not brought the rear-supper, a knock came at the door. Then the latch was lifted, and Mr ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt
... retiring to bed. Mrs. Lashley went up to her room at the same time, indeed with so exact a correspondence of movement that as she reached the polished tulip-wood landing at the top of the stairs, she heard the front door latch as her husband drew it to behind him. That was the last ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... accordingly her sister set about them. Burnworth took off his surtout coat, in the pocket of the lining whereof he had several pistols. There was a little back door to the house, which Burnworth usually kept upon the latch, in order to make his escape if he should be surprised or discovered to be in that house. Unperceived by Burnworth, and whilst her sister was frying the pancakes, Kate went to the alehouse for a pot of drink, when having given the men who were ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward
... for such it doubtless was, ran more steps, ending, to all appearance, in a blank wall. Coming to it, Ithiel thrust a piece of flat iron, a foot or more in length, into a crack in this wall, lifted some stone latch within, and pushed, whereon a block of masonry of something more than the height and width of a man, and quite a yard in thickness, swung outwards. Nehushta passed through the aperture, ...
— Pearl-Maiden • H. Rider Haggard
... avoid me, I passed the mill without looking in at the door, as I was in the habit of doing, and went on to the cottage, where I lifted the latch, and walked in. Both the old people were there, and both looked troubled, though they welcomed me ...
— Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood • George MacDonald
... would have been surprised. She would have seen that the pedestrian on coming up made straight for the arched doorway: that as he paused with his hand upon the latch the lamplight fell upon the ...
— The Mayor of Casterbridge • Thomas Hardy
... He rattled the latch and tramped on the mat to warn them of his approach, and appeared just as Dolly was skimming into a chair, and Mr. Bopp picking up the spoons, which he dropped again to meet Dick, with a face "clear shining after rain;" and kissing ...
— On Picket Duty and Other Tales • Louisa May Alcott
... The first rusty latch yielded easily. The house contained a single dirty room. There was no furniture, except one or two old chairs. The four corners of the room were filled with hemlock branches, which must once have served as beds. A rusty rifle leaned against the wall. Beside ...
— Madge Morton's Secret • Amy D. V. Chalmers
... bovine wit. She does it with her horn or her nose, or may be with her ever ready tongue. I doubt if she has ever yet penetrated the mystery of the newer patent fastenings; but the old-fashioned thumb-latch she can see through, ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... of old habits in that place that at the words not allowed my hand dropped of itself from the latch; and at that instant a voice calling quite close to us through ...
— Elizabeth and her German Garden • "Elizabeth", AKA Marie Annette Beauchamp
... as the man stepped before the consulting-room door, there was the quick rattle of a latch-key heard faintly from the front-door, and as the opening door affected that of the surgery, and made it swing slightly and creak, ...
— The Bag of Diamonds • George Manville Fenn
... tall, lush grass that covered every foot of the new Kansas soil, their eyes fixed eagerly on the log-cabin before them. The latch-string hung out hospitably from the door of split "shakes," and the party entered without ado. Everything was just as Younkins had last left it. Two or three gophers, disturbed in their foraging about the premises, fled swiftly ...
— The Boy Settlers - A Story of Early Times in Kansas • Noah Brooks
... opened into the lane, but there was no sign of occupation. Mr. Buxton went across, threw the window open and looked out. There was a steel cap three or four feet below, and a pike-head; and at the sound of the latch a bearded face ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson
... latch broke the silence. One of the other stick-men eased himself in, holding the door only wide enough to squeeze past the jamb. Don't give the suckers a peek at the seamy side. They might just take their money to the next ...
— Vigorish • Gordon Randall Garrett
... he did so the sound of something heavy falling reached him from within. Kate was evidently moving the heavy benches. He hesitated only for an instant, then he placed his hand cautiously on the latch and raised it. In spite of his precautions the heavy old iron rattled noisily, and again he hesitated. Then, with a thrust, he pushed the aged ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... quite close, and appears to be coming down the graveled path. The noise is curiously measured and deliberate. It ceases outside the door; and I rise to my feet, and stand motionless. From the door, comes a slight sound—the latch is being slowly raised. A singing noise is in my ears, and I have a sense of ...
— The House on the Borderland • William Hope Hodgson
... evening in question, Betty made no appearance, and Aubrey was let in by her mistress, a plain-featured middle-aged woman, on whom he had no temptation to waste his perfumes. He made his way up the stairs to Winter's door, and his hand was on the latch when he heard ...
— It Might Have Been - The Story of the Gunpowder Plot • Emily Sarah Holt
... bit of waiting the latch clicked and the door opened. The door was opened by Mr. Cloyster himself. He was in evening dress and hysterics. I thought I had heard a rummy sound from the other side of the door. Couldn't account for it at the time. ...
— Not George Washington - An Autobiographical Novel • P. G. Wodehouse
... the cabin, he found the latch-string hanging out. A sharp pull, the door was swung inward and Harvey stepped into a small room, lit up by a crackling wood-fire on ...
— The Jungle Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis
... the latch, And rarely smells the new-mown hay, And the cock hath sung beneath the thatch Twice or thrice his roundelay, Twice or thrice his roundelay; Alone and warming his five wits, The white owl ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... than an hour to high water when Miss Marty Lear heard her brother's boat take ground on the narrow beach below the garden, and set the knives and glasses straight while she listened for the click of the garden-latch. ...
— The Delectable Duchy • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... heard him pass through the south entry,—have you? I always know when he goes into the bar-room by the quick little click of the latch." ...
— Little Grandfather • Sophie May
... pressed the latch of the front door. The door was not locked; it opened, and out of the soft twilight of the mild summer night the constable and the chairman stepped into the seething darkness of ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... where an old woman, bent and feeble, sat working buttonholes with trembling fingers. Her eyes were restless and expectant; she listened eagerly to every sound. A step is at the door, a hand is on the latch. The old woman rises uncertainly, a great hope in her eyes—it is the letter—the letter at last. The door opens, and the old woman falls cowering and moaning, and wringing her hands before the man who enters. It is ...
— Sowing Seeds in Danny • Nellie L. McClung
... a daughter, Who shall requite me in kind and sweeten my manifold labors; Who the piano shall play to me, too; so that there shall with pleasure All the handsomest people in town and the finest assemble, As they on Sundays do now in the house of our neighbor." Here Hermann Softly pressed on the latch, and so went ...
— Hermann and Dorothea • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... he made himself known professionally, but unless he was addressing some desperate criminal, he did not expect to be assaulted. For once, therefore, he was thoroughly surprised when a bony hand shot out and pushed him backward; the door was slammed in his face; the latch clicked, and he was left staring at a small brass plate bearing the legend: ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy
... oft, beneath my thatch Shall twitter from her clay-built nest; Oft shall the pilgrim lift the latch, And share my meal, ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... cottage at the head of the chasm, he lifted the latch and went in. He was confronted by a small boy of three or so, who at sound of the latch had snatched a stick from the floor, with a frown of vast determination on his baby face—an odd, ...
— Carette of Sark • John Oxenham
... the heavy, cumbersome, old-fashioned door latch, pressed it down noiselessly, and exerted a little tentative pressure on the door itself. It was locked. A minute passed in absolute silence, as a little steel instrument was inserted in the lock—and then the ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... despair, and knocking his head against the roof; while one unhappy goldfinch who lived outside a red villa with his name on the door, drew the water for his own drinking, and mutely appealed to some good man to drop a farthing's-worth of poison in it. Still, the door was shut. Mr Pecksniff tried the latch, and shook it, causing a cracked bell inside to ring most mournfully; but no one came. The bird-fancier was an easy shaver also, and a fashionable hair-dresser also, and perhaps he had been sent for, express, from the court end of the town, to trim a lord, or cut and curl a lady; but however ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... voice and muffled tapping had brought the tremulous fingers of old Forsyth to the door-latch. He opened the door partly; a slight figure that had been lurking in the shadow of the porch pushed rapidly through the opening. There was a faint outcry quickly hushed, and the door closed again. The rays of ...
— A Sappho of Green Springs • Bret Harte
... sunset fell, she watched to see Her husband's form swift speeding up the road, From the side-clearing, at that wonted hour, Toward his low roof. The sunset died, and night Sprang on the earth; the absent one came not. The moon moved up; the latch-string was not pulled For entrance in the cabin. Hours sped on. And still, upon the silvered snow, no form Her gaze rewarded. Once she heard afar A panther's shriek. Her fear to frenzy rose. To the side-clearing sped she; naught was there But solitude and moonlight. ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 1 January 1848 • Various
... taken less time than men use to count a hundred. The latch clicked. Democrates gazed blankly on the door, then turned on Lycon with ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... Were thickly crusted, one and all: The rusted nails fell from the knots That held the pear to the gable-wall. The broken sheds look'd sad and strange: Unlifted was the clinking latch; Weeded and worn the ancient thatch Upon the lonely moated grange. She only said, 'My life is dreary, He cometh not,' she said; She said, 'I am aweary, aweary, I would that ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... sterner accent; the pleasantness of his aspect became clouded by a frown. Looking round the constricted room, and realising how like a prison-cell it was compared with what he had expected, he felt oppressed as with the want of air. He sought vainly about the window for latch or hinge to open it, and as he did so glanced along the castle wall painted yellow by the declining sun. He noticed idly that some one was putting out upon the sill of a window on a lower stage what might have been a green kerchief had not the richness ...
— Doom Castle • Neil Munro
... the latch-key in her hand. The car was out of sight now and they seemed to be almost alone in the street. At first there was something almost unfamiliar in her rather startled face, her coiffured hair, her bare neck with its collar of diamonds. There was a moment of suspense. Then he saw ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... went to bed that night a troubled woman, and lay awake watching and expecting when the usual midnight tumult should arise. But that evening there was none. No sound but the key in the latch, the shutting of a door or two, and all quiet. Compunctions filled the mother's heart. What was the wrong if, perhaps, she could satisfy Elinor, perhaps get at the heart of Phil, who had a heart, though it was getting strangled in all those intricacies of gambling and wretched business. She ...
— The Marriage of Elinor • Margaret Oliphant
... Andrew had gone to live in their new home, and the boys were told that they might always "find the latch-string out," as the genial genie of the whole undertaking assured both Hugh and Thad. He seemed to have taken a decided liking for the chums, and could not see enough of them. Many an evening did they spend over at the new home. Thad never seemed to weary ...
— The Chums of Scranton High Out for the Pennant • Donald Ferguson
... on the door feeling for the wooden latch. We mentally say, "You have made too much noise, Mr Thief, for your purpose, and you are discovered." Soon the door opened a little. As it was a beautiful starlight night, the form of a tall man was plainly visible in the opening. Covering him with my ...
— By Canoe and Dog-Train • Egerton Ryerson Young
... Walford was made comfortable in her wide arm-chair, with a huge volume of sermons in her lap; and Lucy was trying to settle down with composure to the execution of some trifle in the way of needle-work, when the sharp click of the gate-latch was heard; there was a crunching of feet upon the gravel walk, the front door was unceremoniously opened, and Lieutenant ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood
... Renshawe confirmed my impressions of his guilt, and I determined to tax him with it, and take him into custody the instant he appeared. It was two in the morning before he did so; and the nervous fumbling, for full ten minutes, with his latch-key, before he could open the door, quite prepared me for the spectral-like aspect he presented on entering. He had met somebody, it afterwards appeared, outside, who had assured him that the mother of the drowned child was either dead or dying. He never ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 434 - Volume 17, New Series, April 24, 1852 • Various
... you!" cried Inez, as the latch turned. "And open the front door for me, please," she said, putting her lips just where the panel ...
— In The Palace Of The King - A Love Story Of Old Madrid • F. Marion Crawford
... him as a feeble old man, living in a cabin and drinking hard cider. The Whigs turned these sarcasms with great effect upon their adversaries. They compared the old soldier and his excellent war record, living in a cabin with the latch string out and eating corn bread, with "Matty Van, the used up man," living in a palace, with roast beef every day, eating from silver plate, with gold spoons, and drawing a salary of $25,000 a year. This was no doubt demagoguism, but there was ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... delighted I am sure with this visitation, and I'd love to ask you all in only I'm busy. You will have to excuse me," and with a very Frenchy bow, the Queen of the Beauty Shop got behind the squared glass door and pushed it shut till the latch clicked. ...
— Jane Allen: Junior • Edith Bancroft
... hymns and emotional exhortations; the day concluding with family worship, which lasted three-quarters of an hour. The young fellow dreaded the Sabbath and rebelled against his gloomy, comfortable, middle-class home, where he had no individuality, no rights—and no latch-key! At last he broke loose—the flesh and blood of twenty-two years old revolted. At twelve o'clock one night he found himself locked out and, as the first bold peal of the bell elicited no reply, he never again applied for admittance, but with four pounds in his pockets ...
— The Road to Mandalay - A Tale of Burma • B. M. Croker
... in the Rue Abel, which is scarcely wide enough for two to walk abreast. The oak door is elaborately carved with heads and leaves, flowers and line ornament, all in strong relief. One grimacing puckered head has a movable tongue that once lifted a latch on being touched. Near the ground the oak has been half devoured by the damp. This door would have been sold long ago to antiquaries or speculators if the house since the Revolution had not become the property of several persons all equally suspicious ...
— Wanderings by southern waters, eastern Aquitaine • Edward Harrison Barker
... way. The human body also becomes visibly electric from the dryness of the skin. One cold night I rose from my bed, and having lighted a lantern, was going out to observe the thermometer, with no other clothing than my flannel night-dress, when, on approaching my hand to the iron latch of the door, a distinct spark was elicited. Friction of the skin at almost all times in winter produced the ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... orders to have the victoria call for her at three, and ran quickly up the front steps. The front entrance was open, the screen door on the latch, and ...
— The Pit • Frank Norris
... step. Paddock used to arrive punctually at 7.30 and let himself in with a latch-key. But about twenty minutes to seven, as I knew from bitter experience, the milkman turned up with a great clatter of cans, and deposited my share outside my door. I had seen that milkman sometimes when I ...
— The Thirty-nine Steps • John Buchan
... and putting her hand behind the clock found the latch of a door. It lifted, and the door opened a little way. By squeezing hard, she managed to get behind the clock, and so through the door. But how she stared, when instead of the open heath, she found herself on the ...
— A Double Story • George MacDonald
... visible. The adventurer went all around it, like a hungry wolf round a sheepfold, and, applying his eye to one of the openings, apparently saw what determined him, for without further hesitation he pushed the tottering door, which was not even fastened by a latch. The whole but shook with the blow he had given it. He then saw that it was divided into two cabins by a partition. A large flambeau of yellow wax lighted the first. There, a young girl, pale and fearfully thin, was crouched in a corner on the damp floor, just where the melted snow ran ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... a blue ribbing all the same," answered Mrs. Sampson; "and I never saw him the wuss for drink, 'e being allays able to use his latch-key, and take 'is boots off afore going to bed, which is no more than a woman ought to expect from a lodger, she 'avin' to do ...
— The Mystery of a Hansom Cab • Fergus Hume
... came to them, this time louder and clearer, and in a moment or two a hand was at the door. The latch clicked softly, and the ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor
... hand was on the latch of the gate he was perceived from within, and the front door flew open and all the family rushed out to receive him—Reuben and Hannah, and the two children and Sally and the dog—the latter was as noisy and sincere in his welcome ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... for her father, and Mary would not go to bed and leave her, so the two sisters waited till they heard the latch-key. Ethel ran out, but her father was already on the stairs, ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge
... French and swapping boulevard reminiscences with a member of a Parisian theatrical troupe making a long jump through northern Wisconsin. And once, at six of the morning, letting myself into my own house with a latch-key, and sitting down to read the paper until the family awoke, I was nearly brained by the butler. He supposed me a belated burglar, and had armed himself with the poker. The most flattering experience of the kind was voiced by a small urchin who plucked at his ...
— The Mountains • Stewart Edward White
... delight, opened to the lifting of an ordinary latch, letting them into a circular arena, surrounded by ...
— Thuvia, Maid of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... of a century the battle with frost and famine went on. The very severity of the struggle with Nature seemed to make the gold hunters kindly toward one another. The latch-string was always out, and the open hand was the order of the day. Distrust was unknown, and it was no hyperbole for a man to take the last shirt off his back for a comrade. Most significant of all, perhaps, in this connection, was the custom of the old days, that ...
— Revolution and Other Essays • Jack London
... to think, he determined that his first move must be to find Carlin, and that very night. It had been some weeks since he had visited the ship-chandler. He had tried the latch several times, and would have repeated his visits had not a bystander told him that Carlin was in the country fitting out a yacht for one of his customers and would not be back for a month. ...
— Felix O'Day • F. Hopkinson Smith
... cheap patent door-locks, were quickly superseding the earlier dwellings. These squat old cots generally had thresholds higher than the floors; their home-made slab doors knew no fastening but a latch with a string unfailingly on the outside day and night, and with their beetling verandahs and tiny box skillions, were crouchingly hard ...
— Some Everyday Folk and Dawn • Miles Franklin
... considering. Then he crossed the entry and Nan, finding he could not, for some reason, put his hand on the latch, opened the door for him, and he went in. But only a step. He stood there, his eyes on the poor bed where Tira lay, and then, as if he were leaving a presence, he stepped back into the entry, and Nan understood that he was not even carrying with him the memory of her great majesty ...
— Old Crow • Alice Brown
... latch rattled, the door swung fatefully back, our heads were raised, our eyes bored her ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson
... tour among the northern or western mountains of our island, he will understand what was in Bertram's mind at this moment—a vision of luxurious refreshment and rest after a hard day's fatigue, disturbed by anxious doubts about the nature of his reception. In this state he laid his hand upon the latch; and perhaps the light of the door-lamp, which at this moment fell upon his features, explained to his guide what was passing in his mind; for he drew him back by ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. I. • Thomas De Quincey
... without hesitation she pulled back the latch, and as she opened the door a rush of sand-laden wind wrenched it from her hand. She staggered away as the door swung free, and there was just time to see a tall, thin figure slip in like a shadow before the light of the hanging-lamp blew out. The girl and the newcomer ...
— The Second Latchkey • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... it," the boy replied, and he pressed forward for the honor of entering first, but Harvey pushed him back quickly as he laid his hand on the wooden latch. ...
— Messenger No. 48 • James Otis
... the door-latch, and to Odo's surprise it yielded to her touch. "We're in luck, I vow," she declared with a laugh. "Come cousin, let us visit the temple ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... was no help for it. He paused on the steps of number fifty, while Lesley rang the bell. She had been formally presented with a latch-key, but the use of it was so new to her, and the fear of losing it so great, that she usually left ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... Michael J. Murphy listened. From within came a medley of gentle sighs, snores and the slow, regular breathing of sleeping men. Softly Mr. Reardon closed the door, turned the ring until the latch caught, drew a section of chain through the ring in such a manner as to prevent the latch from being released, passed the ends of his chain round the steel handrail along the front of the forecastle and ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... he said; "its walls are burglar proof, floor and roof are reinforced concrete, there is one door which in addition to its ordinary lock is closed by a sort of steel latch which he lets fall when he retires for the night and which he opens himself personally in the morning. The window is unreachable, there are no communicating doors, and altogether the room is planned to stand ...
— The Clue of the Twisted Candle • Edgar Wallace
... upon the latch of 'Almack's,' and calls to us from the bottom of the steps; for the assembly-room of the Five Point fashionables is approached by a descent. Shall we go in? It is ...
— American Notes for General Circulation • Charles Dickens
... to his rooms, for on leaving the house he had taken the precaution of dropping his latch-key into his letter-box; but he was in a neighborhood of discreet hotels and he wandered on till he came to one which was known to offer a dispassionate hospitality ...
— The Greater Inclination • Edith Wharton
... to go, and he looked after me. When I had touched the latch I dropped it, and, coming back to the bed, held out my hand. He grasped it with both his as he rose to a sitting posture, and I said my goodnight, trying ...
— Dracula's Guest • Bram Stoker
... Kirkpatrick paused. Its melancholy notes were sung by female voices. Hence, there being no danger in applying to such harmless inhabitants, to learn the way to the citadel, he proceeded to the door; when, intending to knock, the weight of his mailed arm burst open its slender latch, and discovered two poor women, in an inner apartment, wringing their hands over a shrouded corpse. While the chief entered his friends came up. Murray and Graham, struck with sounds never breathed ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... chair. His whole salvation depended upon his putting the notes back under the chair on the landing!... An affair of two seconds!... With due caution he opened the door. And simultaneously, at the very selfsame instant, he most distinctly heard the click of the latch of his aunt's bedroom door, next his own! Now, in a horrible quandary, trembling and perspiring, he felt completely nonplussed. He pushed his own door to, but without quite closing it, for fear of a noise; and edged away from it towards ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... moment Mr. Helbeck lifted the heavy latch of the chapel door; and her young curiosity was too strong for her. ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. I. • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... of the gate latch was heard, and footsteps were approaching the door—not the bounding step of Maggie, but a tramping tread, followed by a heavy knock, and next moment a tall, heavy-built man appeared before her, asking shelter ...
— Maggie Miller • Mary J. Holmes
... the latch of smooth, brown, sun-warmed iron, and went up the brick path, as the old man slowly turned himself about in ...
— Harding's luck • E. [Edith] Nesbit
... had been known for years past as an inveterate drunkard, he had been seen overnight going home in liquor; he had been found locked up in his room, with the key inside the door, and the latch of the window bolted also. No fire-place was in this garret; nothing was disturbed or altered: nobody by human possibility could have got in. The doctor reported that he had died of congestion of the lungs; and the ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... largest cottages, we immediately gained admission. The door, unlike those of Nova Scotian houses, opened outwards, the fastening being a simple wooden latch. The room into which we entered was a large, dark, dingy, dirty apartment. In the centre of it was a tub containing some goslins, resembling yellow balls of corn-meal, rather than birds. Two females were all that were at home, one a little wrinkled woman, whose age it would puzzle a physiognomist ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... a shawl over her head and ran across the field. The house looked lonely and deserted. As she fumbled at the latch of the gate the kitchen door opened, and Christopher Holland appeared ...
— Further Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... near their homes. He and his mate were put ashore in a boat, and as they walked up the trail to the cabin still no one appeared and no smoke issued from the stovepipe, which, rising through the roof, served as a chimney. When he lifted the latch he was quite decided no one, after all, ...
— The Story of Grenfell of the Labrador - A Boy's Life of Wilfred T. Grenfell • Dillon Wallace
... it without a word, and we went silently together to the door that led to the queen's end of the hall. There she stayed for a moment with her hand on the latch. ...
— A Prince of Cornwall - A Story of Glastonbury and the West in the Days of Ina of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler
... proved invaluable to him in difficult transactions. In a matter of so much moment as that of the Great Hara Diamond it was not likely that he would be long contented without taking her into his confidence. He had scarcely finished his first pipe when he heard her opening the door with her latch-key, and his face brightened at the sound. She had been on one of those holy pilgrimages in which all who are thus privileged take so much delight: she had been to the bank to increase the little store which lay there already in her father's name. She came into the ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 6, June, 1891 • Various
... smiles and welcome, and he was a little frightened not to see her face at the window the moment his cab arrived. He expected her to be watching; he was sure, if she were able, she would not have disappointed him. He had a latch-key in his pocket, and he opened the door and went rapidly to the room they occupied. It was empty; it was cleaned and renovated and evidently waiting for ...
— A Singer from the Sea • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... "You cannot wish me success. It will mean failure to you—to your people. No, we are foes, and let us wear our colors honestly. Again, I wish you good-day," and, bowing, I raised the latch, and made my way out of the ...
— Montlivet • Alice Prescott Smith
... the room where was the door through which the friends and visitors came and went was another door, low and narrow. Sandy's guide led the way directly to it, lifted the latch, and opened it. It led to a long entry beyond, gloomy and dark. This passageway was dully lighted by a small square window, glazed with clouded glass, at the further end of the narrow hall, upon which fronted a row of closed doors. The place was ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... the postman perhaps," thought the Mouse to himself, "and he may have a letter for me." So without waiting to see who it was, he lifted the latch ...
— The Cock, The Mouse and the Little Red Hen - an old tale retold • Felicite Lefevre
... sir—ye shall approach the presence of majesty thus,—shadowing your eyes with your hand, to testify that you are in the presence of the Vice-gerent of Heaven.—Vera weel, George, that is done in a comely manner.—Then, sir, ye sail kneel, and make as if ye would kiss the hem of our garment, the latch of our shoe, or such like.—Very weel enacted—whilk we, as being willing to be debonair and pleasing towards our lieges, prevent thus,—and motion to you to rise;—whilk, having a boon to ask, as yet you obey not, but, gliding your hand into your pouch, bring forth your Supplication, and place it ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... oil. Round wooden pillars hold up the roof, the blue paint of which has been freshened recently. The bright light of the fields, filtering through the green foliage which covers the roof of the church, shines through the white window-panes. The door, a little wooden door that closes with a latch, was open; a flight of birds came in, chirping and beating their wings against the walls; they fluttered for awhile beneath the vault and around the altar, two or three alighted upon the holy-water basin, to moisten ...
— Over Strand and Field • Gustave Flaubert
... body sang a great deal, and Mrs. Grey only once, but then, of course, divinely. I should like to hear her again. But look, there are the children. Shall I take the liberty of unfastening for them the latch ...
— Christian's Mistake • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... the doctor through the cool, high, tessellated carriage-hall, on one side of which were the drawing-rooms, closed and darkened. They turned at the bottom, ascended a broad, iron-railed staircase to the floor above, and halted before the open half of a glazed double door with a clumsy iron latch. It was the entrance to two spacious chambers, which were thrown into one ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable
... I said, "loves you, and he's here to tell you himself." And with that I raised my voice and called his name. The door opened instantly—he must have had his hand on the latch the whole time—and there he stood, with his arms stretched out to her and the name, "Norah," on his lips. She sprang to her feet and ran to him with so joyful a cry that I knew my part in the comedy was over, and just as they embraced I turned away ...
— The Harmsworth Magazine, v. 1, 1898-1899, No. 2 • Various
... doubt. He reeled just a trifle, and slowly disappeared in the gloom. The moment he had passed she was not quite sure it was he. She went downstairs in the dark, having taken off her shoes to prevent any noise. She put on her shoes again, drew back the bolts softly, left the door upon the latch, and crept out into the street. Swiftly she walked, and in a few moments she was within half-a-dozen yards of those whom she followed. She could not help being sure now. She continued on their track, her whole existence absorbed in one single burning point, until she saw the ...
— Miriam's Schooling and Other Papers - Gideon; Samuel; Saul; Miriam's Schooling; and Michael Trevanion • Mark Rutherford
... indeed, that once having to return to the office at midnight, in search of his latch-key which he had forgotten in his office-coat, and without which he was unable to obtain admittance to his lodgings, he found old "Smudge,"—as we somewhat irreverently termed the chief,—who was particularly neat and nice in his handwriting— working away; minuting ...
— She and I, Volume 2 - A Love Story. A Life History. • John Conroy Hutcheson
... cited which carry the doctrine further. But it is desired to lay down no proposition which admits of controversy, and it is enough for the present purposes that Si home fait un loyal act, que apres devint illoyal, ceo est damnum sine injuria. Latch, 13. I purposely omit any discussion of the true rule of damages where it is once settled that a wrong has been done. The text regards only the tests by which it is decided whether a wrong ...
— The Common Law • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
... opened; but my attention was not so distracted by it, loud as it sounded after the quiet of the shut-up house, that I failed to notice that the door had not been locked by the gentleman leaving the night before, and that, consequently, only the night latch was on. With a turn of the knob it opened, showing me the mob of shouting boys and the forms of two gentlemen awaiting admittance on the door-step. I frowned at the mob and smiled on the gentlemen, one of whom was ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... car door closed with a spring latch that could only be opened from the outside. He knew that no one could board the train, now that it was in motion, to open the door. Above all he knew that if the young tramp were shut in there with him he would not suffer ...
— Cab and Caboose - The Story of a Railroad Boy • Kirk Munroe
... a pallet bed she had there, and fell into a doze, the colored man quietly raised the latch and ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend
... the iron-work gate, Melky following close at his heels, found and unfastened the patent latch, and slipped out into the road. In two minutes he was back again with a policeman. He motioned the man inside and once ...
— The Orange-Yellow Diamond • J. S. Fletcher
... was reached again, but there was no policeman in the dark nook, and, raising the latch, the lieutenant swung open the gate, and they passed through, the latch falling back into its place with a faint click which sounded terribly loud, and made them pause ...
— The Queen's Scarlet - The Adventures and Misadventures of Sir Richard Frayne • George Manville Fenn
... burning. She decided that she had better take possession of the shack at once; so she got the candle and lit it at the fire. The first thing she did upon entering was to remove her shoes. The relief was a luxury. The door had no means of locking; the wooden latch lifted from the outside. Having latched it, she sat down on the edge of ...
— The Wrong Woman • Charles D. Stewart
... he strode away rapidly through Parliament Street and the Strand, then up Drury Lane, until he reached the door of a mean-looking house in a squalid court, and entering this with a latch-key, disappeared. ...
— The Angel of the Revolution - A Tale of the Coming Terror • George Griffith
... won't signify how long I wait for WATTY. Can you? Too good of you, I'm sure! WATTY will chaff me when he hears I've been borrowing like this, ha, ha!" Here your ear, sharpened by affection, catches a well-known turn of the latch-key at your front-door. "Why, how fortunate!" you exclaim, "here is my husband already, Captain CAULKER. He will come in as soon as ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, May 16, 1891 • Various
... press down the latch; Sleep in thy intellectual crust; Nor lose ten tickings of thy watch 35 ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth
... direction rose some cone-shaped hill. The world lay in coloured waves before them, wild, rugged, and grand, with sheltering spots of beauty between, and the shine of lowly waters. They tapped at the door of the hut, but there was no response; they lifted the latch—it had no lock—and found neither within. Alister and Mercy wandered a little higher, to the shadow of a great stone; Christina went inside the hut and looked from its door upon the world; Ian leaned against the side of it, and looked ...
— What's Mine's Mine • George MacDonald
... woman's manner attracted Cicely's attention, and gave a hint of tragedy. She paused at the door, fumbling with its latch, which was not her way, then turned and stood upright against it, like a ...
— The Lady Of Blossholme • H. Rider Haggard
... accustomed to look at and brave death under every shape, and with a steady hand he buried his tomahawk in the snout of his enemy, and, turning round, he rushed to his cabin, believing he would have time to secure the door. He closed the latch, and applied his shoulders to it; but it was of no avail, the terrible brute dashed in head foremost, and tumbled in the room with Boone and the fragments of the door. The two foes rose and stared at each other; Boone had nothing left but his knife, but Bruin was tottering and unsteady, ...
— Monsieur Violet • Frederick Marryat
... route to the station was by the garden gate; as she raised the latch, she was amazed to see ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... said moral. Yes, Sir. We're th' most onselfish people in th' wurruld. All th' throubles iv th' neighborhood ar-re my throubles an' my throubles ar-re me own. If ye shed a tear f'r anny person but wan ye lose ye'er latch-key, but havin' no wan in partiklar to sympathize with I'm supposed to sympathize with ivry wan. On th' conthry if ye have anny griefs ye can't bear ye dump thim on th' overburdened shoulders iv ye'er wife. But if I have anny ...
— Mr. Dooley Says • Finley Dunne
... the poorest possible description; a mere log hut, consisting of one room, that served as kitchen, sitting-room, and bedchamber. The door of rough planks swung heavily upon two hooks that fitted into iron rings, and formed a clumsy substitute for hinges; a wooden latch and heavy bar served to secure it; windows, properly speaking, there were none, but in their stead a few holes covered with dirty oiled paper; the floor was of clay, stamped hard and dry in the middle of the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 54, No. 338, December 1843 • Various
... Charlie said he would see Mabel home, and explain the cause of her absence to her friends, and Minnie bade her friend good-night with a very tired but happy face. Charlie came up the steps to open the door to her with his latch-key, and as she went in he stopped suddenly and kissed her on the forehead ...
— Hollowmell - or, A Schoolgirl's Mission • E.R. Burden
... received no answer. He knocked again. Still no answer. He therefore ventured to lift the latch and enter. ...
— Rivers of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... foundation of government is, the education of youth; by this means it is most probable that that was a golden age. I have heard Judge Jenkins, Mr. John Latch, and other lawyers, say, that before the Reformation, one shall hardly in a year find an action on the case, as for slander, &c. which was the result of a ...
— Miscellanies upon Various Subjects • John Aubrey
... latch of the gate to open it and go out. He follows her and puts his hand heavily on the top bar ...
— Mrs. Warren's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... door, low and wide, for a time when men had big round bellies and nothing to do but fill them and heads not too far above their business. It was a window gone blind with dust and cobwebs so it resembled the dim eye of age. If the door were closed its big brass knocker and massive iron latch invited the passer. An old ship's anchor and a coil of chain lay beside it. Blocks and heavy bolts, steering wheels, old brass compasses, coils of rope and rusty chain lay on the floor and benches, inside the shop. ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller
... then she'll get on to it that there's something the matter!" Suddenly he remembered the chicken coop. "It's late. Edith won't be coming in." So he skulked around behind the house and the stable, and up the gravel path to the henhouse. Lifting the rusty latch, he stepped quietly into the dusky, feathery shelter. "I can think the damned business out, here," he thought. There was a scuffling "cluck" on the roosts, but when he sat down on an overturned box, the fowls settled into stillness and, except for an occasional sleepy squawk, ...
— The Vehement Flame • Margaret Wade Campbell Deland
... the latch and we passed through a wall some sixteen feet thick and into a stone-paved courtyard with a broad flight of steps at its farther end sweeping to the top of the circular defence. Flanking the sunken courtyard itself were a dozen ...
— A Village of Vagabonds • F. Berkeley Smith
... later her ear caught the sound for which she was now waiting—that of a latch-key at the front door. She stepped quickly out into the passage, where the lamp-light fell upon a tall and robust man with dark, ...
— Denzil Quarrier • George Gissing
... the only person in possession of a latch-key, I presume. No one else could have come in without ringing ...
— The Old Man in the Corner • Baroness Orczy
... sound of the receding car reached his ears. By the time that he had reached the front of the house the street was vacant from end to end. He walked up the steps to the front door, which he unfastened with his latch-key. As he entered the hall, Mrs. M'Gregor ...
— The Golden Scorpion • Sax Rohmer
... them. After they had tiptoed out of the house and gained the road they discovered that they had forgotten the bag of doughnuts. The Knight declared that he would not return for a million doughnuts, but the Boy, remembering how delicious they tasted, stole back to the door and lifted the latch softly. Aunt Jo was still snoring, but, just as he laid hold of the doughnuts, Pluto the cat came leaping in from the kitchen, and the Boy had barely time to put the door between its sharp claws and himself. He ran down the path, vaulted the ...
— The So-called Human Race • Bert Leston Taylor
... not so much coward as to turn about. So presently I rode up the little pitch from the trough road and pulled the gate latch with my riding crop. And then, as though it were by appointment, precisely as I saw her that morning last spring—a hundred years ago it seemed to me—I saw Grace Sheraton coming down the walk toward me, tall, thin. Alas! she did not fill my eye. She was elegantly clad, as usual. I had liefer seen ...
— The Way of a Man • Emerson Hough
... had set it in his studious play for the advantage that did not come to his hand, and turned back to the closed door. Reid lay as he had fallen, Carlson's revolver by his side. Mackenzie stepped over him and tried the door. It was unlocked, fastened only by the iron thumb-latch. ...
— The Flockmaster of Poison Creek • George W. Ogden
... dusk with a faint glimmering of light. And every time a guest entered, the flames of the candles flickered and twisted themselves with the wind, struggling to keep erect. And Borghild's courage, too, rose and fell with the flickering motion of a flame which wrestles with the wind. Whenever the latch clicked she lifted her eyes and looked for Truls, and one moment she wished that she might never see his face again, and in the next she sent an eager glance toward the door. Presently he came, threw his fiddle ...
— Tales From Two Hemispheres • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... delicate justice she appreciated the special form, force, tendency of utterly dissimilar characters and her heart responded to every appeal alike of humblest suffering or loftiest endeavor. In the plain, yet eloquent phrase of the backwoodsman, "the string of her door-latch was always out," and every wayfarer was free to share the shelter of her roof, or a seat beside her hearth-stone. Or, rather, it might be said, in symbol of her wealth of spirit, her palace, with its galleries of art, its libraries and festal-halls, ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. II • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... her knees and went downstairs. The house was empty, except that Joan and the baby were sleeping in Rhoda's old bedroom; for all the rest had gone to keep the watch-night in a chapel two miles or more away. The house-door was not fastened, and she had only to lift the latch in order to open it. There was not the slightest sound from the threshold outside where Rhoda was crouching; no moaning or sobbing, no movement of any kind. Aunt Priscilla opened the door ...
— The Christmas Child • Hesba Stretton
... noiseless circumspection to the width of an inch, peeped out from the crack, and seeing the opposite door still shut, stepped out with a swift, noiseless swing of person and door simultaneously, closed the door behind her, stole down the stairs, and left the house. Not a board creaked, not a latch clicked as she went. She stepped into the street as sedately as if she had come from paying to the dead the last offices of her composite calling, the projected front of her person appearing itself aware of its dignity ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... open, but Vera might be seen standing with one hand on the latch, the other on Magdalen's bicycle, her face lifted with imploring, enticing smiles to Wilfred, who had fallen a little back, while Paula ...
— Modern Broods • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... abashed, my barnes so dear, children. Of her falchion so fierce, nor of her fell words. She hath no might, nay, no means, no more you to grieve, Nor on your comely corses to clap once her hands. I shall look you full lively, and latch full well, search for: And keere ye further of this kithe,[23] above [lay ...
— England's Antiphon • George MacDonald
... fly drive up and her father get out of it. She announced the fact to her mother, and then ran down to the garden gate to meet him. As their hands encountered at the gate, Dolly almost fell back; took her hand from the latch, and only put it forth again when she saw that her father could not readily get the gate open. He was looking ill; his gait was tottering, his eye wavering, and when he spoke his utterance was confused. ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner
... out without umbrella, and when he let himself in by his latch-key at his own house-door about half-past eight, it was no wonder that he wrung out his coat and trousers so that he should not soak his Persian rugs. But from him, as from the charged skies, some tension had passed; this tempest ...
— The Blotting Book • E. F. Benson
... Franklin street to Dr. Dunton's house. He opened the heavy door with a latch-key, but before I could enter it was necessary for him to go ahead and light up. He was profuse in his apologies for the disorder of everything as he led me into the room behind the parlor, but beyond a thick coating of dust the dark ...
— The Mermaid of Druid Lake and Other Stories • Charles Weathers Bump
... latch of the door was raised, and a miserably clad woman entered, closed the door immediately after her, and placed the bar against it. The action attracted the attention of all the inmates of the house, for the doors of the peasantry are universally "left on the latch," and ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover
... to fear, to hope, to pray, To lift the latch, and force the way; And better had they ne'er been born, Who read, to ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... Lifting the tiny brass latch which alone secured it, he swung open the glazed door of the case, and, reaching in, drew forward the flexible left arm of ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... drifted into a curious intimacy with the Grossenstecks. Their house by degrees became my refuge. I was given my own suite of rooms, my own latch-key; I came and went unremarked; and what I valued most of all was that my privacy was respected, and no one thought to intrude upon me when I closed my door. In time I managed to alter the whole ...
— Love, The Fiddler • Lloyd Osbourne
... The latch creaked, there was a whiff of cold wind, and Pashka, stumbling, ran out into the yard. He had only one thought—to run, to run! He did not know the way, but felt convinced that if he ran he would be sure to find ...
— The Cook's Wedding and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... each hard hand a vassal ocean's mane, Thou, skilled by Freedom an' by gret events To pitch new States ez Old-World men pitch tents, Thou, taught by Fate to know Jehovah's plan Thet man's devices can't unmake a man, An' whose free latch-string never was drawed in 330 Against the poorest child of Adam's kin,— The grave's not dug where traitor hands shall lay In fearful haste thy murdered corse away! ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... that thought can travel across space between minds sympathetically in tune, for just as the secretary put his latch-key into his shiny blue door the idea flashed through him, 'I wonder what Mr. Rogers will do, now that he's got his leisure, with a fortune and—me!' And at the same moment Rogers, in his deep arm-chair before the fire, was saying to himself, 'I'm glad Minks has come to me; he's just the man ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... with her. She led me past Madame Tussaud's, around Baker Street Station, and then into the maze of those small cross-streets that lie between Upper Baker Street and Lisson Grove until she stopped before a small, rather respectable-looking house, half-way along a short side-street, entering with a latch-key. ...
— The Seven Secrets • William Le Queux
... S.C., a tavern-keeper, by the name of Samuel Davis, procured the conviction and execution of his own slave, for stealing a cake of gingerbread from a grog shop. The slave raised the latch of the back door, and took the cake, doing no other injury. The shop keeper, whose name was Charles Gordon, was willing to forgive him, but his master procured his conviction and execution by hanging. The slave had but one arm; and an order ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... exciting moment brought him to the cabin's door, still face to the enemy. Fumbling behind him with his left hand, Donald found and lifted the latch. The door swung suddenly open under his weight, Mike scurried between his legs, and the combination resulted in ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... ended giving Mab her weekly lesson, avowing that he came then because he wanted to hear Mirah sing. But on the particular Wednesday now in question, after entering the house as quietly as usual with his latch-key, he appeared in the parlor, shaking the Times aloft with a crackling noise, in remorseless interruption of Mab's attempt to render Lascia ch'io pianga with a remote imitation of her teacher. Piano and song ceased immediately; Mirah, who ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot |
