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Smear   /smɪr/   Listen
Smear

noun
1.
Slanderous defamation.  Synonyms: malignment, vilification.
2.
A thin tissue or blood sample spread on a glass slide and stained for cytologic examination and diagnosis under a microscope.  Synonyms: cytologic smear, cytosmear.
3.
A blemish made by dirt.  Synonyms: blot, daub, slur, smirch, smudge, spot.
4.
An act that brings discredit to the person who does it.  Synonyms: blot, smirch, spot, stain.



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"Smear" Quotes from Famous Books



... if you please! Nothing has happened here, absolutely nothing! We begin again with an absolutely clean slate, without a smear upon it! ...
— Three Comedies • Bjornstjerne M. Bjornson

... hold the family was soon covered in. It looked well, perched on a platform of rock, and seeming to nestle in a recess of the huge precipices which rose behind it. It looked well, as Dessalines could obtain neither of his favourite paints to smear it with. It stood, neither red nor blue, but nearly the colour of the rocks, against which it leaned, and thatched with palm-leaves, which projected so far as to throw off the rains, even ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau

... observe his habits and development. Seeing Dr. Bandinel near, I asked him to look at my curiosity. Hardly, however, had I turned the wriggling little victim out upon the leather-covered table, when down came the doctor's great thumb-nail upon him, and an inch-long smear proved the tomb of all my hopes, while the great bibliographer, wiping his thumb on his coat sleeve, passed on with the remark, "Oh, yes! they have black heads sometimes." That was something to know—another ...
— Enemies of Books • William Blades

... roots, and indeed any description of food, whether beast, reptile, or vermin: they are extremely filthy; this and bad food give them a cutaneous disorder, with which they are very generally afflicted. Several tribes of them smear themselves with oil and pigments, which gives them the appearance of being tattooed. Whether this is intended to defend them against the bites of insects, to operate as a cure or prevention of this ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel

... edge of the lid; but, lifting it, found the flags inside neatly rolled and stowed in order. On the table lay my father's Bible and his pocket Virgil, the latter open and laid face downwards. I picked it up, and the next moment came near to dropping it again with a shiver, for a dry smear of blood ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)

... an invention. As to the waistcoat which had figured so conspicuously in all the rumors, it appeared that suspicion had monstrously exaggerated the facts. Instead of a waistcoat plashed with blood—as popular imagination pictured it—it was a gray waistcoat, with one spot and a slight smear of blood, which admitted of a very simple explanation. Three days before, Franz had cut his left hand in cutting some bread; and to this the maid testified, because she was present when the accident occurred. He had not noticed that his waistcoat was ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.

... bed with the rubbers in my mouth is difficult, but it doesn't make any difference if some of the mud comes off on the side of the bedspread. In fact, it all helps in the final effect. I usually try to smear them around when I get them at last on the spread, and if I can leave one of them on the pillow, I feel that it's a pretty fine little old world, after all. This done, and I ...
— Love Conquers All • Robert C. Benchley

... bit, cut so that the blood ran from the wound. Now, after getting the prisoners to the canoe, he opened the treaty box in order to place therein the original instructions given to the messenger. If you will look at the paper you will observe a slight smear ...
— Boy Scouts in the Philippines - Or, The Key to the Treaty Box • G. Harvey Ralphson

... ses, "Oh, you're in 'ere are yer, Easton," 'e ses—just like that, quite affable like. So I ses, "Yes, sir." "Well," 'e ses, "get it slobbered over as quick as you can," 'e ses, "'cos we ain't got much for this job: don't spend a lot of time puttying up. Just smear it over an' let ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell

... mother even worse, being fierce with her because of the small annual charge. She grew blind and demented toward the end, and was given a room in the west wing, over the counting-house. Nicholas removed the door-handle on the inside, and the wainscot there still showed a dull smear, rubbed by the poor creature's shoulder as she trotted round and round; also marks upon the door, where her fingers had grabbled for the missing handle. There were dreadful legends of this Nicholas—one in particular of a dark foreigner who had ...
— Shining Ferry • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... dirty cud ... Eh!" she suddenly made a gesture of despair. 'Let's better drink some cognac, Jennechka,'" she addressed herself, "'and let's suck the lemon a little! ...' Brr ... what nasty stuff! ... And where does Annushka always get such abominable stuff? If you smear a dog's wool with it, it will fall off ... And always, the low-down thing, she'll take an extra half. Once I somehow ask her—'What are you hoarding money for?' 'Well, I,' she says, 'am saving it up for a wedding. What sort,' she says, 'of joy will it be for my husband, ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin

... out of his daze at the sight of the other. Strength seemed to flow back into his weary body. His fist came up, clean with all the power that was left in him. It went home with a soul-satisfying crunch. Urga's gray gash of a mouth seemed to smear slowly over the rest of his face. A wild animal scream burst from him as he sagged. Then a swirl of other Mercutians anxious to get at the Earthman eddied him out ...
— Slaves of Mercury • Nat Schachner

... usually is the supervisor. He lives by it. He wants to smooth over the defects, he wants to lay the dust that every passerby kicks up, he tries to smear over the truth regarding conditions with messy and ill-smelling oil. Above everything, he doesn't want the road dug up and rebuilt—says it will interfere with traffic, injure business, and even set people to talking ...
— The Friendly Road - New Adventures in Contentment • (AKA David Grayson) Ray Stannard Baker

... Rock. "He ain't worth eyther, that's the truth. An' 'twould only be puttin' pisen on the blade o' my knife to smear it wi' his black blood. F'r all, I ain't a-gwine to let him off so easy's all that, unless you an' the captain insists on it. After the warmish work he's had, an' the sweat he's put himself in by the wearin' o' two shirts at a time, I guess he won't be any the worse of a sprinkling ...
— The Free Lances - A Romance of the Mexican Valley • Mayne Reid

... observation is made by taking a smear from the most vicious part of the wound at intervals of two or three days. The number of bacteria on these smears is noted and counted per oil immersion field. A count of more than 75 bacteria per field is considered infinity. When there are less than 10 bacilli to the field, ...
— A Journey Through France in War Time • Joseph G. Butler, Jr.

... which, if properly applied, may serve to correct this misuse of our American soil. The careful tiller should note that all soils whatever which lie on declivities having a slope of more than one foot in thirty inevitably and rapidly waste when subject to plough tillage. This instrument tends to smear and consolidate the layer of earth over which its heel runs, so that at a depth of a few inches below the surface a layer tolerably impervious to water is formed. The result is that the porous portion of the deposit becomes excessively charged with water in times of heavy rain, and moves ...
— Outlines of the Earth's History - A Popular Study in Physiography • Nathaniel Southgate Shaler

... was Midmore's first word, and 'No—I'm only winded—dear,' was Miss Sperrit's, as he lifted her out of her corner, her hat over one eye and her right cheek a smear of mud. ...
— A Diversity of Creatures • Rudyard Kipling

... our drive, some of these brave boys were to pay the price with their lives. On September 11th, the boys were drilled for the last time. We were then required to strip our bodies of all our clothes and to smear ourselves with a salve. This was a preparation that was designed to protect the body from burns in case we encountered the deadly ...
— In the Flash Ranging Service - Observations of an American Soldier During His Service - With the A.E.F. in France • Edward Alva Trueblood

... Thor gazed at Hicks questioningly—I forgot to add that insect's name—and asked, 'Is it so, Hicks? I got to play for the college?' And when Hicks grinned, 'Sure, Thor, it must be did. Bannister expects you to smear the other teams over the landscape,' that blond Norwegian Viking said, 'Well, then, ...
— T. Haviland Hicks Senior • J. Raymond Elderdice

... appeared to have on red caps. It is curious that the taste for red hair should be so general among the Africans here and further north; in the south black mica, called Sebilo, and even soot are used to deepen the colour of the hair; here many smear the head with red-ochre, others plait the inner bark of a tree stained red into it; and a red powder called Mukuru is employed, which some say is obtained from the ground, and others from the ...
— A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries • David Livingstone

... Ellen, for she stopped at once. Her sister had wiped the grit and the little smear of blood off her chin, and stood in the doorway holding her hand while one by one the other carriages drew up and the occupants alighted. Not a word was spoken till they had all assembled, then the young woman said: "Please come in and have a cup of tea," and turning on her heel led the ...
— Joanna Godden • Sheila Kaye-Smith

... of view, his writing about gold, not very intelligible in itself, and now become undecipherable, was but a smear, and gave no handle to the enemy. Even after the time of James II., and under the "respectable" reign of William and Mary, his caravan might have been seen peacefully going its rounds of the little English country towns. He travelled freely from one end of Great Britain to the other, selling ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo

... the neat mission house, and they had pounded and ground the bright red bricks into the finest powder, which mixed with grease formed a paint to smear their naked bodies. Thus the only results of many years' teaching were the death of many noble men, the loss of money, the failure of the attempt; and instead of the enterprise leaving a legacy of inward spiritual grace to these "men and brethren," the missionary establishment ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker

... following day the air of mystery deepened; and young Mrs. Melton whispered to Isabel, with many glances and becks, that she and her man had seen lights through the chapel windows at three o'clock that morning. Isabel went into the chapel presently to visit the grave, and there was a new smear of black on the east wall as if a taper had been set ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson

... quickly in those clothes, and come out on deck. By the side of your bunk you will find tins of black and white paint to smear your face and hands. At the slightest refusal on your part to do as I bid you—if you utter a cry or make any noise to attract attention—I shall ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy

... marvellous, and the mountain passes were beyond words picturesque. We passed a string of 150 camels pacing along in the moonlight and the snow. All of them wore bells which jingled softly. Around us were the weird white hills, with a smear of mist over them. The radiant moon, the snow, and the chiming camels I ...
— My War Experiences in Two Continents • Sarah Macnaughtan

... net-works of veins, giving rise to a copiously-branched reticulated or frill-like expansion, which covers surfaces varying in extent from a few to several centimeters. They are chiefly composed of a soft protoplasm of the consistence of cream, which may be readily spread out into a shapeless smear, and is usually colorless, but sometimes exhibits brilliant colors of yellow, orange, rose, purple, etc. The development of the plasmodium ceases with the formation of the spores within ...
— The Myxomycetes of the Miami Valley, Ohio • A. P. Morgan

... de plug hat dat wuz lef' him wuz de brim aroun' his neck, Smear'd wid mud f'om top to bottom, well, he wuz a sight, ...
— Fifty years & Other Poems • James Weldon Johnson

... the mirror of the spring, Oliver realized that he was scarcely fit to start on a journey, since, in his energetic wielding of the smoker he had smudged his face far worse than even Polly had. He began splashing and scrubbing, but honey and soot and the odd, sticky glue with which bees smear their hives are none of them easy to remove. When he presented himself once more at the door of the cottage, there was a feast spread out on the rough table—buttered and toasted biscuits spread with honey, iced cocoa with whipped cream, and a big square chocolate ...
— The Windy Hill • Cornelia Meigs

... base creature. I'm capable of gratitude, I'm capable of affection. One may live in paint and tinsel, but one isn't absolutely without a soul. Yes, I've got one," the girl went on, "though I do smear my face and grin at myself in the glass and practise my intonations. If what you're going to do is good for you I'm very glad. If it leads to good things, to honour and fortune and greatness, I'm enchanted. If it means your being away always, for ever ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James

... who could read Greek, had to translate every document he found that did not contain verses. While he listened, he clawed and strummed on the young man's lyre and poured out the scented oil which Orion had been wont to use to smear it over his beard. In front of the bright silver mirror he could not ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... together, bind them with cotton yarn (see Fig. 65) that has been coated with grafting wax. This wax is made of equal parts of tallow, beeswax, and linseed oil. Smear the wax thoroughly over the whole joint, and make sure that the joint ...
— Agriculture for Beginners - Revised Edition • Charles William Burkett

... spaces on the wings of the east wind there was something of wild unrest. The cool, salt flavor of the air spoke of wild stretches of the North Atlantic where sea-fogs have touched the eerie loneliness of Greenland bergs and passed it on to the wind. In this ghostly dusk of driving mist the smear of the rain across the face is like a touch of phantom hands coming out of unfathomed spaces, gentle but uncanny. All the soft perfumes of wood and field seem beaten to the ground by this rain which brings with its salt tang faint breathings of ...
— Old Plymouth Trails • Winthrop Packard

... the plantation, I saw, fluttering in the morning breeze that came sharp and refreshing off the face of the water, a handkerchief. And there was two sorts o' stains on it—caused in the one case by mud—the soft mud of the adjacent beach—and in the other by blood. A smear of blood—as if somebody had wiped blood off his fingers, you'll understand. But it was not that, not the blood, made me give my particular attention to the thing, which I'd picked off with my thumb ...
— Ravensdene Court • J. S. (Joseph Smith) Fletcher

... an old friend with Barnaby's mother. He knew the Maypole story of the widow Rudge—how her husband, employed at Chigwell, and his master had been murdered; and how her son, born upon the very day the deed was known, bore upon his wrist a smear of blood but half ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol III • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.

... was suffocated with bugles. A shrill scent of cherry-blossom ran with her like a crowd, and in her hand she carried an umbrella and a plush bag with a steel snap. Her face, in the midst of this whirlpool of finery, peeped out anxiously, covered as it was with a smear of paint and powder, and when she saw Valentine standing alone to receive her, her nervous eyes ranged uncomfortably about in obvious quest of an acquaintance ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens

... case may be. Even more necessary are the services of an architect when building or remodeling a house. Trying to be your own architect is as foolish as drawing a sketch of little Jerry on canvas and then calling in a house painter to smear on a daub of blue for his coat, a bit of yellow for his hair, white for his collar, and just anything for the background. At worst, though, this futuristic result can be taken to the attic, turned face to the wall and forgotten; but a botched ...
— If You're Going to Live in the Country • Thomas H. Ormsbee and Richmond Huntley

... I know it well, and when we have gotten it, what have we to do but put it in our poke and getting us to the moneychangers' tables, which you know stand still laden with groats and florins, take as much as we will thereof? None will see us, and so may we grow rich of a sudden, without having to smear ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio

... porticos of the temples, at the railway stations and in the parks, you will see women and men, squatting on the ground behind little trays covered with green leaves, powdered nuts and a white paste, made of the ashes of cocoanut fiber, the skins of potatoes and a little lime. They take a leaf, smear it with the lime paste, which is intended to increase the saliva, and then wrap it around the powder of the betel nut. Natives stop at these stands, drop a copper, pick up one of these folded leaves, put it in their mouths, and go off chewing, and spitting out saliva as red as blood. ...
— Modern India • William Eleroy Curtis

... dreaming house in the late summer sunshine; he observed a robin issue out from a lime tree and inspect him sideways; and then another robin issue from another lime tree and drive the first one away. Then he noticed a smear of dust on his own left boot, and flicked it off with a handkerchief. Then, as he put his handkerchief away again, he saw Jenny coming ...
— None Other Gods • Robert Hugh Benson

... right," said Raffles, when he had knelt and felt and listened again. I whimpered a pious but inconsistent ejaculation. Raffles sat back on his heels, and meditatively wiped a smear of his own blood from the polished floor. "You'd better leave him to me," he said, looking and ...
— Mr. Justice Raffles • E. W. Hornung

... But the temple was full "inside and out," And a buzz kept buzzing all round about Like bees when the day is sunny— A buzz universal that interfered With the right that ought to have been revered, As if the couple already were smear'd ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood

... period some had become accustomed to smear needles with poison and then to prick with them whomsoever they would. Many persons thus attacked died without even knowing the cause, and many of the murderers were informed against and punished. ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume V., Books 61-76 (A.D. 54-211) • Cassius Dio

... up on two stones B. The warp is attached to the warp beam C on top and the breast beam D at the bottom. The threads of the warp are not shown, no difference being made between any woven part and the warp threads; to all is given one smear of white paint. Two discs E are seen hanging against the frame posts, one on each side, the earlier sketch showing a larger disc than the final drawing in ...
— Ancient Egyptian and Greek Looms • H. Ling Roth

... interest—that of the giant Puentener, a mercenary whose valor made him the terror of the enemy in the battle of Marignano, in 1515; so that when he was finally killed, they avenged themselves, according to a writing beneath the picture, by using his fat to smear their weapons, and by feeding their horses with oats from his carcass. Just outside the village stands the arsenal, whence, they say, old armor was taken and turned into shovels, when the St. Gothard Railroad was building, so poor and ignorant ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume VI • Various

... performed some imitations. But, unable long to preserve it upright from its weight, the sooty end fell on Master Snapper's book, who was reading a little work upon "Affability." The blow fairly knocked it out of his hand, and made a great smear on his frilled shirt, at which a loud laugh ensued. Now Master Snapper could not bear to be laughed at, and was so much out of humor all the evening ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 3 (of 12) - Classic Tales And Old-Fashioned Stories • Various

... number about 800 all told, and hail from the places given below. Among them are many fine physically developed men, who would be considered good looking were it not for the extravagance with which they be-smear their faces with ...
— The Treaties of Canada with The Indians of Manitoba - and the North-West Territories • Alexander Morris

... birch sapling he paused and picked up Leverett's rifle. Something left a red smear on his palm as he worked the ejector. ...
— The Flaming Jewel • Robert Chambers

... and mercy would be realized in society, as well as in the character of the individual. These different expectations regarding the future are broadly designated as messianic prophecies. The word "messianic," like its counterpart "Messiah" (Greek, "Christ"), comes from the Hebrew word meaning to smear or to anoint. It designated in ancient times the weapons consecrated for battle or the king chosen and thus symbolically set aside to lead the people as Jehovah's representative, or a priest called to represent the people in the ceremonial worship. The common underlying idea in ...
— The Makers and Teachers of Judaism • Charles Foster Kent

... thane, You do unbend your noble strength to think So brainsickly of things.—Go get some water, And wash this filthy witness from your hand.— Why did you bring these daggers from the place? They must lie there: go carry them; and smear The sleepy ...
— Macbeth • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]

... made trouble or resisted, he was to be bound, but on no account must his blood be made to flow, for if this happened it would bring a curse upon the land, and he, Dingaan, swore by the head of the Black One who was gone (that is Chaka) that he would kill him, Ibubesi, in payment. Yes, he would smear him with honey and bind him over an ant-heap in the sun till he died, if he hunted Africa from end to end to catch him. Moreover, should he fail in the business, he would send a regiment and destroy his town at Mafooti, and, put his wives and people to the spear, and seize his ...
— The Ghost Kings • H. Rider Haggard

... smear them well with tar, and lay them on my back. Do not fear; you will succeed in this also; but, in the end, the emperor's desires will be ...
— The Violet Fairy Book • Various

... apply salt water (one-half ounce to the quart), extract of witch-hazel, a weak solution of oak bark, or camphorated spirit. If the surface is raw use bland powders, such as oxid of zinc, lycopodium, starch, or smear the surface with vaseline, or with 1 ounce of vaseline intimately mixed with one-half dram each of opium and sugar of lead. In cases of chafing rest must be strictly enjoined. If there is constitutional disorder or acrid sweat, 1 ounce cream of tartar or a teaspoon of bicarbonate of ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture

... the face of the most smear'd and slobbering idiot they had at the asylum, And I knew for my consolation what they knew not, I knew of the agents that emptied and broke my brother, The same wait to clear the rubbish from the fallen tenement, And I shall look again in a score or two of ages, ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman

... the beach was strewed, and when the glowing embers had succeeded to the flame and formed a red-hot heap, I cut two forked sticks, which, placed on either side upright in the sand, supported my bird upon a long skewer of green tamarisk-wood. A little salt, pepper, and a smear of butter occasionally, produced a result that would ...
— Cyprus, as I Saw it in 1879 • Sir Samuel W. Baker

... the boom and hurrah of the black and white 35th Street cabaret. The round tables rock. Waiters careen. Balanced trays float at crazy angles through the tobacco smoke. Hats flash. Firecracker voices explode. A guffaw dances across a smear of faces. Congo gleams, college boy pallors, the smiles of black and white men and women interlace. A spotlight shoots its long hypotenuse upon the floor. In its drifting oval the entertainer, her shoulders back, her elbows out, her ...
— A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago • Ben Hecht

... met on the veranda by Charnock's dogs. They sprang upon him with welcoming barks, and pushing through them, he entered the untidy living-room. Charnock sat at a table strewn with papers that looked like bills, and there was a smear of ink on ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss

... in laughing, a cigarette dangling from one blood-stained hand, while with the other he wiped the perspiration from his forehead, leaving a dull red smear. She shrank from him, looking at him with blazing eyes. "You are a brute, a beast, a devil! I hate you!" she ...
— The Sheik - A Novel • E. M. Hull

... Allan?" she asked. "It looks as though there had been a bullet in it," and she pointed to the bloody smear ...
— Marie - An Episode in The Life of the late Allan Quatermain • H. Rider Haggard

... voices, and a scuffle, with the sound of blows. A moment later there came, to my horror, a rush of footsteps coming in my direction, with the loud breathing of a running man. I turned my lantern down the long, straight passage, and there was the fat man, running like the wind, with a smear of blood across his face, and close at his heels, bounding like a tiger, the great black-bearded Sikh, with a knife flashing in his hand. I have never seen a man run so fast as that little merchant. He was gaining on the Sikh, and I could see that ...
— The Sign of the Four • Arthur Conan Doyle

... self-appointed task he stood up, hitched his dungarees, spat blood on the deck, and stood waving from side to side like a dancing bear. His face was unrecognizable; his dungarees, so neat and clean when he donned them the night before, were now one vast smear of red, and he grinned horribly, for he was ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne

... particulars of the horoscope copy from beginning to end the Surat al-Rahman (the Compassionating, No. xlviii.);, tie the image in five places with coir left-hand-twisted (i.e. widdershins or 'against the sun'); cut the throat of a blood-sucker (lizard); smear its blood on the image; place it in a loft, dry it for three days, then take it and enter the sea. If you go in knee deep the woman will send you a message; if you go in to the waist she will visit you." (The Voyage of Francois Pyrard, etc., p. 179.) I hold all these charms to be mere ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton

... been led to expect trouble from it. The weapon was always cleaned with water so boiling hot that the heat of the barrel dried it. When occasionally flakes of metal fouling became visible a Marble brush always sufficed to remove enough of it. It was my habit to smear the bullets with mobilubricant before placing them in the magazine. This was not as much of a nuisance as it sounds. A small tin box about the size of a pill box lasted me the whole trip; and only once did I completely empty the magazine at one time. On my return I tested the rifle very thoroughly ...
— The Land of Footprints • Stewart Edward White

... pockets. "I think I've got some of my chemicals; and after that we'll go up to the house." And he stooped again over the target, putting something with his finger over each of the shot-holes, so far as March could see merely a dull-gray smear. Then they went through the gathering twilight up the long green ...
— The Man Who Knew Too Much • G.K. Chesterton

... my old boat, miss," answered the fisherman, blotting out the last letters with a long smear of paint. ...
— The King's Men - A Tale of To-morrow • Robert Grant, John Boyle O'Reilly, J. S. Dale, and John T.

... battle, to protect themselves against ultra-violet radiation, they smear themselves with red paint—presumably because ...
— Skylark Three • Edward Elmer Smith

... upon pollen, lays her eggs in an underground cell, and with each one of them she deposits three beetles, which she has lain in wait for and captured when they were still weak through having only just left off being chrysalides. She kills these beetles, and appears to smear them with a fluid whereby she preserves them fresh and suitable for food. Many kinds of wasps open the cells in which their larvae are confined when these must have consumed the provision that was ...
— Unconscious Memory • Samuel Butler

... shawl with a steady hand. There was an old white straw bonnet flattened down over the forehead; a wisp of blue ribbon string was blown across the face and over the red smear between the eyebrow and the hair; the eyes stared wide and glassy. But it was the same soft brown hair. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various

... with 'em. I was goin' to build a house on mine that was goin' to be a cross between a California bungalow and the Horticultural Building at the World's Fair. Say, I ain't the worst, kid. There's others outside of my smear, understand, that I wouldn't ...
— Roast Beef, Medium • Edna Ferber

... enjoins, about which Dio Cocceianus writes. And if it seems to you an irksome thing to delve into books of ancient writers, at all events I will explain cursorily, as best I may, the entertainments pertaining to the triumph. They cause the celebrator of the triumph to ascend a car, smear his face with earth of Sinope or cinnabar (representing blood) to screen his blushes, fasten armlets on his arms, and put a laurel wreath and a branch of laurel in his right hand. Upon his head they also place a crown of some kind of wood having inscribed upon it his exploits ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol VI. • Cassius Dio

... take a moderately warm iron, smear it well with white wax, rub over each surface of the leaf once, applying more wax for each leaf. This process causes leaves to roll about as when hanging on the trees. If pressed more they become brittle and remain perfectly flat. Maple and oak ...
— The Ladies Book of Useful Information - Compiled from many sources • Anonymous

... assist in their toilet. Both boys had the greatest repugnance to the change, and objected still further when M. du Tillet insisted it was absolutely necessary that they should cut their hair and smear their faces ...
— In the Reign of Terror - The Adventures of a Westminster Boy • G. A. Henty

... her eyes away from her child. Flora had smear on her face; her hands were grimed with the floor. One of her stockings was down: her little white knee was going to scrape on the floor, be black before it was bloody. So—A long shining table under a cold gas spurt. A store ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... been very carefully studied by wise men who tell us it contains no sugar and is probably used as a means of defence, as aphides have been seen to smear the faces of insect enemies with ...
— The Insect Folk • Margaret Warner Morley

... profiteer With unabat- Ed loathing; Though I detest The price they smear On pants and vest ...
— Something Else Again • Franklin P. Adams

... "They smear every thing about the entrance to the hive with a gum which is found between the cells which the Greeks call [Greek: erithakae]. They live under the discipline of an army, taking turns in resting and all doing their equal share ...
— Roman Farm Management - The Treatises Of Cato And Varro • Marcus Porcius Cato

... to this experience with distressed brows. All his talking and thinking became to him like the open page of a monthly magazine. Across it this bloody smear, this thing of ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells

... are fine looking, of middle stature, well proportioned, and with finely cut features; with long and black hair, and black eyes set off with fine eyebrows; they are of the same color as the men. They smear their bodies and hair with grease, which makes them smell very rankly; they are very much ...
— Narratives of New Netherland, 1609-1664 • Various

... and being easy!" laughed Mortimer. "This thing has to be done good and proper. Come on, let's go out. We'll smear this old town with a mixture of ...
— Andy at Yale - The Great Quadrangle Mystery • Roy Eliot Stokes

... not paid when Matt presented it the next morning. As he came out of the bank a newsboy, crying his daily sensation, accosted him with the first afternoon edition, and Matt's glance caught a smear of red ink seven columns wide across ...
— Cappy Ricks • Peter B. Kyne

... was, but still jerking blood from beneath his ear; and there in my arms, as I kneeled on the stones, lay Dolly, her head fallen back and out of her hood, as white as a lily, dead too in an instant, for she was stabbed through her heart, with her life-blood in a great smear down her side, and all ...
— Oddsfish! • Robert Hugh Benson

... us. We were fairly swamped for the moment and all nohow. One evening, retreating on my own line, I came upon some little village—can't remember the name just now, but you know the sort of thing—typical Somme hamlet, a smear of brick-dust with a big notice-board on top, saying, 'THIS IS LE SARS,' or 'POZIERES,' or whatever its name was. Anyway, in this village I found a Divisional H.Q., four Brigade H.Q.'s, and oddities of all sorts sitting one on top of t'other waiting for ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Apr 2, 1919 • Various

... sat as quiet as a lamb and let the servant smear his scratches with it, but he never said a word, in spite of Marianna's inquiries. Fallen amongst thorns, fallen amongst thorns, yes, that he had! He continued to nod in a stupid kind of way. Then he groaned and moaned like a man ...
— Absolution • Clara Viebig

... the next morning, and the vessel grew day by day till at length a skeleton ship rose to view. Weeks passed on and the ship made rapid progress till the whole hulk stood ready. Then a great cauldron was heated, and the bubbling tar within was used to smear over the planks and thus ...
— The Children's Longfellow - Told in Prose • Doris Hayman

... seclusion from the sun, we clambered up the opposing steep emerging from an entanglement of jungle on a high and open ridge which commanded an unimpeded view to the west—a scene of theatrical clarity with a single theatrical smear. From a hollow far below slothful smoke filtered through the matted, sombre, dew-bespangled foliage, rose a few feet, and drifted abruptly, dissolving from diaphanous blue to nothingness. The resonant whooping of a swamp pheasant, antiphonal to a bell-voiced, ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield

... lead to the solution of the whole mystery. The chair was a cheap one, made of white wood, and had the usual smooth strip of wood at the top. On the back of this piece of wood, a quarter of an inch or so from the bottom, on the left-hand side, was a faint smear of blood. The presence of the blood set me thinking. When found, the chair had been exactly eighteen inches from the body. The mere fact that the man had been stabbed from behind and to the heart, precluded any possibility of his having jumped up and caught ...
— My Strangest Case • Guy Boothby

... time he sat there in the dark, the moon through the skylight above laying a pale smear which lengthened slowly towards him down the stairway. He tried to ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... vision as to the affection tendered us, so long as we remain unmoved, but once our feelings are stirred, their palpitating fears so smear our ...
— Some Everyday Folk and Dawn • Miles Franklin

... in a letter to the Editor, Who thanked me duly by return of post— I'm for a handsome article his creditor; Yet, if my gentle Muse he please to roast, And break a promise after having made it her, Denying the receipt of what it cost, And smear his page with gall instead of honey, All I can say is—that ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron

... Katerina arrived, and, stepping on board of her by the plank which communicated with the quay, the first thing that he did was to run to the mainmast and embrace it with both arms, although there was no small portion of tallow on it to smear the cloth of his coat. "Oh; my dear Vrow, my Katerina!" cried he, as if he were speaking to a female. "How do you do? I'm glad to see you again; you have been quite well, I hope? You do not like being laid up in this way. Never ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat

... stride round the Mother, while the music bursts out with renewed vigour, urging the other women, the human tabernacles of the cholera deities, to follow suit. Thereafter the camphor-cake is handed round to both women and men in turn who plunge their hands in the ashes and smear their faces with them; and so, after distribution of the offering of cocoanuts, sugar, and betel, the celebration closes. A few girls still dance and jerk their shining bodies before the altar, but Rama who is getting ...
— By-Ways of Bombay • S. M. Edwardes, C.V.O.

... a startling discovery. At first she had imagined that the long silken fluff was attached to one of the rings, but this her quick eyes had proved to be a mistake. On one of the slim fingers of the Countess was a thick smear ...
— The Slave of Silence • Fred M. White

... and a peculiar power of springing and hurling itself upon its prey. The Patagonians are a barbarous people in the main and, like all barbarous people, are vengeful, cunning, and subtle. A favourite revenge of theirs upon unsuspecting enemies is to get within touch of them and secretly to smear a mixture of coriander and oil of sassafras upon some part of their bodies, and then either to lure or drive them into the forest. By a peculiar arrangement of Mother Nature this mixture has a fascination, a maddening effect upon the Mynga Worm, just as ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew

... the woods began again. They seemed to have no relation to the regularly spaced bursts of smoke along a little smear in the desert earth two thousand yards away—no connection at all with the strong voices overhead coming and going. It was as impersonal as the drive of the sea ...
— France At War - On the Frontier of Civilization • Rudyard Kipling

... the whole more immediately depends; or he may give the latter, viz. the proportions and arrangement of the larger parts and the general masses of light and shade, and leave all the minuter parts of which those parts are composed a mere blotch, one general smear, like the first crude and hasty getting in of the groundwork of a picture: he may do either of these, or he may combine both, that is, finish the parts, but put them in their right places, and keep them in due subordination ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt

... a loud crash; one of my pommels gave me an awkward dig in the side. I saw the white star on my horse's forehead shoot below me; and the muddy, gravelly lane seemed to rise in my face and rasp my hands and smear my habit, and get conglomerated with my hair. The horsemen were all round me when I got up. I did not care for my accident; I did not care for being bruised—in fact, I did not know whether I was hurt or not—but my prevailing feeling was one of burning shame and horror as ...
— Kate Coventry - An Autobiography • G. J. Whyte-Melville

... Yankee rascal," said the captain, when I told him I never drank ... "I think it would do you good if you got a little smear of beer-froth on your mouth once in a while ... you'd stop looking leathery like a mummy ... you've already got some wrinkles on your face ... a few good drinks would plump you out, ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp

... in writing—made the letters run the opposite way in the end; and the change was due to the use of ink and other pigments for staining papyrus, parchment, or paper. If the hand in this case moved from right to left it would of course smear what it had already written; and to prevent such untidy smudging of the words, the order of writing was reversed from left rightward. The use of wax tablets also, no doubt, helped forward the revolution, for in this case, ...
— Falling in Love - With Other Essays on More Exact Branches of Science • Grant Allen

... of the usual low-hummed chantings. We had with us a small boy of ten or twelve years whose job it was to take care of the dogs and to remove ticks. In fact he was known as the Tick Toto. As this was his first expedition afield, his father took especial pains to smear him with fat from the lioness. This was to make him brave. I am bound to confess the ...
— African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White

... being worked by some simple, not very strong mill-contrivance downstairs. A shelf had been fixed up inside the pipe. On the shelf (as I could see by looking in) was a tallow candle in a sconce. Two oval bits of red glass, let into the wood, made the eyes of this lantern-devil. The mouth was a smear of some gleaming stuff, evidently some chemical. This was all the monster which had frightened me. The clacking noise was made by the machine which moved it round. As for the owl, that was probably painted ...
— Martin Hyde, The Duke's Messenger • John Masefield

... down the tool and over its edge, that the stoning has turned up a burr. This must be removed by stropping on both sides alternately. A paste composed of emery and crocus powders mixed with grease is used to smear the leather before stropping; this can either be procured at the tool shop, or made by the carver. When the tool has been sufficiently stropped, and all burr removed, it is ready for use, but it is as well to try it on ...
— Wood-Carving - Design and Workmanship • George Jack

... Carpet—Do not attempt to sweep the carpet until it has been covered with dry salt. Then sweep it and no smear ...
— Fowler's Household Helps • A. L. Fowler

... effusion of the talented young countess, who longed for rural retirement. And down came a great tear into the red trimming of British North America, and Kate unadvisedly trying to wipe it up with her handkerchief, made a red smear all across to Cape Verd! Formerly she would have exclaimed at once; now she only held up the other side of the book that her aunt might not see, and felt very shabby all the time. But Lady Barbara was reading over a letter, and did not look. ...
— Countess Kate • Charlotte M. Yonge



Words linked to "Smear" :   hatchet job, soil, mistake, rub, accuse, dirty, begrime, blemish, resmudge, malign, splodge, traduce, defamation, blotch, cytologic specimen, obloquy, traducement, error, calumniation, moil, defect, libel, bemire, cover, charge, blood, splotch, mar, drag through the mud, fault, colly, grime, fingerprint, badmouth, fingermark, assassinate, calumny, inkblot, dust



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