"Tap" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... sought relief in housework, making her bed, tidying her room. It was odd, this morning, how her notice of little, familiar things had the power to add to her pain, brought to mind memories become excruciating as she filled the water pitcher from the kitchen tap she found herself staring at the nick broken out of it when Lise had upset it. She recalled Lise's characteristically flippant remark. And there was the streak in the wall-paper caused one night by the rain leaking through the roof. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... a crushing indictment against the young man. "The crime was committed so quietly that not the faintest sound was heard; therefore the murderer was in the house; he went to the Marquise's room and announced his arrival by a cautious tap on the door; the Marquise then opened the door to him, and was not surprised to see him, for she knew him quite well; he went into her room ...
— Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... the smith replied, "and had my cudgel in readiness to tap him on the wrist if he had drawn his dagger. I would testify the same ...
— Wulf the Saxon - A Story of the Norman Conquest • G. A. Henty
... sap begins to rise. If the time be delayed, the juice will grow too thick to be drawn out. It should be as thin and clear as possible. The method of procuring the juice is by boring holes in the trunk of the tree, and fixing in facets made of elder; but care should be taken not to tap it in too many places at once, for fear of injuring the tree. If the tree is large, it may be bored in five or six places at once, and bottles are to be placed under the apertures to receive the sap. When four or five gallons have been extracted from different ...
— The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, • Mary Eaton
... doctor repeated after me; "you had better learn to live without him." "What an absurdity!" I said and wondered when he would come. Still later, Miriam, father, and I were in the parlor, when there was a tap on the window, just above his head, and I saw a hand, for an instant. Father hurried out, and we heard several voices; and then steps going away. Mother came down and asked who had been there, but we only knew that, whoever it was, father had afterward gone with them. Mother went on: ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson
... say?" the Englishman asked in a tone of astonishment, and his query was emphasized with a firm tap of ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller
... ma'am; that will do," muttered the man, impatiently; "and even that is as much as my place is worth. Now, just tap at yonder door, ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn
... windows jar, and a sound that resembled a faint tap. "Yes," he said quietly. "I may have been mistaken, but it was quite like a ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... our order doth proscribe All the year round matins; When they've left their beds, our tribe In the tap sing latins; There they call for wine for all, Roasted fowl and chicken; Hazard's threats no hearts appal, ...
— Wine, Women, and Song - Mediaeval Latin Students' songs; Now first translated into English verse • Various
... tap-room loiterer had slunk away to camp or cabin, and when the echo of the patrol's tread had died out in the fragrant darkness, came one to the door below, hammering the knocker; and I saw his spurs and scabbard shining in the luster of the stars, and ...
— The Reckoning • Robert W. Chambers
... produce a great man or something great would occur that would meet the emergency. Twice only had the drum been beaten, and assistance came, first in the persons of the great Admiral Blake and then Admiral Nelson. Some one must have given it a sly tap to bring the ...
— The Red Watch - With the First Canadian Division in Flanders • J. A. Currie
... duty; and he went past that lantern steady and swift; only, as he went, he groaned and shuddered. For about 2500 of Jack's steps we only pass one house - that where the lantern was; and about 1500 of these are in the darkness of the pit. But now the moon is on tap again, and the ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... suppuration the matter generally can be felt to fluctuate in the groin, or near the top of the thigh. In this circumstance, my friend Mr. Bent, Surgeon near Newcastle in Staffordshire, proposes to tap the abscess by means of a trocar, and thus as often as necessary to discharge the matter without admitting the air. Might a weak injection of wine and water, as in the hydrocele, be used with great caution to inflame the walls ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. II - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin
... bushy eyebrows, stood over the brake, watchful and motionless in the wild saraband of dancing shadows. Then the ship, obedient to the call of her anchor, forged ahead slightly and eased the strain. The cable relieved, hung down, and after swaying imperceptibly to and fro dropped with a loud tap on the hard wood planks. Singleton seized the high lever, and, by a violent throw forward of his body, wrung out another half-turn from the brake. He recovered himself, breathed largely, and remained for a while glaring down at the powerful and compact ...
— The Nigger Of The "Narcissus" - A Tale Of The Forecastle • Joseph Conrad
... there came a very low tap at my door; then another, like a tiny post-knock. I could never understand why it was I made no answer. Had I done so, and thus shown that I was awake, it might have sealed my fate. I was standing in the middle of the floor staring at the door, which I expected ...
— Uncle Silas - A Tale of Bartram-Haugh • J.S. Le Fanu
... side, with a round orifice in the middle of one side, and the side opposite covered with stout cloth stretched tight over a framework. A saucer containing strong ammonia water, and another containing strong hydrochloric acid, will cause dense fumes in the box, and a tap with the hand upon the cloth back will force out a ring from the orifice. These may be made to follow and strike each other, rebounding and vibrating, apparently attracting each other and being attracted by ...
— The Machinery of the Universe - Mechanical Conceptions of Physical Phenomena • Amos Emerson Dolbear
... Environment - current issues: tap water is not potable; poaching has diminished its reputation as one of the last great wildlife refuges; ...
— The 2000 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... soon as he opened his eyes in the morning there was a tap at his door, and the gay, strong voice he loved so ...
— Scottish sketches • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... in the kitchen, while the third, Ned Hunter, remained on guard. At a few minutes after nine the maid, Edith Baxter, carried down to the stables his supper, which consisted of a dish of curried mutton. She took no liquid, as there was a water-tap in the stables, and it was the rule that the lad on duty should drink nothing else. The maid carried a lantern with her, as it was very dark and the path ran across the ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... in his preface to "Countess Julie": "The theatre has for a long time seemed to me the Biblia pauperum in the fine arts, a bible with pictures for those who can neither read nor write, and the dramatist is the revivalist, and the revivalist dishes tap the ideas of the day in popular form, so popular that the middle class, of whom the bulk of theatre-goers is comprised, can without burdening their brains understand what it is all about. The theatre therefore has ...
— Plays: The Father; Countess Julie; The Outlaw; The Stronger • August Strindberg
... the persuasive sergeant came, what were they? Multiform ragged losels, runaway apprentices, starved weavers, thievish valets—an entirely broken population, fast tending towards the treadmill. But the persuasive sergeant came; by tap of drum enlisted, or formed lists of them, took heartily to drilling them; and he and you have made them this! Most potent, effectual for all work whatsoever, is wise planning, firm combining, and commanding among men. Let no man despair of Governments ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine—Vol. 54, No. 333, July 1843 • Various
... up and arrived in time to hear the man give a peculiar knock at the door—one loud tap, followed by three soft ...
— The boy Allies at Liege • Clair W. Hayes
... a low tap at the door; then, before Mrs. Lawrence could answer, Fred marched in, kissed his mother dutifully, ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas
... finished dressing for dinner, there was a tap at my door. My friend (?) stood there beaming. "Have you got it done? You know you promised to write me a ...
— Threads of Grey and Gold • Myrtle Reed
... a gap in the curtains and I risked a tap on the glass. My God, how surprised he was to see me standing there! I grinned at him and he let me in, and then——" He broke off and fell forward in his chair with his face in his hands. "This whisky has gone to my head!" he muttered. "You've mixed ...
— Simon • J. Storer Clouston
... showering iron filings upon the paper, I notice a tendency of the filings to arrange themselves in determinate lines. They cannot freely follow this tendency, for they are hampered by the friction against the paper. They are helped by tapping the paper; each tap releasing them for a moment, and enabling them to follow their tendencies. But this is an experiment which can only be seen by myself. To enable you all to see it, I take a pair of small magnets ...
— Six Lectures on Light - Delivered In The United States In 1872-1873 • John Tyndall
... went up to him, and gave him a friendly tap on the shoulder, "What are you thinking about?" ...
— De La Salle Fifth Reader • Brothers of the Christian Schools
... the best of wine too; and old Salterne had a good tap of Alicant in old time, old time, old time, sir! and you must drink it now, whether he does or not!" and ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... we'll get some more at the saloon, and—we'll paint the town red." He rose and fetched two glasses from a cupboard and set them on the table. Then he took his sheath knife from his belt, and, with a skilful tap, knocked ...
— The One-Way Trail - A story of the cattle country • Ridgwell Cullum
... his last copy and was engaged in piling the copy-books neatly, one on top of another, when there came a soft tap at the door. ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... slight tap was heard at the door. The young girl turned pale, for in her present frame of mind any little matter affected her. Nor were her apprehensions materially allayed by the entrance of Dorothy, who, looking white as a sheet, said she did not dare to remain in her own room, having been terribly ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... of eyes were piercingly fixed upon him. A voice was saying inside him—"What a fool you are! What a fool you are! I always told you you were a fool!" And his heart was beating as it had never beat, and his forehead was damp, his throat distressingly dry, and one foot nervously tap-tapping on the floor. This condition lasted for something like ten hours, during which time the eyes continued to pierce the cloud and him ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... remained in a kneeling posture all this time scarcely able to control her tears. A tap on the shoulder aroused her, and looking up she saw the kindly face of Lord Hunsdon, the lord chamberlain, bending ...
— In Doublet and Hose - A Story for Girls • Lucy Foster Madison
... it in— Children's heads are hollow; Rap it in, tap it in— Bang it in, slam it in Ancient archaeology, Aryan philology, Prosody, zoology, Physics, climatology, Calculus and mathematics, Rhetoric and hydrostatics. Stuff the school children, fill up the heads of them, Send them all lesson-full home to the beds of them; When ...
— The Gentleman from Everywhere • James Henry Foss
... believe, e'en though I knew 't were true. From Oxford the young men made their way to storied Warwick, where the portcullis is raised—or lowered, I do not remember which—every evening at sundown to tap of drum. It is the same old Warwick Castle that Shakespeare knew; the same cedars of Lebanon that he saw; the same screaming peacocks; the same circling rooks and daws, and down across the lazy Avon over the meadows the same ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard
... dress, and mended it with quick, pussy-like movements of her fingers. She tried to arrange Una's hair so that its pale golden texture would shine in broad, loose undulations, and she was as excited as Una when they heard Walter's bouncing steps in the hall, his nervous tap at the door, his fumbling ...
— The Job - An American Novel • Sinclair Lewis
... day in her vine-shaded home, looking out through the slender branches of the honeysuckle, which were gently swayed by a refreshing breeze, when she heard a slight tap. She listened eagerly. Another tap—presently another. How her heart fluttered! It proceeded from one of those highly-prized eggs, and she knew it was the timid knock of a birdling, who was in that little chamber, ...
— The Nest in the Honeysuckles, and other Stories • Various
... men proper to Italian churches, who, having dabbled themselves with holy water, wander forlornly and aimlessly about, and seem to consort with the foreigners looking at the objects of interest. Lounging young fellows of low degree appear with their caps in their hands, long enough to tap themselves upon the breast and nod recognition to the high-altar; and lounging young fellows of high degree step in to glance at the faces of the pretty girls, and then vanish. The droning ends, presently, and the devotees disappear, ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells
... own fermometer, Mist' Ross, an' that's mah inside. Right about five minutes befo' noon, thar's a little knock that says 'Tap, tap,' Dan'l, yo're hungry.' An' that knockin's always right, Mistah Ross. Ah sho' is hungry right at ...
— The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men • Francis William Rolt-Wheeler
... nieces. He sent them gorgeous fans, and watch bracelets, and velvet bags. He took two expensive rooms at a downtown hotel, and there was something more tear-compelling than grotesque about the way he gloated over the luxury of a separate ice-water tap in the bathroom. ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber
... tap at the door; and a man came staggering in, without saying with your leave, or by your leave, with something heavy on his head. Setting this down in the middle of the table, symmetrically in the centre of the nuts and ...
— The Cricket on the Hearth • Charles Dickens
... continuance of its species, it probably does not think about it as a person would, any more than the plant or tree thinks about the light when it bends toward it, or about the moisture when it sends down its tap-root. Touch the tail of a porcupine ever so lightly, and it springs up like a trap and your hand is stuck with quills. I do not suppose there is any more thinking about the act, or any more conscious exercise ...
— Ways of Nature • John Burroughs
... striving with reins and whip, knee, heel and spur to execute a movement which the master had compelled his horse to perform while apparently holding himself as rigid as bronze. "I ride here, sir," was the grim answer, with another tap on ...
— In the Riding-School; Chats With Esmeralda • Theo. Stephenson Browne
... out while the opposite side is filling. The tank may be made from 1/2-in. material and when completed as shown, lined with oil cloth to make it watertight. The tank is placed with the partition directly under a water tap and the flow of water will cause it to tip from time to time, keeping the prints constantly ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics
... and Mrs. Simmons gave him farewells which were full of feeling. Aunt Suse had come down the brick walk, tap-tapping with her cane, as Harry stood at the gate ready to mount ...
— The Guns of Bull Run - A Story of the Civil War's Eve • Joseph A. Altsheler
... song, MRS. BATHOLOMMEY has given a quick tap on the door and entered. She is about forty years of age. Her faded brown hair is streaked with grey. She wears a plain ...
— The Return of Peter Grimm • David Belasco
... a cup, and looked complacently into its clear depths. The tap on the door broke his reverie, and he ...
— Millennium • Everett B. Cole
... tended The rose baith ear' an' late; He water'd it, and fann'd it, And wove it with his fate; But the thistle tap it wither'd, Winds bore it far awa', And Scotland's heart was broken, For the rose ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... he stumbled downstairs, leaving Horace relieved to some extent. Rapkin would be sober enough after his head had been under the tap for a few minutes, and in any case there would be the ...
— The Brass Bottle • F. Anstey
... isn't," I contradicted. "Manufacturers' claims to the contrary, there is no such thing as a tap-proof radio. Maybe he wasn't supposed to leave his post, but if he did, he used ...
— Four-Day Planet • Henry Beam Piper
... lapsed into gentler lines, for some one had the audacity to touch mademoiselle's hand with a birdlike tap of ...
— The Isle of Unrest • Henry Seton Merriman
... There was a tap at his door, and he called "Come in." From her babyhood Lily had had her own peculiar method of signaling that she stood without, a delicate rapid tattoo of finger nails on the panel. He ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... ought to have done, what any man retaining his common sense would have done the moment he got his hands upon the thing, was to turn off the tap. Then he might have played foot-ball with the man, or battledore and shuttlecock as he pleased; and the twenty or thirty people who had rushed forward to assist would have only applauded. His idea, however, as he explained to us afterwards, was to ...
— Three Men on the Bummel • Jerome K. Jerome
... discovered the fact and reported it casually to Major Phelps, who spoke to the colonel about it. Both of these officers had their hands very full at that time, and both of them had felt the blessing of having the ever-ready and ever-willing Brighton boys always on tap, as it were, to run quick errands and be eyes and feet for anyone that required ...
— The Brighton Boys with the Flying Corps • James R. Driscoll
... when a slight tap on his shoulder caused him to turn his head; it was Captain Lawton, who, with a smile of peculiar meaning, beckoned him to follow. The state of Wellmere's mind was such, that he would gladly have gone anywhere to avoid ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... he sat drooping and listless, there came a light foot along the passage, a light tap at the door, and the next moment she stood before him, a little paler than usual, but lovelier than ever, for celestial ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 103, May, 1866 • Various
... country inns when Turpin rode to Rippleside! Puck tuned the fiddle-strings, and country maids grew coy, Tavern doors grew magical when Colonel Jack might tap at them, The gay Golden ...
— The Lord of Misrule - And Other Poems • Alfred Noyes
... Disturbed by a gentle tap at the door, I sprang up at once and threw on a dressing gown. Outside, when I opened the door, was Aunt Janet. She was holding a lighted candle in her hand, for though it was getting light in the open, the passages were still dark. ...
— The Lady of the Shroud • Bram Stoker
... since been a "goner," Though the uttermost heel-tap be drained, I will give them a place of high honour, Well knowing that once they contained My solace when seasons were rotten, When the cold put my courage to flight, Or the sergeant, perchance, had forgotten To kiss ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, April 14, 1920 • Various
... your peaked men of countries, as your favorite Shakespeare has it? You must be content with the spider and the rat, to crawl and scratch round your flock bed! I have known prisoners in the Bastille to feed them for companions,—why don't you begin your task? I have known a spider to descend at the tap of a finger, and a rat to come forth when the daily meal was brought, to share it with his fellow prisoner!—How delightful to have vermin for your guests! Aye, and when the feast fails them, they make a meal of their ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... while the morning star Hung yet behind the pine bough, woke and prayed The world's great shipwright, and his soul was glad Because the Voice was favorable. Now Began the tap o' the hammer, now ran forth The slaves preparing food. They therefore ate In peace together; then Niloiya forth Behind the milk-white steers went on her way; And the great Master-builder, down the course Of the long river, on his errand sped, And as he ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Jean Ingelow
... the roots of the tamarack, of larch; such as coarse birch-baskets, bark canoes, and the covering of their wigwams. They call this 'wah-tap,' [Footnote: Asclepia paviflora.] (wood-thread,) and they prepare it by pulling off the outer rind and steeping it in water. It is the larger fibres which have the appearance of small cordage when coiled up and fit for use. This 'wah-tap' is very ...
— Lady Mary and her Nurse • Catharine Parr Traill
... said I; "we're here for a woman's sake, and if there's man's work to do, we'll do it, lads. Take my advice and you'll turn straight back and run for it. Better a tap on the head than a cry ...
— The House Under the Sea - A Romance • Sir Max Pemberton
... these," he said, "and they all lie in a line with one another. Any one of them will tap the tunnel that connects the laundry—the former Museum—with the chamber where the mummy ...
— Three John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... more watery, while his battered old face assumed an expression indicating deep inward satisfaction. "Thank you, my boy! This is one of those intrinsically trifling benefits which, conferred at the moment of acute need, touch the heart and tap the unfailing springs of human gratitude—I must step down to the tavern—when I return, please God, we shall know more of each other." While he was still speaking he had produced a jug from behind the quilt that screened his bed, and now, bareheaded, and with every ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester
... immediately after another tap at the door announced David. He stepped inside the door; a great mark of condescension. He had never come to Matilda's room ...
— The House in Town • Susan Warner
... threw off all encumbering clothing, and each of the boys, with loaded rifle, began the ascent of the mountain, parallel to the slide, and under the thick cover of the forest. More than once Uncle Dick had to tap Leo on the shoulder and make him wait for the others, for an Indian has no mercy on a weak or inexperienced person on a hunting-trail. Indeed, so little did he show the fabled Indian calm, he was more excited than any of the others when ...
— The Young Alaskans in the Rockies • Emerson Hough
... though not absolutely certain, looked full of hope and promise; but Dolly was firm and reckless. I am ten years her senior, but still young to be called a "'fraid cat" with impunity; so I finally mounted the vehicle. The driver gave a gay, insouciant tap to a front tire, as much as to say: "Courage, mon enfant! C'est la derniere fois!"—then flung himself into his seat, and, blowing a horn, started his base-hospital up the mountain at a breakneck pace. The ...
— Ladies-In-Waiting • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... out into a long rope and held it while Uncle Clem hit the ends a sharp tap with the edge ...
— Raggedy Andy Stories • Johnny Gruelle
... the night wild, watching from grass-tuft and root and burrow, heard the rasping tap of the owl's beak hammering helplessly at the spines on the back of the hedgehog, now beside himself with rage. Not one of them, too, that did not jump with terror—engrained by the bitter experience of hundreds of generations—at her fiendish scream. Then, in a flash, that owl was upon her ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... billet was in a monastery for old priests, on the eastern edge of the town, and at night my window was lighted by distant shell-fire, and I gazed out to a sky of darkness rent by vivid flashes, bursts of red flame, and rockets rising high. The priests used to tap at my door when I came back from the battlefields all muddy, with a slime-plastered face, writing furiously, and an old padre used to plague ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs
... to tap the wealth of the gorgeous East, into her lap fell the stream of gold from that quarter. The secret of her windfall was the small bulk and enormous value of her cargoes. From Malabar she fetched pepper and ginger, from Ceylon cinnamon and ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... matter o' use to tap maples less than a foot across. They hain't no sugar in 'em,' said Zack, among his other practical hints. 'The older the tree, the richer the sap. This 'ere sugar bush is as fine as I'd wish to tap: mostly hard maple, an' the right age. Soft maple don't make nothing but molasses, ...
— Cedar Creek - From the Shanty to the Settlement • Elizabeth Hely Walshe
... tap on the door, and an ancient darky entered, with a tall glass of whipped-cream punch, light as a feather, and as delicate as thought. Then, breakfast, in a long, low-ceilinged room on the ground floor, with a blazing fire at each end, a pickaninny gravely watchful ...
— The Statesmen Snowbound • Robert Fitzgerald
... not even gone to bed. She was sitting by her window, gazing out on the hushed, gloomy, breathless summer night,—waiting, waiting, she scarce knew for what,—when she was aware of a figure approaching, and knew Penn's light, quick tap at the door. ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... The foot tap of Mrs. Nesbit became audible. She shook her head with some force and exclaimed: "O Jim, wouldn't I like to have ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... fetched from the depths of his waistcoat pocket a capacious gold box, and opened it with a tap, as though he were about to offer me a pinch of snuff. 'There's ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke
... impossible twist, or enlarge them to cover, with unexpected propriety, a much wider or more momentous experience. The force of experience in any moment—if we abstract from represented values—is emotional; so that for sublime poetry what is required is to tap some reservoir of feeling. If a phrase opens the flood-gates of emotion, it has made itself most deeply significant. Its discursive range and clearness may not be remarkable; its emotional power will quite suffice. For this reason ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... said in praise of any one, and it seemed to excite his interest, she would pooh-pooh it, literally with a "pooh!" a shrug of the shoulders, a toss of the head, or an impatient tap of the foot. ...
— Absalom's Hair • Bjornstjerne Bjornson
... free from sediment, and consequently bring down no liquid mire to add to its substance. The soil is formed completely of vegetable matter, without any admixture of earthy particles. In many even of the softest parts juniper-trees stand firmly fixed by their long tap roots, affording a dark shade, beneath which numerous ferns, reeds, and shrubs, together with a thick carpet of mosses, flourish, protected from the rays of the sun. Here and there also large cedars ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... basin and cloth to the sink. Empty, rinse the basin, and dry it with the cloth. Rinse the cloth under the tap and wring it dry. ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Household Management • Ministry of Education
... elbow, her thighs lithe and restless, a panther in a cage. At the back of the stage she turns suddenly, advances; the snapping of her fingers gets loud, insistent; a thrill whirrs through the guitar like a covey of partridges scared in a field. Red heels tap threateningly. ...
— Rosinante to the Road Again • John Dos Passos
... into the Fish and Game Department, where a solitary light (which burnt night and day) threw a dim radiance over vast surfaces of white marble dominated by silver taps. The fish and game were below in the refrigerators. Simon let the cylinder fall on to a slab; Albert turned a tap, and immediately the cylinder was surrounded by clouds of steam. The phenomenon was like some alchemical and mysterious operation. And the steam, as it rose and spread abroad in the immense, pale interior, might have been the fumes ...
— Hugo - A Fantasia on Modern Themes • Arnold Bennett
... to bid one rack one's brain— I'm sure my poor head aches again, I've scratched it so, and all in vain. Oh for a trap, a trap, a trap!" Just as he said this, what should hap At the chamber door but a gentle tap! "Bless us," cried the mayor, "what's that?" (With the corporation as he sat Looking little though wondrous fat; Nor brighter was his eye, nor moister Than a too-long-opened oyster, Save when at noon his paunch grew mutinous For ...
— The New McGuffey Fourth Reader • William H. McGuffey
... housewifely things her stepmother had taught her; and try to order his house well. But that troubled her not at all at present. She was more concerned with the ceremony, and the many eyes that would be turned upon her. It was a relief when a tap came on the door and the dear ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... this"—pointing to the schooner—"that Indiaman to-day had never shown heels. And more, how think ye my store is replenished? Dost think I tap the rock for wine? Does Milo crush the granite and bring forth meat for thy hungry bellies? Are my treasures kept at high tide by snatching the colors from the sunset? Fools!" she cried, and for a moment passion conquered her calm. "In that schooner are wines ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... spectators—idlers who never find anything better to do than gazing at street spectacles, and people of both sexes, with more or less of business on hand, who cannot avoid pausing for a moment when the police sweep by to clear the street and the tap of the bass-drum is heard,—just to see what the excitement is all about. In this instance a file of policemen extending almost from curb to curb were marching abreast to keep the way clear in front of the regiment; close behind them sounded the crashing of brass, the screaming of clarionet-reeds ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford
... our hats. The rich people opened their purses and paid the debts of everybody in jail. We hung lanterns on the tree in the evening, set off rockets, and kindled bonfires. John Hancock kept open house, with ladies and gentlemen feasting in his parlors, and pipes of wine on tap in the front ...
— Daughters of the Revolution and Their Times - 1769 - 1776 A Historical Romance • Charles Carleton Coffin
... institution for which he pleaded. The whole discourse pleased his auditors, and a deputation waited on him to request he would print it. "Gentlemen, I thank you for the compliment; but I must give the same answer that I have given on other like occasions; and that answer is—The tap is out." "The Archbishop of York," said he, speaking of a late primate, "preached one day at Carlisle; I was present, and felt muzzy and half asleep; when on a sudden I was roused, and began to prick up my ears; and what should I ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 388 - Vol. 14, No. 388, Saturday, September 5, 1829. • Various
... passed many weary hours, while all about me was a stir and bustle, a confused sound made up of many, as the never-ending tread of feet, the sound of hoarse voices now faint and far and anon clear and loud, the scrape of a fiddle, snatches of rough song, the ceaseless ring and tap of hammers—a very babel that, telling of life and action, made my gloomy prison the harder to endure. And here (mindful of what is to follow) I do think it well to describe in few words the place wherein I lay. It was indeed a very dog-hole, just below the orlop, some ten feet square (or thereabouts) ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... now a very big man, the biggest man thereabout. And it was now that he began to tap another source of supply—to, as it were, open a fresh cask—i.e. the local bank. At first he only asked for a hundred or so, a mere bagatelle, for a few days—only temporary convenience. The bank was glad to get hold of what really looked like legitimate business, and he obtained the bagatelle ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... the cut ham," I shouted, for my sister was come to the door by chance, or because of the sound of a horse in the road, "and cut a few rashers of hung deer's meat. There is a gentleman come to sup, Annie. And fetch the hops out of the tap with a skewer that it may ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... have to wash these down at that tap," said he. "The poor devil has finished what you left at daybreak, besides making a hole in my flask; but he can't or won't eat a bite, and if only he stands his trial and takes his sentence like a man, I think he might ...
— Mr. Justice Raffles • E. W. Hornung
... hall lights, and then went down again. The hour for the girls to gather was set for half-past ten. First of all, however, The Fox was to go down and listen at Miss Picolet's door to make sure that she had gone to bed. Then Miss Cox was to tap softly but distinctly at the door of each invited guest as she came ...
— Ruth Fielding at Briarwood Hall - or Solving the Campus Mystery • Alice B. Emerson
... mysterious jests and laughter, which sometimes he feared to be at his expense, and so joined in, and made them laugh the more at his misconception. He went and came among them at will; he had but to tap at Mrs. Ellison's door, and some voice of unaffected cordiality welcomed him in; he had but to ask, and Kitty was frankly ready for any of those strolls about Quebec in which most of their waking ...
— A Chance Acquaintance • W. D. Howells
... excellency," she ejaculated, gasping after each word. "That Amalia Ludwigovna, ah! Lida, Kolya, hands on your hips, make haste! Glissez, glissez! pas de basque! Tap with your heels, ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... day he took his staff, said farewell to the brotherhood, and set off for the town. And the monks were left without music, and without his speeches and verses. They spent a month drearily, then a second, but the old man did not come back. At last after three months had passed the familiar tap of his staff was heard. The monks flew to meet him and showered questions upon him, but instead of being delighted to see them he wept bitterly and did not utter a word. The monks noticed that he looked greatly aged and had grown thinner; his ...
— The Horse-Stealers and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... night, Lawrence heard somebody tap at his window. He knew well who it was, for this was the signal agreed upon between him and his wicked companion. He trembled at the thoughts of what he was about to do, and lay quite still, with his head under the bedclothes, till he ...
— The Parent's Assistant • Maria Edgeworth
... a tap at the door, and a call boy offered a card. "It's against orders, I know, ma'am," ...
— The Law of the Land • Emerson Hough
... time, but nothing like the good times they had out at the school near grandpap's, where I sometimes visited. There you could whisper! Yes, sir, you could whisper. So long as you didn't talk out loud, it was all right. And there was no rising at the tap of the bell, forming in line and walking in lock-step. Seemingly it never entered the school-board's heads that anybody would ever be sent to state's prison. They left the scholars unprepared for any such career. They have remedied all that in city schools. Now, when a boy grows up and goes to Sing ...
— Back Home • Eugene Wood
... not come in until evening. At ten o'clock Clayton found the second man carrying up-stairs a tray containing whisky and soda, and before he slept he heard a tap at Graham's door across the hall, and surmised that he had rung for another. Later still he heard Natalie cross the hall, and rather loud and angry voices. He considered, ironically, that a day which had found a part of the nation ...
— Dangerous Days • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... of the gentle gardener lay in a few plants of zinnias close to a dripping tap. In bright red, gold, and white, he accepted them as substitutes for the sacred lotus, and prison flowers never flaunted more freely. As innocent as they, he deftly, tirelessly trained each plant, caressed each opening ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... cock nose': but I love him, Jack, for he knows his business. We've a professional at last. No more Pall Mall promenaders—no more Braddocks. Loudons, Webbs! We live in the consulship of Pitt, my lad—deprome Caecubum—we'll tap a cask to it in Quebec. And if ...
— Fort Amity • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... was uncontrollable, Johnnie began to thrash about and scream. And as Barber half dropped, half flung him to the floor, old Grandpa roused, and came round in his chair, tap-tapping with the cane. "Captain!" he shrilled. "The right's falling back! They're giving us grape and canister!—Oh, our boys! Our poor boys!" Frightened by any trouble, his mind always reverted to old scenes ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... so; and he had asked that if this were so might he spend the time with her instead. Because of this she had lived all Sunday in the dread of his coming. Yet very often she found herself arrested in the midst of some homely action, letting some tap run on to inordinate splashings, some pot boil to an explosion of flavoured fumes, because she was brooding with an infatuated smile on his rich colours and rich ways, on the slouch by which he dissembled ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... burning, and a young man lay stretched on a dirty mattress, and a little bantam kept watch beside him, to the steps of another caravan, where, from the sounds we heard, high jinks were going on with some children. At the sound of a tap on the door there was an instant hush, and then a girl of nineteen, who had a baby in her arms, asked us to come in. We looked up in amazement; the girl's face appeared like an apparition—so fair, so beautiful, so like some face we had seen elsewhere, that we were confused and puzzled. In a ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... was a tap at the door, and another old lady bounced in. She was stout, jolly-looking and effusive. The greetings between the pair were warm, and they were evidently old friends. But underneath the new-comer's gush and noise I was dimly conscious of ...
— The Motormaniacs • Lloyd Osbourne
... narcissus in the air, but there are no flowers anywhere, only white dust whipping up the street, and a girl with a gay Spring hat and blowing skirts. The dust and the wind flirt at her ankles and her neat, high-heeled patent leather shoes. Tap, tap, the little heels pat the pavement, and the wind rustles among the ...
— Men, Women and Ghosts • Amy Lowell
... the effect of this method of interpretation upon the churches of our denomination? It is to cut the tap-root of their strength, and to imperil their very existence. Baptist churches are founded upon Scripture. Their doctrine of regenerate church-membership, and of church ordinances as belonging only to believers, presupposes an authoritative rule of faith and practice in the New Testament. ...
— A Tour of the Missions - Observations and Conclusions • Augustus Hopkins Strong
... loss of ten or twelve ounces of blood, I frequently and designedly put myself in the way of trial. But the vampire seemed to take a personal dislike to me; and the provoking brute would refuse to give my clavet one solitary trial, though he would tap the more favoured Indian's toe, in a hammock within a few yards of mine. For the space of eleven months, I slept alone in the loft of a woodcutter's abandoned house in the forest; and though the vampire came in and out every night, and I had the finest opportunity of seeing ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 569 - Volume XX., No. 569. Saturday, October 6, 1832 • Various
... is so much lighter than iron that when the ore is melted the slag floats on top just as oil floats on water, and can be drained out of the furnace through a higher opening than that through which the iron flows. The slag tap is open most of the time, but the iron tap is opened only once in about six hours. It is a magnificent sight when a furnace is "tapped" and the stream of iron drawn off. Imagine a great shed, dark and gloomy, with many workmen hurrying about to make ready for what is to come. The floor ...
— Diggers in the Earth • Eva March Tappan
... vague allusion to "a thousand dollars more." A quiet contentment naturally suffused his personality, and he was more than usually lazy and deliberate in his speech. At midnight, when he was about to retire, he was a little surprised, however, by a tap on his door, followed by the presence of Mistress Peg Moffat, heiress, and landlady of ...
— The Twins of Table Mountain and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... in putting off reality, had gained a kind of dignity which rested upon each impartially. Thus rid of any uncomfortable warmth of partisanship or load of obligation, she was dropping off to sleep when a light tap sounded upon her door. A moment later Cassandra stood beside her, holding a candle and speaking in the low tones proper to the time ...
— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf
... There came a tap at her door, and her aunt's voice called, "Shall I come in?" and before she could faintly consent, her aunt pushed in, and caught her in her arms, and kissed her, and broke into a twitter of welcome and compassion. "You ...
— The Lady of the Aroostook • W. D. Howells
... murmur rose in pitch upon the second. Like a flock of agitated gulls, the boats in the harbour stirred nimbly from place to place; a belated newspaper tug tore by, headed for the upper bay, smoking fiercely, the water boiling from her bows. From the battleship came the tap of a drum. The excursion steamers and chartered ferryboats moved to points of vantage and took position, occasionally feeling the water ...
— A Man's Woman • Frank Norris
... afternoon, for as the drill bit deeper into the rock it provoked indications of a terrific force imprisoned far below. To the observers it seemed as if that sharp-edged tool was tap-tapping upon the thin shell of some vast reservoir already leaking and charged to the bursting point with a mighty pressure. An odor of gas escaped from the casing mouth, occasionally there came hoarse, throaty gurglings of the thick ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... Tap the cannikin, troll the cannikin, Toss the cannikin, turn the cannikin! Hold now, good son, and fill us a fresh can, That we may quaff it ...
— Lyrics from the Song-Books of the Elizabethan Age • Various
... or confusion in the scolding of herring-wives than in the public disputes of men of this profession? I had rather my son should learn in a tap-house to speak, than in the schools to prate. Take a master of arts, and confer with him: why does he not make us sensible of this artificial excellence? and why does he not captivate women and ignoramuses, as we are, with admiration at the steadiness of his reasons and the beauty of his order? ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... Bill went to his own room and tried to read. The thought that in a short time Lee, good, honest, loyal Lee, would be on his way to prison, a convicted thief, was more than he could bear. The print danced before his eyes. He heaved a sigh of relief when a tap on the door was followed by the entrance ...
— Battling the Clouds - or, For a Comrade's Honor • Captain Frank Cobb
... who left his lance sticking in the dead man. Mah-to-toh-pa found the body, drew out the lance, and carried it to his village, where it was recognized as the property of a famous warrior named Won-ga-tap. He kept the bloodstained weapon, {324} vowing that some day he would with it avenge his brother's death. Four years passed by, and still he nursed his wrath. Then one day he worked himself up to a frenzy and went through the village crying that the ...
— French Pathfinders in North America • William Henry Johnson
... my fingers round the thrapple o' that leein' scoundrel on the tap of the coach! Gie me your hand, Captain Smith—it's all a mistake. I'll set it right in two minutes. Come with me to Chatterton's rooms—ye'll make him the happiest man in England. He's wud wi' love—mad with affection, as a body may say. He thought you had ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... of Job's intuition. But in a God-created world made for the delectation of mankind, to forego its pleasures would be to offend the Creator, if indeed stark madness could kindle His ire. But to curb one's thirst for life and to spurn its joys because one holds them to be the tap root of all evil, is an action at once intelligible and wise. And this is what Job evidently does when he practises difficult virtues and undergoes terrible sufferings without the consciousness of past guilt or the faintest ...
— The Sceptics of the Old Testament: Job - Koheleth - Agur • Emile Joseph Dillon
... table, with one arm flung across it, and her body bowed with grief. At her feet lay a trodden bunch of the monkey flowers: and at the tap-tap of his wooden leg on the threshold she sprang up and faced him, ...
— The Westcotes • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... together and set his feet as if for the sound of the referee's whistle. He heard the orchestra leader tap his music-stand; then, as the first strains of the waltz floated forth, he stepped into the ballroom and made toward his sweetheart. All at once he found that his brain ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... which drinking-water was kept, and upon which either stood or hung cups or goblets. These fountains were often of fantastic shapes, and usually enamelled. One is described as representing a dragon on a tree top, and another a castle on a hill, with a convenient tap at some point for drawing ...
— Arts and Crafts in the Middle Ages • Julia De Wolf Addison
... summon the various companies to roll-call; and the men were seen emerging from their tents and huts. It will give some idea of the internal organization of the Texian army, if I record the proceedings of the company that lay opposite to us, the soldiers composing which were disturbed by the tap of the drum in the agreeable occupation of cooking their breakfast. This consisted of pieces of beef, which they roasted at the fire on small wooden spits. Soon a row of these warriors, some only half-dressed, stood before the sergeant, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various
... which shot the flames emitted from the numerous chimneys of forges, glass-works, and factories, which made it the busy place it was. Ever and anon came the deafening sound of the trip-hammer, the rap-a-tap-tap of the rivet-headers' tools striking upon the heavy boiler-plates; the screeching of steam-whistles; the babel of men's voices; the clanging of deep-toned bells. Each in turn striking upon my ear, seemed as a whole to furnish sufficient noise-tonic for even the most ardent upholder ...
— Four Months in a Sneak-Box • Nathaniel H. Bishop
... second thing that is plainly spoken of that hinders prayer. James speaks of it in his letter.[15] "Ye have not because ye ask not"—that explains many parched up lives and churches and unsolved problems: no pipe lines run up to tap the reservoir, and give God an opening into the troubled territory. Then he pushes on to say—"Ye ask, and receive not"—ah! there's just the rub; it is evidently an old story, this thing of not receiving—why? "because ...
— Quiet Talks on Prayer • S. D. (Samuel Dickey) Gordon
... her side, offering gently to relieve her of hood and cloak, and with a tap on his arm drawing Mr. Van Brunt's ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... the door can open." She flipped a switch and punched a number. "I can call anybody in here, any time, you know. Hello, dear, this is Teddy. Can you come in for just a few minutes? Thanks." And, one minute later, there came a light tap on the door. ...
— Masters of Space • Edward Elmer Smith
... that drummed on the veranda overhead and gurgled past his feet in the gutter. Behind him, from a leak in the pipe, the water fell to the ground with a noisy splash as if someone had turned on a tap. Joe felt that he hated water like a cat. His watery blue eyes, fixed with a careless scrutiny on every face, told him in an instant whether the owner was a likely mark that he could touch for a drink, but his luck was out. He decided that the two women ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone |
