"Berth" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... large Rhodes plate; and the thing was done. Lady Lesbia's cabin was all bamboo and embroidered India muslin. An oval glass, framed in Dresden biscuit, adorned the side, a large white bearskin covered the floor. The berth was pretty enough for the cradle of a duchess's first baby. Even Lesbia, spoiled by much indulgence and unlimited credit, gave a little cry of pleasure at sight of the nest that had been made ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... possession of the nest, the kingbird had succeeded, without much trouble, in making most of his fellow-creatures understand that he laid claim to the upper branches of the oak, and was prepared to defend them against all comers, and they simply gave the tree a wide berth in passing. ...
— Little Brothers of the Air • Olive Thorne Miller
... "sometimes the longest way round is the shortest way home. We don't touch this side the Golden Gate. So you may as well see the purser when he gets up and have him assign you a berth. It's ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... he purchased a basket, which he lashed ingeniously on the left-hand seat of the car, and a cushion, which he fitted into the basket. The berth prepared, he deposited the sumptuously-apparelled Jean therein and drove away, amid the perplexed benisons of the landlady and ...
— The Joyous Adventures of Aristide Pujol • William J. Locke
... with undue thickness, and took the thing in hand himself. The crushed Bettany, who was never allowed to finish anything, disappeared hastily in order to answer the electric bell which was ringing madly from Philip Gaddesden's berth. ...
— Lady Merton, Colonist • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... some on tables, and some under tables. One man was asleep, and was snoring like a hippopotamus—like a hippopotamus that had caught a cold, and was hoarse; and the other fifty-nine were sitting up, throwing their boots at him. It was a snore, very difficult to locate. From which particular berth, in that dimly-lighted, evil-smelling place, it proceeded nobody was quite sure. At one moment, it appeared to come, wailing and sobbing, from the larboard, and the next instant it thundered forth, seemingly from the starboard. So every man who could reach a boot picked ...
— Diary of a Pilgrimage • Jerome K. Jerome
... blanket and buffalo-robe about this," whispered Oscar, pressing his toil-stained hand on the nice white spread of his berth. "Say, wouldn't Younkins allow that this was rather comfortable-like, if he was to see it and compare it with his deerskin coverlet that ...
— The Boy Settlers - A Story of Early Times in Kansas • Noah Brooks
... be Oneidas or Tuscaroras near us, Arrowhead," said Cap, addressing his Indian companion by his conventional English name; "will it not be well to join company with them, and get a comfortable berth for the night ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... listen to what I say. Keep the train boys away from me. Dust me off whenever I want you to. Give me an extra blanket, and if there is any one in the berth over me slide him into ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... was confined to her berth for nearly all of the voyage, but the rest of the family remained in excellent health and spirits, and ...
— The Children's Portion • Various
... chevalier. Nobody exactly knew his story. No doubt he had relatives and children of his own somewhere, but these matters remained vague and mysterious. For the last three years he had been employed at the railway station as a superintendent in the goods department, a simple occupation, a little berth which had been given him by favour and which enabled him to live in perfect happiness. A first stroke of apoplexy at fifty-five years of age had been followed by a second one three years later, which had left him slightly paralysed in the left side. ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... experience of the difficult route along the heights bordering on Tanganyika made them determine to give the Lake a wide berth this time, and for this purpose they held well to the eastward, passing a number of small deserted villages, in one of which they camped nearly every night. It was necessary to go through the Fipa country, ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume II (of 2), 1869-1873 • David Livingstone
... putting on a collar in July; but, after an hour or two, I managed to imagine that telegram as a Summons from the Great Unknown, and it was in a proper spirit of adventure that I flung together a few books, and climbed into the only available upper berth on a discomfortable train that ...
— The Unpopular Review, Volume II Number 3 • Various
... had taken their seats in the boat, and were waiting the orders of the coxswain to haul her out of her berth, when Captain ...
— All Aboard; or, Life on the Lake - A Sequel to "The Boat Club" • Oliver Optic
... looks more human than you do. See here, Don, Lindsey said that he might start off again to-morrow on a short cruise to Newport. I think I can get you a berth with him. Will ...
— The Seventh Noon • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... sailing four leagues. At length we mounted the deck of the Medusa, of painful memory. When we got on board, we found our berths not provided for us, consequently were obliged to remain indiscriminately together till the next day. Our family, which consisted of nine persons, was placed in a berth near the main deck. As the wind was still contrary, we lay ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous
... serious ones. I have thought of taking a vacation. Then there is another hospital berth I could have. Head of a small hospital in a mining town. But I don't like to ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... he exclaimed. "Hang that butler of mine! He knew the hall clock was too fast, and I told him to put it back. If his memory serves him no better than this, he may ship himself off to a fresh berth.—Hark! Listen!" ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 1, January, 1891 • Various
... things,—"Never a disadvantage without a corresponding advantage,"—came to our help. Under cover of the smoke we were practically secure from the shells and snipers, and stumbling and staggering round the fire, giving it a wide berth, we at last ...
— S.O.S. Stand to! • Reginald Grant
... and give it a wide berth, then," counseled his chum. "If it were the captain or the chief, you would see ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... changes as no one else in the world. He should be especially cautious at night. A singer who filled an engagement in Savannah started from there for the North at night. He had been in perfect voice. As the night was warm he left one of the windows of his berth open. At Washington he woke up with cold. It was snowing, and snow had come in through the open window on to his berth. His nose was "stuffed." He had no voice when he reached New York. This was ...
— The Voice - Its Production, Care and Preservation • Frank E. Miller
... up suddenly in his berth, every sense straining and alert. What was it that had awakened him in the deathly stillness of the space-flier? His right hand slid under the pillow and clutched the handle of his gun. Its firm coolness was a ...
— Pirates of the Gorm • Nat Schachner
... not," said a tired, fretful voice from the lower berth. "As soon as you girls get through, ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield
... homesteads." Guests and strangers slept there; not in the portico, as in Homer. "Here were the lock-beds." There were butteries; one of these was reached by a ladder. The walls were panelled. [Footnote: The Ere Dwellers, p. 145.] Thorgunna had a "berth," apparently partitioned off, in the hall. [Footnote: Ibid., 137-140.] As in Homer the hall was entered from the courtyard, in which were separate rooms for stores and other purposes. In the courtyard also, in the houses of Gunnar of Lithend and ...
— Homer and His Age • Andrew Lang
... intensity. As we approached we began to make out more distinctly the sugar plantations, the groves of coconut trees and casuarinas, the features of the town, and the dense mass of shipping in the harbour. We hove to off the Bell Buoy (denoting the outer anchorage) for the steamer which towed us to our berth abreast ...
— Narrative Of The Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Commanded By The Late Captain Owen Stanley, R.N., F.R.S. Etc. During The Years 1846-1850. Including Discoveries And Surveys In New Guinea, The Louisiade • John MacGillivray
... I sat, turning this over in my mind. Was it ruin, or would my success here carry us through? Without a moment's sleep I ate my breakfast, braced myself with coffee, engaged a berth for the return journey, and promptly presented myself at Pendleton's office at ten. Wearily we went over the precious contract, and I ...
— Aladdin & Co. - A Romance of Yankee Magic • Herbert Quick
... travelers; for unless the person who descends be extremely quick in his motions, his seat flies up before he has quite left it, and oversets him, and the opposite weight, of course, goes plump to the ground,—with as fatal effects as cutting the hammock-strings of a middy's berth." ...
— A Midsummer Drive Through The Pyrenees • Edwin Asa Dix
... he was satisfied that such was the case, I despatched him to the cook's galley to procure some hot water, with which, and the aid of soap, I managed speedily to get rid of the stains of the fight. By the time I got to rights, breakfast was on the table, and I went into the berth and sat myself down as if nothing had happened. I flattered myself that my messmates looked at me with considerable respect, though they ...
— Marmaduke Merry - A Tale of Naval Adventures in Bygone Days • William H. G. Kingston
... me, sir. But if it's all the same to you, I've got a good berth here and would like ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... southwest, they followed the Souris River to the watershed of the Missouri, and in three weeks were once more the guests of the smoky Mandan lodges. Round the inside walls of each circular hut ran berth beds of buffalo skin with trophies of the chase,—hide-shields and weapons of war, fastened to the posts that separated berth from berth. A common fire, with a family meat pot hanging above, occupied the centre of the lodge. In one of these lodges the two brothers and their men were quartered. ...
— Pathfinders of the West • A. C. Laut
... about her. Did you hear what Dolph said to the captain about making money? They're engaged in some kind of smuggling, or I'll eat my hat! But what it can be I haven't any idea. Well, we're lucky to be rid of 'em so easily. Guess they'll give Tarpaulin Island a wide berth after this. And it's dollars to doughnuts the captain never inquires after those revolvers at the Rockland office. I didn't feel it was quite safe to give 'em back to him just now, but I didn't want to take 'em away for good. He can do as he ...
— Jim Spurling, Fisherman - or Making Good • Albert Walter Tolman
... at the night. The sound of the Baron's name seemed to bring a strength into him. He walked toward his berth, his head unnecessarily high, smoking at his cigarette and humming a tune remembered ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... smoking-car to make the journey, and arrived exhausted. The river packet was leaving in a few hours for Muscatine, Iowa, where his mother and his two brothers were now located. He paid his sister a brief visit, and caught the boat. Worn-out, he dropped into his berth and slept the thirty-six hours ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... rendered.[253] If the service required has no substantial relation to transportation, it will be deemed arbitrary and void, as in the case of an order requiring railroads to maintain cattle scales to facilitate trading in cattle,[254] and of a prohibition against letting down an unengaged upper berth while the lower berth ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... the dining room. Nothing was stayed for this tragedy which had come to me. On we went through the darkness! Dorothy was lying where I had placed her, her head turned to one side, her face pale in the last sleep. I aroused little Reverdy. He looked at his mother, kneeled by the berth, and sobbed. The physician took us out of the cabin, locked the door, and put us in another. I tucked little Reverdy in bed again; then I went out to look, at the storm, the dark ...
— Children of the Market Place • Edgar Lee Masters
... train for Washington, intending to run my luck for getting a sleeper there. This was the day before Christmas-eve and I was due to arrive in New Orleans Christmas-day, some time. Well, when I got to Washington there was not a berth to be had for love or money, and I was in a pickle. I fumed and fussed; abused the railroad companies and got mad with the ticket agent, who seemed, I thought, to be very indifferent as to whether I went to New Orleans or not, and I had just decided to turn around and come back to New York, when ...
— The Burial of the Guns • Thomas Nelson Page
... the convicts were all locked down under hatches and sentinels placed over them. The men lay six in a berth, and it so happened that one of these disclosed to Birt a plot that forty of them had made and signed with their blood. Would he join them and have his share of ...
— Susan - A Story for Children • Amy Walton
... at last accounts Dr. Coursen had so far recovered as to send in his application for a berth in some hospital over in France, where his wonderful knowledge of surgery might prove useful to the countless wounded men at the front. And doubtless ere this reaches the eye of the reader he may be across the Atlantic, serving humanity in ...
— The Chums of Scranton High on the Cinder Path • Donald Ferguson
... forth, in good earnest, on the important business before us. Neb was permitted to follow, but at such a distance as to prevent his being suspected of belonging to our party—a gentleman, with a serving-man at his heels, not being the candidate most likely to succeed in his application for a berth in the forecastle. ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... descriptions have so misled the public! It is perfectly unaccountable. Here I expected to doze all the way across the desert, while in fact I 've grudged my eyes time enough to wink ever since I left my berth this morning." ...
— Deserted - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... have a special care in times of calms and foggy weather to give such a berth one unto the other as to keep your ships clear, and not come foul one of another. Especially in fogs and mists you shall sound with drum or trumpet, or make a noise with your men, or shoot off muskets, to give warning to other ships to ...
— Fighting Instructions, 1530-1816 - Publications Of The Navy Records Society Vol. XXIX. • Julian S. Corbett
... generally lie off their own piers, and wait for the Custom-House boat to board them. As soon as this is done, and the necessary forms are gone through with, preparations are made to land the emigrants, as the ship cannot enter her berth at the pier till this duty is accomplished. The emigrants and their baggage are placed on board the Custom-House steamer, and are at once conveyed to Castle Garden, a round building which juts out into the water at the extreme end of ...
— The Secrets Of The Great City • Edward Winslow Martin
... not hesitate at details. They teach the immature porter not merely the routine of making up and taking down beds, and the proper maintenance of the car, but they go into such finer things as the calling of a passenger, for instance. Noise is tabooed, and so even a soft knocking on the top of the berth is forbidden. The porter must gently shake the curtains ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... the family finances, and shipped on a whaler sailing out of New London. From "'foremast hand with hayseed in his hair," he became boatsteerer; then followed rapid promotion from fourth to second officer's berth, and at the age of five-and-twenty he was as competent a navigator and as good a seaman and boatheader as ever trod a whaleship's deck. For like many a country-bred boy he had the sea instinct in his bones, inherited perhaps from his progenitors, ...
— John Frewen, South Sea Whaler - 1904 • Louis Becke
... east from the Campanella. If the weather is what it should be in late summer you will have a fresh breeze on the starboard quarter from ten in the morning till four or five o'clock in the afternoon. Sail straight across the wide gulf of Salerno, and when you are over give the Licosa Point a wide berth, for the water is shallow and there are reefs along shore. Moreover there is no light on Licosa Point, and many a good ship has gone to pieces there in dark winter nights when the surf is rolling in. If the wind holds you may run ...
— The Children of the King • F. Marion Crawford
... I'm not specially fit today. Had a beastly night of it. Fancy having to keep one's umbrella up in the berth to keep the light from the passage out of one's eyes! I don't believe such a thing could happen on a British steamer. Can't you manage to ...
— The Honorable Percival • Alice Hegan Rice
... the stateroom, it was with little less than horror that I saw Miss R—— in the lower berth—my berth. Such are the brutalizing influences of seasickness that I immediately reminded her that hers was above. She dragged herself out, and, in a very ecstasy of selfish misery, I discarded my garments and burrowed into the warmth of my bed. Never had blankets seemed more comfortable, ...
— A Woman's Impression of the Philippines • Mary Helen Fee
... opened to me, my anxiety to return, and, at least, to have the chance of deciding upon my course for myself, was beyond measure. Beside that, I wished to be "equal to either fortune,'' and to qualify myself for an officer's berth, and a hide-house was no place to learn seamanship in. I had become experienced in hide-curing, and everything went on smoothly, and I had many opportunities of becoming acquainted with the people, and much leisure for reading and studying navigation; yet practical seamanship ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... "And when his father would have used his influence to secure some sort of commission with an easy berth, John was more indignant than ever. He said if he ever wore shoulder straps they would be a recognition of his service to his country and not, as he put it, a pretty gift from a rich father. So he and Charlie Martin both enlisted as privates, and, ...
— Helen of the Old House • Harold Bell Wright
... say I didn't make myself very clear,' he went on, 'nor you neither. Naturally, we was both of us inclined to give such a subject a wide berth. Hows'ever, at last I have made up my mind to speak plain; and I have mentioned to Doctor ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... a long time on his berth, thinking....trying in vain to catch through a thunder of surprising emotions the word that might bring explanation. That strange impression of giant bulk, unsupported by actual measurements; that look of startled security seeking shelter; that other look of being sure, of knowing where ...
— The Centaur • Algernon Blackwood
... Chauxville than you have," she said gravely. "He is one of those men of whom women do see more. When men are present he loses confidence, like a cur when a thoroughbred terrier is about. He dislikes you. I should take care to give M. de Chauxville a wide berth ...
— The Sowers • Henry Seton Merriman
... closing-materials which are less delicate in texture but of greater resisting-power, while not an invariable characteristic, occurs frequently enough to make us suspect that the insect knows how to distinguish what is best suited now to the snug sleeping-berth of the larvae, anon to the defensive barricade of the home. Sometimes the choice is an exceedingly judicious one, as is shown by the nest of the Diadem Anthidium. Time after time, whereas the cells were composed of the finest grade of white cotton, gathered from Centaurea solsticialis, ...
— Bramble-bees and Others • J. Henri Fabre
... three days' rest for the old ship before he started her again in inverse order, seeing the same shores from another bearing, hearing the same voices in the same places, back again to the Sofala's port of registry on the great highway to the East, where he would take up a berth nearly opposite the big stone pile of the harbor office till it was time to start again on the old round of 1600 miles and thirty days. Not a very enterprising life, this, for Captain Whalley, Henry Whalley, otherwise Dare-devil Harry—Whalley of the Condor, a famous clipper ...
— End of the Tether • Joseph Conrad
... case, a proper nut, to have that honor offered me. For it was an honor in sailordom. I thought of the foc'sles to come, and my shipmates pointing me out most respectfully as the fighting bloke who had been offered a chief runner's berth by the ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer
... said the Colonel, who kept a stiff face, but was, I think, rather crestfallen. "I shall act as I think best. Anyhow, get out of this, both of you. This is my private berth, and you ...
— The Passenger from Calais • Arthur Griffiths
... showed it to the coloured porter, and they went down the little passage past the dressing room, and came to the big velvet seats which he remembered perfectly. His mother was breathing nervously, and she was quite pale as she discussed the question of Teddy's berth with the man who had letters ...
— Martie the Unconquered • Kathleen Norris
... general good-humour punishment could not be of long duration. The next day the poor chaplain had his absolution, and returned to his berth and his duty. The Pelican met with no more adventures. Sweeping in fine clear weather round the Cape of Good Hope, she touched once for water at Sierra Leone, and finally sailed in triumph into Plymouth Harbour, where she had been long ...
— English Seamen in the Sixteenth Century - Lectures Delivered at Oxford Easter Terms 1893-4 • James Anthony Froude
... were lightly spoken, and by him soon forgotten, but Rose remembered them long, dwelling upon them in the wearisome nights, when in her narrow berth she listened to the swelling sea as it dashed against the vessel's side. Many a fond remembrance, too, she gave to Maggie Miller, who, in her woodland home, thought often of the travelers on the sea, never wishing that she was with ...
— Maggie Miller • Mary J. Holmes
... the unbridy bride spent together all the time that Rudd could spare from the store. He bought for her a little frame house with a porch about as big as an upper berth, a patch of grass with a path through it to the back door, some hollyhocks of startling color, and a highly unimportant woodshed. It spelled HOME to them, and they were as happy as people usually are. He did all he could to please her. At her desire he even gave ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... old messmate, whose cot was slung a little way outside the berth, so that he might have the advantage of the air coming down the after-hatchway, sucking lustily at an orange which he grasped in one hand, while he held a book in the other. He was so absorbed in its perusal that he did not notice ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston
... tell you. I have come here to offer you a berth on board my ship, the Fair Maid, now lying ...
— Athelstane Ford • Allen Upward
... what feelings I have just made the discovery that my berth is in the same closet with those engaged by Professor Woodensconce, Mr. Slug, and Professor Grime. Professor Woodensconce has taken the shelf above me, and Mr. Slug and Professor Grime the two shelves opposite. Their luggage has already arrived. On Mr. Slug's ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... threw up my berth at home you wondered why I was in such a hurry to leave the old country, and home, and you, and it was very hard not to tell you the real reason. I came out here to make enough money to set up housekeeping, and, dear, I want you to come and help me, now I have succeeded ...
— The Etiquette of Engagement and Marriage • G. R. M. Devereux
... was all ready, Dr. Smith helped her take off her shoes and tuck them into a little hammock that hung over the window; then he unbuttoned her dress and helped her climb into her berth bed. Mary Jane took off her dress, hung it on the rack just as her mother had told her to do and settled herself comfy for the night. But suddenly she remembered that she hadn't told the kind Dr. Smith "good night." She fumbled with the curtains ...
— Mary Jane: Her Book • Clara Ingram Judson
... time-tables and knew which train to take out of Albany. Realizing the long and tedious journey before her, she concluded that it would be the part of wisdom to secure berth reservation ...
— The Mission of Janice Day • Helen Beecher Long
... I have made this sufficiently plain, and that what I have said will enable you to go well round the violin back, guarding the corners, always greasing your saw as you prepare to round them, rather giving them a wide berth than brushing close past, almost touching the line, in a hurry, when snap may go your steel or ...
— Violin Making - 'The Strad' Library, No. IX. • Walter H. Mayson
... see that I get off. I sleep heavily and I'm hard to rouse. But you just make me wake up, don't mind what I say, don't pay attention if I kick about it, just put me off, do you see?" "All right, sir," said the porter. The man got into his berth and fell fast asleep. He never woke or moved till it was broad daylight and the train was a hundred miles beyond Buffalo. He called angrily to the porter, "See here, you, didn't I tell you to put me off at Buffalo?" The porter looked at him, aghast. ...
— My Discovery of England • Stephen Leacock
... low voice, "would you mind getting a berth somewhere out in the car tonight? The porter says they are not all taken. I'm not feeling very well. I think the dressing on the chicken salad must have ...
— One of Ours • Willa Cather
... day, I soon fell fast asleep, and dreamt of Susannah Temple. The next morning I was early at the Adelphi hotel; my father had not yet risen, but the native servants who passed in and out, attending upon him, and who took care to give me a wide berth, had informed him that "Burra Saib's" son was come, and he sent for me. His leg was very painful and uncomfortable, and the surgeon had not yet made his appearance. I arranged it as before, and he then dressed, and came out ...
— Japhet, In Search Of A Father • Frederick Marryat
... said he. "Seven hundred was the actual figure. I needn't tell you I have given the bounders a wide berth since the day I raised the wind; but I went and had it out with them over this. And half the seven hundred is for default interest, I'll trouble you, from the beginning ...
— Mr. Justice Raffles • E. W. Hornung
... still warm, he wrote a letter to the four stating that Henry Ware would be delivered to the savages for them to do with as they chose,—the implication being torture and death—and that unless the four gave Detroit a very wide berth they would soon be treated in the same way. Then he called the miserable Doran before him, and told him, when he took the late watch again the next night, to hook the letter on the twig of a tree near where he had been attacked before, and then watch and see what would ...
— The Border Watch - A Story of the Great Chief's Last Stand • Joseph A. Altsheler
... all the year round," said Annie, with a faint attempt at a smile, for she was still sick and faint. "I rather like her wild, rough moods. It has been a great trial to my patience to lie in my berth, helpless and miserable from what you well term a 'prosaic malady,' when I was longing to see the ocean. Now that we have made a desperate attempt to reach deck, there is nothing to see. Do you think this dense fog will ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe
... keep Bob with us this winter if I can prevail upon him to stay," remarked the financier presently. "He is too able a chap to lose sight of. I can find a big paying berth for him in New York and if he will take it, your mother won't have to worry any further about money affairs. And if you, sonny, make good and do as well as your brother"—he patted Walter's shoulder, "I'll do the same for you some day. You have done well this summer. Finish ...
— Walter and the Wireless • Sara Ware Bassett
... say ten inches by fourteen, in the frozen ground, and removes the earth to the depth of three or four inches, then fills the cavity with dry ashes, in which are placed bits of roasted cheese. Reynard is very suspicious at first, and gives the place a wide berth. It looks like design, and he will see how the thing behaves before he approaches too near. But the cheese is savory and the cold severe. He ventures a little closer every night, until he can reach and pick a ...
— In the Catskills • John Burroughs
... between the 26th and 27th was terrible, the whole nervous system being jerked and strained to pieces, and he wandered too much to send any message home; 'I lost my wits since they shot me,' he said. Towards morning he almost leapt from his berth ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... stormed almost apoplectic with rage, and tried to send back Indian messengers to his men. The Nor'westers laughed at him good-naturedly and relegated him to quarters in one room of a log hut, where sole furnishings were a berth bed and a fireplace without a floor. Robertson's only possessions in captivity were the clothes on his back, a jackknife, a small pencil, and a notebook; but he probably consoled himself that his men were ...
— Canada: the Empire of the North - Being the Romantic Story of the New Dominion's Growth from Colony to Kingdom • Agnes C. Laut
... building is raised as many rounds as it is intended, the ribs are raised, on which a course of clapboards is laid, butts resting on a "butting pole." A press pole is laid on the clapboards immediately over the ribs to keep them from shifting by the wind, and the pole is kept to its berth by stay blocks, resting in the first course against the butting-pole. The logs are run upon the building on skids by the help of wooden forks. The most experienced "axe-man" are placed on the buildings as "cornermen;" ...
— The Fair Play Settlers of the West Branch Valley, 1769-1784 - A Study of Frontier Ethnography • George D. Wolf
... topmast and running-rigging on deck—cast loose the lanyards of the lower rigging, and quite dismantled the mainmast, so as to make it appear as if we were about to haul to the wharf and take it out. The men all remained on board, expecting that we should shift our berth ...
— The Privateer's-Man - One hundred Years Ago • Frederick Marryat
... common sounds in our language is that of the vowel u, as in the word urn, or as the diphthong ea in the word earth, for which we have no character. Writers have made various efforts to express it, as in earth, berth, mirth, worth, turf, in which all the vowels are indiscriminately used in turn. [Fist] This defect has led to the absurd method of placing the vowel after the consonants, instead of between them, when a word terminates ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... you ever went to sea, then, my son," said Tregelly, good-humouredly. "There's always danger of the ship sinking; and yet you went to your berth, I suppose, every night, and slept ...
— To Win or to Die - A Tale of the Klondike Gold Craze • George Manville Fenn
... they feel not in their hearts; who only abstain from evil because it is accompanied by danger, and from doing good because it requires courage and self-denial; who traffic with religion, and, like avaricious Jews, lay out their capital at interest, for the purpose of securing a comfortable berth for their miserable souls; and who worship God from fear, and tremble before Him ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger
... Australian colonists is a bustard, and he has the good sense to give a wide berth to the two-legged immigrants indeed the most common method of endeavouring to secure an approach to him is to drive up to him in a buggy, and then to let fly. The approach is generally made by a series of concentric circles, of which the victim ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris
... to warn them to be wary of the cruel looking shaft, and they gave it a wide berth. Dirola led the way past it to a small chamber or room, hewn out of the ice to the left and rear ...
— Through the Air to the North Pole - or The Wonderful Cruise of the Electric Monarch • Roy Rockwood
... it as homelike as possible. They both had so many cabin bags and wall pockets and basket catchalls which had been parting gifts that it was difficult to find wall space for them all. Patty was to occupy the lower berth and Elise the wide and comfortable sofa. For they concluded they could chatter better if on a level. This left the upper berth as a broad shelf for books and magazines, boxes of candy, and all the odds and ...
— Patty in Paris • Carolyn Wells
... phrases that one doesn't care for—vulgar phrases he picks up by meeting uncanny people through the medium. These things tickle him, and he goes about repeating them. He has to interview a great number of people, and has no easy berth of it. A high type of man couldn't do the work he does. But he is a good-hearted old fellow. Good-bye, Lodge! ...
— Mrs. Piper & the Society for Psychical Research • Michael Sage
... captain and put him in charge of the work at the Norfolk, Virginia, navy-yard. The most important business going forward there was the reconstruction of the United States frigate, Merrimac. This consisted in building above her berth-deck sloping bulwarks seven feet high, covered with four inches of iron, and pierced for ten guns. To her bow, about two feet under water, a cast-iron ram was attached, and on the eighth of March, she cast loose from her moorings and started down the river. ...
— American Men of Action • Burton E. Stevenson
... in a small handkerchief and walked to Boston, one hundred miles distant, hoping there to find a ship in which he could work his passage across the ocean, and collect oriental works from port to port. He could not find a berth. He turned back, and walked as far as Worcester, where he found work, and found something else which he liked better. There is an antiquarian society at Worcester, with a large and peculiar library, containing a great number of books in languages not usually studied, ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume III (of 6) - Orators and Reformers • Various
... dryly; "you might go as assistant to a parish doctor, or get a berth on board an emigrant-ship. There are lots of chances for a ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... there ain't another spot this side of Cape Cod with as many fine points to it. I wouldn't leave this little bay for a berth on any ocean liner." ...
— The Motor Girls on Crystal Bay - The Secret of the Red Oar • Margaret Penrose
... her intended berth, slowly emerged from her "sulphurous canopy," that the light breeze had kept wrapped around her, like a veil; and, clewing up her topsails, gracefully swept round towards the westward, as if intending ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... going to spend my life carrying parcels up and down the King's Road, Brighton, if I can squeeze in here. It isn't so much the berth that I care about, but the advantages, information fresh from the fountain-head. You won't catch me chattering over the bar at the 'Red Lion' and having every blessed word I say wired up to London and printed next morning ...
— Esther Waters • George Moore
... into her stateroom and sat down on the berth. Presently she opened the envelope. There was a thick fold of bills, her ticket, and both were wrapped in a sheet of paper penciled with dots and crooked lines. She laid it aside and ...
— North of Fifty-Three • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... through the machine-shops. I was fortunate enough to get charge of the best screw-cutting and brass-turning lathe in the shop; the former occupant, Jack Singleton, having just been promoted to a foreman's berth at the Messrs. Armstrong's factory. He afterwards became superintendent of all the hydraulic machinery of the Mersey Dock Trust at Liverpool. After my four years had been completed, I went into the drawing-office, to which ...
— Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles
... eyes as he left me alone. I went to my stateroom at once and to bed. What thoughts came to me as I lay there inviting sleep to turn them into dreams, while the great ship waited for the tide! I tossed about my berth; I prayed; I listened. At length I thought I heard my father's voice mingled with others, and a sound of casting off—but I heard ...
— The Master of Silence • Irving Bacheller
... hard work, has an assured livelihood; and only the few who have taken the same time to learn the trade, and are as little afraid of hard work as himself, can compete with him. This temptation to seek a "soft berth," where the only work required is sitting in an office, or talking, or writing, or riding around, is the form of sloth which is taking the strength and independence and manliness out of young men to-day faster than anything else. It is only one degree above the loafer and the tramp. The young ...
— Practical Ethics • William DeWitt Hyde
... the chaps as fetches her out of that snug little berth? For division to self and partners, how much? For division to self ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... stuff get on their nerves—same old sun in the same old place, same kind of weather. What happens? The natural thing, of course. They get so they hate each other like poison. They go around with a mad on. They carry hate against the commander and the cook and the fellow whose berth creaks every time he shifts. Each man thinks the shipload is the rottenest gang ever thrown together. He wonders why they didn't bring somebody decent along. He gets to scoring up grudges against the different people, and waits his chance to ...
— Golden Lads • Arthur Gleason and Helen Hayes Gleason
... household already agitated by the imminent departure of June, whose berth was booked for the following day. She was, indeed, in the act of confiding Eric Cobbley and his family to her father's care ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... Damn sternly, as the proprietor made his flying appearance, "You've done a pretty mean piece of work here"—pointing to the unconscious midshipman in the berth. "Do you understand that you're pretty likely to go ...
— Dave Darrin's Second Year at Annapolis - Or, Two Midshipmen as Naval Academy "Youngsters" • H. Irving Hancock
... over a seat is bad form, especially if there is some one else in it. So is prowling from one end of the car to the other. Besides, it makes some people nervous. Snoring is impolite and so is talking in one's sleep, but they are beyond remedy. Talking with the person in the berth above or below is not, however, and is much more disturbing than the noise of the train. Forgetting the number of one's berth and blundering into the wrong place is a serious breach of good manners in a sleeping car, and it is extremely severe on timid persons who have gone to bed ...
— The Book of Business Etiquette • Nella Henney
... The Gully as wide a berth as possible and took the track by the foot of the rocks to Y. Beach, about 2-1/4 miles further on. The attack was to commence at 9 a.m. and we had three-quarters of an hour to do this, climb the long, steep ascent at Y. Beach, and cross by the sunk ...
— The Incomparable 29th and the "River Clyde" • George Davidson
... called on Dr. White, and announced such a collection of symptoms that the doctor grew alarmed, insisted on absolute quiet, and conveyed Crayme in his own carriage to the boat, saw him into his berth, and gave to Fred Macdonald a multitude of directions and cautions, the sober recording of which upon paper was of great service in saving Fred from suffering over the Quixotic aspect which the whole project had begun, in ...
— Romance of California Life • John Habberton
... went on, paying no attention to the interruption. "I have no love either for Dutch Calvinists or French Huguenots; but I have no desire either to be cutting their throats or for them to be cutting mine. I should like a snug berth under the crown here or at Cadiz, or at Seville; but I see no chance whatever of my obtaining one. I cannot take up the trade of a footpad, though disbanded soldiers turned robbers are common enough in Spain. What ...
— By England's Aid or The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) • G.A. Henty
... and all for that! The reverence struck me; o'er each head Religiously was hung its hat, Each coat dripped by the owner's bed, Sacred from touch: each had his berth, His bounds, his proper place of rest, Who last night tenanted on earth Some arch, where twelve such slept abreast,— Unless the plain asphalte ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson
... out Kitty. "He's going straight off to Africa—to-morrow! Celia, of course, will be buried out in India—her uncle has cabled him that he'll arrange everything. And Peter has had the chance of a returned berth in a boat that sails to-morrow, so he proposes to get his kit together and ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... know," said honest BILL CREMER. "Of course I don't hold with COURTNEY'S goings-on in the political field, and he can scarcely have expected us to keep him on in a snug berth. But this I will say, the manners of the new Chairman may, so to speak, be more MELLOR, but, as Chairman of Committees, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, March 4, 1893 • Various
... kill, even if it doesn't cure," said Merritt; "and, Rob, if you can get him to understand what you're saying, be sure and ask if that chemical factory, where we understood Steven had been given his responsible berth, has shut down, or if it ...
— The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields • Lieut. Howard Payson
... endeavoured to arouse himself, to keep awake, but finally fatigue conquered, and he sank into a deep sleep. He had no knowledge of how long this slumber lasted, or what suddenly awakened him, so startled at the moment that he sat up in the berth, staring into the blackness. Was it a dream, or a reality? Had some one spoken? He could neither see nor hear anything; the boat seemed to be motionless, not even throbbing now to the beat of the engine—the silence was uncanny. It seemed to him his ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish
... He can see you go on board if he likes to watch or send a spy. But he mustn't see you sneaking off again with the Arab porters who carry luggage. If you think anything of the plan, you'll have to stand the price of a berth, and let some luggage you can do without, go to Marseilles. I'll see you off, and stop on board till the last minute. You'll be in your cabin, putting on the clothes I wear sometimes when I want some fun in the old town—striped ...
— The Golden Silence • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... them from our sight. The five weeks spent on the Valetta on the homeward trip were indeed enjoyable. First, the weather was fine all the way. I do not think we had one really rough day. The ship was full; not an empty berth. A "land boom" was on at the time; there was plenty of money about, and most of the passengers were well-to-do men taking their families home to have a good time. Land booms I have heard described as speculations in land, owing to ...
— The Chronicles of a Gay Gordon • Jose Maria Gordon
... many betrayed the same impatience, and could not understand that a man who is hungry should control himself and be content with the fact of organization. There was a revolutionary feeling abroad; a sterner note was audible, and respectable people gave the unemployed a wide berth, while old people prophesied the end of the world. The poor had acquired a manner of thinking such as had ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... hold, and to make soundings sartin. I have lost many a deep-sea, besides hand leads by the dozen, on rocky bottoms; but give me the roadstead where a lead comes up light and an anchor heavy. There's a boat pulling athwart our forefoot, Captain Barnstable; shall I run her aboard or give her a berth, sir?" ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... residence of Lord Moira. His lordship obtained a comfortable post to soothe the declining years of Moore's father, and held out to the poet himself the prospect—which was not however realized—of another snug berth for his own occupancy. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland never received the benefit of the Irish patriot's services in any public capacity at home—only through the hands of a defaulting deputy in Bermuda: it did, ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... in to see Veath and was welcomed gladly. He was lying in his berth, and Hugh sent for a bottle of his champagne. Two glasses of the wine put new life into him and something of a sparkle flew to his dull eyes, as if cast there by the bubbling liquor. His tongue loosened a little, Hugh finding ...
— Nedra • George Barr McCutcheon
... reach the place indicated, my husband shows the ticket to another porter who is standing there. He examines it and says with a wave of his hand, 'Right in this car.' We enter, and find the number of my berth. My husband puts my traveling bag under the seat, and we all sit there talking for some time. We then hear the conductor's warning, 'All aboard.' My husband and sister both kiss me and hurriedly leave the car. A moment later ...
— The Pastor's Son • William W. Walter
... with a musket on its shoulder, it marched ponderously and slowly around the circle, eying each of the sitting beasts—except the wolf—suspiciously as it passed. The watchful eyes of both Signor Tomaso and Hansen noted that it gave wider berth to the puma than to any of the others, and also that the puma's ears, at the moment, were ominously flattened. Instantly the long whip snapped its terse admonition to good manners. Nothing happened, except that the pug, from between the puma's legs, barked insolently. The sandy-brown bulk ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... into the two-berth compartment which he had managed to secure at the end of the carriage for himself and Nellie, the poor tired child was as ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... however: he gave him the necessary means to move to Moscow and to establish himself there. Before the departure for Moscow, I was brought back to the lodge, but kept as before under the strictest guard. The loss of the 'snug little berth,' of which he was being deprived 'thanks to me,' increased my stepfather's vindictive rage ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... through the darkness something called and called to her, imperatively. With great pain she struggled up through endless stages of half-consciousness, until she was herself again, Sylvia Marshall, heavy-eyed, sitting up in her berth and saying aloud, "Yes, what is it?" in answer to a knocking on ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... at least, that Slade sold his mill, and became a tavern-keeper; for Joe had a sure berth, and wages regularly paid. He didn't always stick to his work, but would go off on a spree every now and then; but Slade bore with all this, and worked harder himself to make up for his hand's shortcoming. And no matter what deficiency the little store-room at home might show, Fanny Morgan ...
— Ten Nights in a Bar Room • T. S. Arthur
... on the line the boat-train from Marseilles crawled into the Gare du Lyon a couple of hours late. Craven had not slept. He had given his berth in the waggon-lit to an invalid fellow passenger and had sat up all night in an overcrowded, overheated carriage, choked with the stifling atmosphere, his long legs cramped for ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull
... a man, I think he's about the average, ordinary young American, of the secretary type. He has little real ambition, but he has had a good berth with Joseph, and he has worked fairly hard to keep it. As a suspect, the notion is absurd. He wasn't ...
— The Gold Bag • Carolyn Wells
... The berth in which the steerage passenger lay was pointed out to him: he looked at the face upon the pillow, and shook his head. A rough, reddened, blistered face it was, with dirt grained into the pores and matting the hair and beard: not in the least like the countenance of ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... necessary, for a better understanding of what is to follow, to mention with some degree of particularization the places and manners in which my three friends elected to take their sleep, as well as the condition and berth of the ...
— A Deal in Wheat - And Other Stories of the New and Old West • Frank Norris
... in her berth, which was a top one, and looking languidly over the side at her friend, who lay in the berth below looking sympathetically up, she revealed her hopes and fears and sentiments, to the edification, (it is to be hoped) of a mean-spirited passenger in the saloon, ...
— Under the Waves - Diving in Deep Waters • R M Ballantyne
... it, the recess behind the altar no longer was filled with the black shadows that had obscured it on the previous afternoon; and even the hole into which Young so nearly had fallen was plainly visible. Taking advantage of the better light, the lost-freight agent—who certainly had found a fitting berth in that department of railway service, for such a man for hunting for things, and for finding them, I never came across—made a more careful examination of the deeper portion of the recess, and presently he gave a shout ...
— The Aztec Treasure-House • Thomas Allibone Janvier
... unapproachable. He used an extremely heavy, large bore rifle. In the hands of a man strong enough to stand its fierce recoil it was a veritable cannon. The Indians had soon learned to respect the range of that rifle, and they gave the cabin a wide berth. ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey
... from the curtain of a near-by berth, and vanished instantly. Mr. Amidon, seeing it, plunged back into the shelter from which he had tumbled, and lay there trembling—trembling, forsooth, because, instead of summer, it seemed winter; for Elm Springs Junction, it ...
— Double Trouble - Or, Every Hero His Own Villain • Herbert Quick
... of her berth and found she must climb. The car was lying on its side. She looked out into the aisle through her curtains and everything was dark. The air choked her with dust, and she caught the odour of burning wool. Deep down below somewhere ...
— The One Woman • Thomas Dixon
... Nobody in the parish could have been found hardy enough to cross the glen-foot where Mawsie lived long after dark. Well, had I thought of all this before, it is possible that I might have given her house a wide berth. It was now too late. I felt like one in a dream, impelled forward towards the cottage. I seemed to be walking on the air as ...
— Our Home in the Silver West - A Story of Struggle and Adventure • Gordon Stables
... Judges' bench in each of the Courts at Westminster Hall has been furnished with luxurious air-cushions, and heated with the warm-air apparatus. Baron Parke declares that the Bench is now really a snug berth,—and, during one of Sergeant Bompas's long speeches, a most desirable ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, November 27, 1841 • Various
... berth to a more convenient spot, the Endeavour was fired on by one of the forts owing to some misunderstanding, but satisfactory apologies and explanations were made, and it was thought so little of that neither Cook nor Banks mention it in ...
— The Life of Captain James Cook • Arthur Kitson
... known my place. I have not perpetuated that kink, and with it, possibly, the base and cowardly instincts of which it was meant to be the outward and visible sign—though it isn't in my case—that my fellow-men might give me a wide berth. ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier
... hour in collecting and bestowing in two large valises such articles as his simple needs would demand, and then set out for a railroad office in the business portion of the city, where he bought his ticket and berth. Then, after a moment of irresolution on the threshold of the place, he turned to the right, thrusting his way through the sluggish crowds on Tower Street until he came to the large bookstore where he had been want to spend, from time to time, some of his leisure moments. A clerk ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... "that I shall put you in the top berth. The lower berth is considered more desirable, but I claim it on the score of age ...
— Joe's Luck - Always Wide Awake • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... whose opportunities of study have been of the scantiest. Ben Jonson working as a bricklayer with his book in his pocket: Wm. Cobbett reading his hard-earned 'Tale of a Tub' under the haystack, or mastering his grammar when he was a private soldier on the pay of 6d. a day; when 'the edge of my berth or that of my guard-bed was my seat to study in; my knapsack was my bookcase; a bit of board lying on my lap was my writing table, and the task did not demand anything like a year of my life:' Gifford, as a cobbler's apprentice, working out his problems on scraps of waste leather; or ...
— The Quarterly Review, Volume 162, No. 324, April, 1886 • Various
... advertisements. I know this, as the phrase is, of my own knowledge. Then, the influence of suggestion is very powerful in these announcements. If you are without a position, it is depressingly plain to you that you are totally unqualified to obtain one again, of any account. If you have a berth paying a living wage, you perceive that some mysterious good fortune attends you, and you are made humble by fear for yourself, and compassionate towards others. For who are you, in heaven's name, and what the devil do you know, that you should make a living in this world! In this world ...
— Walking-Stick Papers • Robert Cortes Holliday
... speedily to be transformed into one of drama! He knew very well, on arriving at Villa Steno, that he was to have his last tete-a-tete with his pretty and interesting little friend. For he had at length decided to go away, and, to be more sure of not failing, he had engaged his sleeping-berth for that night. He had jested so much with love that he entered upon that conversation with a jest; when, having tried to take Alba's hand to press a kiss upon it, he saw that ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... home), frostbitten by standing all night between the couplings, holding parts of broken steampipe together so the Pullman car will keep warm. Young widow and her child, of course, sleeping in the Pullman; white-haired old gentleman vacates his berth in their favour. Good-natured travelling salesman up all night, making cigar-band decorations for the Tree, which is all ready in the dining car ...
— Plum Pudding - Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned • Christopher Morley
... from her perilous berth next to the British left approach, as she was the only frigate left which seemed to have a chance of running the gauntlet of Boscawen's fleet. Her shot-holes were carefully stopped; and on the night of July 14, she was silently towed ...
— The Great Fortress - A Chronicle of Louisbourg 1720-1760 • William Wood
... retired soon to my berth, and woke up the next morning on the broad ocean. Two days of sea sickness and I was all right again. There were about one thousand passengers from all parts of our country. I tried to fathom the motives and standing of different ones. Colonel B. from Kentucky, an aristocratic-looking ...
— The Adventures of a Forty-niner • Daniel Knower
... dread of man. That in such case his axe would be an all-sufficient defence he did not doubt. But he was in a fierce hurry to get home. He did not want to be stopped and forced into any fight. For a moment he thought of turning off through the woods and giving these night foragers a wide berth. Then he remembered his uncertain snowshoes. The snow would be very soft off the trail, and there would be the chance of breaking the shoe again. Who was he, to be turned out of his path by a bunch of wild curs? It was ...
— The Backwoodsmen • Charles G. D. Roberts
... had reached Queen's Wharf, the berth generously provided by the Harbour Board, the Greenland dogs were transferred to the quarantine ground, and with them went Dr. Mertz and Lieutenant Ninnis, who gave up all their time during the stay in Hobart to the care of those important animals. A feeling of relief spread ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... in there are you sure you can contrive to patch her up? It looks like a rotten passage, and not much of a berth beyond it." ...
— Told in the East • Talbot Mundy
... to approach that black heap. I left it there, with the water rippling round it, under the still stars, and giving it a wide berth pursued my way towards the yellow glow of the house; and presently, with a positive effect of relief, came the pitiful moaning of the puma, the sound that had originally driven me out to explore this mysterious island. At that, ...
— The Island of Doctor Moreau • H. G. Wells
... of Sir Richard Wayne that Anstice was thinking half an hour later when the Moldavia had come to her berth at the quay and he was about to leave the ship on which the short and ...
— Afterwards • Kathlyn Rhodes |
