"Limber" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... cried King, capering about in his long Court robes, and looking like a very merry Monarch, indeed. "First the May-pole dance, that'll limber us up some." ...
— Marjorie's Maytime • Carolyn Wells
... ten days ago, when I leaves Vee and my peaceful little home after a week-end swing, I expects to be shot up to Amesbury, Mass., to inspect a gun-limber factory. Am I? Not at all. By 3 P.M. I'm in Bridgeport, Conn., wanderin' about sort of aimless, and tryin' to size up a proposition that I'm about as well qualified to handle as a plumber's helper called in ...
— The House of Torchy • Sewell Ford
... fight was rather a severe and dangerous sport. A lump of soft clay was stuck on the end of a limber and springy willow wand and thrown as boys throw apples from sticks, with considerable force. When there were fifty or a hundred players on each side, the battle became warm; but anything to arouse the bravery of Indian boys seemed to them a ...
— Indian Child Life • Charles A. Eastman
... to prevent my having a little sport on Sunday. I think it is necessary to swallow a little fresh air on Sunday, to blow the sawdust out of my throat; and to have a game of ball occasionally, to keep my joints limber, for they get stiff leaning over the work-bench, shoving the jack-plane, and chiseling out mortices all ...
— The Runaway - The Adventures of Rodney Roverton • Unknown
... braces rove; top-gallant sheets, and wheelropes, made of green hide, laid up in the form of rope, were stretched and fitted; and new topsail clew-lines, &c. rove; new fore-topmast backstays fitted; and other preparations made in good season, that the ropes might have time to stretch and become limber before ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... slender and supple as she was, and moreover rendered swift with the terrible spur of hysteria, was no match for Annie Eustace who had the build of a racing human, being long-winded and limber. Annie caught up with her, just before they reached Alice Mendon's house, and had her held by one arm. Margaret gave a stifled shriek. Even in hysteria, she did not quite lose her head. ...
— The Butterfly House • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... whether it will go. No, you first look after the machinery, to see if all is in working order, and then you start out, knowing it will go. I do a lot of gymnastics each day, to exercise the voice and limber up the anatomy. These act as a massage for the voice; they are in the nature of humming, mingled with grunts, calls, exclamations, shouts, and many kinds of sounds—indeed so many and various they cannot be enumerated. But they put the voice in condition, ...
— Vocal Mastery - Talks with Master Singers and Teachers • Harriette Brower
... so that his head was clear of the water, and rested upon a little bank of sand; along which, his soft and limber trunk lay extended to its full length. Curving like a pair of gigantic scimeters from its base, were the yellow enamelled tusks; those ivory arms that for years,—aye centuries, perhaps,—had served him to root up the trees of the forest, and rout his antagonists in many a dread encounter. ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid
... twice on her chair and opened her photocells wide. Tin Philosopher coughed to limber up the diaphragm of his ...
— Bread Overhead • Fritz Reuter Leiber
... financial success if he could have brought himself to follow John Kollander's advice. But Amos could not abide the presence much less the counsel of the professional patriot, with his insistent blue uniform and brass buttons. Under an elaborate pretense of independence, John Kollander was a limber-kneed time-server, always keen-eyed for the crumbs of Dives' table; odd jobs in receiverships, odd jobs in lawsuits for Daniel Sands—as, for instance, furnishing unexpected witnesses to prove improbable contentions—odd jobs in his church, odd ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... "Oh, you'll limber up soon," said Hank, cheerfully. "Now, if you boys will get the water, and break out the grub, I'll get ...
— The Moving Picture Boys on the Coast • Victor Appleton
... limber Was fir-tree timber,— A mast-fir tall, From Gudbrand's dale. Taking another, With both together He rowed amain; Like arrowy cane Or steel blade brilliant Were the oars resilient. The sun climbs up The mountain slope, The winds, ...
— Fridthjof's Saga • Esaias Tegner
... bumblebees and whisk 'em; to bail the water from a leaky boat; to catch minnows in; to put over honey-bees' nests, and to transport pebbles, strawberries, and hens' eggs. John usually carried a sling in his hand, or a bow, or a limber stick, sharp at one end, from which he could sling apples a great distance. If he walked in the road, he walked in the middle of it, shuffling up the dust; or if he went elsewhere, he was likely to be running on the top of the fence or the stone wall, ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... Verely? You put me off with limber Vowes: but I, Though you would seek t' vnsphere the Stars with Oaths, Should yet say, Sir, no going: Verely You shall not goe; a Ladyes Verely 'is As potent as a Lords. Will you goe yet? Force me to keepe you as a Prisoner, Not like a Guest: so you shall pay your Fees When you ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... spots here and there, and patches of creamy—fur? Or was it hair which hung in strips, as if the creatures had been partially plucked in a careless fashion? The necks were long and moved about in a serpentine motion, as though their spines were as limber as reptiles'. On the end of those long and twisting necks were heads which also appeared more suitable to another species—broad, rather flat, with a singular toadlike look—but furnished with horns set halfway ...
— The Defiant Agents • Andre Alice Norton
... time. Even as I write our audience has gathered. Limber folk in front squat on the floor. Bearded folk behind perch on chairs as on a balcony. Already, behind the scenes, the captain of the pirates has assumed his hook and villainous attire. Patch-Eye mumbles his lines against a loss of memory. Paint has daubed him ...
— Wappin' Wharf - A Frightful Comedy of Pirates • Charles S. Brooks
... rest, but for the first time we were doing it in reality. The battery dropped into action on innumerable occasions during the course of the day, and had only time to fire a few rounds before the enemy had decamped out of range. Then we would limber up with all speed, the teams waiting the orthodox two hundred yards in rear and to the flank, and gallop forward and take up a new position right out in the open, and help the enemy on his way with a few reminders that we were up and after him, and ...
— Three years in France with the Guns: - Being Episodes in the life of a Field Battery • C. A. Rose
... Limber-limbed, lazy god, stretched on the rock, Where is sweet Echo, and where is your flock? What are you making here? "Listen," said Pan,— "Out of a river-reed ...
— The White Bees • Henry Van Dyke
... descended into the valleys, an astonishing number of parasites and epiphytes was observed, especially on the pines and oaks. The round yellow clusters growing on the branches of the oaks sometimes give the entire forest a yellow hue. In the foot-hills I saw a kind of parasite, whose straight, limber branches of a fresh, dark green colour hang down in bunches over twenty feet in length. Some epiphytes, which most of the year look to the casual observer like so many tufts of hay on the branches, produce at certain seasons extremely ...
— Unknown Mexico, Volume 1 (of 2) • Carl Lumholtz
... with the south side of the White Tower, and portions of the palace, a small courtyard, in which some remains of the ancient buildings may still be traced. On a raised platform is the gun-carriage and limber on which the body of Her Majesty the late Queen Victoria was conveyed on the occasion of her funeral, 2nd February, 1901, from Windsor Railway Station to St. George's Chapel. This was placed here by order of the Houses of Parliament. We now reach a doorway made in the ...
— Authorised Guide to the Tower of London • W. J. Loftie
... can't run," Smoke contradicted. "You can keep up with no man. Your backbone is limber as thawed marrow. If I run, I run alone. The world fades, and perhaps I shall never run. Caribou meat is very good, and soon will come summer and ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... rose and tightened his belt about him and set out afresh. The long sleep had restored his vigor and his eye gleamed with satisfaction. The muscles that had stiffened from long disuse—he would not have admitted that the stiffness came from age—were limber as of old, and he felt that, after all, it was good to be once more upon the trail. But even his confidence would have been rudely shaken could he have foreseen the peril ...
— Jessica, the Heiress • Evelyn Raymond
... Aw, now, Stella; can't you be a good fellow for once? Do it, if it hurts you. Honest, I hate to say it, but you're the limit, you are! My God! limber up a ...
— Humoresque - A Laugh On Life With A Tear Behind It • Fannie Hurst
... had been sained in and dried so often they was about half rotten. When we hitched, Ike took good britches hold, and lifted me up and down a few times like I was a child. He was the heaviest, but I had the most spring in me, and so I jest let him play round for sum time, limber like, until he suddenly took a notion to make short work of it by one of his backleg movements. He drawed me up to his body and lifted me in the air with a powerful twist. Just at that minit his back ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume III. (of X.) • Various
... a devil's darnin' needle? Gosh! I'm s'prised at ye. I seen lots of 'em right on this here river. He's a bug about so long"—he stuck out a finger—"and he's got jaws like a crab and a long limber tail a with reg'lar needle in the end, and inside him is a roll o' tough silk—tough as spider web. And he's death on liars. Any time a feller tells a lie he's got to look out, or all to oncet one o' them bugs'll come scootin' at him and grab him by the nose with them jaws. Then he'll curl ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
... had found Jimmy entirely too limber a foil to use with any degree of skill, and she knew from past experience that Sandy and Carter were much better matched. If Sid Gray had been there also, she would have been quite happy. In Annette's estimation it was all a mistake about love being ...
— Sandy • Alice Hegan Rice
... and the little children wanted her in the bedroom, her father was sure to shout out from the stable for Stineli to come to his help, for he had mislaid his cap, or his whip-lash was in a knot, and she found the one in a trice,—it was generally on the meal-box,—and her limber fingers had no trouble in untying the knotted lash. So, you see, Stineli was always busy running about and working, but always merry with it all, and rejoiced also in winter, when the school began. Then ...
— Rico And Wiseli - Rico And Stineli, And How Wiseli Was Provided For • Johanna Spyri
... fishing-rod with both his hands he gripped it as he spoke, And, where the butt and top were spliced, in pieces twain he broke; The limber top he cast away, with all its gear abroad, But, grasping the tough hickory butt, with spike of iron shod, He ground the sharp spear to a point; then pulled his bonnet down, And, meditating black revenge, set forth for ...
— Thomas Davis, Selections from his Prose and Poetry • Thomas Davis
... quickly stowed away, but it was 4.30 a.m., just at dawn, before the last limber was unloaded and sent away. The scene of limbers hopelessly locked, plunging mules, serenely indifferent camels, cursing transport drivers, and dripping unloading parties who could not find the limbers ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... spoonfull of Coriander-seed bruised, halfe a quarter of a pound of butter rubbed in the flower and sugar, then wet it with the yolks of two Eggs, and halfe a spoonfull of white Rose-water, a spoonfull or little more of Cream as will wet it; knead the Past till it be soft and limber to rowle well, then rowle it extreame thin, and cut them round by little plates; lay them up on buttered papers, and when they goe into the Oven, prick them, and wash the Top with the yolk of an Egg beaten, and made thin with Rose-water or faire ...
— The Compleat Cook • Anonymous, given as "W. M."
... the idee, and told her so. I like 'em both. Ury is a tall, limber-jinted sort of a chap, sandy complected, and a little round shouldered, but hard-workin' and industrious, and ...
— Sweet Cicely - Or Josiah Allen as a Politician • Josiah Allen's Wife (Marietta Holley)
... the boys run up wi' you an' begin to git limber-jawed," league continued, "thes hang your thum' in that kinder keerless like, an' they'll sw'ar by you thereekly. Ef any of 'em asts the news, thes say they's a leak in Sugar Creek. Well, well, well!" he exclaimed, after a little pause; "hit's thes like I tell you. ...
— Mingo - And Other Sketches in Black and White • Joel Chandler Harris
... ain't got a sufficiency yet, boys. Limber up them guns again. Same order as before. Put a few more petals on them flowers, and I'll trim their ...
— The Black Box • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... cutery-corn, Apple seed and apple thorn; Wire, brier, limber-lock, Five geese in a flock, Sit and sing by a spring, ...
— Pinafore Palace • Various
... in a bowl, add a tablespoonful of water to each egg and give twelve good, vigorous beats. To each six eggs allow a saltspoonful of pepper, and, if you like, a tablespoonful of finely chopped parsley. Take the eggs, a limber knife and the salt to the stove. Draw the pan over the hottest part of the fire, turn in the eggs, and dust over a half teaspoonful of salt. Shake the pan so that the omelet moves and folds itself over each time you draw the pan towards you. Lift the ...
— Many Ways for Cooking Eggs • Mrs. S.T. Rorer
... threatened by artillery alone, advance and kill off the men and horses before they get into battery. When the pieces have got into battery, lie down, if on exposed ground, till they limber up again, and then ...
— A Treatise on the Tactical Use of the Three Arms: Infantry, Artillery, and Cavalry • Francis J. Lippitt
... at 2 o'clock that morning, and for two solid hours were loading up the trucks with our transport, G.S. waggons and limbers. It was real sport and we thoroughly enjoyed it. A long row of flat trucks was lined up, and as each limber drew up the horses were unharnessed and we ran the limber right along the whole line of trucks until all were filled. The work completed, we detailed for our trucks. Every trenchman ...
— One Young Man • Sir John Ernest Hodder-Williams
... that big, happy Sol Hanson came back to bear his share of the load—and, for the week that followed, he had to bear all of it, for Phil's overtaxed brain refused to awaken for seventy-two hours and his overworked body declined to limber up for seventy-two ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... little child, a limber elf, Singing, dancing to itself, A fairy thing with red round cheeks, That always finds and never seeks; Makes such a vision to the sight As fills a father's eyes with light; And pleasures flow in so thick and fast Upon his heart, ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney
... dress of the women that gives life and color to the shifting show of street life. In Europe it is the soldier, and in England the private soldier particularly. The German private soldier is too stiff, and the French private soldier is too limber, and the Italian private soldier has been away from the dry-cleanser's too long; but the British Tommy Atkins is a perfect piece of work —what with his dinky cap tilted over one eye, and his red tunic that fits him without blemish or wrinkle, and ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... of you again." The circus man took hold of Pony and felt his joints. "You're put together pretty tight; but I reckon we could make you do if you'd let us take you apart with a screw-driver and limber up the pieces with rattlesnake oil. Wouldn't like it, heigh? Well, let me see!" The circus man thought a moment, and then he said: "How would double-somersaults on four horses ...
— The Flight of Pony Baker - A Boy's Town Story • W. D. Howells
... perching birds grasp a twig firmly with their very limber toes and sharp claws, and put their head under their wing; but many others, like tame Geese and Ducks, sleep standing on the ground on one foot or sometimes floating on ...
— Citizen Bird • Mabel Osgood Wright and Elliott Coues
... worried. "You'll make the grade, Alan. A few more weeks, days maybe, while you learn the combinations, limber up your fingers, pick up the knack ...
— Starman's Quest • Robert Silverberg
... your jabbering tongues still," he said, "and let me have a chance to talk. It's so long since I've seen a boy from up on the Earth that I'd like to talk a spell myself—to limber up my old tongue. It's grown ...
— Half-Past Seven Stories • Robert Gordon Anderson
... wagon-trains; an' white men, Mexicans, half-breeds an' Injuns is a-mixin' an' meanderin' 'round, a-lyin' an' a-laughin' an' a-drinkin' of Red Light whiskey mighty profuse. Four or five mule skinners has their long limber sixteen-foot whips, which is loaded with dust-shot from butt to tip, an' is crackin' of 'em at a mark. I've seen one of these yere mule experts with the most easy, delicate, delib'rate twist of the wrist make his whip squirm in the air like a hurt snake; an' then ...
— Wolfville Days • Alfred Henry Lewis
... neither was the body hung upon straps. There was no cover to the seat, which was unique in its way, and original in its get-up. Neither was there a well-padded cushion to sit on, or a back to recline against. It was nothing more or less than a limber board placed across from one side of the box to the other. My father took his seat on the right, the place invariably accorded to the driver—we did not keep a coachman then—my mother and sister, the latter being an infant, sat on the opposite ...
— Life in Canada Fifty Years Ago • Canniff Haight
... so I am watching the development of a problem with which I, that is, my mind, can have very little to do. Question: shall I get stiffer as the days grow colder, until on the hike they will discharge me as an old man; or will it all work off as I get used to the exercise, until I am limber? It is really a very serious matter, my dear, this being forty-five years old. One should turn life into a profession, and study how to become young. There are a number of men of my age or older here at camp, and I find we all have this same ...
— At Plattsburg • Allen French
... Horn, taking advantage of the calm to exercise the boat's crew with the fire-arms and to limber up the weapons, was passing out the Lee-Enfields from their place on top the cabin skylight, Jerry suddenly crouched and began to stalk stiff-legged. But the wild-dog, three feet from his lair under the trade-boxes, was not unobservant. ...
— Jerry of the Islands • Jack London
... showed up in a big carry-all motor-van about the time Jack and his followers trooped on the field, and began to pass the ball around to limber up their muscles for the great test. They were given a royal reception, for there were many hundreds of Harmony rooters on hand to help the boys with cheers and the waving of flags and pennants. Besides, Chester was showing a fine spirit that could applaud a clever play, even on the part of the ...
— Jack Winters' Gridiron Chums • Mark Overton
... the jump. As soon as his arm was warm and limber Ted hustled him to the mound, and for fifteen minutes he stood there and threw to bases as signals were flashed to him. Then Ted gave him ten minutes of fielding bunts. By that time the sweat was running down his face and his ...
— Don Strong, Patrol Leader • William Heyliger
... Lloyd. "Campbell would not risk any scrimmaging or tackling this evening, with McGill men even now in town thirsting for their blood. He's got them out for a run to limber up their wind and ...
— The Prospector - A Tale of the Crow's Nest Pass • Ralph Connor
... wounded to be sent to-morrow, and that wagons' be sent to bring in the many tents belonging to us which are pitched along the road for four miles out. I did not destroy them, because I knew the enemy could not move them. The roads are very bad, and are strewed with abandoned wagons, ambulances, and limber-boxes. The enemy has succeeded in carrying off the guns, but has crippled his batteries by abandoning the hind limber-boxes of at least twenty caissons. I am satisfied the enemy's infantry and artillery ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... "It'll limber us up and at the same time help the horses," he said. "Knowing what kind of rifles we carry and how we can shoot, the Sioux won't be in any hurry to ride into the forest directly after us. We've a big advantage now in being ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler
... court-martialed for his mix-up with the quartermaster sergeant, and got seven days field punishment No. 1. This meant that two hours each day for a week he would be tied to the wheel of a limber. During those two-hour periods Jim would be at Bill's feet, and no matter how much we coaxed him with choice morsels of food, he would not leave until Bill was untied. When Bill was loosed, Jim would have nothing to do with him—just ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy
... (He was there with a mouthful of toast.) "Take the mess limber and fetch 'em back if the Heavy Group Artillery will let you—they're in ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, February 28, 1917 • Various
... for England on the 14th day of September, 1914. I was detailed on a gun limber of my subsection of the First Battery, the artillery being the arm of the service to which I was assigned. Starting about 4:30 in the afternoon, in torrents of rain, we headed for the city of Quebec. Along ...
— S.O.S. Stand to! • Reginald Grant
... profanity in such volume that the ear ached under it as must have ached the heroic Slapjack under the chill of the melting snow. He was relieved quickly, however, and emerged triumphant, though blue and puckered, his wilderness of whiskers streaming like limber stalactites, his boots loosely "squishing," while oaths still poured from him in such ...
— The Spoilers • Rex Beach
... knaves might have developed qualities more attractive. Had we sprung a leak, been "stove" by a whale, or been blessed with some despot of a captain against whom to stir up some spirited revolt, these shipmates of mine might have proved limber lads, and men of mettle. But as it was, there was naught to strike fire ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. I (of 2) • Herman Melville
... kill the doctor. The country physician only laughed at the wild and, to Evan, appalling curses and threats of the temporary lunatic. It mattered not to that rustic doctor whether his patient carried a stiff neck or a limber one—he would do his work just the same. He happened to be a dentist, which was fortunate, for he needed dental knowledge to extract a great tooth from the patient. The further skill of a veterinary surgeon would scarcely have been superfluous, Evan ...
— A Canadian Bankclerk • J. P. Buschlen
... installed about halfway between it and the flitter were two of the alien warriors. Perhaps they had changed watches during the night. If they had not, they could go without sleep to an amazing degree, for as Raf walked in a circle about the flyer to limber up, they watched him closely, nor did their grips on their odd weapons loosen. And he had a very clear idea that if he stepped over some invisible boundary he would be ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton
... cuirassiers came riding up, and the retreat now sounding through our ranks, we were obliged to fall back upon the infantry. The French pursued us hotly; and so rapid was their movement, that before Ramsey's brigade could limber up and away, their squadrons had surrounded him and ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... my children," said Lagroin. "First in, first served. Best men, best pickings. But every man must love his chief, and serve him with blood and bayonet; and march o' nights if need, and limber up the guns if need, and shoe a horse if need, and draw a cork if need, and cook a potato if need; and be a hussar, or a tirailleur, or a trencher, or a general, if need. But yes, that's it; no pride but the love of France and ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... and wreathes and serpentines round the cable and messenger like an elegantly-modeled garter-snake round the twisted stalks of a vine. Indeed, Selvagee is the exact type and symbol of a tall, genteel, limber, spiralising exquisite. So much for the derivation of the name which the sailors applied ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... through there with two pair o' pants on," answered Mr. Briley. "I expect they must have to keep limber as eels. I used to think, when I was a boy, that 'twas the only thing I could ever be reconciled to do for a livin'. I set out to run away an' follow a rovin' showman once, but mother needed me to home. There warn't nobody but me an' ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... no other than the man Garnache had known as "Sanguinetti"—brought him, still clad in the clothes in which he had come. He was a tall, limber fellow, with a very swarthy skin and black, oily-looking hair that fell in short ringlets about his ears and neck, and a black, drooping mustache which gave him a rather hang-dog look. There was a thick stubble of beard of several days' growth about his chin and face; his eyes were furtive ...
— St. Martin's Summer • Rafael Sabatini
... observed among the artillery-men, and in a short time several of the guns were dismounted, and four or five powder waggons blown up. Then a loud cheer burst from the Russian artillery-men as they saw the French bring up the horses from behind the shelter of the crest, limber-up and drive off with the guns. But from other points of vantage 150 guns were now pouring their fire into the town, and, as the flames broke out from several quarters, exclamations of grief and fury were ...
— Through Russian Snows - A Story of Napoleon's Retreat from Moscow • G. A Henty
... Him took de slop bucket out of my hand and look at it, all 'round it, put upside down on de ground, and set me down on it; then he fall down dere on de grass by me and blubber out and warm my fingers in his hands. I just took pity on him and told him mighty plain dat he must limber up his tongue and ask sumpin', say what he mean, wantin' to visit them pigs so often. Us carry on foolishness 'bout de little boar shoat pig and de little sow pig, then I squeal in laughter over how he scrouge so close; de slop bucket tipple over and I lost my seat. Dat ever remain de ...
— Slave Narratives Vol. XIV. South Carolina, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... semi-darkness with the gray shadow ever brightening. Dawn broke as we saddled our horses. The pups were limber, and ran to and fro on their chains, scenting the air; the older hounds stood ...
— Tales of lonely trails • Zane Grey
... limber, bounding feet That swept the winter's snows? What stateliest stag so fast and fleet? Their ...
— Indian Legends of Minnesota • Various
... of a fight for things that I always remember how I got them. I even enjoy seeing a canny old vulture eyeing me as if it were saying: 'Ware the sting of the rattler, lest I pick your bones as I did old Limber's.' I like sufficient danger to put an edge on life. This is so tame. I should have loved it when all the homes were cabins, and watchers for the stealthy Indian canoes patrolled the shores. You wait until mother comes, and if my violin isn't angry with me ...
— A Girl Of The Limberlost • Gene Stratton Porter
... Behemoth biggest born of earth upheaved His vastness: Fleeced the flocks and bleating rose, As plants: Ambiguous between sea and land The river-horse, and scaly crocodile. At once came forth whatever creeps the ground, Insect or worm: those waved their limber fans For wings, and smallest lineaments exact In all the liveries decked of summer's pride With spots of gold and purple, azure and green: These, as a line, their long dimension drew, Streaking the ground with sinuous trace; ...
— Paradise Lost • John Milton
... of a lord to behold; very thin and limber about the legs, with small feet like a doll's, and a small, glossy head like a seal's. I had seen just such looking lords standing in sentimental attitudes in ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... came down here, (we had sulky drizzles all the morning, but an hour ago a lull,) for the before-mention'd daily and simple exercise I am fond of—to pull on that young hickory sapling out there—to sway and yield to its tough-limber upright stem—haply to get into my old sinews some of its elastic fibre and clear sap. I stand on the turf and take these health-pulls moderately and at intervals for nearly an hour, inhaling great draughts of fresh air. Wandering by the creek, I have three or four naturally favorable ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... a two-by-six plank four or five feet long with a single grab-nail in the end,—the springboard of the Pacific coast logger, whose daily business lies among the biggest timber on God's footstool. Each then clambered up on his precarious perch, took hold of his end of the long, limber saw, and cut in to a depth of a foot or more, according to the size of the tree. Then jointly they chopped down to this sawed line, and there was the undercut complete, a deep notch on the side to which the tree would fall. That done, they swung the ends of their springboards, ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... settle down. He continued in business on shore until 1886, when his health became so affected by confinement that he was advised to resume his old outdoor life for a time, to recuperate. So he concluded to limber his joints with another voyage. On looking about for a course, he found he had made all the rivers in America that promised adventure, except those of the far west. He went to San Francisco and prepared for a run down the Sacramento from Red Bluff, ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... are a few diseases, such as septicaemia, limber neck and infectious enteritis, that are sometimes mistaken for fowl cholera. These diseases are caused by different microorganisms that may be found in the digestive tract and air-passages of healthy birds, insanitary conditions and decomposed feed, ...
— Common Diseases of Farm Animals • R. A. Craig, D. V. M.
... brutally frank about it, the thing just naturally is not possible. I don't care if Young Lochinvar was as limber as a yard of fresh tripe—and he certainly did shake a lithesome calf in the measures of the dance if Sir Walter, in an earlier stanza, is to be credited with veracity. Even so, I deny that he could have done that croupe trick. ...
— A Plea for Old Cap Collier • Irvin S. Cobb
... and pointing,—now to describe the spruce and its short, stubby, upturned needles; the lodgepole pines with their straighter, longer leaves and more brownish, scaly bark; the Englemann spruce; the red fir and limber pine; each had its characteristic, to be pointed out in the simple words of the big Canadian, and to be catalogued by the man at his side. A moment before, they had been only pines, only so many trees. Now each was different, each ...
— The White Desert • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... way with greater ease than they had expected along the beach, which was strewn with pieces of wreck. They met with several dead bodies, but not a single living being could they discover, either on shore or floating on the pieces of limber still tossing about. ...
— The Rival Crusoes • W.H.G. Kingston
... long box that might hold a man? It will be a short, rather tall box, packing-case shape. Remember, he is as limber as you are and can be accommodated to any position. He will be put in it sitting bolt upright. It will be only half the length of a man, with nothing in its shape to suggest that it might hold a man. Who said take it to the medical school from here? I ...
— The Strange Adventures of Mr. Middleton • Wardon Allan Curtis
... now have been about sixty-five; a square, hard-featured, red-faced seaman, who knew all about his ship, from her truck to her limber-rope, but who troubled himself very little about any thing else. He had married a widow when he was posted, but was childless, and had long since permitted his affections to wander back into their former channels; from the domestic hearth to his ship. He seldom spoke of matrimony, ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... timber of prodigious size were grown in our little county of Surrey, my own grandfather had standing at Wotton, and about that estate, timber that now were worth L100,000. Since of what was left my father (who was a great preserver of wood) there has been L30,000. worth of limber fallen by the axe, and the fury of the hurricane in 1703, by which upwards of 1,000 trees were blown down. Now, no more Wotton! stript and naked, and ashamed almost to own its name." The Wotton woods are still flourishing, and within the last fourteen years we have passed ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume XIII, No. 369, Saturday, May 9, 1829. • Various
... the Syrian spears, so limber and so straight, Tell of the slender dusky maids, so lithe and proud of gait. Languid of eyelids, with a down like silk upon her cheek, Within her wasting lover's heart she queens ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 8 • Richard F. Burton
... fancy handkerchief from his pistol-pocket and wiped the beads from the bridge of his limber ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers
... affected anger, "I shall have my fellows as limber as supple-jacks on such fare; afraid of an Englishman as a Virginian negro is ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... to Miss Pritchard. "My dear Miss Pritchard, why do you let this charming child waste her time learning to do vaudeville stunts that any limber-jointed, pretty-faced chit could do, with a glorious voice ...
— Elsie Marley, Honey • Joslyn Gray
... its full flower for the bran-dances—which came into being, I think, because the pioneers liked to shake limber heels, but had not floors big enough for the shaking. So in green shade, at some springside they built an arbor of green boughs, leveled the earth underneath, pounded it hard and smooth, then covered it an inch deep with clean wheat bran, put up seats roundabout it, also a fiddlers' ...
— Dishes & Beverages of the Old South • Martha McCulloch Williams
... be nice to Birdie on account of Mr. Smelts' stiff leg. Not that it ever did him any good when it was limber, but I always feel mean when I see it sticking out straight ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice
... middle of the room, the rifle pointed toward the door. Shadows flowed into the valley and filled it so that only the tops of the tallest pines were lighted by the sun. The lonesome gloom deepened and the pines swung their limber tops and talked with the sound of moving ...
— The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower
... night, Hie away; and aim thy flight Where consort none other fowl Than the bat and sullen owl; Where upon thy limber grass, Poppy and mandragoras, With like simples not a few, Hang forever drops of dew; Where flows Lethe without coil Softly like a stream of oil. Hie thee hither, gentle sleep: With this Greek no longer keep. Thrice I charge thee by my wand, Thrice with moly from my ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... embankment passed me on the road, the horses walking grandly, the men tired but in high enough spirits. The enemy long-range guns were waking up now and playing a damnable tattoo on the main routes leading west. I saw one limber-waggon belonging to the Engineers blown sky-high, and three maimed ...
— Pushed and the Return Push • George Herbert Fosdike Nichols, (AKA Quex)
... fugitives under the cover it afforded. The news that a principal chief, Abdoolah Khan, had been severely wounded in the plain gave pause to the offensive vigour of the Afghans, and the assailants fell back, abandoning the gun, but carrying off the limber and gun-team. Our people reoccupied the position, the gun recommenced its fire, and if the cavalry and infantry could have been persuaded to take the offensive the battle might have been retrieved. But they remained ...
— The Afghan Wars 1839-42 and 1878-80 • Archibald Forbes
... they take care to turn the edges, made thin for this purpose, up toward each other, thus forming a groove extending through the whole length of the metal-coated thong, with the exception of the extremity, which is left limber that it may be wound round the hand of the executioner, while a strong iron hook is appended to the other extremity. The scaffold on which the victim suffers is called in Russian 'Kobyla,' literally a mare. It is an inclined plane, on which ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... asthma, or the distemper, or the consumption, or something of that kind. They used to give her two or three hundred yards' start, and then pass her under way; but always at the fag-end of the race she'd get excited and desperate-like, and come cavorting and straddling up, and scattering her legs around limber, sometimes in the air, and sometimes out to one side amongst the fences, and kicking up m-o-r-e dust and raising m-o-r-e racket with her coughing and sneezing and blowing her nose—and always fetch up at the stand, just about a neck ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... grim muzzle pointed out through a slit in the colloid screen. "The six guns we've got aboard, in strategic positions, look like good medicine to me! Wouldn't it be the correct thing to call the gun-crews and limber up a little? These chaps aren't going to be all day in getting here, and ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England
... me over with a discouraging and cynical suspicion. I certainly did look as rugged as a navvy. When they gave me a going over, they found that my heart was out of place and that my left hand might never limber up again. They voted for a discharge in jig time. I had all I could do to keep ...
— A Yankee in the Trenches • R. Derby Holmes
... that he might discover some sign of their passage—a discarded lorry, a broken limber, or an old camp site—he continued farther and farther into the west until well into the afternoon. Above a tree-dotted plain through the center of which flowed a winding river he determined to turn about and start for camp. It would take straight flying at top speed to cover the distance before ...
— Tarzan the Untamed • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... will look the most attractive. By driving two limber poles into the ground by the side of each of two gate posts, and bringing the two ends of the poles together, and fasten them securely, a respectable arch can be made. At the foot of each pole plant a Clematis Jackmanii, and train them to run up their poles; they will grow rapidly, and in a short ...
— Your Plants - Plain and Practical Directions for the Treatment of Tender - and Hardy Plants in the House and in the Garden • James Sheehan
... always has gorillas ridin' 'em.' Well, I looked around and I would have been scared myself if I hadn't recognized our own bunch of snakes, each one of 'em with the tail of the snake in front of him in his mouth. Old 'Limber Larry'—we called him that on account of his habit of going to sleep curled up in a true lover's knot—was in the lead, and behind him came about half a mile ...
— Side Show Studies • Francis Metcalfe
... open admiration, the swift, sure precision of her every move. She glanced up, a slice of bacon held above the pan, and their eyes met. During a long moment of silence the man's heart beat wildly. The girl's eyes dropped suddenly: "Crisp, or limber?" she asked, and to the cowboy's ears, the voice sounded even richer and deeper ...
— Prairie Flowers • James B. Hendryx
... me up at Centerport. They saw that I was limber and could do a turn or two, and they made me join. They promised me good wages and a fine time, but as soon as we got on the road they treated me ...
— Out with Gun and Camera • Ralph Bonehill
... boats crouched, sat, or lay a picturesque mob. Some pulled spasmodically on the very long limber oars; others squatted doing nothing; some, huddled shapelessly underneath white cloths that completely covered them, slept soundly in the bottom. We took these for merchandise until one of them suddenly threw aside his covering and sat up. Others, again, ...
— African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... Jacqueline rang out, "But this isn't new at all! It's just ragging, like they do at the quarters, only not so limber. We've known how to rag for ever so long, haven't we, Blossom? ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... forced from their numerous and strong positions; and our troops mounted the Huft Kothul, giving three cheers when they reached the summit. Here Lieutenant-colonel Cunningham, with a party of sappers, pressed the enemy so hard, that they left in their precipitation a twenty-four pound howitzer and limber, carrying off the draft-bullocks. Having heard that another gun had been seen, and concluding that it could not have gone very far, I detached a squadron of dragoons, under Captain Tritton, and two horse-artillery guns, under Major Delafosse, in pursuit; the gun, a twelve-pound howitzer, with ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... trying to limber up my German vocabulary he passed us along to his Ober-leutenant in the hut along the roadside. The Ober- Ieutenant was grave. He said we must report to army headquarters in Brussels, and that under ...
— The Log of a Noncombatant • Horace Green
... the woods were several batteries, chopped down and deserted. There was a little flour on hand, which had been picked up on the road. An oil-cloth was spread, the flour placed on it, water was found, and the dough mixed. Then some clean partition boards were knocked out of a limber chest, the dough was spread on them and held near the fire till partially cooked. Then with what delight ...
— Detailed Minutiae of Soldier life in the Army of Northern Virginia, 1861-1865 • Carlton McCarthy
... of that great throng, to fire The courage of the mighty ones to clash Hands in the gory play. Sooth, little spur Needed they for their eagerness for fight. But, ere they closed, they flashed out proving blows To wot if still, as theretofore, their arms Were limber and lithe, unclogged by toil of war; Then faced each other, and upraised their hands With ever-watching eyes, and short quick steps A-tiptoe, and with ever-shifting feet, Each still eluding other's crushing might. Then with a rush they closed like thunder-clouds Hurled ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus
... in his front line. Now this battery was on the way from Blair to report to me, coming down just as McPherson was going up the road, and the same skirmish-line that killed McPherson killed the horses of that battery and captured a portion of the men, and McPherson really almost fell upon the limber of one of the guns. This was Murray's United States Battery of four pieces. I do not know as I have seen this mentioned in any of the reports, unless it is in mine; but these are the facts of the matter. That ...
— The Battle of Atlanta - and Other Campaigns, Addresses, Etc. • Grenville M. Dodge
... came from a large glass-framed musical box. The dark rafters ran low, just above them. Faces glanced towards them as they all filed avertedly through the room. There were two or three guttural greetings—"N' Morgen, Meine Damen...." A large limber woman met them in the front room with their bill and stood talking to Fraulein as the girls straggled out into the sunshine. She was wearing a neat short-skirted crimson-and-brown check dress and a large blue apron and her haggard face was lit with radiantly kind strong ...
— Pointed Roofs - Pilgrimage, Volume 1 • Dorothy Richardson
... its valedictory twitch he was upon it. In his hand, ready for use, was his razor; not his shaving razor, but the razor he carried for social purposes. He bent down, and with the blade made swift slashes right and left at a limber ankle joint, then rose again and was briskly upon his homeward way, leaving behind him the maimed carcass, a rumpled little heap, lying in the dust. A dozen times before he reached his boarding house he fingered the furry talisman where it rested in the bottom of his hip pocket, ...
— Sundry Accounts • Irvin S. Cobb
... up the hollow of a shabby wig. 'What shall we do with him?' said I. 'Hustle him out!' cried he; 'hustle him out! he didn't get his liquor here: I've no room for such company!' I then endeavored to put my companion upon his feet, but his legs bent under him, and his whole body seemed as limber and lifeless as a wet rag. 'You can't do any thing with him in that way,' continued the landlord; 'if you want to get him home to-night, you must take him on your back and carry him there yourself. He'll be bright enough in the ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, January 1844 - Volume 23, Number 1 • Various
... me. Master Hugh raved and swore his determination to "get hold of me;" but, wisely for him, and happily for me, his wrath only employed those very harmless, impalpable missiles, which roll from a limber tongue. In my desperation, I had fully made up my mind to measure strength with Master Hugh, in case he should undertake to execute his threats. I am glad there was no necessity for this; for resistance to him could not have ended so happily for me, as it did in the case of Covey. ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass
... reckon it isn't nothin' much," came the reassuring reply. "Give a feller a little chance to limber up; won't you? I'll feel all right in a short time. But it was sure a rough deal for me, and some surprise too, let me tell you, fellers. I never had the least bit of idea they'd jump out on me like they did; and would you believe me, the whole bunch had red ...
— Fred Fenton on the Track - or, The Athletes of Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... interstices of these are also filled up with the same membrane. From the two ribs which join to the lower spine-bone, there hangs down a sort of short apron, very full of plaits, from hip-joint to hip-joint, and reaches below the buttocks, half-way or more to the hams. This has also several small limber ribs in it. Just upon the lower spine-joint, and above the apron, as I call it, there are two other long branches, which, when close, extend upon the back from the point they join at below to the shoulders, where each rib has a clasper, ...
— Life And Adventures Of Peter Wilkins, Vol. I. (of II.) • Robert Paltock
... generated. Simply to enter such a room in the morning, is almost sufficient to sicken a healthy individual; how much more injurious must be its effects upon the lodgers themselves. Examine in the morning a child, who has passed the night thus confined. You will find him limber as a rag, exhausted by perspiration, wholly destitute of animation, without appetite, and on the very verge of cholera. I should recommend an entirely different plan of management. Instead of a feather bed, the child should be placed on a hard mattress, or on blankets ...
— North American Medical and Surgical Journal, Vol. 2, No. 3, July, 1826 • Various
... having broader leaves, which are thick like leather, and bearing small knobs like those of the cypress. From these trees hang down many branches into the water, each about the thickness of a walking-stick, smooth, limber, and pithy within, which are overflowed by every tide, and hang as thick as they can stick of oysters, being the ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr
... the laal limber Frenchman," says Mattha, "for catching owte frae a rabbit to a slap ower the lug ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine
... tree and played lazily. Bosephus lay stretched full length on the leaves, following idly with any words that happened to fit the strain. A blue jay just over their heads bobbed up and down on a limber branch, waiting for them to go. The Bear took up the ...
— The Arkansaw Bear - A Tale of Fanciful Adventure • Albert Bigelow Paine
... of deep disgust from the Signaller brought no comment until the last letter was read, but then the Limber Gunner remembered and remarked ...
— Between the Lines • Boyd Cable
... true that "One man's meat is another's poison." When poor Limber, lost and starving in the fastnesses of the swamp, gave to it a name, afterward to be on the lips of millions; to him it was deadly poison. To me it has been of unspeakable interest, unceasing work of joyous nature, and meat in full measure, ...
— Moths of the Limberlost • Gene Stratton-Porter
... had been having brave sport with the above-mentioned species Number Two; but, so long as I remained, that was the sum total of their spoil. One could almost observe, by the gradual melancholy which settled upon their countenances as the time went on with no thrilling rap to make the top of the limber rod dance again, the hopeless fading out of these unsubstantial specimens from even the imagination. The east wind of course had been against everything ever since the trout season opened, and it was ...
— Lines in Pleasant Places - Being the Aftermath of an Old Angler • William Senior
... his son. There's no sort of business about him. I don't know just how you'd describe him. He's tall; and he's got white hair and a moustache; and his fingers are very long and limber. I couldn't help noticing them as he sat there with his hands on the top of his cane. Didn't seem to be dressed very much, and acted just like anybody. Didn't talk much. Guess I did most of the talking. Said he was glad I seemed to be getting ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... the last night I served the Duca di Sant' Agata, were my tongue so limber! The gondolier and the confessor are the two privy-councillors of a noble, Master Stefano, with this small difference—that the last only knows what the sinner wishes to reveal, while the first sometimes knows more. I can find a safer, if not a more honest employment, than to be ...
— The Bravo • J. Fenimore Cooper
... such catastrophe Denham suddenly seized the little fellow and put him through a number of acrobatic feats in breathless succession, till he was fairly hustled into good temper and everybody around was laughing, even Gerald. Jake Dexter was instantly incited to display some marvellous limber-jointed powers of his own, and had just demonstrated to the assembled company, to his and their entire satisfaction, that the impossible is after all sometimes possible, when luncheon was announced by the ringing of a cow-bell, and a gay onslaught upon the usual picnic table, rich in luxuries ...
— Only an Incident • Grace Denio Litchfield
... with as much docility as the slave had done, and by their united efforts the patient was soon dressed in warm dry clothes, wrapped in a hot, thick blanket, and tucked up comfortably in bed. But though her form was now limber, and her pulse perceptible, she had not yet spoken or opened her eyes. It was a half an hour later, while Hannah stood bathing her temples with camphor, and Mrs. Jones sat rubbing her hands, that Nora showed the first signs of returning consciousness, and these ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... blades Of soft and vivid grass We lay, nor heard the limber wheels That pass and ever pass In noisy continuity until their stony rattle Seems in itself ...
— A Treasury of War Poetry - British and American Poems of the World War 1914-1917 • Edited, with Introduction and Notes, by George Herbert Clarke
... cannot count them up. But I am rested now. Shall we walk about a little and get my knees limber? Where ...
— A Little Girl in Old Detroit • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... long-lost to love, one face that lies Only upon the breast of Memory, Would never find it—even the very blood Is stamped into the horror of the mud— Something that mad men trample under-foot In the narrow trench—for these things are not men— Things shapeless, sodden, mute Beneath the monstrous limber of the guns; Those things that loved us once... Those that were ours, ...
— Out To Win - The Story of America in France • Coningsby Dawson
... eyes wide in horror, then his chest collapsed and his neck felt limber. "Oh, my God," he whispered, as though in appeal to the Infinite Father of Mercy and Justice, "what a thing to say about me! What ...
— Amanda - A Daughter of the Mennonites • Anna Balmer Myers
... shall begin to grow in love With my dear self, and my most prosperous parts, They do so spring and burgeon; I can feel A whimsy in my blood: I know not how, Success hath made me wanton. I could skip Out of my skin, now, like a subtle snake, I am so limber. O! your parasite Is a most precious thing, dropt from above, Not bred 'mongst clods, and clodpoles, here on earth. I muse, the mystery was not made a science, It is so liberally profest! almost All the wise world is little else, in nature, But parasites, or sub-parasites.—And ...
— Volpone; Or, The Fox • Ben Jonson
... "has puzzled half the doctors on the Pacific Slope. It's as good as new, and as limber as a ...
— Round the Red Lamp - Being Facts and Fancies of Medical Life • Arthur Conan Doyle
... mortification, he knew he would find his tea-leaves parched to a cinder. He lingered a moment, however, with his eyes still fixed upon the departing wolf that was just about to disappear over the crest of a ridge. The fox was still in his jaws, but no longer struggling. Reynard looked limber and dead, as his legs swung loosely on both sides of the wolf's head Lucien at that moment saw the latter suddenly stop in his career, and then drop down upon the surface of the snow as if dead! He fell with his victim in his jaws, and lay ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid
... limber!" threatened Lovey Mary. "If you do I'll spank you right here on the street. Stand up! Straighten out your legs! Tommy! ...
— Lovey Mary • Alice Hegan Rice
... says; and blame-don! ef the girl didn't keel right over in my arms as limber as a rag! Clean fainted away! Honest! Jest the excitement, I reckon, o' breakin' it to her so suddent- like—'cause she liked Annie, I've sometimes thought, better'n even she did her own mother. Didn't go half so hard with her when her other sister married. ...
— Complete Works of James Whitcomb Riley • James Whitcomb Riley
... two sorts: one quite heavy, almost like a sledge-hammer or maul, and with a short handle; the other much lighter, and with a longer, more limber handle. This last was used by men in war as a mace or war club, while the heavier hammer was used by women as an axe to break up fallen trees for firewood; as a hammer to drive tent-pins into the ground, to kill disabled animals, or to break up heavy bones for the marrow they contained. ...
— Blackfeet Indian Stories • George Bird Grinnell
... grass from the upper hole. A thick volume of smoke rolled out. The bear must be dead. No creature could live in such an atmosphere. I introduced my ramrod through the opening. I could feel the soft hairy body of the animal, but it was limber and motionless. It was dead. Feeling convinced of this, at length, we removed the rocks below, and dragged it forth. Yes, the bear was dead,—or, at all events, very like it; but, to make the thing sure, Cudjo gave him a knock on the head with his axe. His long, shaggy ...
— The Desert Home - The Adventures of a Lost Family in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... Machiavelli's "Prince," which must come to the mind of every one who reads the "Farewell Address," one sees at once that the "Prince" is more limber, it may be more spontaneous, but the great difference between the two is in their fundamental conception. The "Address" is frankly a preachment and much of its impressiveness comes from that fact. The "Prince," on the other hand, ...
— George Washington • William Roscoe Thayer
... like a skeered woman or a burnt baby, when they go a-jumping from one tree to another? And do they always keep a-swinging their long, limber tails?" ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady
... remarkably lustrous and expressive, her black hair waved back from her brown face into a great braided coil, her features were not pretty so much as noble. Her figure, with its limber curves, was pliant and graceful in any position or emergency—the result of years in the saddle. Her feet and hands were small, the latter being firm but infinitely ...
— The Free Range • Francis William Sullivan
... Edie, you'se an angel for sayin' dat. Don't be afeard, I'se good for sumpen yet, if I be old. I once work for fear in de South; den I work for money, and now I'se gwine to work for lub, and it 'pears I can feel my ole jints limber up at de tought. It 'pears like dat lub is de only ting dat can make one young agin. Neber you fear, Miss Edie, we'll pull trough, and I'se see you a grand lady yet. A true lady you'se allers be, even if you went ...
— What Can She Do? • Edward Payson Roe
... a forked willow-twig between gill and gill-cover. Nor was this all; the fish was fresh-caught, for the gills had not puffed out, nor the supple body stiffened. Every little wavelet rippled its slim and limber length; and a thread of blood trailed from the throat-latch out over the ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... Peace, That now is foremost in your prayers, Shall crown your harvest with increase, And bless with smiles the home of tears; Your wounds be healed; your noble sons, Unhurt, unmutilated—free— Shall limber up their conquering guns, In triumph ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... limber, lissom, lithe of sway, * Brunettes tall, slender straight like Samhar's nut-brown lance;[FN380] Languid of eyelids and with silky down on either cheek, * Who fixed in lover's heart work to ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 4 • Richard F. Burton
... me at the time, but owing to our hurried movements and the vicissitudes of the battle, I have never had an opportunity to verify it. It was said that during the retreat of the artillery one piece of Stewart's battery did not limber up as soon as the others. A rebel officer rushed forward, placed his hand upon it, and presenting a pistol at the back of the driver, directed him not to drive off with the piece. The latter did ...
— Chancellorsville and Gettysburg - Campaigns of the Civil War - VI • Abner Doubleday
... lines of denser blackness, dexter-borne. Rank after rank, they came, out of the dark, So silently no pebble crunched beneath Their feet more sharp than did a woodchuck stir. And so came on the foe all stealthily, And found their guns a-limber, fires ablaze, And men in calm repose. With bay'nets fixed The section in advance fell on the camp, And killed the first two sentries, whose sharp cries Alarmed a third, who fired, and firing, fled. This roused the guard, but "Forward!" ...
— Laura Secord, the heroine of 1812. - A Drama. And Other Poems. • Sarah Anne Curzon
... all amount to? They would say the same of any acrobat in a circus whose joints were a bit more limber than those of the rest of his tribe. That does not remove their contempt for ...
— The Dreamer - A Romantic Rendering of the Life-Story of Edgar Allan Poe • Mary Newton Stanard
... but the snow that had poured itself down so steadily in that October storm did not give way. It sank a trifle at noon and covered itself at night with a glare of ice. It was impossible to go anywhere except on snow-shoes. Sheila quickly learned the trick and plodded with bent knees, limber ankles, and wide-apart feet through the winter miracle of the woods. It was another revelation of pure beauty, but her heart was too sore to hold the splendor as it had held the gentler beauty of summer and autumn. Besides, little by little she was aware of a vague, encompassing ...
— Hidden Creek • Katharine Newlin Burt
... were fiercest. How I groaned until the muscles became limber. I found myself using very rough language, groaning, gritting my teeth viciously. But I stayed with the work and held up my end, while the laymen watched us sedulously, and seemed to grudge us even a moment to wipe the sweat ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... second encounter with the Boers. The populace has recovered from the Proclamation, and their wild enthusiasm can scarcely be restrained. They want to go out to meet Jameson and bring him in with triumphal outcry. It is hard to be only a 'she-thing' and stay in the house with a couple of limber-kneed men, when such ...
— A Woman's Part in a Revolution • Natalie Harris Hammond
... had a rather contrary effect from what it does usually; it did settle Smith—in five minutes he was so very "boozy" that his chin bore down upon his breast, he became as "limber as a rag," and snored like a pair ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley
... so limber to believe I could compell it from thee. Twas a trick, A meere conceipt of mirth; thou sha't ha mine. Dost thinke I stand upon a sword? Ile gi' thee A case of Pistolls when we come to London; And ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Various
... replied the long-nosed man, speaking up. "No, ma'am. Not yet. He's fairly limber." And he scolded, to the "tramp": "Come on, now! You weigh a ton, with ...
— Gold Seekers of '49 • Edwin L. Sabin
... little more to say than that here again his practice has nothing bookish or formal about it, but draws right into life and the living speech of men. He has no settled rules, no favourite order. In this respect, as in others, language was in his hands as limber as water at the fountain. He found it full of vital flexibility, and he left it so; nay, rather made it more so. As he did not learn his craft in the little narrow world of school rhetoricians, where all goes by the ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... Twirl your limber hazel twig; Little hands may harm a nestling Thoughtlessly, as ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various
... secretive looks, his sand-gray lean face; Jackson Jorth, her uncle, huge, gaunt, hulking, with white in his black beard and hair, and the fire of a ghoul in his hollow eyes; Tad Jorth, another brother of her father's, younger, red of eye and nose, a weak-chinned drinker of rum. Three other limber-legged Texans lounged there, partners of Daggs, and they were sun-browned, light-haired, blue-eyed men singularly alike in appearance, from their dusty high-heeled boots to their broad black sombreros. They claimed to ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey
... strewn; From the rivers whose crisped sheen Is kissed by the trembling moon; While the dwarf looks out from his mountain cave, And the erl king from his lair, And the water-nymph from her moaning wave, We skirr the limber air. ...
— The Pilgrims Of The Rhine • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... great change, and Mr. 'Possum touched him and said his complexion seemed pretty solid, somewhat like a shell, and Mr. Crow told him how he had to move rather carefully in it, at first, though very likely it would limber up in time. Then he told them how he was going to do the kitchen that way, and perhaps other things, and they all got excited and talked about it, and Mr. 'Possum said that probably he would have them give him a coat next winter, to match the snow which would be handy, nights ...
— Hollow Tree Nights and Days • Albert Bigelow Paine
... be sech a limber-jinted coward!" said Nimbus. "I'm sorry I ebber tuk ye in atter Marse Sykes hed put yer out in de big road, dat I am." There was a murmur of approval, and he added: "An' ef yer hed enny place ter go ter, yer shouldn't stay in my house nary ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... legs we used to fling Limber-jointed in the dance, When we heard the fiddle ring Up the curtain of Romance, And in crowded public halls Played with hearts like jugglers'-balls.— Feats of mountebanks, depend!— Tom ...
— Riley Love-Lyrics • James Whitcomb Riley
... and limber, Bore him home on poles and branches, Bore the body of the beaver; But the ghost, the Jeebi in him, Thought and felt as Pau-Puk-Keewis, Still lived ...
— The Song Of Hiawatha • Henry W. Longfellow
... shawter 'bout Chrismus-time," Little Lizay ventured to suggest, "an' it gits col', an' my fingers ain't limber." ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, October, 1877, Vol. XX. No. 118 • Various
... tilling Long hours in gripping gusts, Was mastered by their chilling, And now his ploughshare rusts. So savage winter catches The breath of limber things, And what I love he snatches, And ...
— Time's Laughingstocks and Other Verses • Thomas Hardy |
