"Little finger" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the contrary, I was so discreet in my behaviour that I made him wonder. It so happened that the poor girl was attacked by a disorder in her right hand, which ate into the two bones belonging to the little finger and the next. [1] Owing to her father's carelessness, she had been treated by an ignorant quack-doctor, who predicted that the poor child would be crippled in the whole of her right arm, if even ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... was in her pleading, even if it did deny. He could have snatched her to his heart and stifled her with kisses, yet he did not dare to touch so much as her little finger. What strange power held her aloof? But if ...
— A Little Girl in Old Quebec • Amanda Millie Douglas
... ut rest,' sez I; an' thinkin' I'd been a trifle onpolite, I sez, 'The tay's not quite sweet enough for my taste. Put your little finger in the cup, ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling
... marriageable age. What these solemnities really are, is but little known, and they seem to differ widely in each tribe. In some, the young girls have a couple of front teeth knocked out; in others they lose a joint of the little finger; and at that time the hideous lumps with which the men embellish their bodies must be raised. These curious ornaments are formed by cutting gashes in the flesh three-quarters of an inch long, and ...
— Australian Search Party • Charles Henry Eden
... you have beheld in your dreams comes to meet you in living form. The castle that hovered in the air stands all at once on the earth, a substantial and splendid building. See here, Tonino, you are not paying the least heed to my words; but my little finger tells me, and so does somebody else as well, that the bright standard of love is gaily waving for you out at sea. Patience, Tonino—patience, my boy!" Thus the old woman sought to comfort poor Antonio; ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... prodigious fame. Some historians lodged protests; they might as well have protested against Dares. Gerald de Barry cried out it was an imposture; and William of Newbury inveighed against the impudence of "a writer called Geoffrey," who had made "Arthur's little finger bigger than Alexander's back."[183] In vain; copies of the "Historia Regum" multiplied to such an extent that the British Museum alone now possesses thirty-four of them. The appointed chronicler of the Angevin kings, Wace, translated it into ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... the other evening that I saw a father with his infant son on his knee, having a little hand spread out, and entertaining its owner by travelling from thumb to little finger, and ...
— Children's Rhymes, Children's Games, Children's Songs, Children's Stories - A Book for Bairns and Big Folk • Robert Ford
... he touched me. I do think I had the honour of touching His Gracious Majesty's little finger, I really do!" ...
— The Gold that Glitters - The Mistakes of Jenny Lavender • Emily Sarah Holt
... scout will stand holding his right hand raised level with his shoulder, palm to the front, thumb resting on the nail of the little finger, and the other three fingers upright pointing upward. This the ...
— Outdoor Sports and Games • Claude H. Miller
... practices of the human family throughout the world. Even here, the two different classes of Damaras practice rites in common with the New Zealanders, such as that of chipping out the front teeth and cutting off the little finger." It is less astonishing if, as the same traveler remarks, their agreement with the Bechuanas goes even farther. Now, since the essence of civilization lies first in the amassing of experiences, then in the fixity with which these are retained, and lastly in the capacity to carry ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... in a single day. The ladies would criticise these beauties, and all of them were smitten with the youthful Cappara. And the youthful Cappara would eye them up and down, swearing that the day one of them gave him her little finger to kiss, he would ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... have the whip, get the whip; gain a hold upon, preponderate, dominate, rule the roost; boss [U.S.]; override, overrule, overawe; lord it over, hold in hand, keep under, make a puppet of, lead by the nose, turn round one's little finger, bend to one's will, hold one's own, wear the breeches; have the ball at one's feet, have it all one's own way, have the game in one's own hand, have on the hip, have under one's thumb; be master of ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... proximity of danger, and, I am sure, even with their sagacity, did not think of it; but bearing the common nuisance towards the boundary of their country, they were only bent upon ejecting it summarily. The little finger of my glove first reached the side of the ant-hill, and falling, like a paralyzed limb, suddenly over the brink, cast some forty excellent folks, head over heels, with rapidity and great force to the long grass beneath. Unconscious of this accident at the other extremity, the ants who ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross
... building in Batavia, though they pay enormous annual duties to the Company on their industry and trade. Among other duties, they pay for being allowed to let their nails grow long, especially that of the little finger, as it is a proof that they do not work for their living. The twisted tail, which they wear extremely long, often down to their knees, pays in proportion to its length. It is measured every year at a fixed time. ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston
... touch her at this present, nor even to look upon her, except to take from her somewhat which shall serve as a token to me and a memorial of her; that some sign endure between me and her." Then Kamar al-Zaman raised the young lady's hand and took from her little finger a seal-ring worth an immense amount of money, for that its bezel was a precious jewel and around it were graven ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... being able to come downstairs quickly, which, however, was not born with them, but came on at the age of twenty." Three pairs of twins have peculiarities in their fingers; in one case it consists in a slight congenital flexure of one of the joints of the little finger; it was inherited from a grandmother, but neither parents, nor brothers, nor sisters show the least trace of it. In another case the twins have a peculiar way of bending the fingers, and there was a faint tendency ...
— Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development • Francis Galton
... kava-drinking was finished I made her sit beside me, and the Nanomaga woman told her I would run away from the ship if she would be my wife. She put her face to my shoulder, and then took the circlet from her forehead and bound it round my bared arm, and I gave her a silver ring which I wore on my little finger. Then, together with the Nanomaga man and his wife, we made our plans.... Ah! she was a fine girl. For nearly a year was she wife to me until she sickened and died of the meisake elo[8] which was brought to Ponape by ...
— By Rock and Pool on an Austral Shore, and Other Stories • Louis Becke
... the cooks. "But you must sit just there, and not put even your little finger in the way of us; for we are the Tzar's cooks, and we are in the middle of making ready his dinner." And the cook put a stool in a corner out of the way, and Ivan slipped in round the door, and sat down in the corner and looked about ...
— Old Peter's Russian Tales • Arthur Ransome
... combat, sensible of the prize for which they had to contend, and each determined, to deal death to his adversary. Morgan aimed a blow with his gun; but the Indian hurled a tomahawk at him, which cutting the little finger of his left hand entirely off, and injuring the one next it very much, knocked the gun out of his grasp, and they closed. Being a good wrestler, Morgan succeeded in throwing the Indian; but soon found himself overturned, and the savage upon him, feeling for his knife and sending forth ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... slaves among men, but the larger number of those who wear his most galling fetters are women. If he but crooks his little finger these bond-women rush pell-mell in the direction he points. They are thus keen to do his bidding, because each woman who is the first to carry out his rules in her own particular town or neighborhood acquires great distinction in the eyes of the ...
— Dickey Downy - The Autobiography of a Bird • Virginia Sharpe Patterson
... myself, then," shouted the Squire; "and as for the boy, he shall swallow his damned pride before he gives my girl an anxious hour. What is he, to say he will or will not, if she lifts her little finger? By the Lord Harry, he ought to go down on his face like a heathen when she ...
— Jerome, A Poor Man - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... been successful; but these were matters in which the world does not write down a man's good luck as being generally conducive to his happiness. He had never had a headache, rarely a cold, and not a touch of the gout. One little finger had become crooked, and he was recommended to drink whisky, which he did willingly,—because it was cheap. He was now fifty, and as fit, bodily and mentally, for hard work as ever he had been. And he had a thousand a-year to spend, and spent it without ever feeling the necessity of saving ...
— An Old Man's Love • Anthony Trollope
... direct reply, but from his little finger he detached a ring and held it out for her to see. I saw it too, for I was standing close by Mme. la Marquise, and the flickering light of the tallow candle fell full upon the ring. It was of gold, and upon it there was an exquisitely modelled, five-petalled ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... have made good. Continuez, chere enfant—and if you don't know what that means your French lessons are in vain. Now the usual few words: don't let any man who is not married to you lay the weight of his little finger on you! Don't ignore convention unless there is a good reason—and then don't! When you're tired of behaving yourself go to sleep; and if you can't sleep, sleep some more; and then some. Men are exactly like women until they differ ...
— The Firing Line • Robert W. Chambers
... again, and I tried it on. It was a little large. Harold took it, and tried to put it on one of his fingers. It would fit on none but the very top of his little finger. We laughed heartily at the disparity in the ...
— My Brilliant Career • Miles Franklin
... our birds would call him in and give him a drink. He hadn't been at it five minutes before a fiery, red-headed little potman had knocked him head over heels in the gutter and told him to go away. Bill could have broken the chap in two with his little finger, but he daren't do anything. He came over to me and I sent him back again. This time he did get invited inside. And there he stayed for a full hour, while the witness and I stood shivering and wet ...
— The Grell Mystery • Frank Froest
... took pity on her, and called her near her, and gave her four loaves, some roast meat, and a ring from her little finger, saying, "having sold this, make jewels [for your daughter] and live comfortably; and come occasionally to see me, the house is yours." The old hag having completely gained the object she came in search of, poured heartfelt blessings on the princess, saluted her and trotted ...
— Bagh O Bahar, Or Tales of the Four Darweshes • Mir Amman of Dihli
... it will be more painful to-morrow. Take for example the love of money: we know well that though money is a useful servant it is a hard master; be assured if it get and keep the mastery of a soul, its little finger in the end will be thicker than its loins were at the beginning. Avarice chastises its slave in middle life with whips; but if he abide its slave, it will chastise him when ...
— The Parables of Our Lord • William Arnot
... very strange. Find a man with his sights? He could follow his target as though a magnetic power attracted his rifle. The weapon seemed to have a volition of its own. It drifted along with the canter of Bill Dozier. With incredible precision the little finger of iron inside the circle dwelt in turn on the hat of Bill Dozier, on his sandy mustaches, on his fluttering shirt. And Andy knew that he had the life of a man under the command of ...
— Way of the Lawless • Max Brand
... on the altar. As he feels rather thirsty, he's just about drinking, When Miss Faucit, in tears, comes in running like winking; He pauses, of course, and, as she's thirsty too, Says, very politely, "Miss, I after you!" The young lady curtsies, and, being so dry, Raises somehow her fair little finger so high, That there's not a drop left him to "wet t'other eye"; While the dose is so strong, to his grief and surprise, She merely says, "Thankee, Sir Walter," and dies. At that moment the King, who is riding to cover, Pops in en passant on ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... examining part of a field which had been deeply drained, after long-previous shallow drainage, it was found that the worms had greatly increased in number, and that their bores descended quite to the level of the pipes. Many worm-bores were large enough to receive the little finger. A piece of land near the sea, in Lincolnshire, over which the sea had broken and killed all the worms, remained sterile until the worms again inhabited it. A piece of pasture land, in which worms ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... really distressing to witness the situation of those poor wretches. the radix of this plant is of the knob kind, of a long ovate form terminating in a single radicle, the whole bing about 3 or four inches in length and the thickest part about the size of a man's little finger. it is white firm and crisp in it's present state, when dryed and pounded it makes a fine white meal; the flavor of this root is not unlike that of annisseed but not so pungent; the stem rises to the hight of 3 or four feet is jointed smooth and cilindric; from r to 4 ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al
... and know what things he ought to do, and also may have grace and power faithfully to fulfil the same.' Don't let him rule you. He is very like to try it, the only man in a family of women—for he shall make little account of Hans Moriszoon, though there is more sense in Hans's little finger than in all Aubrey's brains. If I can see into the future, Aubrey is not unlike to push you o'er, and Hans to pick you up again. Have a care, Lettice. You remember when Walter was in ...
— It Might Have Been - The Story of the Gunpowder Plot • Emily Sarah Holt
... as tender-hearted and compassionate as we may, a pain in our little finger must still come home to us more than another's loss of a limb, at least, if there is no special link between us. Isidore's pity for the half-witted girl was presently lost sight of in what had first been only the inconvenience, but had latterly become the positive suffering ...
— The King's Warrant - A Story of Old and New France • Alfred H. Engelbach
... me, if you are, for I love you. And I want you to be careful. Don't run any risks. I'd rather have the whole shipyard smashed than your little finger." ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... instance our Lameate yonder will string a pretty sonnet on the despair of love, he knowing nothing of despair, . . he will write of a broken heart, his own being unpricked by so much as a pin's point of trouble; and he will speak in his verso of dying for love when he would not let his little finger ache for the sake of a woman who worshipped him! Look not so vaguely! 'tis so, indeed! and as for the divine part of him, wait but a little, and thou shalt see thy ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... my hand, the back of my hand, my fingers, my thumb, my forefinger, my middle finger, my ring finger, my little finger, my knuckles, my finger joints, my nails, the tips of my fingers, the veins, the ball of my thumb, and the lines ...
— Object Lessons on the Human Body - A Transcript of Lessons Given in the Primary Department of School No. 49, New York City • Sarah F. Buckelew and Margaret W. Lewis
... you see at last, dull peasants, What the end will be? Your fathers Once gave up their little finger; Now they want to seize the whole hand. Only give it, and you'll soon see, How they'll flay your very skin off! Who can really thus compel us? In his woods free lives the peasant, Nothing but the sun above him. So ...
— The Trumpeter of Saekkingen - A Song from the Upper Rhine. • Joseph Victor von Scheffel
... tenderest, most natural creature in the world. But it's just my luck—another woman has got him. And such a woman, too! A nagger, a shrew, a cat, a piece of human flint, a thankless wretch, whose whole selfish body isn't worth the tip of his little finger." ...
— Capt'n Davy's Honeymoon - 1893 • Hall Caine
... along with the provisions—a touch of the nature common to us all. They express deep grief by inflicting wounds upon their faces with a shark's tooth; and, when they feel themselves in danger of dying, they cut off a joint of the little finger to appease the anger of the Divinity. There was scarcely one of the adult islanders who was ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien
... Much heated and out of breath, the priest threw a scrutinizing glance upon his lord and master, and from the Count turned his eyes towards the empty stool, and looked as if he would have given his little finger to be able to reach even that ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne
... Athelstane, "be reasonable. The Lady Rowena cares not for me—she loves the little finger of my kinsman Wilfred's glove better than my whole person. There she stands to avouch it—Nay, blush not, kinswoman, there is no shame in loving a courtly knight better than a country franklin—and do not ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... drowned or eaten with Rames, but the next something yielded, and she and the boy tumbled in a heap upon the stones. They rose and staggered together to the terrace. As they went Tua saw that Rames was looking at his right hand curiously; also that it was covered with blood, and that the little finger was torn off it. Then she remembered nothing further, except a sound of shouts and of heavy hammering at ...
— Morning Star • H. Rider Haggard
... of his fellow gold-seekers, Cass was superstitious. "Cass!" His own name! He tried the ring. It fitted his little finger closely. It was evidently a woman's ring. He looked up and down the highway. No one was yet stirring. Little pools of water in the red road were beginning to glitter and grow rosy from the far-flushing east, but ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte
... raise his eyes. He wore a white shirt under his striped jacket, a high collar, and a necktie, very carefully tied. His hands were thin and white and well cared for, and he had a seal ring on his little finger. When he heard steps approaching in the corridor, he rose, blotted his book, put his pen in the rack, and left the room without raising his eyes. Through the door he opened a guard ...
— O Pioneers! • Willa Cather
... one else if he wishes to do that," said Blucher, mournfully. "I cannot help him, for they have pensioned me. I have no regiments. I—but, thunder and lightning! what is the matter with my pipe today? The thing will not burn." And he put his little finger into the bowl, and tried to ...
— NAPOLEON AND BLUCHER • L. Muhlbach
... not such scoope to humerous discontent, Wee all are partners of your privat greefes. Kinges are the heads, and yf the head but ache The little finger is distempered. Wee greeve to se you greeved, which hurteth us And yet availes not to asswage your greefe. You are the Sunne, my lo:, wee Marigolds; Whenas you shine wee spred our selves abroad And take our ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Various
... consequence they reckon with their fingers, by bending the little finger of the right hand close to the palm, and the other fingers in succession, proceeding to the left hand, concluding the calculation by clapping both the hands together; and if it requires to be extended, the same ...
— Observations Upon The Windward Coast Of Africa • Joseph Corry
... she cried one night, "ah, well-a-day! you know not how to choose a man. An I could choose for you, Jule! By God's lady, there's Signior Mercutio, a brave gentleman, a merry gentleman, and a virtuous, I warrant ye, whose little finger-joint is worth all the body of this blackbird prince, dropping down from Lord knows where to fly off with the sweetest bit of flesh ...
— A Midnight Fantasy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... powerless?—Hummel. Who could drive to the uttermost ends of the earth persons against whom not a shadow of suspicion had previously rested?—Hummel. Who dictated to the chiefs of police of foreign cities what they should or should not do in certain cases; and who could, at the beckoning of his little finger, summon to his dungeon-like offices in the New York Life Building, whither his firm had removed from Centre Street, the most prominent of lawyers, the most eminent of citizens?—Surely none but Hummel. And now Hummel was fighting for his own life. The only man that stood ...
— The Lock and Key Library/Real Life #2 • Julian Hawthorne
... very well how little the title meant to her. She had loved this old lady with a sort of pitying, patronizing love, realizing even very early in her life that she, herself, had more self-reliance, more executive ability, in her little finger, than was spread all over the placid lady who early learned that "Ruthie" was to do precisely as ...
— The Chautauqua Girls At Home • Pansy, AKA Isabella M. Alden
... began to make her preparations very neatly and quickly. First, with a little knife she made a small gash in the Prince's little finger and dropped three drops of his blood on the wooden stool, near the cauldron. Then she gathered up a lot of rubbish, such as old shoes and rags, and put them in the cauldron with water and pepper and ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various
... to do, for they don't know;' and at the end, when the orb was put into her hand, she said to him, 'What am I to do with it?' 'Your Majesty is to carry it, if you please, in your hand.' 'Am I?' she said; 'it is very heavy.' The ruby ring was made for her little finger instead of the fourth, on which the rubric prescribes that it should be put. When the Archbishop was to put it on, she extended the former, but he said it must be on the latter. She said it was too small, and ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... that great queen of song, by the public who cannot yet have forgotten the latter, I am more than ever impressed with the worthlessness of popularity and public applause, and the mistake of those who would so much as stretch out their little finger to obtain it. I came to England just in time to see my father leave the stage, and close his laborious professional career. After a long life of public exhibition, and the glare of excitement which inevitably attends upon it, to withdraw into ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... of a 5-ft. string together, making a double line on which a key is placed and the string held as shown by the dotted lines in the sketch. Turn the palms of the hands toward you and reach over with the little finger of the right hand and take hold of the inside line near ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics
... The legend provokes a good many questions. One would like to know whether this was the first case of female rebellion in Massachusetts against the common-law right of a man to correct a woman with a stick not thicker than his little finger—a rebellion which has resulted in the position of man as the tourists saw him where the New Hampshire Amazon gave them a meal of victuals; and whether the girl married the man who planted the twig, and, if ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... bewraies carving, etc.) The passage in the text sufficiently shows that carving was a sign of intelligence made with the little finger, as the glass was raised to the mouth. See the prefatory letter to Mr. R. G. White's Shakespeare's Scholar, 8vo., New York, 1854, p. xxxiii. Mr. Hunter (New Illustrations of Shakespeare, i. 215), ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... a fad popular enough to spread through the entire school was an unheard of thing at Warwick Hall, but A.O. Miggs had that distinction early in the term. Her birthday was in October, and when she appeared that morning with a zodiac ring on her little finger, set with a brilliant fire opal, there was a mingled outcry ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston
... then wind a little sterile cotton round his moistened little finger, dip it in the boracic solution, and holding the baby up by the feet head down, insert this finger into the throat, thus clearing it of mucus. The tongue and mouth may be gently washed with ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Volume I. (of IV.) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague, M.D.
... this, I came amid thickets where was a glory of flowers of all colours, but one in especial I noticed, white and trumpet-shaped. And here I was often stayed by quickset and creeping plants, their stems very pliant and strong and of the bigness of my little finger. On went I haphazard through a green twilight of leaves, for here (as hath been said) were many trees both great and small, some of which were utterly strange to me, but others I knew for cocos-palms, plantain and bread-fruit, the which rejoiced me greatly; and hereabouts I found growing great bunches ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... of a thing, is nothing else but the Determination, or Defining of its Place; and so both the Terms of the Distinction are the same. And in particular, of the Essence of a Man, which (they say) is his Soule, they affirm it, to be All of it in his little Finger, and All of it in every other Part (how small soever) of his Body; and yet no more Soule in the Whole Body, than in any one of those Parts. Can any man think that God is served with such absurdities? And yet all this is necessary to beleeve, to those that will ...
— Leviathan • Thomas Hobbes
... heart warms towards him now. When I think what the men were whose clamour put him out of office in 184-, I have the conviction forced upon me, that the best among them was not worth his little finger. He left the colony in a most prosperous state, and, retiring honourably to one of his stations, set to work, as he said, to begin life again on a new principle. He is wealthy, honoured, and happy, as he ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... Leaving Satish Chandra, for that night she became invisible. The servants, seeing Kamal Mani bowed to the ground with hair unbound, left Satish and hurried to her. But Satish would not be left; he at first stood in silence by his weeping mother, and then, with his little finger under her chin, he tried to raise her face. Kamal looked up, but did not speak. Satish, wishing to comfort his mother, kissed her. Kamal caressed, but did not kiss him, nor did she speak. Satish put his hand on his mother's throat, ...
— The Poison Tree - A Tale of Hindu Life in Bengal • Bankim Chandra Chatterjee
... world, thou Holy One! If a man shall throw on the ground a bone of a dead dog, or of a dead man, as large as the top joint of the little finger, and if grease or marrow flow from it on to the ground, what penalty ...
— Sacred Books of the East • Various
... fed a bit," Van Bibber ran on, cheerfully. "They did not treat her very well, I fancy. She is thin and peaked and tired-looking." He drew up the loose sleeve of her jacket, and showed the bare forearm to the light. He put his thumb and little finger about it, and closed them on it gently. "It is very thin," he said. "And under her eyes, if it were not for the paint," he went on, mercilessly, "you could see how deep the lines are. This red spot on her cheek," he said, gravely, ...
— Van Bibber and Others • Richard Harding Davis
... inches; hair, dove-coloured; scar on little finger of left hand; has assured carriage, walking boldly into good hotels and mixing with patrons on terms of equality; weight, 200 pounds; face slightly asymmetrical, but not definitely criminal in type; loathes Japanese art, but likes ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley
... whom she made this remark, assented to it, at the same time ogling a piece of frosted cake, which she presently appropriated with great refinement of manner,—taking it between her thumb and forefinger, keeping the others well spread and the little finger in extreme divergence, with a graceful undulation of the neck, and a queer little sound in her throat, as of an m that wanted to get out and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various
... least," he said, flicking an ash from the sleeve of his uniform with a dexterous little finger, "especially as I am not going to be with you all the way. These bucolic joys are hardly in my line. I'll get you to drop me at ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... because human strife is to be transferred from the heart and personality of man into cunning contrivances of machinery, which by and by will fight out our wars with only the clank and smash of iron, strewing the field with broken engines, but damaging nobody's little finger except by accident. Such is obviously the tendency of modern improvement. But, in the mean while, so long as manhood retains any part of its pristine value, no country can afford to let gallantry like that of Morris and his crew, any more than that ...
— Sketches and Studies • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... expected to hear more of Oliver Cromwell. He stared across the dull shine of the table at his parent's coat of peach-coloured velvet and shirt front of frilled linen; at the lace ruffle on the wrist, the signet ring on the little finger, the hand—firm, but fine—as it reached for a decanter or fell to playing with a gold toothpick. He loved this father of his with the helpless, concentred love of a motherless child; admired him, as all must admire, only more ...
— Lady Good-for-Nothing • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... his paper on extra digits,[188] has {181} recorded no less than twenty-four cases where such excess coexisted in both little fingers; also one case in which the right little finger and little toe were so affected; six in which it was both the little fingers and both the little toes; and twenty-two other cases more or less the same, but in which the details were not accurately to ...
— On the Genesis of Species • St. George Mivart
... with the chill of the old misgiving about his heart, as he remembered the stormy encounter at the dock, with the haunting shadow of doubt in his mind, laboriously dismissed as an offence against his loyalty. "It seems to me that Oswyn has more real genius in his little finger than Dick has in his whole body; I am sure of it. It was a pity that they should both have chosen the same subject, especially as their ideas, as to colour and treatment and so on, are so much the same. But, of course, Dick had a perfect right ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... did so we had another sitting at Dr. Towne's house, which gave me a closer view of all that went on, for I was permitted to sit at his left and grip his little finger. The circle was slightly changed the next time, and on his right sat a young lady whom we will call Miss Brown. She was a wide-awake and very unexcitable person, and I believe kept close hold on the psychic's right hand. In addition to our linked ...
— The Shadow World • Hamlin Garland
... all sketching either from nature or excellent copies here. As it was not a public day except to those who wished to attend for instruction, I ought not with propriety to have intruded, but "J'etais Anglois" and every attention was paid. You would have given a little finger to have seen the room; it was a hot summer's day, but there all was cool and fragrant; the windows opened on the gardens, the tables were covered with groupes of flowers in vases; the company, about ...
— Before and after Waterloo - Letters from Edward Stanley, sometime Bishop of Norwich (1802;1814;1814) • Edward Stanley
... of the character in Trabea another:—"The kind procuress, allured by my money, will observe my nod, will watch my desires, and study my will. If I but move the door with my little finger, instantly it flies open; and if Chrysis should unexpectedly discover me, she will run with joy to meet me, and throw ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero
... difficult it still is for the humbly-born, in spite of Magna Chartas, habeas corpuses, and Houses of Commons! Finishing his long ramble, he remembered the biggest and grandest gentleman of his acquaintance, and wondered bitterly if the Right Honorable Everard Barradine had done so much as to raise a little finger ...
— The Devil's Garden • W. B. Maxwell
... which were of shepherd-tartan. His coat was of light-blue, with a high collar of velvet, and much too wide for him. A black silk neckerchief tied carelessly about his throat, and a waistcoat of pineapple shawl-stuff, completed his dress. On one long little finger shone a stone which Donal took for an emerald. He motioned his visitor to a seat, and went on writing, with a rudeness more like that of a successful contractor than a nobleman. But it gave Donal the advantage ...
— Donal Grant • George MacDonald
... succession. Next, in the backward order in time, is the Miohippus, which corresponds pretty nearly with the Anchitherium of Europe. It presents three complete toes—one large median and two smaller lateral ones: and there is a rudiment of that digit which answers to the little finger of ...
— Thomas Henry Huxley; A Sketch Of His Life And Work • P. Chalmers Mitchell
... a quieting arm about her. "Why, see here, Kippy," he said, "didn't you know It was afraid of me? Look how strong I am! I could kill It with my little finger." ...
— Mr. Opp • Alice Hegan Rice
... shouted impressively, "dot is not a good vay to tie dot horse. By Chiminy, he vould break his neck mit der rope. Glen, vy you makes play mit der gun dot vay? Donnerwetter! ven I speak mit you, stand op mit der little finger to der seam of der pantaloons. You vill ...
— My Lady of the North • Randall Parrish
... thin branches from the tree. From these he cut three pieces, each about as long as his first finger and about as thick as his little finger. ...
— Seven O'Clock Stories • Robert Gordon Anderson
... little hands covering her face. It was twilight, and beyond the little finger glanced a watchful eye towards the door, to see if Theodore would go. She didn't think he would. ...
— The Wedding Guest • T.S. Arthur
... at the end of the tape-measure hooked over my little finger, I took a candle in that hand and the compass in the other, and having ascertained that the course of the stream was due southeast, I told Joe to go ahead. My partner, therefore, with his arm slipped through the ...
— The Boys of Crawford's Basin - The Story of a Mountain Ranch in the Early Days of Colorado • Sidford F. Hamp
... i' the bill, sir; error i' the bill. I commanded the sleeves should be cut out, and sew'd up again; and that I'll prove upon thee, though thy little finger be ...
— The Taming of the Shrew • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... always held his hands half closed as though grasping something; now they had stiffened so that he could never open them fully. The little finger of his left hand had been bitten off "in gratitude" by an adversary whom he had knocked down: according to Harald's version of the story, he had compelled the fellow to swallow the piece ...
— Absalom's Hair • Bjornstjerne Bjornson
... people who have been turned off are feeling injured that it should have been done so soon, and apparently only the weight of poppa's personality on its New York end kept the gangway out. As we drove up he appeared to lift his little finger and three dishevelled navigators darted upon the cab. They and we and our trunks swept up the gangway together, which immediately closed behind us, under the direction of an extremely irritated looking Chief Officer. We reunited as a family as well as we could in connection ...
— A Voyage of Consolation - (being in the nature of a sequel to the experiences of 'An - American girl in London') • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... retreat? And he could not but reflect that while there were plenty of women who were eager to present him with silver cigarette-cases, blue and white flower-jars, and things of that kind, there was not one of them, as he believed, who would dip her little finger in a bottle of ink for his sake. More than that, which of them would herself have dared ridicule in order to save him from ridicule? And in what light should he regard this suddenly prompted action on her part, which seemed to him so bewildering at the time, but which she appeared ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black
... astounded, he paused, and gazed upon the pair. The younger female was the loveliest maid he had ever looked upon. She had the smallest eyes in the world, the most tempting, large, full, pouting lips, the blackest and most abundant hair, exquisitely plaited, and feet no bigger than her little finger. As these are the four characteristics of female beauty dearest to a Chinaman's heart, it is no wonder that Mien-yaun thought her a paragon. The old woman, on the contrary, was hideously ugly. Her teeth ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 20, June, 1859 • Various
... their brightness those of a serpent or hyena. His forehead was constructive but low, and, we may say, rather unintellectual than otherwise. He was without whiskers, a circumstance which caused a wound on the back part of his jaw to be visible, and one-half of the left-hand little finger had been shot off in defence of his church and country, according to his own account. This was a subject however, upon which he always affected a good deal of mystery when conversing with the people, or we should say, he took care ...
— The Tithe-Proctor - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... sense you'd take Joe Nolan, as I've told you fifty times if I've told you once. He's got real good wages, and you could twist him around your little finger." ...
— Jewel Weed • Alice Ames Winter
... who got into a greater number of scrapes than Annie Forest; but neither was there ever a girl who managed to right herself more quickly. She knew the art of twisting other people round her little finger. Having performed this feat to perfection on Mrs. Martin, alias Patty, alias nursey, she went happily to bed, knowing that all would be right for the present, and never giving a thought to the evil but still distant hour when she must return her mother's ...
— Red Rose and Tiger Lily - or, In a Wider World • L. T. Meade
... even yet form some notion from the puppet-shows, was not always very skilfully filled up, and that many platitudes were occasionally uttered by him; but still, on the whole, Punch had certainly more sense in his little finger than Gottsched in his whole body. Punch, as an allegorical personage, is immortal; and however strong the belief in his death may be, in some grave office-bearer or other he still pops up unexpectedly ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... outline,—great freedom in that right hand. But, hold! is the composition good? You have not got the great pyramidal form. Don't you think, too, that you have lost the advantage of contrast in this figure; since the right leg is put forward, surely the right arm should be put back? Peste! but that little finger is ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... me,' said Faith. 'He cares more for Lois's little finger than for my whole body,' the girl moaned out in the bitter ...
— Curious, if True - Strange Tales • Elizabeth Gaskell
... accomplished. She was indolent, passive, the caustic even called her dull; but dressed like an idol, hung with pearls, growing younger and blonder and more beautiful each year, she throned in Mr. Beaufort's heavy brown-stone palace, and drew all the world there without lifting her jewelled little finger. The knowing people said it was Beaufort himself who trained the servants, taught the chef new dishes, told the gardeners what hot-house flowers to grow for the dinner-table and the drawing-rooms, selected the guests, ...
— The Age of Innocence • Edith Wharton
... mirror as she undressed that night. "He was grinding his teeth in sheer mortification and looking quite murderous when I told him he was boring me, and I went off with Tony. Yes, I think I am taking my revenge. What a triumph if I find myself able to twist round my little finger, so to speak, the man who boasted no woman could ...
— Bandit Love • Juanita Savage
... to laugh again. "Ah, you disbelieve?" he said politely. "Shall I send, then, for some proof—an ear, perhaps, or a little finger, still very warm and bleeding, to convince you?... In five minutes it ...
— The Fortieth Door • Mary Hastings Bradley
... pledge you; I see nothing against it but the father or the girl taking a tantrum, and I am told the mother can wind them both round her little finger. Take care not to affront her with any ...
— Bride of Lammermoor • Sir Walter Scott
... ruffled. Zoeth was mightily pleased and Mary-'Gusta was happy because he was. The plan of alternate Sundays was adopted. It was but one instance of the "managing" quality which the girl possessed. Isaiah declared that she wound all hands around her little finger, but even he seemed to ...
— Mary-'Gusta • Joseph C. Lincoln
... the Tin Woodman, "and he's wearing my right arm! I can recognize it by the two warts on the little finger." ...
— The Tin Woodman of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... horse there seems hardly a doubt that exostoses on the legs, caused by too much travelling on hard roads, are inherited. Blumenbach records the case of a man who had his little finger on the right hand almost cut off, and which in consequence grew crooked, and his sons had the same finger on the same hand similarly crooked. A soldier, fifteen years before his marriage, lost his left eye from purulent ...
— The Humour of Homer and Other Essays • Samuel Butler
... to do, Frank? What am I to do? Think how desolate I am, how unfriended, how much in want of some one whom I can call a protector! I cannot have you always with me. You care more for the little finger of that prim piece of propriety down at the old dowager's than you do for me and all my sorrows." This was true, but Frank did not say that it was true. "Lord Fawn is at any rate respectable. At least, I thought he was so when I ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... equipped carpenter's shop. A young man with a paper cap on his head and clad in blouse and overalls was whistling and driving the plane as he whistled. He looked up as the two entered, and took off his cap. As he did so, his little finger carried a small curling shaving up to his hair ...
— In His Steps • Charles M. Sheldon
... there's no one else," said Mr. Brett. "Do have it. You see, I couldn't get it on my little finger. And won't you keep the big one too? It isn't as if I were like Mrs. Stuyvesant-Knox's ...
— Lady Betty Across the Water • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... to scratch the left ear with the left little finger, and then bite the lower lip, before shaking hands with anybody. I thought that I would go into an inn and try these signs on somebody (on the landlord if possible) and then ask his advice. An inn would be a good place, I thought, because the landlord would be sure to buy from the ...
— Jim Davis • John Masefield
... called Hermann Sudermann the Klingsor of the German stage, meaning thereby that he was a master of black magic. Of course, like most comparisons, this was a far-fetched one. Yet Sudermann is a master of theatrical machinery. With a pressure of his little finger he can set the wheels whirring and make their noise attractive if not precisely significant. This is the case with his latest offering, Der gute Ruf (Good Reputation), which captured Berlin at the Deutsches Schauspielhaus ...
— Ivory Apes and Peacocks • James Huneker
... surveying parties. His practical ownership of the San Tome silver mine gives him a special position. He seems to have the ear of every provincial authority apparently, and, as I said, he can wind all the hidalgos of the province round his little finger. If you follow his advice the difficulties will fall away, because he wants the railway. Of course, you must be careful in what you say. He's English, and besides he must be immensely wealthy. The Holroyd house is in with him in that ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... him. William Condor daintily knocked off the ash of his cigar faith the tip of his little finger, ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis
... where the sun set and dug for gold I would find it. When I became a man I went three thousand miles in the direction of the sun setting and dug and found gold. It is not a dream, for as I close this writing I see on my little finger a gold ring made from the gold I there dug, which has been there for forty-five years. It is so fine that it has been wearing away, and it is not more than one-fourth the size it was when I first put it on, and time is likewise ...
— The Adventures of a Forty-niner • Daniel Knower
... word, with the glance of an eye, the movement of your little finger"—and she paused, looking intensely, imploringly up into his face—"in less time than it takes me to say what I say now, you may have it all." As he made no answer, only meeting her eyes, she added insistently: "You know she's a ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... duke was to pass all his life at Vincennes, he was afraid of his prisoner attempting suicide. A fortnight afterward the duke, going to the tennis court, found two rows of trees about the size of his little finger planted by the roadside; he asked what they were for and was told that they were to shade him from the sun on some future day. One morning the gardener went to him and told him, as if to please him, that he was going to plant a bed of asparagus for his especial use. Now, since, as every one ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... looked bonny enough to warm any father's heart, as he marched up and down with an air learned by watching many a parade in barrack-square and drill ground, and though Nicholas did not cry in spite of falling hard, and Dora, who took the part of the Doctor, treading accidentally on his little finger in picking him up, still the Captain and his wife sighed nearly as often as they smiled, and the mother dropped tears as well as pennies into the cap which Tom, as the King of Egypt, brought round ...
— A Budget of Christmas Tales by Charles Dickens and Others • Various
... certain of our Spanish acquaintances was hardly to be wondered at. They could not believe that sensible, civilized human beings would shoot tiny birds, pay for eggs the size of the tip of one's little finger more than hens' eggs were worth, undergo not a few hardships and run many risks while living in the simplest of native houses on very inadequate food, unless actuated by some hidden purpose. At ...
— The Philippines: Past and Present (vol. 1 of 2) • Dean C. Worcester
... men who were his habitual companions urged him, on the contrary, to meet the remonstrances of his subjects with threats of still harsher exactions. Their advice was taken, and when Jeroboam again presented himself, Rehoboam greeted him with raillery and threats. "My little finger is thicker than my father's loins. And now whereas my father did lade you with a heavy yoke, I will add to your yoke: my father chastised you with whips, but I will chastise you with scorpions." This unwise answer did not produce the intimidating effect which was desired; the cry of revolt, which ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 6 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... friend Mr. Power, surgeon, at Bosworth in Leicestershire, on examining the body of an elderly lady who died of this disease, March 29, 1793. "On opening the abdomen I found a large cyst attached to the left ovarium by an elastic neck as thick as the little finger, and so callous as not to admit of being separated by scissars without considerable difficulty. The substance of the cyst had an appearance much resembling the gravid uterus near the full period of gestation, and ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. II - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin
... them to cross, and they've laid in a supply of water-bags accordingly,—but it's the meanest weapon! And then again, there's men that are iron, and not to be bent under calamities, that these tears can twist round your little finger. Well, I suppose Faith concluded 'twas no use to go hungry because her bread wasn't buttered on both sides, but she always acted as if she'd condescended ninety degrees in marrying Dan, and Dan always seemed ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 55, May, 1862 • Various
... not so! I never cursed thee, love; I never moved My little finger, ere I looked to thee For ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Francesca da Rimini • George Henry Boker
... the ateliers: toy-making, wooden shoes with leather tops for the trenches, cigarette packages, baskets, typewriting, stenography, weaving, repairing. In one of the many ateliers I visited with Madame Castell I saw a man who had only one arm, and the left at that, and only a thumb and little finger remaining of the ten he had taken into war, learning to write anew. When I was shown one of his exercises I was astounded. He wrote far better than I have ever done, and I can recall few handwritings so precise and elegant. One may imagine what a man ...
— The Living Present • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... greater quantity— enough for four or five individuals. The sdines are roasted over a charcoal fire, and flavored with a sauce of lemon, pimento, and garlic. When there are no sdines, there are sure to be coulious in plenty,—small coulious about as long as your little finger: these are more delicate, and fetch double the price. With four sous' worth of coulious a family can have a superb blaffe. To make a blaffe the fish are cooked in water, and served with pimento, lemon, spices, onions, and garlic; but without oil or butter. Experience has demonstrated ...
— Two Years in the French West Indies • Lafcadio Hearn
... LEVI, Whose little finger is as heavy As loins of patriarchs, prince-prelate, And bishop-secular. This zealot Is of a mungrel, diverse kind; 1225 Cleric before, and lay behind; A lawless linsie-woolsie brother, Half of one order, half another; A creature of amphibious ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... the whole house are now all mere cylinders of bark, and through the thickest of them you could push your little finger. The household furniture—in fact everything made of wood—has been attacked and utterly ruined. Indeed, the ants will gnaw through most substances except earthenware, glass, iron, and tin. So greatly are these tiny creatures ...
— The New McGuffey Fourth Reader • William H. McGuffey
... a three-stringed lute; and a hat of state very high and hard. When the prudent Mrs Chivery perceived that in addition to these adornments her John carried a pair of white kid gloves, and a cane like a little finger-post, surmounted by an ivory hand marshalling him the way that he should go; and when she saw him, in this heavy marching order, turn the corner to the right; she remarked to Mr Chivery, who was ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... and Do lay on the arm of poor Midge who never moved except to touch them now and then with a tender little finger, or to kiss them softly, saying, "Dear babies, it is very nice not to be all alone. Are you comfy, darlings?" till she ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... denomination he might belong to, or the character of his congregation, but as I watched, I saw him draw a sporting paper from his pocket, and turning his hand, a hitherto unseen diamond flashed brilliantly from his little finger. I hastily, revised my judgment, and turning slightly observed the man who sat next me. Determined to draw only logical inferences, I scrutinized his coat, that garment being usually highly suggestive to our best regulated detectives. I noticed that while the left sleeve was unworn ...
— The Gold Bag • Carolyn Wells
... astonishment which kept George fixed and staring. Georgiana, who sat immediately facing the door, gazed at him with dark, enormous eyes. Between the thumb and forefinger of her right hand she was holding a drumstick of the dismembered chicken; her little finger, elegantly crooked, stood apart from the rest of her hand. Her mouth was open, but the drumstick had never reached its destination; it remained, suspended, frozen, in mid-air. The other two sisters had turned round to look at the ...
— Crome Yellow • Aldous Huxley
... one to the other, and began to fumble about under his blue cotton blouse till he produced from some hidden pocket a tiny thin bottle, less than my little finger, and gave it to ...
— To The West • George Manville Fenn
... two came blustering as if her hand were not enough; but Jemmy Armstrong rapped them so sharply over the pate, with "Soft, ye loons, her hand!" that they dabbed at her little finger-tips, and were out of his reach in a jiffy, rubbing their polls with a sheepish grin; for Jemmy Armstrong's love-pats would have cracked ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett
... being one inch and nine tenths in diameter. Their claws are five in number, attached to as many short digitations. The three middle claws are strong, and about eight or nine tenths of an inch in length; the thumb and little finger claws are also strong, but shorter than the others, being only from six to seven tenths of an inch. The fleshy root of the thumb claw is smaller and more flexible than the others. The sole of the paw is hard, and the upper part is covered with the common hair, down to the roots of the claws ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 2 • David Collins
... had imagined. Having paid his landlord the trifle due for rent, without any other incumbrance than the packet of articles picked up in the trunk at sea, three pounds sterling in his pocket, and the ring of Madame de Fontanges on his little finger, Newton, with his father, set off ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... strikes Dick over the shoulders with a rattan as big as your little finger. A lawyer would tell you the story something in this way:—And that, whereas the said Thomas, at the said Providence, in the year and day aforesaid, in and upon the body of the said Richard, in the peace of God and the State, then and there being, did make a most violent assault and inflicted ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, - Issue 495, June 25, 1831 • Various
... there is a powerful telescope. Many Germans carry a "ziel-stock," a long walking stick from the bottom of which a tripod can be protruded and near the top a sort of handle piece of metal about as big as a little finger. When the German sportsman has sighted a roebuck he plants his aiming stick in the ground, rests the rifle on the side projection, carefully adjusts his telescope, sets the hair trigger on his rifle and finally ...
— Face to Face with Kaiserism • James W. Gerard
... forego your share of the De Repentigny fortune, Angelique? You could call it your own any day you chose by giving your little finger to Le Gardeur! you do really ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... 9. Dolor humeri in hepatitide. Pain of shoulder in hepatitis. 10. Torpor pedum variola Cold feet in eruption of small-pox. erumpente. 11. Testium dolor nephriticus. Nephritic pain of testis. 12. Dolor digiti minimi Pain of little finger from sympathy. sympatheticus. 13. Dolor brachii in hydrope Pain of the arm in dropsy of the pectoris. chest. 14. Diarrhoea a dentitione. Diarrhoea ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. II - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin
... again,' she said, and then she turned to go. But the two men who were holding the King by the arms seized his hands and forced a knife into his grasp, and then made him cut her little finger just enough ...
— The Red Fairy Book • Various
... fool?" she answered. "Do you not know that to speak disrespectfully of the ancestors of a Chinaman is unforgivable? To all appearances Prince Shan never moved from his wonderful palace in Pekin, many thousands of miles away. Yet he lifted his little finger and ...
— The Great Prince Shan • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... finger. When I first saw him, his fingers were all close together; but now the little finger was quite away from the third finger—the ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... as I could; and when I came to 'I, Henry, take thee, Nyleptha,' I translated, and also 'I, Nyleptha, take thee, Henry,' which she repeated after me very well. Then Sir Henry took a plain gold ring from his little finger and placed it on hers, and so on to the end. The ring had been Curtis' mother's wedding-ring, and I could not help thinking how astonished the dear old Yorkshire lady would have been if she could have foreseen that her wedding-ring was to serve ...
— Allan Quatermain • by H. Rider Haggard
... drew from her finger a gold ring, set with three priceless diamonds. It was so small it would only go on the little finger of her lover's left hand. "This is a token of my love," she said gravely, "therefore guard it well. When the diamonds are bright and shining, thou shalt know that my love for thee will be burning clear and true; but if ever ...
— Tales From Scottish Ballads • Elizabeth W. Grierson
... to realize that it would not be to his advantage to continue the conversation, especially in the spirit already shown. He therefore drew himself up to his full height and gravely saluted, using the well-known Boy Scout form, with thumb and little finger touching and the other three fingers ...
— Boy Scouts Mysterious Signal - or Perils of the Black Bear Patrol • G. Harvey Ralphson
... attention. It was a great door of massive and magnificent oak, highly polished, with heavy bands of glittering bronze running across it. But it was so lightly poised on its hinges, that, despite its great weight, a child could have swung it back and forth with his little finger. Henry Ware, who built the house after his term as governor was over, was always ...
— The Sword of Antietam • Joseph A. Altsheler
... betting is allowable, that if you only indulge moderately in it, you may do it with impunity. He might as well have said that if you only steal coppers the law will smile upon you, but if you steal gold you will come in for its stripes. He might as well have said, "If you only put your little finger in this fire it will not hurt you, but if you thrust your whole hand in, it will burn." There can be no moderation in a thing which is essentially and in all its principles based on dishonesty and corruption, and evil excitement and evil greed. I am profoundly sorry that such a ...
— Men of the Bible; Some Lesser-Known Characters • George Milligan, J. G. Greenhough, Alfred Rowland, Walter F.
... should catch in the wood; second, a slight wavering of the hand will not cause as much variance in the cuts as when held closer up to the rest. The left hand should act as a guide and should be held over the tool near the cutting edge. The little finger and the back part of the palm of the hand should touch the tool rest thus assuring a steady movement. The left hand should not grasp the tool at ...
— A Course In Wood Turning • Archie S. Milton and Otto K. Wohlers
... had happened to hear something, you would pore over us and our condition night and day; but because we are before your eyes you never look at us. You care nothing that this is ragged and ugly," she said, putting her little finger on his sleeve; "but you strive mightily to make an imaginary leaf on an old stick beautiful. I'm sorry you don't care for the position of women; I should have liked us to be friends; and it is the only thing about ...
— The Story of an African Farm • (AKA Ralph Iron) Olive Schreiner
... of elevated points, which answered to the punctures of the Otaheiteans, but were blacker; besides these, he had other black punctures on his body. A small cylinder was fixed through two holes in the loop of his ear, and his left hand wanted the little finger. He continued his silence for a considerable while, but some others, who ventured on board soon after him, were of a more communicative turn, and after having performed the ceremony of touching noses, spoke a language which was unintelligible to ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr
... the second finger to Simon Cleophas, the second joint to Tathideo, the third to Joseph; the top joint of the third finger to Zaccheus, the second to Stephen, the third to the evangelist Luke; the top joint of the little finger to Leatus, the second to Mark, the third to Nicodemus." Thus the body was ...
— Three Thousand Years of Mental Healing • George Barton Cutten
... beyond the limit which her own perfectly ladylike manner always sets for me; but to my surprise her foot was tapping the floor, and there was a gleam in her eyes which told the mischievous Jimmie that the music was getting into Bee's blood. Jimmie wrenched my little finger under the table ...
— Abroad with the Jimmies • Lilian Bell
... 1529, a ring was left as a bequest to a relative, described as "a table diamond set with black aniell, meate for my little finger." ...
— Arts and Crafts in the Middle Ages • Julia De Wolf Addison
... not take me long to see that though Mr. Sims commanded the vessel, by reason of his skill in navigation, yet my cousin was the real moving spirit of the entire ship's company, and could turn the captain round his little finger, if ...
— Athelstane Ford • Allen Upward
... vines." The stranger drove a jaded-looking pair of calico ponies, hitched to a clattering democrat wagon, and he sat on the extreme end of the seat, with the lines in his right hand, while his left rested on his thigh, with his little finger gracefully crooked and his elbows akimbo. He wore a blue shirt, with gay-colored armlets just above the elbows, and his vest hung unbuttoned down his lank ribs. It was plain he was ...
— Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... ready and glad to do; I gave him the gold ring, with a hearty good will, which Cousin Maud had given me for my confirmation, and he put it on his sweetheart's finger that very day, albeit her silver ring was too small for his little finger. So he bid her wear it, and solemnly promised to keep his troth, even without a ring, till the next home-coming; and Ann put her trust in her lover as surely as in ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... or they would not have laughed at the thing and made him out over-sensitive. And Ken was now growing too discouraged and bewildered to tell them. Moreover, he was getting stubborn. The thing was far from a joke. The cunning of the coach proved that. Worry wound the boys round his little finger. ...
— The Young Pitcher • Zane Grey
... I thought mysel' that it was an awkward fix, and certainly he managed those Portuguese fellows well, and turned the lot round his little finger. Ay, ay; he knows what he is doing perfectly well, young as ...
— With Moore At Corunna • G. A. Henty
... Having now reached her little finger, Mrs Nickleby was carrying the account over to the other hand, when a loud 'Hem!' which appeared to come from the very foundation of the garden-wall, gave both herself and ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens |
