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Flap   Listen
verb
Flap  v. t.  (past & past part. flapped; pres. part. flapping)  
1.
To beat with a flap; to strike. "Yet let me flap this bug with gilded wings."
2.
To move, as something broad and flaplike; as, to flap the wings; to let fall, as the brim of a hat.
To flap in the mouth, to taunt. (Obs.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Flap" Quotes from Famous Books



... they've summoned (With Hell to aid, that hears them pray) New legions of an army dread, Now down the blue sky flames the day; The dew dies off; the foul array Of obscene ravens gathers and goes, With wings that flap and beaks that flay: This is King ...
— Essays in Little • Andrew Lang

... slant wing of the flying blast; while the sun would pour in his rays full and mighty and generous, unsifted by the presumptuous glass—green and gray and crowded with distorting lines; and the sharp flap of pigeon's wing would be mimic thunder to the flash which leapt from its whiteness ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald

... arranged for the instincts and several habits of animals. The true otter-hound is completely web-footed, even to the roots of its claws; thus enabling it to swim with much greater facility and swiftness than other dogs. But it has another extraordinary formation; the ear possesses a sort of flap, which covering the aperture excludes the entrance of the water, and thus the dog is enabled to dive after the otter without that inconvenience which it would otherwise experience. The Earl of Cadogan has, what his Lordship considers, the last of the breed of the true otter-hound. It was a present ...
— Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse

... It was of the ordinary business size and was stamped with the Boston postmark, and a date a week old. Captain Dan looked at the postmark, studied the address, which was in an unfamiliar handwriting, and then turned the envelope over. On the flap was printed "Shepley and Farwell, Attorneys, ——- Devonshire Street." The captain drew a long breath; he leaned back in his chair and sat staring at ...
— Cap'n Dan's Daughter • Joseph C. Lincoln

... a loose pair of blue pantaloons, with boots rising above his knees pulled over them: his lower parts remind you of Charles the Twelfth. He has a long scarlet waistcoat, with large gilt buttons and flap pockets, and his uniform coat over all, of blue turned up with red, has a very commanding appearance. To a broad black belt over his shoulder hangs his cutlass, the sheath of which is mounted with silver, and the hilt ...
— Snarley-yow - or The Dog Fiend • Frederick Marryat

... is fastened to a thin board held in the left hand and resting on the left arm of the observer. A stop watch is inserted in a small compartment attached to the back of the board at a point a little above its center, the face of the watch being seen from the front of the board through a small flap cut partly loose from the observation blank. While the watch is operated by the fingers of the left hand, the right hand of the operator is at all times free to enter the time observations on the blank. A pencil sketch of the work to be observed is made in the blank space on the ...
— Shop Management • Frederick Winslow Taylor

... full of roots or sprouts (a kind of rush). Sprush, spruce. Spunk, a match; a spark; fire, spirit. Spunkie, full of spirit. Spunkie, liquor, spirits. Spunkies, jack-o'-lanterns, will-o'-wisps. Spurtle-blade, the pot-stick. Squatter, to flap. Squattle, to squat; to settle. Stacher, to totter. Staggie, dim. of staig. Staig, a young horse. Stan', stand. Stane, stone. Stan't, stood. Stang, sting. Stank, a moat; a pond. Stap, to stop. Stapple, a stopper. Stark, strong. Starnies, dim. of starn, star. Starns, stars. Startle, ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns

... high arches overhead. Passing near the gorilla's cage I heard Jack's voice, as he yelled with stentorian lungs: "Will nobody let me out? Oh, will nobody let me out?" Quick as thought I ran behind his cage, and unfastened the narrow flap that closed the opening. In another moment the African gorilla was out and across the hall, to where a blonde young lady in a white dress was being helplessly borne along by old Coriander, also encumbered by the stout mother of Miss ...
— Half-Hours with Great Story-Tellers • Various

... tents we went forward till we were met at the largest by a sort of marine footman, who bowed slightly and said to me, "What name shall I say, ma'am?" and I answered distinctly, so that he might get the name right, "Mr. and Mrs. Homos." Then he held back the flap of the marquee, which seemed to serve these people as a drawing-room, and called out, standing very rigidly upright, to let us pass, in the way that I remembered so well, "Mr. And Mrs. 'Omos!" and a severe-looking, rather elderly lady rose to meet us with an air that was both ...
— Through the Eye of the Needle - A Romance • W. D. Howells

... warm Carolinas, and the sand-banks fringed with pines; where the great owl-rays leap and flap, like giant bats, upon the tide. But I wandered north and north, upon the treacherous warm gulf stream, till I met with the cold icebergs, afloat in the mid-ocean. So I got tangled among the icebergs, and chilled with the frozen breath. But the water babies helped me from ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V2 • Charles H. Sylvester

... banners of the Carlovingian prince. His reply is expressed with the eloquence of indignation and truth: "We confess the magnitude of your preparation," says the great-grandson of Charlemagne. "Your armies were indeed as numerous as a cloud of summer locusts, who darken the day, flap their wings, and, after a short flight, tumble weary and breathless to the ground. Like them, ye sunk after a feeble effort; ye were vanquished by your own cowardice; and withdrew from the scene of action to injure and despoil our Christian subjects of the Sclavonian coast. We were few in number, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon

... minister's gaze down from the moon to the quay-door. Its upper flap still stood open, allowing a square of moonlight to pierce the straight black shadow of the ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... rifle raised against my life. The ample surtout of greenish blanket-cloth, a little further faded—the red skirt underneath—the coarse horse-skin boots rising to his thighs—the crimson kerchief turbaned around his head, its loose flap falling down over his shaggy eyebrows—were all identical with the portrait remaining in my memory. I watched him with eager eye. Was it his intention to step nearer and examine us? Or had he come forth upon some other business? He was looking grave, and sad, I thought; but ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid

... chiffonnier, and overmantel, and all. You couldn't wish for anything better. The girl I lived with had only a few odd bits—I'd be ashamed to have such a poor sort of parlour.—In the kitchen they give you a dresser, and a flap-table, and linoleum on the floor. Jim and me went to the shop one day to have a look round. ... That was when he had a bit put by!" Mary sighed, and flicked away a tear. "And now you're going next! I'm getting a bit sick of bad luck, ...
— Flaming June • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... is greatly excited) like a short cape or cloak (see Fig. 7). These great ears differ somewhat in shape in the elephants of different parts of Africa, and local races can be distinguished by the longer or shorter angle into which the flap is drawn out. The grinding teeth of the two elephants differ very markedly, but one must see these in a museum. The grinders are very large and long (from behind forwards), coming into place one after the other. Each grinder occupies, when fully in position, ...
— More Science From an Easy Chair • Sir E. Ray (Edwin Ray) Lankester

... rods pivoted together at the corners and swinging on two centers, so that in the first position it is truly square, and in other positions of rhomboid form, the two outer bars approaching each other like those of a parallel ruler. The hinge flap comes down on the exact center of the plate, minus the thickness of the block holding the diamond. By this appliance plates can be cut in either direction. Fig. 3 represents a similar arrangement for cutting a number of very small plates out of one large one; ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 647, May 26, 1888 • Various

... flap their way slowly over the ocean floor, looking for a dinner. They can eat shell-fish, and are fitted with teeth suited to the work of crushing such hard fare. But, as we have seen, they have also the Shark's love of eating ...
— Within the Deep - Cassell's "Eyes And No Eyes" Series, Book VIII. • R. Cadwallader Smith

... life has gone out of them. In the hands of an inferior artist, who fancies that imagination is something to be squeezed out of color-tubes, the past becomes a phantasmagoria of jackboots, doublets, and flap-hats, the mere property-room of a deserted theatre, as if the light had been scenical and illusory, the world an unreal thing that vanished with the foot-lights. It is the power of catching the actors in great events at unawares that makes ...
— Among My Books • James Russell Lowell

... Bethink you, my lord, how necessary is this rod of mine to fright away all those listeners, who else would play at bo-peep with the honourable council, and be searching for keyholes and crannies in the door of the chamber, so as to render my staff as needful as a fly-flap in a ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott

... observed to exhibit some peculiar action of the limbs when standing at rest; some move the head monotonously in a circle, or from right to left; some swing their feet back and forward; others flap their ears or sway themselves from side to side, or rise and sink by alternately bending and straightening the fore knees. As the opportunities of observing this custom have been almost confined to elephants ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent

... impiety; for they had much experience in these matters. But among them was a Gaster who was calmer than the swearer, and more prudent and conciliating than those he swore against. Hearing this objurgation, he went blandly up to the sacred porker, and, lifting the flap of his right ear between forefinger and thumb with all delicacy and gentleness, thus whispered into it: "You do not in your heart believe that any of us are such fools as to sell our gods, at least while we have such a reserve ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor

... described him it would have been necessary to write a military memoir, for he wore under his smock-frock a cast-off soldier's jacket that had seen hot service, its collar showing just above the flap of the frock; also a hunting memoir, to include the top-boots that he had picked up by chance; also chronicles of voyaging and shipwreck, for his pocket-knife had been given him by a weather-beaten sailor. But Creedle carried about with ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy

... was sitting once in the wigwam here, Philip's maid came in with the child in her arms, and asked me to give her a piece of my apron, to make a flap for it. I told her I would not. Then my mistress bade me give it, but still I said no. The maid told me if I would not give her a piece, she would tear a piece off it. I told her I would tear her coat then. With that my mistress rises up, and take up a stick big enough to have killed me, ...
— Captivity and Restoration • Mrs. Mary Rowlandson

... The flap of the tent was raised - the couple entered. Next moment a wild shriek from the girl thrilled through all present. Bill slapped his leg. 'That's done the trick!' he whispered to 'Becca. It was indeed a splendid advertisement of the charms of Robert. ...
— Five Children and It • E. Nesbit

... sojourns at the Post. When they are away at their camps and igloos their own costume is almost exclusively worn, and is the best possible costume for the climate and the country. The adikey, or koolutuk, of the women, has a long flap or tail, reaching nearly to the heels, and a sort of apron in front. The hood is so commodious in size that a baby can be tucked away into it, and that is the way the small children are carried. The men wear cloth trousers except in the very cold weather, ...
— The Long Labrador Trail • Dillon Wallace

... we took prompt measures to provide against it, and he was quick to suggest that we adopt the tactics of Forrest and ride at them if they made a display of hostilities. I had just time to shift my carbine to the front under my overcoat and loosen the flap of my holsters when the lady drove up. We raised our hats as she came up, and made way for her ...
— A Little Union Scout • Joel Chandler Harris

... boat. We added a few things that lay handy, and in a few minutes were laughingly driving our four-footed treasures on shore, to the extreme astonishment of the gannets, which seemed as though they would never cease to flap their wings, as their new associates were driven ...
— The Little Savage • Captain Frederick Marryat

... to fetch it without touching the wall. When the child who fetches it comes back, if he has failed ever so little to fulfil the conditions, a dab of white on the brim of his cap, the tip of his shoe, the flap of his coat or his sleeve, will betray his ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau

... Church, John; Golly is going there, too, as hospital nurse. There's a pair of you! He! he! Look after her, John, and protect her Manx simplicity." Before John could recover himself, Golly was at his side executing the final steps of a "cellar-door flap jig" ...
— New Burlesques • Bret Harte

... another house, facing the long garden and originally the river. The front of this house boasts the loveliest bit of Georgian architecture left in the old seaport. A pure Adam loggia, executed in stone, runs across the garden facade. While arches are now filled in and clothes hung to dry flap on the gallery, the outline is so chaste in its classic form that nothing can destroy the ...
— Seaport in Virginia - George Washington's Alexandria • Gay Montague Moore

... think, to look at him," Urquhart said to Lucy, "that he had been going in extensively for the flip-flap this afternoon. It's a pity Stephen can't see you, Margery; you look starved enough to satisfy even him. You never come across Stephen now, I suppose? You wouldn't, of course. He has no opinion of the Ignorant Rich. Nor even of the well-informed rich, like me. He's blindly prejudiced in ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay

... selected one of the telegrams and ripped open the flap. There was no change in his fine mobile features, but his eyes were fixed on the message for a long time. He was brought to himself ...
— Death Points a Finger • Will Levinrew

... considered later. Well, she was glad she had settled it all. If she had not come to this conclusion she might have been, at that very instant, dropping the letter to Harold Vickers into the box. She would have stood, thus, facing the box, have raised the cast-iron flap,—this with one hand,—and with the other have thrust ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various

... he muttered. "Maid gone off on her own business, I suppose. Well, I can sit down here and wait till Beatrice comes back. What's this? A letter addressed by some unknown correspondent to Mrs. Richford. By Jove! Sartoris's address on the flap. Now, what does this little game mean? And who wrote the letter? My dear Sartoris, if I only had you here ...
— The Slave of Silence • Fred M. White

... more defiant as the last allies of Holland, the States of Utrecht, were gradually losing courage, were seen the freshest ballads and caricatures against the Advocate. Here an engraving represented him seated at table with Grotius, Hoogerbeets, and others, discussing the National Synod, while a flap of the picture being lifted put the head of the Duke of Alva on the legs of Barneveld, his companions being transformed in similar manner into Spanish priests and cardinals assembled at the terrible ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... our traveller possessed was an old curved sabre; but it was doubtful whether it could be drawn from its iron scabbard, which appeared as rusty as if it had lain for years at the bottom of a river. It was carried obliquely along the flap of the saddle, and under the thigh of the horseman—the common mode in Mexico—thus transferring the weight of the weapon from the hip of the rider to the ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid

... this means it soon freezes as hard as a stone, and prevents their common enemy, the wolverene, from disturbing them during the winter; and as they are frequently seen to walk over their work, and sometimes to give a flap with their tail, particularly when plunging into the water, this has, without doubt, given rise to the vulgar opinion that they use their tails as a trowel, with which they plaster their houses; whereas that ...
— Quadrupeds, What They Are and Where Found - A Book of Zoology for Boys • Mayne Reid

... remarkable character of these species is the presence at the end of the snout of a semi-circular lobe, which forms a flap completely covering the openings of the nostrils. This lobe can, of course, only be well seen in the specimens preserved in spirit. In the dried skin its presence can sometimes be detected, but not always. In the only spirit specimen, an adult female, the flap measures about 0.3 inch in breadth, ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale

... not to go out, after all,' said Henry, returning surprisingly to the room. 'I don't feel like it.' And he settled into an ear-flap chair that had ...
— A Great Man - A Frolic • Arnold Bennett

... death when they entered. Not so much as the flap of a wing or the stir of a leaf roused suspicion, yet they had barely advanced a short hundred paces when those apparently bare rocks in front flamed red, the narrow defile echoed to wild screeches and became instantly crowded with weird, leaping figures. It was like a plunge from heaven ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish

... of shocking shots, he took the seventeenth hole in seven, he was in a parlous condition. His run of success had engendered within him a desire for conversation. He wanted, as it were, to flap his wings and crow. I could see Dignity wrestling with Talkativeness. I gave him ...
— Love Among the Chickens • P. G. Wodehouse

... layer of it in the front corners of the cabin. A loud humming noise was ringing in his ears, and mingled with it was a deep, sonorous roar. Brick threw off the blanket and crawled to the door. He pulled the sled away and partly lifted the flap of canvas. When he saw a solid wall of snow staring him in the face, he uttered a shout that ...
— The Camp in the Snow - Besiedged by Danger • William Murray Graydon

... the injury takes place. In its movement backwards the inner border of the shoe of the hind-foot catches the coronet of the fore, and tears it backwards with it. Quite frequently a portion of the skin is removed entirely, but often it hangs as a triangular flap. The flap in such a case is always attached by its hindermost edge, and indicates plainly enough that the direction of the blow that cut it must have ...
— Diseases of the Horse's Foot • Harry Caulton Reeks

... I came on deck, I found that we were lying becalmed. The sea was as smooth as glass, but it could not be called level; for ever and anon there came a slow rising swell, which made the little craft rock from side to side, and the sails flap with a loud irregular sound against the masts, as if they were angry at having nothing to do, and wished to remind the wind to fulfil its duty. The sun shone out of the sky, without a cloud to temper its heat, and its rays made one side of the ocean shine ...
— Mark Seaworth • William H.G. Kingston

... a general favourite with the younger as well as with the elder part of the family, was seized upon the moment he entered the room: a pretty little girl of five years old took him prisoner by the flap of the coat, whilst two of her brothers assailed him with questions about the ears, eyes, and fins of fishes. One of the little boys filliped the glass globe, and observed, that the fish immediately came to the surface of the water, and seemed ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth

... skirt of his coat. The Queen, while speaking of this event, said that on the most momentous occasions whimsical contrasts always struck her, and that even at such a moment the pious Elisabeth holding Barnave by the flap of his ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan

... Master Porges, flap-cheeked and stertorous, grovelled like a fat spaniel. Prosper came to the rescue as he swam up to the height of a man again, gasping for the air. "Ah, seneschal," he said, "we each love honour and ensue it after our fashion. We should be ...
— The Forest Lovers • Maurice Hewlett

... newcomers rather coldly, Grace and Arline turned to leave the tent. But Grace reflected grimly as she lifted the tent flap that if any one of the trio had been the all-wise Sphinx, instead of her friend Emma Dean, there were several questions she might have asked that would have been disconcerting to ...
— Grace Harlowe's Third Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower

... winds won from the midland vales To where the tress of the Siren trails O'er the flossy tip of the mountain phlox And the bare limbs twined in the crested rocks, High above as the seagulls flap Their lopping wings ...
— Afterwhiles • James Whitcomb Riley

... instead of putting one complete sleeping suit, he puts in the upper parts of two, without the nether and more necessary portions. It is irritating to discover, when you are dressing in a hurry, that he has put your studs into the upper flap of your shirt front; but I am not sure it does not try your patience more to find out, as you brush your teeth, that he has replenished your tooth-powder box from a bottle of Gregory's mixture. But Dhobie day is his opportunity. He first ...
— Behind the Bungalow • EHA

... to flap over you shelteringly, madame," I rejoined, somewhat flippantly, I fear, "and will to the end, no doubt; for, in its very organization, our country can never be subjected to the fluctuations of other lands—revolt ...
— Miriam Monfort - A Novel • Catherine A. Warfield

... Unsnap the flap of the pocket and the interior retaining strap; lay the retaining strap out flat in prolongation of the pocket, insert a clip of cartridges, points of bullets up, in front of the retaining strap; press down until the base of the clip rests on the bottom of ...
— Military Instructors Manual • James P. Cole and Oliver Schoonmaker

... burnt red earth, were gaunt, tattered, and thirsty-looking, weary of crying for moisture to the pitiless skies. At last the ceaseless ripple of talk ceased, crew and passengers slept on the hot deck, and no sounds were heard but the drowsy flap of the awning, and the drowsier creak of the rudder, as the Kilauea swayed sleepily on the lazy undulations. The flag drooped and fainted with heat. The white sun blazed like a magnesium light on blue water, black lava, and fiery soil, roasting, blinding, scintillating, and flushed ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird

... a fourth will take Hercules's club from him, and with that centurion in the Spanish [5431]Caelestina, will kill ten men for his mistress Areusa, for a word of her mouth he will cut bucklers in two like pippins, and flap down men like flies, Elige quo mortis genere illum occidi cupis? [5432]Galeatus of Mantua did a little more: for when he was almost mad for love of a fair maid in the city, she, to try him belike what he would do for her sake, bade him in jest leap into the river Po if he loved her; ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior

... a crow who was no sleeper, But a thief and a murderer Till a very late hour; and this keeper Made him one of the things that were, To hang and flap in rain and wind, In the sun and in the snow. There are no more sins to be sinned On the dead oak ...
— Poems • Edward Thomas

... jolly, And sprouting is every corbel and rafter With lightsome green of ivy and holly; Through the deep gulf of the chimney wide Wallows the Yule-log's roaring tide; The broad flame pennons droop and flap And belly and tug as a flag in the wind; Like a locust shrills the imprisoned sap, Hunted to death in its galleries blind; And swift little troops of silent sparks, Now pausing, now scattering away as in fear, Go threading the soot forest's tangled ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman

... Luff! Luff! to some one in the dark water before the ship. In that direction, we could just see a light, and then, the great black hull of a strange vessel, that was coming down on us obliquely; and so near, that we heard the flap of her topsails as they shook in the wind, the trampling of feet on the deck, and the same cry of Luff! Luff! that our ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville

... odds with the turkey-cock, and I can't even please the pigs. The very hens pick holes in my hands when I grope for the new-laid eggs, And the gander comes hissing out of the pond on purpose to flap at my legs. I've been bump'd in a ditch by the cow without horns, and the old sow trampled me down, The beasts are as vicious as any wild beasts—but they're kept in cages in town! Another thing is the nasty dogs—thro' the village I hardly can stir Since giving ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood

... and turned to the automatic figure, eager to find out what it contained; his penny had hardly dropped when a little flap opened and a large, white envelope, sealed with a big, red seal, fell out. He couldn't make out the letters on the seal, but that was neither here nor there, as he did not know ...
— In Midsummer Days and Other Tales • August Strindberg

... I didn't know whether you were English or not, till after you'd climbed up? Nor I did. But one of the men's up, and there's a bell-push under the flap of the table." ...
— The Brother of Daphne • Dornford Yates

... and cup from the cover and places them on the left side of the haversack; unstraps and spreads out haversack so as to expose its contents; folds up the carrier to uncover the cartridge pockets; opens same; unrolls toilet articles and places them on the outer flap of the haversack; places underwear carried in pack on the left half of the open pack, with round fold parallel with front edge of pack; opens first-aid pouch and exposes contents to view. Special articles carried ...
— Infantry Drill Regulations, United States Army, 1911 - Corrected to April 15, 1917 (Changes Nos. 1 to 19) • United States War Department

... turned her head from side to side, crying and coughing. Grandma was saying, "My land, my land, I'd give five years of my life to be in my own house with this sick little mite!" when a smooth gray head thrust aside the tent flap and a neighborly ...
— Across the Fruited Plain • Florence Crannell Means

... a big white goose would drop into the pond or an ibis flap lazily overhead, seeming to realize that it had nothing to fear from the prostrate bodies which spat fire at other birds. The stillness of the marsh was absolute save for the voices of the water fowl mingled in the wild, sweet clamor so dear to the heart of every sportsman. As the day began to die, ...
— Camps and Trails in China - A Narrative of Exploration, Adventure, and Sport in Little-Known China • Roy Chapman Andrews and Yvette Borup Andrews

... hideous death—bear her limbs aloft wherever there is dust to dust, till she reach that devouring den, and fiercer and more furious than any bird of prey that ever bathed its beak in blood, throttle the fiends that with their heavy wing would fain flap her down the cliffs, and hold ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson

... said, as he sealed the flap of the envelope. "Seems funny to be writing a note to the Hermit, doesn't it. The shoe generally used to be on the other foot when we were on the Patrol. By the way, there's one thing that's been puzzling me for some little time. ...
— The Ranger Boys and the Border Smugglers • Claude A. Labelle

... themselves in vain phosphoric flashes, but will not ignite; the water that has run down your neck has formed reservoirs within your boots; the servants are reduced to the inactivity of sponges; and—the tents MUST be pitched. The heavy soaked canvas that can hardly flap in the strong wind is at length spread over the cold soft ground; the camp-beds, though wet as tripe, MUST be arranged; and down go the iron legs, sinking to an unknown depth into the ...
— Cyprus, as I Saw it in 1879 • Sir Samuel W. Baker

... couldn't honestly say I remembered it. But I still have a little hope you'll hear good news from Mr. Dickerson; or that in the morning it may be handed in at our house, for my dad put his full address on the back flap, I remember that very distinctly. Yes, I'd be willing to stand my gruelling and not whimper if only ...
— Jack Winters' Gridiron Chums • Mark Overton

... out with a sharp scalpel a crescentic flap of skin muscle, etc., convexity forward, commencing 0.5 cm. in front of the root of one ear and terminating at a similar spot in front of the other ...
— The Elements of Bacteriological Technique • John William Henry Eyre

... the first great vault, which forms a sort of vestibule to the caverns. With our hands to our mouths we hallooed several times and then held our breath while we waited for an answer. The only sound which came out of the stillness was the occasional drip of water or the flap of a bat's wing. Had the Colonel been lost in any of the winding passages he must have heard us and replied, for the slightest sound is audible in such a cavern, echoing and re-echoing as it does through countless vaulted galleries. ...
— The Four Pools Mystery • Jean Webster

... tatters upon his emaciated frame. On his head was an old felt hat, in a terribly dilapidated condition. He wore one boot and one shoe, which he had probably taken from the common sewer of Richmond, or some other southern city; they were ripped to such an extent that the "uppers" went flipperty-flap as he walked, and had the general appearance of the open mouth of the mythic dragon, with five bare toes ...
— The Soldier Boy; or, Tom Somers in the Army - A Story of the Great Rebellion • Oliver Optic

... Berto's compare, and I thought of Butler's accident and of the authoress of the Odyssey writing her poem up here three thousand years ago. And what are three thousand years to Time in his flight? An interval that he can clear with a flap or two of his mighty wings. No one knows how often he has flapped them since these narrow roughly paved streets began to give the town its irregular shape; no one knows anything of the prehistoric ...
— Castellinaria - and Other Sicilian Diversions • Henry Festing Jones

... your grandfather's with me? Come on, then;" and here they will come, the puppy so glad that his gait is more awkward than ever, his fat body, twisted out of all shape, wriggling along, while his tail will flap about in every direction and his ears look like ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various

... ducks!" she said. (She called it "docks," Melody; you cannot think how soft her speech was.) "Poor leetle docks, that go flap, flap; not yet zey have learned to swim, no! But here now, see a bird of ze water, a sea-bird what you call." She turned her wrist and sent the flat pebble flying; it skimmed along like a live thing, flipping the little crests of the ripples, going miles, it seemed to ...
— Rosin the Beau • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards

... selection of chance domestic variations. Now we can see according to this view that a foot might be selected with longer and longer bones, and wider connecting membranes, till it became a swimming organ, and so on till it became an organ by which to flap along the surface or to glide over it, and lastly to fly through the air: but in such changes there would be no tendency to alter the framework of the internal inherited structure. Parts might become lost (as the tail in dogs, or horns in cattle, or ...
— The Foundations of the Origin of Species - Two Essays written in 1842 and 1844 • Charles Darwin

... the clouds had now spread over the horizon—except to the southward, where it was still clear, and from which a short sharp gust of wind came every now and then, filling out the loose folds of the courses, and then, as it died away, letting them flap against the masts with a heavy dull sound as of distant thunder, an occasional streak of pale lightning darting across the sky to the north-west, where the heavens were most obscured, as if to bear ...
— On Board the Esmeralda - Martin Leigh's Log - A Sea Story • John Conroy Hutcheson

... which he had some supper. I saw it again in his room when I went in there to look at the plans of the Norwegian estate which he had told me about. He didn't take those plans out of that hand-bag; he took them out of a side flap-pocket in ...
— The Rayner-Slade Amalgamation • J. S. Fletcher

... fair-sized dog-kennel, and a tent-pole happens to give way. Then you wake with wet canvas flapping about you. The rain pours down in a deluge that makes you shiver at the mere thought of turning out to put the tent-pole right. Let the rain drift and the canvas flap with sounds like gunshots. It is better at any rate than lying as Tommy does on the hillside yonder with only one blanket to roll himself in, and with that thought, perhaps, you may be able to cuddle yourself off to sleep again ...
— Four Months Besieged - The Story of Ladysmith • H. H. S. Pearse

... rolled off the tip of his clever tongue, same as Mulvaney here, as would ha' made a rare good preacher if he had nobbut given his mind to it. I lent him a suit o' miner's kit as almost buried th' little man, and his white face down i' th' coat-collar and hat-flap looked like the face of a boggart, and he cowered down i' th' bottom o' the waggon. I was drivin' a tram as led up a bit of an incline up to th' cave where the engine was pumpin', and where th' ore was brought up and put into th' ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling

... preferred to retain their national dress and manners; and in this respect they presented a marked contrast to the delegates from Bengal. Some of these appeared in entirely European costume, while others could easily be recognised as Bengalis by the peculiar cap with a flap behind which they had donned. None of them wore the gold rings or diamond pendants which adorned the ears of some of the Madrassees; nor had they their foreheads painted like their more orthodox and more conservative brethren from the Southern presidency. There were Hindustanis from Delhi, Agra, ...
— New Ideas in India During the Nineteenth Century - A Study of Social, Political, and Religious Developments • John Morrison

... the thick fibre of the deltoid to the bone. He tried to sever the tendons to slip the head of the humerus from the socket, but failed. He wasted no time in further trial, but made a second incision from the bullet-hole diagonally to the middle of the first cut, and turned the pointed flap thus made up over the shoulder. It was now easy to unjoint the bones, and but a moment's work to saw off the shattered piece, tie the severed arteries, and bring the flap again ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 5 • Various

... the wind clan of the Omahas to flap their overalls to start a breeze, while a sorcerer of New Britain desirous of appeasing the wind god throws burnt lime into the air, and towards the point of the compass he wishes to make a prosperous journey, chanting meanwhile a song. Finnish wizards made a pretence of selling wind to ...
— A History of Nursery Rhymes • Percy B. Green

... college halls, it rustled the thumbed book leaves of the schoolrooms. This wind blew upon all vanes of all the churches of the country and turned them one way, — toward war. It blew, and shook out as if by magic a flag whose device was unknown to soldier or sailor before, but whose every flap and flutter made the blood bound in our veins. . . . It arrayed the sanctity of a righteous cause in the brilliant trappings of military display. . . . It offered tests to all allegiances and loyalties, — of church, of state; of private loves, ...
— Sidney Lanier • Edwin Mims

... it raced past, with suddenly altered flight, beating its powerful wings over my head. Its white body looked enormous as the mist swallowed it. At the same moment a gust tore my hat from my head and flung the flap of my coat across my eyes. But I was well-trained by this time, and made a quick dash after the retreating black object, only to find on overtaking it that I held a prickly branch of gorse. The wind combed my hair viciously. ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery In Four Volumes - Mystic-Humorous Stories • Various

... conception of our future. We shall have, beyond question, the ordinary collapse of speculation that follows a sudden expansion of paper currency. We shall have that shivering and expectant period when the sails flap and the ship trembles ere it takes the wind on the new tack. But it is no idle boast to say that there never was a country with such resources as ours. In Europe the question about a man always is, What is he? Here it is as invariably, What does he do? ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell

... to each other and went about the business of preparing for slumber. As he raised the glowing flap of his tent, Larkin saw Smith lounging in a chair before the electric heat unit. "Aren't you ...
— The Terrible Answer • Arthur G. Hill

... on one layer of skin with the hair inside and over that another covering of skin with the fur side out. She sewed the skins together over the entrance with leather thongs and left a flap for a door. ...
— The Eskimo Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins

... and took the limp form. The drenched garments were already frosting in the cold. He turned the flap of the cape back ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... bloodthirsty villain, Is 't you? Too late I closed the blind! Alas! List! there's another trump!—There, two of 'em!— Two? A quintette at least. Mosquito chorus! A—ah! my cheek! And oh! again, my eyelid! I gave myself a stunning cuff on the ear And all in vain. Flap we our handkerchief; Flap, flap! (A smash.) Quick, quick, bring in a lamp! I've switched a flower-vase from the shelf. Ah me! Splash on my head, and then upon my feet, The water poured;—I'm drowned! my slipper's ...
— Autumn Leaves - Original Pieces in Prose and Verse • Various

... bag so that the other side was presented for inspection, disclosing the fact that some sharp instrument had been used to cut a great flap out of the leather, running in a rough semicircle from clasp to clasp ...
— The Bandbox • Louis Joseph Vance

... before her was a small patch of marshy ground, long grass growing about a little pool. A rook had alighted on the margin, and was pecking about. Presently it rose on its heavy wings; she watched it flap athwart the dun sky. Then her eye fell on a little yellow flower near her feet, a flower she did not know. She plucked and examined it, then let it drop carelessly from ...
— A Life's Morning • George Gissing

... slow heave of a lazy sea, To the flap of an idle sail, The Nancy's Pride went out on the tide; And the skipper stood by ...
— Ballads of Lost Haven - A Book of the Sea • Bliss Carman

... large ears noticed Neville for the first time. He frowned darkly, and his big ears seemed to flap with annoyance. ...
— A Book for Kids • C. J. (Clarence Michael James) Dennis

... told that everybody had rudimentary muscles extending from the ear into the cheek. I asked: "What are they?" I was told: "They are the remains of muscles; that they became rudimentary from the lack of use." They went into bankruptcy. They are the muscles with which your ancestors used to flap their ears. Well, at first, I was greatly astonished, and afterward I was more astonished to find they had become rudimentary. How can you account for John Calvin unless we came up from the lower animals? How could you account ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll, Volume I • Robert Green Ingersoll

... moved, seeming glad to pass us by and rush again on its race undisturbed, stood still. From the swill came quiet, out of the shimmer a mirror disentangled itself, and lay there on the sea, smooth and bright. But it grew dull in an instant; I heard the sails flap, but saw them no more. A dense white vapour settled on us, the length of my arm bounded my sight, all movement ceased, and we lay on the water, inert and idle. I leant beside the gunwale, feeling the fog moist ...
— Simon Dale • Anthony Hope

... wind blowing aside a tent-flap as he passed, giving him a glimpse of its intimate interior. That little lifting of her reserve was a glance into the sanctuary of her heart. The melancholy of her eyes was born out of somebody's escapade with money; he was ready to risk his last guess ...
— Claim Number One • George W. (George Washington) Ogden

... chase each other through the water, and flap their wings and dive about, in evident enjoyment of their pastime, it is a sign that rain ...
— Welsh Folk-Lore - a Collection of the Folk-Tales and Legends of North Wales • Elias Owen

... croquetwicket, being high enough so that as we stood upright in the wagon-box our heads would just nicely clear them. Over this skeleton we stretched our white canvas cover, and tied it down tightly along the sides. This made what we called the cabin. There was an ample flap in front, which could be let down at night and fastened back inside during the day. At the rear end the cloth folded around, and was drawn together with a "puckering-string," precisely like a button-bag. By drawing the string tightly this ...
— The Voyage of the Rattletrap • Hayden Carruth

... as a 'front' down at the fortune-teller's booth," replied Davy quickly. "I'd either buy out—or buy in—with Tony Garci, who has a concession, and plant Maizie right at the tent-flap as a 'come-on.' Her name would have to be Madame Tousan, or Princess Caraza, or some such, and she would have to dress the part. Black and red, maybe, with plastered hair and a coppery skin. A quart of rings and bracelets on each hand and arm, horseshoe earrings, and a big ostrich fan. Never ...
— David Lannarck, Midget - An Adventure Story • George S. Harney

... the land. Sometimes there would be a cessation in the crimes; then a shepherd, going his rounds, would notice his sheep herding together, packing in unaccustomed squares; a raven, gorged to the crop, would rise before him and flap wearily away, and he would come upon the murderer's ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant

... cylindrical barrel, gauged to take a half-inch spherical bullet with three drachms of powder, was fitted with a nipple for percussion caps, and provided with a fixed sight for a range of one hundred yards and two flap sights for two hundred and five hundred yards respectively, the latter being regarded in those days as an exceptionally long range. Also, with a normal pull upon the trigger of six ounces, it was fitted with an ingenious arrangement which, by pressing ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood

... cartridge-belt slung jauntily across her hips and from it hung a holster of stiff new leather with the top flap open to show the butt of a man-sized forty-five caliber six-shooter—her first gun. Not a man of the gang but had loaned her his guns time and again, but they had never dreamed of giving her a weapon ...
— Riders of the Silences • Max Brand

... late, almost midnight, when he went to bed. With the storm wailing and twisting more fiercely about him, he fell asleep. And it was late when he awoke. The forest was filled with a moaning sound. The fire was low. Beyond it the flap of the woman's tent was still down, and he put on fresh fuel quietly, so that he would not awaken her. He looked at his watch and found that he had been sleeping for nearly seven hours. Then he returned to his tent to get the things for breakfast. Half a dozen paces from ...
— Isobel • James Oliver Curwood

... on the walls, reposeful leather-covered chairs and a comfortable bookcase gave an atmosphere of warmth and coziness. Paul lit a cigarette and attacked a pile of unopened letters. At last he came to an envelope, thick and faintly scented, bearing a crown on the flap. He opened ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke

... flat leather pocketbook and took an envelope from an inner flap, laying it before them on the tablecloth. His knowledge that they would not have believed him if he had not brought his proof was founded on everyday facts. They would not have doubted his veracity, but the possibility of such delirious good ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... are covered with scales; The feet are bright yellow. The fowl is in beauty Peerless, alone, though like the peacock Delightfully wrought, as the writings relate. It is neither slow in movement, nor sluggish in mien, 315 Nor slothful nor inert as some birds are, Who flap their wings in weary flight, But he is fast and fleet, and floats through the air, Marvelous, winsome, and wondrously marked. Blessed is the God who gave him that bliss! 320 When at last it leaves ...
— Old English Poems - Translated into the Original Meter Together with Short Selections from Old English Prose • Various

... slept long. It is time to be off. There is some whiskey in that flask. I don't take those things, but Ram Lal says you had better have some, as you might get fever." So I did. Then we started, leaving everything in the tent, of which we pegged down the flap. There were no natives about, the dooly-bearers having retired to the other side of the valley, and the jackals would find nothing to attract them, as we had thrown the remainder of our meal over the edge. As for weapons, I had a good revolver and a thick stick; Isaacs had a revolver and ...
— Mr. Isaacs • F. Marion Crawford

... of him who is to speak, and the right ear of him or them to whom the speaker addresses himself. This flapper is likewise employed diligently to attend his master in his walks, and upon occasion to give him a soft flap on his eyes; because he is always so wrapped up in cogitation, that he is in manifest danger of falling down every precipice, and bouncing his head against every post; and in the streets, of justling others, or being ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift

... not worth two-pence, we could purchase a large bullock; and a sheep for a small piece of iron not worth two or three good hob-nails. These natives go quite naked, having only a sheep skin on their shoulders, and a small flap of skin before them, which covers them just as much as if it were not there. While we were there, they lived on the guts and offal of the meat which we threw away, feeding in a most beastly manner, as they neither washed ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr

... pile of letters as well as his fist, and Drake sprang to gather them, replacing them on the desk and dexterously slipping a paper-cutter under the flap of each envelope as he did so. At the very first note he opened, Brax threw himself back in his chair with a long whistle of mingled amazement and concern, then ...
— Waring's Peril • Charles King

... least, it seemed so to him. Whenever he saw a bird soaring above the tree-tops he couldn't help hoping it was Mr. Crow. And whenever he heard a caw—caw far off in the distance Brownie Beaver dropped whatever he happened to be doing, expecting that Mr. Crow would flap into sight at ...
— The Tale of Brownie Beaver • Arthur Scott Bailey

... a few words in the Indian tongue. Suddenly the flap of the wigwam opened, revealing an aged Indian woman. She looked older than anyone that the girls had ever seen before. Her brown face was a network of fine wrinkles; but her black eyes blazed with ...
— The Automobile Girls in the Berkshires - The Ghost of Lost Man's Trail • Laura Dent Crane

... threshed the deck with its tail, and snapped so fiercely with its tremendous jaws, that we had to keep a sharp look-out lest it should catch hold of a leg. At last its tail was cut off, the body cut open, and all the entrails' taken out, yet even after this it continued to flap and thresh about the deck for some time, and the heart continued to contract for twenty minutes after it was taken out and pierced ...
— Fighting the Whales • R. M. Ballantyne



Words linked to "Flap" :   bate, tent flap, flapping, fly, lap, uvula, thump, undulation, fret, fly sheet, aerofoil, agitation, landing flap, roll, tent-fly, say, flaps, surface, covering, pound, flutter, flail, rainfly, fuss, codpiece, flap down, protective fold, pother, articulate, tizzy, dag, thresh, enunciate, tongue, move, pronounce, wave, overlap, wing, sound out, pocket flap, niggle, soft palate, control surface, leaflet, earlap, undulate, dither, clap, airfoil, displace



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