Free translatorFree translator
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




A couple of   /kˈəpəl əv/   Listen
A couple of

adjective
1.
More than one but indefinitely small in number.  Synonym: a few.  "A couple of roses"






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |





"A couple of" Quotes from Famous Books



... did not usually allow the careful observation necessary to clear up this difference in the development of the symptoms. Nevertheless it is preferable to consider the cases in which transitory symptoms persist for a period of hours, or even a couple of days, as instances of pure concussion, unless the existence of this condition can be ...
— Surgical Experiences in South Africa, 1899-1900 • George Henry Makins

... not spoken, as usual, but now he repeated, with rapt, far-off eyes: "'Hurley was hurt in the wrist and Diaz died?' Hurley and Diaz! I played with Hurley, a couple of times." ...
— Riders of the Silences • Max Brand

... occupied had been once a missionary station, and consisted merely of a couple of chambers, a sitting-room, and a veranda that ran round the house, which was built of an inferior species of mahogany, and ceiled and floored with the same. The colour of the wood, together with the fact, that all the former occupants had fallen victims to the ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 449 - Volume 18, New Series, August 7, 1852 • Various

... ocean and were two days without sight of land. But on the morning of the third day they saw land ahead, and came within reach of it, and cast anchor in a broad bay. This was the country to which Leif had been before and called Helloland.[1] Karlsefne had boats manned from either ship, and stayed a couple of days to explore. It was a litter of rock, very barren, and full of white foxes. They found plenty of fish, and laid in a good store; but that was no country in which to settle, so they left it, going south before a ...
— Gudrid the Fair - A Tale of the Discovery of America • Maurice Hewlett

... town and was within a couple of blocks of his hotel when he glimpsed two figures crouching against the fence of the alley. He stopped in his tracks, watched them intently an instant, and was startled by a whistle from the rear. He knew at once his retreat, too, was cut off, and without hesitation vaulted the ...
— Ridgway of Montana - (Story of To-Day, in Which the Hero Is Also the Villain) • William MacLeod Raine

... Prince grew up the courtiers proposed to the Raja that he should arrange for his son's marriage; the Raja however wished to postpone it for a time. So the courtiers used to laugh and say to the Prince "Wait a little and we will find you a couple of wives;" the young man would answer, "What is that? I can find them for myself. If you offered to find me ten or twelve wives there would be something in it." The Raja heard of his boasting like this and was very angry and said "Well if he is so sure that he ...
— Folklore of the Santal Parganas • Cecil Henry Bompas

... little Horace: they be indeed a couple of chap-fall'n curs. Come, we of the bench, let's rise to the urn, and condemn ...
— The Poetaster - Or, His Arraignment • Ben Jonson

... as much interest in one as in another. In his own life the study of the occult played a part; he was familiar with the contemporary fads in mystery and acquainted with their professors. "Ancient" history also attracted him, and he even wrote a couple of volumes of a 'History of Athens.' In all his writing there is a tendency to lapse into a discussion of the "Ideal and the Real," aiming always at the conclusion that the only true Real is the Ideal. It was this tendency which chiefly aroused the ridicule of his critics, ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various

... wouldn't mind her knowing where he lives; but he's such a queer devil that I'll write and ask him first. We shall hear in a couple of days; I can tell him her address, at any rate; then he may write direct to her, ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts

... to read books which are worse than their own. At a nine-cent window of a neighboring tinman's he was able to buy himself the few little necessities which he wanted for housekeeping. And not to detain the reader too long upon merely fleshly arrangements, in the course of a couple of hours of Tuesday evening and Wednesday evening, he had fitted up his convenient if not pretty bower with all that man requires. It was easy to buy a mince pie or a cream cake, or a bit of boiled ham or roast chicken, according as payday was near or distant. One is glad to have a tablecloth. ...
— The Brick Moon, et. al. • Edward Everett Hale

... was part green and she bought it. Then she said she'd take it right along in her car. Said she had a friend that was as loony about cats as she was and she was goin' to fetch her right down the very next day. And a couple of hours after she'd gone Nate and his boy came back with a clothes basket with a board over the top and loaded in the balance of the family and went off with 'em. I ain't seen a hair of 'em since—no, I won't say that quite, ...
— Shavings • Joseph C. Lincoln

... his work, I have been struck with that defect, or rather excess, which we find in almost all the books of a hundred or a couple of hundred years ago, and which prevails still among the Germans—I mean with that quantity of useless erudition with which they intentionally swell out their works, and the result of which is that their subject is overlaid with ...
— Selections from Previous Works - and Remarks on Romanes' Mental Evolution in Animals • Samuel Butler

... drink. Then I watched her out of the corner of my eye. She was with an older woman, and, say—she didn't see a man in that whole room. As far as they were concerned they might have been so many flies buzzing round among the palms. Then a couple of government officers lounged in and caught sight of her. They all know her down there 'cause she is of the blood royal. Her grandmother's sister was the last queen and was murdered in cold blood. Yes, sir, and there weren't men enough there to get up and shoot the bunch ...
— The Web of the Golden Spider • Frederick Orin Bartlett

... thee to the school.' The driver used the 'thou', which is rudeness when applied to a white man. In the clearest and most fluent vernacular Kim pointed out his error, climbed on to the box-seat, and, perfect understanding established, drove for a couple of hours up and down, estimating, comparing, and enjoying. There is no city—except Bombay, the queen of all—more beautiful in her garish style than Lucknow, whether you see her from the bridge over the river, or from the top of the Imambara looking down on the gilt ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling

... rather hard? So Monsieur EIFFEL pro tem. disappears. To walk round about a prison yard Is the Tour d'Eiffel for a couple of years. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, February 18, 1893 • Various

... had nothing to eat but bread or crackers—and often that was of a stale quality and a scant allowance. The eldest, a little boy, attended the Sunday-school of a Boston church; he has one of the truest, noblest, and most interesting faces I have ever seen. On missing him for a couple of Sundays, the superintendent of the school went in search of him, and for the first time knew of ...
— White Slaves • Louis A Banks

... first chapters' were the work of Clarke, says the editor of the Marcus Clarke Memorial Volume, writing in 1884; but in an article published in the Imperial Review (Melbourne) for 1886, the contributed matter is limited to a couple of chapters written by Mr. G. A. Walstab, and skilfully inserted in the middle of the novel. Walstab was one of Clarke's best friends, and he is no doubt the 'G. A. W.' to whom the story is dedicated 'in grateful remembrance of the months of July ...
— Australian Writers • Desmond Byrne

... several portions are yet visible at San Giovanni to this day. Presently when night came and effaced both form and colour in all the Church, he tore himself regretfully from the river Jordan and sought his house. He supped in the kitchen off a couple of tomatoes and a scrap of cheese, went upstairs to his room, undressed in the dark and got ...
— The Well of Saint Clare • Anatole France

... what was a man in St. John's place to do? As it was he was turning himself out of house and home for Hewson, and that was sacrifice enough. He hesitated, sighed deeply, and then said, "Well, I will throw all that in for a couple of thousand more." ...
— Questionable Shapes • William Dean Howells

... gone up the spurs in your dinghy. He's taken a couple of nephews with him, and he's lolling in the stern like ...
— The Day's Work, Volume 1 • Rudyard Kipling

... No matter, as well not. Only tell you he's a German Duke, or a Spanish Don Ferdinand. Well, you've me! poorly off else. A couple of ignoramuses! don't know when to buy nor when to sell. No doing business with either of them. We met once or twice; all to no purpose; only heard Don Vampus count his old Grandees; how will that get interest for money? Then comes Master Harrel—twenty bows to a word,—looks ...
— Cecilia Volume 1 • Frances Burney

... jeered at the little Parson stood foremost, far more through vanity than malice, "Owd Sammy Craddock." A couple of months after Lowrie's death, "Owd Sammy" had sauntered down to the mine one day, and was entertaining a group of admirers when ...
— That Lass O' Lowrie's - 1877 • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... cheering. What with current and paddling, we were flashing along like swallows. It was no joke to keep up with us upon the woody shore. But the girls picked up their skirts as if they were sure they had good ankles, and followed until their breath was out. The last to weary were the three graces and a couple of companions; and just as they too had had enough, the foremost of the three leaped upon a tree-stump and kissed her hand to the canoeists. Not Diana herself, although this was more of a Venus after ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... ladies in handsome blue dresses, Marjorie noticed. She liked it, and drew a deep, happy breath of Spring air. Then suddenly over all the pleasure came a depressing black shadow. And yet what she had seen was something which made most people smile and feel a little happier; a couple of plump, gay young returned soldiers going down the street arm in arm, and laughing uproariously at nothing at all for the sheer pleasure of being at home. She turned away from the window feeling as if some one had taken a piece of happiness away from her, and snatched the nearest paper ...
— I've Married Marjorie • Margaret Widdemer

... them went into a restaurant and, without taking off their greatcoats, drank a couple of glasses of vodka each. Before drinking the second glass, Vassilyev noticed a bit of cork in his vodka, raised the glass to his eyes, and gazed into it for a long time, screwing up his shortsighted eyes. The medical student did not ...
— The Schoolmistress and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... "A couple of months after the storming of Majuba, I, together with a friend, had a conversation with a Boer, a volunteer from the Free State in the late war, and one of the detachment that stormed Majuba, who gave us a circumstantial account of the ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 1 (of 6) - From the Foundation of Cape Colony to the Boer Ultimatum - of 9th Oct. 1899 • Louis Creswicke

... the second to work to the southward so long as it was night, and be near Swanston Cottage by morning. What I should do there and then, I had no guess, and did not greatly care, being a devotee of a couple of divinities called Chance and Circumstance. Prepare, if possible; where it is impossible, work straight forward, and keep your eyes open and your tongue oiled. Wit and a good exterior—there is all life ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson

... nights when his master dined at the club would cook himself a tasty dish. A gleam of daylight still lingered in the studio, and Paul flung himself down on a sofa. There, as he was trying to think by what ill-luck his artfullest, cleverest designs had been upset, he fell asleep for a couple of hours and woke up another man. Just as memory gains in sharpness during the sleep of the body, so had his determination and talent for intrigue gone on acting during his short rest. He had found a new plan, and moreover a calm fixity of resolution, such as among the modern ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet

... recognize me," he said to himself; "so may my bullies," and as he thought, Ren de Montigny was pushed forward by a couple of soldiers and stood ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... delays on the point of a battle are rarely ever beneficial. I think we had better take up with Colonel Boone's second proposition—divide our forces, and proceed at once to action; though, for the matter of prudence, it may be advisable to send a couple of scouts ahead, before deciding ...
— Ella Barnwell - A Historical Romance of Border Life • Emerson Bennett

... just dismounted from their horses. They were a couple of stout lads who still looked bashful, as became youths recently released from the seminary. Their firm healthy faces were covered with the first down of manhood, down which had, as yet, never known a razor. ...
— Taras Bulba and Other Tales • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol

... arrived, who seated themselves round the room, laid their hands on their laps, and sighed. Near the stove a couple of young girls packed themselves by the side of Henrietta, on a bench that was too short for them; and a small boy, with a sallow face, whose parents dragged him from meeting to meeting, seated himself on the extreme end of a bench ...
— Skipper Worse • Alexander Lange Kielland

... greatest of them, like Francis von Sickingen, were not ashamed to "let their horses bite off travellers' purses" now and then. But it was not only the nobles who became gentlemen of the road. A well-to-do merchant of Berlin, named John Kohlhase, was robbed of a couple of horses by a Saxon squire, and, failing to get redress in the corrupt courts, threw down the gauntlet to the whole of Electoral Saxony in a proclamation that he would rob, burn and take reprisals until he was given compensation for his loss. ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith

... inability to suggest a void, or the two central perpendicular lines may have been joined by a horizontal one on the upper part of the relief, which is lost, and thus a doorway indicated; it would then have a couple of pilasters and a couple of columns on ...
— A History of Art in Chaldaea & Assyria, v. 1 • Georges Perrot

... always helped father out, long past my majority, and never hinted for anything beyond my board and clothes. And when I got engaged to Annie, I went to him and said, 'Father, now's the time to give me a start, or let me cut loose from here.' And he never answered me a word; but a couple of weeks after that he bought the Turnbull place. And last week it was, he said to me, kind of quick, as if he'd made up his mind to somethin', and wa'n't quite ready to talk it over, 'I've got a sort of a new scheme afoot.' And then 'twas I wrote ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown

... reformatory for juvenile thieves, and a children's convalescent hospital—to all of which she gave her immediate personal superintendence, and almost every penny she had. She had let her house in Hampshire, and lived with a couple of female servants in a small furnished house on Campden Hill. She did without a carriage, and went about in cabs and omnibuses, dressed like a daily governess, though nobody could appear more regally magnificent than she did ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al

... swayed, peasants shrieked maledictions or shook fists; but always, crawling at snail's pace, we managed to scrape past without accident. Sometimes we frightened cows; and a couple of great yellow dogs, drawing a cart which contained two peasant girls in costume, swore canine oaths against ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson

... across the table. Lord Lackington was telling scandalous tales of his youth to a couple of Foreign Office clerks, who sat on either side of him, laughing and spurring him on. The old man's careless fluency and fun were evidently contagious; animation reigned around him; he was the spoiled child of ...
— Lady Rose's Daughter • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... records of bookselling for just a couple of centuries back. Robert Kettlewell was established at the Hand and Sceptre, King's Street, Bloomsbury, whence he issued his kinsman's apparently useful, and certainly very dull, pamphlet, entitled 'Death Made Comfortable; or, The Way to Die ...
— The Book-Hunter in London - Historical and Other Studies of Collectors and Collecting • William Roberts

... became altogether distracted from classic lore, by the appearance of a very unclassic boy, clad in a suit of brown corduroys and wearing hob-nailed boots a couple of sizes too large for him, who, coming suddenly out from a box-tree alley behind the gabled corner of the rectory, shuffled to the extreme verge of the lawn and stopped there, pulling his cap off, and treading on his own ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli

... afraid," said Sonia, her little shoes tapping the stone steps and then crunching the carpet of snow as she ran to meet Nicolas, who was within a couple of yards of her. And yet not the Nicolas of every-day life. What had transfigured him so completely? Was it his woman's costume with frizzed-out hair, or was it that radiant smile which he so rarely wore, and which at this ...
— In the Yule-Log Glow, Book I - Christmas Tales from 'Round the World • Various

... She brought a couple of tiny candles in Sevres candlesticks, and two little silver saucers, in which she lit fragrant pastilles. As the pale gray smoke arose, floating in faint wreaths and spirals before the enshrined photograph, ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various

... his cart out of the garage. The wheels squeaked but that didn't bother him. He met a couple of boys in his grade at school on his way to the store and ...
— Jerry's Charge Account • Hazel Hutchins Wilson

... selected the worst-looking one of the lot, but to the surprise of all of us she stood perfectly still, only switching him a few times with her tail. As soon as he got a couple of quarts of milk he stopped and came out of the yard. Ollie and I had, of course, been laughing at him a good deal, but Jack paid no attention to it. As we walked towards the house ...
— The Voyage of the Rattletrap • Hayden Carruth

... the maintenance of elaborate clockworks at any place excepting the central station. The domestic clock will, in fact, become mainly a "receiver" for the wireless telegraphic apparatus, and its internal mechanism will be reduced, perhaps, to a couple of wheels, which are necessary to transmit the motion of a minute-hand to that ...
— Twentieth Century Inventions - A Forecast • George Sutherland

... own dear Phyllis," James said tenderly, though, as a matter of fact, he had a very remote idea of what his own dear Phyllis was like. He had met her only a couple of months before the scout mission was scheduled, and so their courtship had been brief, and the actual weeks of marriage even briefer. He had remembered Phyllis as beautiful—and she was beautiful. He had not, however, remembered her as pig-headed—and ...
— The Venus Trap • Evelyn E. Smith

... learning. As on the occasion of our trip to the village we were seized by a couple of the powerful creatures and whirled away through the tree tops, while about us and in our wake raced a chattering, jabbering, grinning ...
— At the Earth's Core • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... dropped into the vacant chair, saying: "May I recall myself to you, M. Ste. Marie? We met, I believe, once or twice, a couple of years ago. ...
— Jason • Justus Miles Forman

... his garb, confessed his relation with the Muses, and stood a second round of drinks. As the waiter was going off with the bottle Schaunard requested him to be good enough to forget it. He had heard the silvery tinkle of a couple of five-franc pieces in one of Colline's pockets. Rodolphe had soon reached the same level of expansiveness as the two friends, and poured ...
— Bohemians of the Latin Quarter • Henry Murger

... the terra-cotta model of a shoe found at Sitia, show the daintiness with which the Minoans indulged themselves in the matter of footwear. In personal adornment the men to some extent made up for their simplicity in the matter of dress. The Cup-Bearer wears a couple of thick bracelets on his upper arm, and another, which bears an agate signet, on his wrist; and such decorations seem to have been in common use. The King whose figure in low relief has been reconstructed from fragments found at Knossos, wears ...
— The Sea-Kings of Crete • James Baikie

... stayed only long enough to smoke a couple of cigarettes, but the other guests were much longer in shaking off the fascination of Lassalle's boyish spirits and delightful encyclopaedic monologues. When the last guest was gone, Lassalle betook himself to the ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... waiter a couple of dollars out of his own pocket and wrote Van Bibber's name on the check, and walked in state into the cafe, where he ordered a green mint and a heavy, black, and expensive cigar, and seated himself at the window, where he felt that he should always have sat if the fates had been ...
— Van Bibber and Others • Richard Harding Davis

... the scene across the Nile where a great concrete tower rose into the sky. "It's this land. Look at it. There's a tower for television. A couple of miles away are the pyramids. Down the street is a new office building with aluminum walls, and it's right next to a stone mosque that's nearly as old as the city. If you ask me, Horus or Thoth or one of the old Egyptian gods is getting fed up and messing with the signal just ...
— The Egyptian Cat Mystery • Harold Leland Goodwin

... this he thought it best to go, for he wished very much to get the red caftan and cap. So getting down from the petsch he began to put on his stockings and boots, and to dress himself; and when he was quite dressed, he took with him a couple of pails and a hatchet, and went to the river: for the village in which they lived stood very near the river. When he had come to the stream, he began to hew away at the ice, and when he had made a very big hole, he filled his pails with water, and placing ...
— Emelian the Fool - a tale • Thomas J. Wise

... Anticipating the melancholy which I foresaw would result from this disappointment, I went out with the idea of amusing myself, and happening to meet Giustiniani I told him of my misfortune, saying that I should not be sorry to make up for it by a couple of hours of the ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... and manufactured salt; and collected quite a store of wild cotton, though it grew very sparingly and it cost her hours to find a few pods. But in hunting for it she found other things—health, for one. After sunset she was generally employed a couple of hours on matters which occupy the fair in every situation of life. She made herself a sealskin jacket and pork-pie hat. She made Mr. Hazel a man's cap of sealskin with a point. But her great work was with the cotton, which will ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade

... shores on either hand: but the wind was fair. We undertook, then, to cross, and quitted the island, to enter the broad, lake-like expanse, just as the sun was going down, hoping to reach Astoria in a couple of hours. ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast of America in the years 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814 or the First American Settlement on the Pacific • Gabriel Franchere

... fun for you. But if you had been baited by her for a couple of hours, as I was, you could not have stood it much better than I did. Why, she had the impudence to insist upon my acting in direct opposition to your wishes; and all but insinuated that I was a fool ...
— Flora Lyndsay - or, Passages in an Eventful Life • Susan Moodie

... there built a small campfire, over which they made themselves a can of hot chocolate, and this, with some sandwiches and some doughnuts, constituted the repast. Andy wanted to take time to clean a couple of the squirrels and cook them, but Jack and the others were afraid this would take too long, and so the ...
— The Rover Boys on Snowshoe Island - or, The Old Lumberman's Treasure Box • Edward Stratemeyer

... and exhaustion. Towards night he became feverish, his hollow cheeks glowing with an ominous tint. In the morning he occasionally prepared himself as if to start for his place of business; he left the house, and walked for perhaps a couple of hundred yards, then slackened his pace, stopped, looked about him in an agony of indecision, and at length returned. After this futile endeavour, he had recourse to the bottles in his cupboard, and presently fell into a ...
— In the Year of Jubilee • George Gissing

... the lower orders adopt the abandoned fashions of their betters, though with less of the well-bred taste which sometimes in the latter makes even absurdity graceful. In this way it has come to pass that at the very moment in which a reaction against the irreligious or anti-religious philosophy of a couple of generations ago is making itself felt in the study, the spreading pestilence of negation and unbelief has gained and continues to gain possession of the street. Some fifty years ago religion and even Christianity, seemed to the sanguine eyes of ...
— The Faith of the Millions (2nd series) • George Tyrrell

... crossed Blake's face. "Oh, that'll do, Mac! Give us peace about the woman. I'm sick to death of all such nonsense. We're due in a couple of hours. I think I'll try for forty winks." He threw away his cigar and tucked ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston

... "There are a couple of my men outside," Mytor told him. "When the priests are spotted you can slip ...
— Bride of the Dark One • Florence Verbell Brown

... sweet and odorous foliage greens of the islands. An altar was to be erected at one end of the lanai and appropriately decorated. The order was willingly carried out, men, women, and children working with a will, so that the whole structure was finished in a couple of hours. ...
— Hawaiian Folk Tales - A Collection of Native Legends • Various

... from the inn, but there was some mist in the fields and a goodish bit about the spinney they had pointed out to me. A child could have found the road, however, for it was just the highway to Newmarket; and when I had cruised along it a couple of hundred yards, to the very gates of Lord Hailsham's house, I turned about and stood off at the spinney's edge, perhaps three hundred yards away. Then I just lighted a cigarette and waited, as I had been told ...
— The Man Who Drove the Car • Max Pemberton

... who had wakened before the rest regarded him with placidity, declining to be amused by his winkings, but exhibiting no other emotion. She had been playing by herself with a couple of buttons tied on a string, and after giving a civil amount of attention to Theron's grimaces, she turned again to the superior attractions of this toy. Her self-possession, her capacity for self-entertainment, the care she took not to arouse the others, all impressed ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic

... rode in again, alone, bending to study the water and the footing. A gravel bar led off for a couple of rods, flanked by deep potholes. Ten rods out the bar turned. He followed it up, foot by foot, for twenty rods, quartering. Then he struck out for ...
— The Covered Wagon • Emerson Hough

... the trees, a red light flashed and was gone. The faint, irregular hum of Piccadilly persisted for a couple of seconds, and then was drowned in the loud report, which seemed to linger and wander in the great open spaces. G.J.'s flesh crept. He comprehended the mad ecstasy of Queen, and because he comprehended it his ...
— The Pretty Lady • Arnold E. Bennett

... of war, ten thousand Frenchmen landed in the Dardanelles would be masters of Constantinople, and perhaps of the Empire. In time of peace, four hundred bold and well-informed men may produce the same effect. Besides, with some temporary cession of a couple of provinces to each of the Imperial Courts, and with the temporary present of an island to Great Britain, everything may be settled 'pro tempore', and a Joseph Bonaparte be permitted to reign at Constantinople, as ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... it did! Look at that great coffee stain you got on it this mornin'! Havin' a couple of perfect strangers come in to dinner makes more work than a man knows anything about. Children, you take off the knives, an' pile 'em up on the other table. Be ...
— Jane Field - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... have just recollected that we are a couple of very stupid fellows. We have been talking all this time about chalk and limestone, and have forgotten to settle what they are, and how they were made. We must think of that next time. It will not do for us (at least if we mean to be scientific men) to use terms without defining them; in plain English, ...
— Madam How and Lady Why - or, First Lessons in Earth Lore for Children • Charles Kingsley

... the moon began to show over the tree-tops, the entire party moved out silently by a little-used by-path towards Battleford. A couple of troopers went on some considerable distance in front, and one on either flank, with strict instructions to create no alarm if possible in meeting with an enemy, but to at once warn ...
— The Rising of the Red Man - A Romance of the Louis Riel Rebellion • John Mackie

... we intend to follow the fate of my wit," resumed Frank, "we must step out a little faster to get out of them; which we sha'n't do under a couple of miles' ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various

... shall see how accurate are my assertions. It has pleased Madame Colette Willy to embody in a couple of delightful animals, the aroma of gardens, the freshness of the field, the heat of state-roads,—the passions of men.... For through this girlish laughter ringing in the forest, I tell you, I hear the sobbing of a well-spring. One does not stoop to a poodle or tom-cat, without ...
— Barks and Purrs • Colette Willy, aka Colette

... his army at Appomattox, April 9, 1865, and yet a couple of days later the old Colonel's battery lay intrenched right in the mountain-pass where it had halted three days before. Two weeks previously it had been detailed with a light division sent to meet and repel a force which ...
— The Burial of the Guns • Thomas Nelson Page

... his stiff, flat-topped felt hat on the oak chest, and was taking off his overcoat. He paused and, lifting his chin—and his incredible white whiskers with it—gazed at Rachel almost steadily for a couple of seconds. ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett

... and coats, however, and then trooped in to the end of the cook shed where the meals were served. Tom turned away to look over his horses and see that they were all ready for the day's work. Rafe put up the roan ponies in a couple of empty stalls and gave them a ...
— Nan Sherwood at Pine Camp - or, The Old Lumberman's Secret • Annie Roe Carr

... "We have a couple of brass cannons, Neal. They're not much to boast of, but if they are properly served they will do some mischief. I have a little experience of artillery, though it wasn't in my regular line of fighting. I think I'll perhaps get charge of one ...
— The Northern Iron - 1907 • George A. Birmingham

... A couple of gentlefolk once lived in a certain part of England. (My godmother never would tell the name either of the place or the people, even if she knew it. She said one ought not to expose one's neighbours' failings more than there was due occasion for.) They had an only child, a daughter, ...
— The Brownies and Other Tales • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... several offshoots of the Dudgeon tree. Mrs. Dudgeon was ironing at a table beneath the one small window, in the fading light. She was a staid and dapper matron, with here and there the faintest line of care upon her comely face. A couple of the children were rolling upon the hearthrug in the ruddy glow of the fire, and two or three others were doing their home-lessons by the aid of the same unsteady gleam. The father, swept to one side by the surges of his superabundant family, sat on a chair at the extreme corner of the ...
— The Golden Shoemaker - or 'Cobbler' Horn • J. W. Keyworth

... women stole out into the second ante-chamber, which was lighted only with a couple of glimmering wax tapers, and in its desolate disorder, with the confusion of chairs, divans, and tables, brought back sad recollections of the wild women who had on the day before pressed into this apartment in their desire ...
— Marie Antoinette And Her Son • Louise Muhlbach

... this appeal, after a couple of days, Mrs. Jamieson, who, if a silly, overindulgent mother, was a much more efficient woman than her sister, made her appearance in Squantown, and under her supervision matters were soon in a better condition, and Katie was ...
— Katie Robertson - A Girls Story of Factory Life • Margaret E. Winslow

... scandalized his wife and the dominie by starting suddenly from his knees, and rubbing his eyes, with a stentorian exclamation of 'By ——! here's the keg at last!' and in tumbled, as he spake the word, a couple of sturdy herdsmen, whom, on hearing, a day before, of the advocate's approaching visit, he had despatched to a certain smuggler's haunt at some considerable distance in quest of a supply of run brandy from the Solway frith. The pious 'exercise' of the household was hopelessly ...
— Sir Walter Scott - (English Men of Letters Series) • Richard H. Hutton

... as I did so, I caught sight of the sane magnificent phenomenon which I had met with on the second day of my wanderings. The colossal live oak rose in all its silvery splendour, at the distance of a couple of miles. Whilst I was gazing at it, and reflecting on the strange ill luck that had made me pass within so short a distance of the river without finding it, I saw my new acquaintance approach a neighbouring cluster of trees, amongst ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 54, No. 338, December 1843 • Various

... table. Beyond it a door leading to the kitchen at the back of the house. Next to the kitchen the family bed room where Poke Drury and his dreary looking spouse slept. Adjoining this was the one spare bed room, with a couple of broken legged cots and a wash-stand without any bowl or pitcher. If one wished to lave his hands and face or comb his hair let him step out on the back porch under the shoulder of the mountain and utilize the road house toilet facilities there: they were a tin basin, a water pipe leading ...
— Six Feet Four • Jackson Gregory

... consternation which caused them to spring to their feet and look about them apprehensively. Then they, too, caught sight of the Englishmen, and, like their piache, made a mad dash for their huts, yelling as they went. Thus, in the course of a couple of minutes, the two young Devonians were left in complete, undisputed possession of the village, although they were conscious of being stealthily observed from practically ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood

... a telephone message that Red Gilbat was playing ball with some boys in a lot four blocks down the street. When at length a couple of players marched up to the bench with Red in tow Delaney uttered an immense sigh of relief and then, after a close scrutiny of Red's face, ...
— The Redheaded Outfield and Other Baseball Stories • Zane Grey

... have come at an opportune moment," he said. "Really, the fates are more than kind. The yacht is making for Brethaven jetty to take me on board. If you ladies will come with me for a couple of hours' cruise, I need scarcely say how charmed I ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell

... two men reached the postern gate. A couple of sentinels were standing by, but the gate itself was open, and from within there came the sound of bustle and of noise, of a good deal of swearing, and ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy

... well all mapped out for us, to the wonderful endeavors of Thomas Alva Edison is more than even our combined conceit can stand for. If we deserved such praise, even in the smallest way, you'd see us with our chests swelled out so far that we'd look like a couple of garden toads. ...
— Radio Boys Cronies • Wayne Whipple and S. F. Aaron

... Fortunata's house, and the public oven, they returned to the abode of Sallust, where the Englishman finished his sketch, while the lazzarone chatted with the blind man, and kept him amused. Continuing their lounge, he made a number of other drawings, and in a couple of hours his ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 341, March, 1844, Vol. 55 • Various

... ago, a young man whom I knew, happened to go to a notorious gambling house in New York, with a couple of companions. One of these young men was a member of a wealthy family and had been frequently to this place, where he was always most welcome. My friend held a clerical position in a financial institution, was ...
— Heart and Soul • Victor Mapes (AKA Maveric Post)

... their chums, as well as many other cadets and boys and girls from that vicinity, had been using the hill for a couple of hours when the race between the Blue Moon and the Yellow Streak was proposed by Nick Carncross, the new ...
— The Rover Boys on a Hunt - or The Mysterious House in the Woods • Arthur M. Winfield (Edward Stratemeyer)

... putting on more fuel. What I had hitherto eat served only to sharpen my appetite; I could not help, therefore, being earnest with them to get me some more victuals. Having understood my necessities, they talked together some little time; after which getting up, they both went out, taking with them a couple of dogs, which they train to assist them in fishing. After an hour's absence they came in trembling with cold, and their hair streaming with water, and brought two fish, which having broiled, they gave me the largest share, and then we all lay down as ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 17 • Robert Kerr

... last, pointing across a dirty street to a shabby little brick house. "That's the place where Isabelle's mother and I started in St. Louis. We had a couple of rooms over there the first winter. The store was just a block further west. It's torn down now. I passed some of the best days of my life in those rooms on the second story.... It isn't the outside that counts, my boy!" The Colonel tucked his ...
— Together • Robert Herrick (1868-1938)

... stayed a couple of days, exploring in the country and fishing in the river, which was so broad and deep that it would easily bear a ship of one hundred and fifty tons burden and a full bowshot would not carry across it. Then, naming their first ...
— Prince Henry the Navigator, the Hero of Portugal and of Modern Discovery, 1394-1460 A.D. • C. Raymond Beazley

... his horse, and dashed off, followed by the rest of the party. De Banyan wiped away the cold sweat from his brow, and returned to his suffering companion. He helped him to dismount and seated him on a block while he secured the horse. By this time, a couple of negro women came out of the house. They were the early risers of the family, and at once manifested the most abundant sympathy for the sufferer. The doors of the house were thrown wide open to him; and Captain ...
— The Young Lieutenant - or, The Adventures of an Army Officer • Oliver Optic

... on for a couple of miles, having no difficulty in following the trail, until they reached the brow of a small eminence. Here they were greeted with a sight that startled them. A group of a dozen Indians were reclining ...
— The Young Adventurer - or Tom's Trip Across the Plains • Horatio Alger

... of old and second hand books, is now nearer the Seine; and especially in the Quai des Augustins. Messrs. Treuttel and Wuertz, Panckoucke, Renouard, and Brunet, live within a quarter of a mile of each other: about a couple of hundred yards from the Quai des Augustins. Further to the south, and not far from the Hotel de Clugny, in the Rue Serpente, live the celebrated DEBURE. They are booksellers to the King, and to the Royal Library; and a more respectable house, or a more ancient ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Two • Thomas Frognall Dibdin

... look at us now. Suppose a posse was to rush the house. They bust into the kitchen side. Where are they? Just the same as if they hadn't got in at all. I bolt the doors from the inside of the big room, and they're shut out agin. Or suppose they take the big room? Then a couple of us slide out on this balcony and spray 'em with lead. This house ain't going to be took till the last room is filled full of the ...
— Black Jack • Max Brand

... dollars pay you for keeping young Hoff down here a couple of months and making the beginning of a ...
— Average Jones • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... Leonard, "beggars must put their pride in their pockets. If you will lend me a couple of hundred pounds and take the ruby in pledge, I shall be even more grateful to you than I am at present, and that ...
— The People Of The Mist • H. Rider Haggard

... operations were carried on for obtaining supplies, report having arrived that Cleander, the Lacedaemonian governor of Byzantium, was coming, which he presently did, with a couple of galleys but no transports. From information received, Cleander was inclined to regard the army as little better than a band of brigands; but this idea was successfully dissipated by Xenophon. Cleander went back to Byzantium, and the Greeks ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XI. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton

... that he spoke of it familiarly as "Blank;" observing, at breakfast, "Blank looks pretty tall this morning;" or considerably doubting in the courtyard in the evening, whether there warn't some go-ahead naters in our country, sir, that would make out the top of Blank in a couple of ...
— The Holly-Tree • Charles Dickens

... them here in the control cabin; I'll detail a couple of men to guard them. I'm taking no chances: they must be in sight every minute. Carse is too damned dangerous." He peered back at the captives. The trader's eyes were shut; Friday still appeared unconscious from the brutal blow on his head. "Asleep. Well, they'd better sleep—while they ...
— Hawk Carse • Anthony Gilmore

... the school proceeded as usual for a couple of hours, and there were no further signs of insubordination among the boys. At recess I purposely kept away from my more intimate friends, for I did not wish to tell them what course I intended to pursue, fearful that ...
— Breaking Away - or The Fortunes of a Student • Oliver Optic

... that another goat might be given him, together with two axes. Our commander, esteeming himself happy in having an additional opportunity of serving him, dispatched the messengers back with the axes and a couple of kids, male and female, which were spared for him out of ...
— Narrative of the Voyages Round The World, • A. Kippis

... on through the dense foliage, Captain Nockelles, a hardy backwoodsman, leading. Soon I caught sight of a couple of blacks, and a white man with a pistol in his hand standing before them, while two of the blood-hounds lay dead at his feet. The blacks held their rifles ready for action. On seeing the white man, our captain, refraining from firing as I thought ...
— In the Wilds of Florida - A Tale of Warfare and Hunting • W.H.G. Kingston

... o'clock Adj.-Gen. Amos Totten set up the cinch of his sword-belt by a couple of holes and began another tour of inspection of the State House. He considered that the parlous situation in state affairs demanded full dress. During the evening he had been going on his rounds at half-hour intervals. On each trip he had been much pleased ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day

... gave up the thought of it with a shudder, and resigned myself, instead, to watch through the night—the long, cold, Pyrenean night. Presently he curled himself up like a dog and slept in the blaze, and then for a couple of hours I sat opposite him, thinking. It seemed years since I had seen Zaton's or thrown the dice. The old life, the old employments—should I ever go back to them?—seemed dim and distant. Would Cocheforet, ...
— Under the Red Robe • Stanley Weyman

... getting a cheque from her this year instead of her usual present, you might do that. But show her that we are really fond of her—remember she is your mother, and has few pleasures. A fiver just now would make a good deal of difference to me, and even a couple of ...
— Eliza • Barry Pain

... operates as a fatal check to the progress of industry. The country is eaten up with foreign soldiers. The great hotels in all the principal towns resemble casernes. The reader may judge of my surprise on opening my bed-room door one morning, to find that a couple of Croats had slept on the mat outside of it all night. It might be a special mark of honour to myself; but I rather think that they are accustomed to bivouac in the passages and lobbies. The eternal drumming in the streets is enough ...
— Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber - Or The Influence of Romanism on Trade, Justice, and Knowledge • James Aitken Wylie

... our arrival at the Landing, news, true or false, reached us that the ice was still fast on Lesser Slave Lake. At any rate, the boat's crew expected from there did not turn up, and a couple of days were spent in anxious waiting. Some freight was delayed as well, and a thunderstorm and a night of rain set the camp in a swim. The non-arrival of our trackers was serious, as we had two scows and a York boat, with a party all told of some fifty souls, and only thirteen ...
— Through the Mackenzie Basin - A Narrative of the Athabasca and Peace River Treaty Expedition of 1899 • Charles Mair

... back to school at noontime, saw a crowd of boys on the corner a couple of blocks away, thought of what a task it would be to go into that crowd or try to pass it. A mortal and unreasoning fear came over me. Try as I would, I couldn't screw my courage up to the point of going past that crowd. But I had small choice. It was ...
— Stammering, Its Cause and Cure • Benjamin Nathaniel Bogue

... intending to be very gracious and condescending. "Very healthy employment. The land requires some rain, does it not? Still I trust it will not rain till I am home, for my plume's sake," tossing his head. "Allow me," and as he passed he offered Oliver a couple of cigars. "One each," he ...
— After London - Wild England • Richard Jefferies

... forecasting whether Mr. Trigger would desire to drink port wine at the Percy Standard every evening during the process of canvassing. About nine o'clock the waiter announced that a few gentlemen below desired to see Sir Thomas. "Our friends," said Mr. Trigger. "Just put chairs, and bring a couple of bottles of port, John. I'm glad they're come, Sir Thomas, because it shows that they mean to take to you." Up they were shown, Messrs. Spiveycomb, Spicer, Pile, Roodylands,—the bootmaker who has not yet been named,—Pabsby, and seven or eight others. Sir Thomas shook hands with ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope

... while a wealth of bric-a-brac enriched every nook and corner. In the doorway hung an old altar-lamp of silver, with a cup of ruby glass, and from various points depended other lamps of Moresque and antique shapes. A pair of tall brass flambeau-stands, spoil of a Belgian cathedral sacked a couple of centuries ago, upheld the heaviest candles Tom had been able to find, which smoked ...
— The Pagans • Arlo Bates

... noting (at least in the Latin Library) the position of the case, the subjects of the books contained in it, and their titles. This is succeeded by an enumeration of the number of volumes, so as to shew, in a couple of pages, how many the whole Library contained. MM. Muentz and Fabre print this enumeration, but, so far as I know, the catalogue itself has not as yet been printed by any one. For my present purpose I shall combine the headings of the catalogue, the subjects, and the ...
— The Care of Books • John Willis Clark

... cannon-balls, and our whole loss was one boatman slightly wounded in the leg. From 4 o'clock till night the enemy's fire was continued, but at long intervals. It began again the next morning. I suffered this as on the previous day for a couple of hours, at the end of which. I fired several shots and silenced it. My firing seemed to trouble the enemy more than I expected it would. One of my boats was sunk by a cannon-ball, several were pierced ...
— Three Frenchmen in Bengal - The Commercial Ruin of the French Settlements in 1757 • S.C. Hill

... of the night that he first came to himself. 'Twas a blowy night, and most of the crew were on deck. A couple of men ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 79, May, 1864 • Various

... Kelley for bringing you in so early, for I want you to tell me something about Shakespeare's plays as they are constructed for the stage. You can imagine that I do not get much time to study such matters, but I recently had a couple of talks with Hackett—Baron Hackett, as they call him—who is famous as Jack Falstaff, but from whom I elicited few satisfactory replies, though I probed him ...
— McClure's Magazine, Volume VI, No. 3. February 1896 • Various

... in the middle of such scenery as one does not often get the chance of seeing. Many and many is the time that I have thrown down my pick and shovel in disgust, clambered out of my claim, and walked a couple of miles or so to the top of some hill. Then I would lie down in the grass and look out over the glorious stretch of country—the smiling valleys, the great mountains touched with gold—real gold of the sunset, and ...
— A Tale of Three Lions • H. Rider Haggard

... company the greater part of the time. Every day Dan had some suggestion or other to make for Miss Vallincourt's amusement. Either it was: "Would you care to see the hay-loader at work?" Or: "I've just bought a couple of pedigree Devon cows I'd like to show you, Miss Vallincourt." Or, as yesterday: "There's a pony fair to be held to-morrow at Pennaway Bridge. Would you care to drive in it?" And to each and all of Storran's suggestions Magda had yielded ...
— The Lamp of Fate • Margaret Pedler

... a rage—and with more reason than on certain other occasions. He was sure that there was treachery somewhere; at the least, it was all a trick to bring a couple of thousand good Tennessee volunteers within the clutches of Wilkinson's recruiting officers. He managed to write to the President a temperate letter of protest; but to Governor Blount and to the troops he unbosomed himself with characteristic forcefulness of speech. There ...
— The Reign of Andrew Jackson • Frederic Austin Ogg

... lonely cars which had been stopped and robbed—and among the settlers a couple of murders had taken place in a single district. The mail from Charleville to Montmedy was held up at last by men in masks armed with revolvers. "We will go out armed!" exclaimed the drivers in the garage, and polished ...
— The Happy Foreigner • Enid Bagnold

... keeping off the mosquitoes, and making every man's face glow like a beaker of Port. The meat had the true wild-game flavour, not at all impaired by our famous appetites, and a couple of flasks of white brandy, which Zeke, producing from his ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville

... to consider serious was how much the platform might show through the trees, and whether or not the upper boughs were strong enough to hold. We went up to make sure, straddling out on them, and bobbing up and down, and choosing a couple of nice forks for where we'd lay the main cross-piece. Tom tied his handkerchief around a likely bough, to mark the place for the block and give us a clean hoist from below, and we both come down ...
— Wild Justice: Stories of the South Seas • Lloyd Osbourne

... never allowed any one to see her, save a young and interesting cousin of mine. She seldom went out except on Sundays, and then was carried to church in an old sedan-chair by a couple of labourers, who did odd jobs of gardening about the house. She had such an insuperable objection to be seen by anybody, whether at home or abroad, that she concealed her face ...
— Tales for Young and Old • Various

... town, on the bank of a large marsh, conceived a big idea in the money-making line. He took it to a prominent merchant, and began to develop his plans and specifications. 'There are at least ten million frogs in that marsh near me, an' I'll just arrest a couple of carloads of them and hand them over to you. You can send them to the big cities and make lots of money for both of us. Frogs' legs are great delicacies in the big towns, an' not very plentiful. It won't take me more'n two or three ...
— Lincoln's Yarns and Stories • Alexander K. McClure

... most readers who would be likely to practise "Choice Cookery," for those who are not adepts many of the recipes would be impossible to execute. Frying, once understood, is so easy a process one wonders that so few should excel in it. To those who are not sure of themselves I recommend practice. A couple of hours' practice and careful observance of rules will enable a bright woman to ...
— Choice Cookery • Catherine Owen

... walked alone to my father's, and there, after a word or two to my father and mother, my wife and I mounted, and, with my father's boy, upon a horse I borrowed of Captain Ferrers, we rode to Bigglesworth by the help of a couple of countrymen, that led us through the very long and dangerous waters, because of the ditches on each side, though it begun to be very dark, and there we had a good breast of mutton roasted for us, and supped, ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... a couple of years before he published The Life of Johnson, in fact while he was writing it, had written to Temple:—'I was the great man (as we used to say) at the late Drawing-room, in a suit of imperial blue, lined with rose-coloured silk, and ornamented with rich gold-wrought buttons.' Letters ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill

... the experienced eye of Wayland had descried at a distance. For the valiant mercer's horse, which was a beast of mettle, feeling himself put to his speed, and discerning a couple of horses riding fast at some hundred yards' distance before him, betook himself to the road with such alacrity as totally deranged the seat of his rider, who not only came up with, but passed at full gallop, ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott

... to with more enthusiasm. The grinning Ortigies set out a couple of bottles, intending as a matter of course to join in the celebration. He ...
— A Waif of the Mountains • Edward S. Ellis

... raiding cavalry. Late in October Forrest performed the remarkable feat of taking a flotilla with cavalry. He suddenly swooped down on the Tennessee near Johnsonville and took the gunboat Undine with a couple of transports. Hood had meanwhile been busy on Sherman's line of communications, hoping at least to immobilize him round Atlanta, and at best to bring him back from Georgia for ...
— Captains of the Civil War - A Chronicle of the Blue and the Gray, Volume 31, The - Chronicles Of America Series • William Wood

... After a couple of columns more in a similar strain, the correspondent signs himself Philopyraphagus Ashburniensis. In his History of Inventions, Vol. III, page 272, 1817 edition, ...
— The Miracle Mongers, an Expos • Harry Houdini

... carelessly upon the floor; if you gave it a kick with your foot, up started a ghastly-looking figure before you. If you sat down in one particular chair, although there was nothing in its appearance to distinguish it from others, a couple of arms would immediately clasp you, so as to render it impossible to disentangle yourself, till some one, who understood the trick, chose to set you at liberty. In his garden was an arbour, by the side of a canal, in which, if you unguardedly ...
— Domestic pleasures - or, the happy fire-side • F. B. Vaux

... silent for a couple of seconds, his body braced, his fingers touching the sheaf of notes that lay in front of him. To the waiting House the silence was effective. It might mean over-assurance, or it might mean a failure of nerve at a critical moment. Either possibility had a tinge of piquancy. Moved ...
— The Masquerader • Katherine Cecil Thurston

... into the same state of mind," the lad went on. "When the green hands come they are crazy about the stuff for about a couple of days; then it is all over. You couldn't hire them to eat. Every few weeks the different employees are allowed to buy two pounds for themselves at the wholesale price, but you would be surprised to see how few of them do it. If they get it you can be pretty certain that ...
— The Story of Sugar • Sara Ware Bassett

... shopkeeper, having in his service a couple of shopmen, who in point of intellect, were the very reverse of their master, a wag who frequented the shop, for some time puzzled the neighbourhood by designating it a "music-shop," although the proprietor dealt as much in music as in millstones. However, being pressed for an explanation, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume XII, No. 347, Saturday, December 20, 1828. • Various

... fixed; from a peasant they take ten kopecks for a beating, from a workman twenty—that's for the rods and the trouble. Peasant women are flogged too. Not long ago, in their enthusiasm for beating in a police station, they thrashed a couple of budding lawyers, an incident upon which Russkiya Vyedomosti has a vague paragraph ...
— Letters of Anton Chekhov • Anton Chekhov

... doctored a very lame horse with Pratts Liniment after trying other treatment for months. In a couple of days the lameness left and we used him every day till he died of ...
— Pratt's Practical Pointers on the Care of Livestock and Poultry • Pratt Food Co.

... to reach port in a couple of days!" cried Sam. "Some of these steam yachts can run ...
— The Rover Boys in Southern Waters - or The Deserted Steam Yacht • Arthur M. Winfield

... Lanison was conscious that some attention was paid to him as he passed. He was a fine gentleman, and retained a little of that old-fashioned grace which had been the admiration of the town a couple of decades ago, when foolish women had looked upon him almost as a hero of romance, and men had thought twice before raising the anger of so accomplished a swordsman. A remembrance of former triumphs, with perhaps a little sigh to keep it company, came to him as he went towards the ...
— The Brown Mask • Percy J. Brebner

... answered for him, and all spoke with praise of his art as a cook. A couple of ogres brought in the cooked meat and spread it out on the table. Then the great king ate of it till he could eat no more, praised it with his mouth full, and said that in the future they were always to furnish him with food ...
— The Chinese Fairy Book • Various

... muse shall skip: The poet's purpose she best may serve Inside the den—if she have the nerve. Behold! laid out in dark recess, A ghastly goat in stark undress, Pallid and still on her gelid bed, And indisputably very dead. Her skin depends from a couple of pins— And here the most singular statement begins; For all at once the butchered beast, With easy grace for one deceased, Upreared her head, Looked round, and said, Very distinctly for one so dead: "The nights are sharp, and the sheets are thin: I ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)

... to suggest the following meaning of the epitaph in Lavenham churchyard, which is the subject of A. B. R.'s Query. The word est has evidently been omitted in the third line: with this restored, the lines will read as a couple of hexameters: ...
— Notes and Queries, No. 179. Saturday, April 2, 1853. • Various

... righteousness'! Jacob barely believed, and will wait to see whether all will turn out as it has been promised. That is not the glad, swift response of a loving, trusting heart. Nor is he contented with repeating to God the terms of his engagement, but he adds a couple of clauses which strike him as being important, and as having been omitted. There was nothing about 'bread to eat, and raiment to put on,' nor about coming back again 'in peace,' so he adds these. A true 'Jew,'—great ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren

... large room, surrounded with bookshelves and cases of anatomical preparations. Hodges seated himself at a table, on which a shaded lamp was placed, and writing out a prescription, desired his servant to get it made up at a neighbouring apothecary's, and to take it, with a couple of blankets, to the sexton of Saint Paul's. He then produced a bottle of medicated canary, and pouring out a large glass for ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth

... critter—yes, he is old, too. He's so nigh seventy he don't dast look at the almanac for fear he'll find it's past his birthday. And he's always been so tight with money that he'd buy second-hand postage stamps if the Gov'ment wouldn't catch him. And his wife's been dead a couple of hundred year, more or less, and yet, by thunder-mighty, all to once he ...
— Thankful's Inheritance • Joseph C. Lincoln

... is no remedy. I may live on for several years, or I may die suddenly; it's all a matter of care—or chance. I want to forget the sad news for a while if I can. I've told Catherine, and I suppose I've added to her usual burden of vapours and melancholy—so we're a couple of miserable wretches. It's not very unselfish of us to ask you to come and ...
— The Life Everlasting: A Reality of Romance • Marie Corelli

... vessels where a passage might be obtained. The cavaliers were to sail in a couple of days for London, but another ship would go out of harbour with the tide on the following day for Southampton, and this was decided on by acclamation by the Hampshire party, though no good accommodation ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge

... sentimental thought. If he only had a couple of blankets, he mused, he could camp out here in Roger's back yard all night. Surely no harm could come to the girl while he kept watch beneath her casement! The idea was just fantastic enough to appeal to him. ...
— The Haunted Bookshop • Christopher Morley

... took the precaution of drawing a couple of half-crowns from his pocket and slipping ...
— High Noon - A New Sequel to 'Three Weeks' by Elinor Glyn • Anonymous



Words linked to "A couple of" :   a few, few



Copyright © 2024 Free Translator.org