"Screwing" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... time she could in screwing the music-stool to the right height for her little figure. It was no sooner up high enough than she found she wanted it to go down, and then it would go down too low. At last it was just as right as it could be, and there was nothing more ...
— Terry - Or, She ought to have been a Boy • Rosa Mulholland
... said, and he filled the pewters up again. "It's up to me," and he set to work boring out the glasses with his rag, as if he was short-handed and the bar was crowded with customers, and screwing up his face into what I suppose he considered an innocent or unconscious expression. The girl began to sidle in and out with a smart frock ...
— Joe Wilson and His Mates • Henry Lawson
... upon the ground, regardless alike of the tremulous hold which Mr Brass maintained on one side of his cravat, and of the firmer grasp of Miss Sally upon the other; although this latter detention was in itself no small inconvenience, as that fascinating woman, besides screwing her knuckles inconveniently into his throat from time to time, had fastened upon him in the first instance with so tight a grip that even in the disorder and distraction of his thoughts he could not divest himself of an uneasy sense of choking. Between the ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... he never runs against a porter; and he who clears the way for a lady, will be sure never to rub against a market woman, or jostle an apple-seller's board. If accused of beating down his laundress to the lowest fraction, of making his boot-black call a dozen times for his pay, of higgling and screwing a fish boy till he takes off two cents, or of threatening to discharge his seamstress unless she will work for a shilling a day, how easy to brand it all as slander, by showing that he pays his minister in advance, is generous in ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... of equal difficulty to keep it going. Though fitted by competent workmen, it often would not go at all. Then the foreman of the factory at which it was made was sent for, and he would almost live beside the engine for a month or more; and after easing her here and screwing her up there, putting in a new part and altering an old one, packing the piston and tightening the valves, the machine would at length begot to work.[17] Now the case is altogether different. The perfection of modern ...
— Industrial Biography - Iron Workers and Tool Makers • Samuel Smiles
... the boy, admiringly. "You'll have to get up early to get around the boss. Why, this barrel here——" He stopped short, as though suddenly remembering the value of silence, and screwing up one eye as if to indicate that he could tell things if he liked, he added, "Well, when the boss gets his hands on a thing he don't let go easy, I tell ...
— The Boys of Crawford's Basin - The Story of a Mountain Ranch in the Early Days of Colorado • Sidford F. Hamp
... half-past eleven," said Miss Cottle, screwing her body about, so that she could look down through the glass walls of the office to the clock, on the main floor below. "Why, my heavens! It's twelve o'clock!" she announced amazedly, throwing down her pen, and ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... boy. I tell you, Dr. Lively, I can't economize any more than I do and have done. I might wring and twist and screw in every possible direction, and at the year's end there wouldn't be a nickel to show for all the wringing and twisting and screwing. There's only one way in which the purse can be made up—there's only one way in which economy is possible. You can save that money, Dr. Lively: you're the only member of the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine. Vol. XII, No. 33. December, 1873. • Various
... islanders swarmed from the tiny forecastle, two of them leaping to the halyards and holding by a single turn, while the third fastened down the engineroom, companion and swung the ventilators around. Below, Lee Goom and Toyama were lowering skylight covers and screwing up deadeyes. Duncan pulled shut the cover of the companion scuttle, and held on, waiting, the first drops of rain pelting his face, while the Samoset leaped violently ahead, at the same time heeling first to starboard then to port ...
— The Night-Born • Jack London
... to affect his imagination, for he put his fingers to his ears and shut his eyes, screwing them up tightly just as a small boy does when his face is being soaped. There was something pathetic in it that touched me. It also gave me a lesson, for it seemed that before me was a child, only a child, though the features were worn, and the stubble on the jaws ...
— Dracula • Bram Stoker
... stood gazing steadily at her as if striving to take in the meaning of her words, the while screwing up his ear most violently till it stuck out like a horn upon the side of his shiny, bald head. "Permit me to say, Miss Brodie," he said, with a deliberate and measured emphasis, "that you must be a most extraordinary ...
— Corporal Cameron • Ralph Connor
... cried, "that was it. He asked me to make him a clown's dress and keep it deeply secret. He said he wanted to surprise Aunt Margaret and Albert's uncle. And I didn't think it was wrong," said Dora, screwing up her face; she then added, "Oh dear, oh dear, oh, oh!" and with these concluding ...
— New Treasure Seekers - or, The Bastable Children in Search of a Fortune • E. (Edith) Nesbit
... And dammy, I owe my man Lightfoot fourteen pound now which he's lent and paid for me: and he duns me—the confounded impudent blackguard: and I wish to Heaven I knew any way of getting a bill done, or of screwing a little out of my lady! I'll give you half, Ned, upon my soul and honor, I'll give you half if you can get any body to ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... cavaliere, screwing him unmercifully by the ear, "you have compassed my death by your infernal arts. I am poisoned—a dying man, but my last ounce of strength shall be enough to avenge me." So said, he began to belabour the wretch ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... thought," he said, screwing up his forehead, as though in the process of profound cogitation, "that one of these days some lucky fellow will take the Lynhaven Railway off Chenney's hands and earn ...
— Bones in London • Edgar Wallace
... awry,—for I must mention That he had riveted his attention Upon his wonderful invention, Twisting his tongue as he twisted the strings, Working his face as he worked the wings, And with every turn of gimlet and screw Turning and screwing his mouth round, too, Till his nose seemed bent To catch the scent, Around some corner, of new-baked pies, And his wrinkled cheeks and his squinting eyes Grew puckered into a queer grimace, That made him look very droll in the face, And also ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various
... in abuse as well as in praise—e.g. of some seedlings—"The little beggars are doing just what I don't want them to." He would speak in a half-provoked, half-admiring way of the ingenuity of a Mimosa leaf in screwing itself out of a basin of water in which he had tried to fix it. One must see the same spirit in his way of speaking of Sundew, earth-worms, etc. (Cf. Leslie Stephen's 'Swift,' 1882, page 200, where Swift's inspection of the manners and customs of servants are compared ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... devil may you be?" asked Captain Sharpland, screwing his eyeglass into his eye. He disliked Jews, ...
— Corporal Sam and Other Stories • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... his great delight was in locks, clocks, engines—anything mechanical, in fact; but the only way in which he could indulge his love for such things was in taking off, oiling, putting to rights, and screwing on again all the locks in their own house, or any of the neighbours that would let him. As he often conquered refractory locks, he became quite of importance in "the Row," and was often sent for. He had ...
— Charlie Scott - or, There's Time Enough • Unknown
... played, six; lost, five; drawn, one) knew how to slash the ball across the net at a tennis garden party, always read the prayers in church as though he were imploring God to keep a straighter bat and improve His cut to leg, and had a passion for knocking nails into walls, screwing locks into doors, and making chicken runs. He was, he often thanked his stars, a practical Realist, and his wife, who was fat, stupid, and in a state of perpetual wonder, used to say of him, "If Will ...
— The Golden Scarecrow • Hugh Walpole
... physicians were not agreed concerning her distemper, for she left two of them in a very hot dispute about it when she came out of her body. "And pray, madam," said the same spirit to the sixth passenger, "How came you to leave the other world?" But that female spirit, screwing up her mouth, answered, she wondered at the curiosity of some people; that perhaps persons had already heard some reports of her death, which were far from being true; that, whatever was the occasion of it, she was glad at being delivered from a world in which she had ...
— From This World to the Next • Henry Fielding
... I shall attain to sooner or later?" the former sorter persists, screwing up his eyes slyly. "I shall certainly get the Swedish 'Polar Star.' That's an order it is worth working for, a white cross with a ...
— The Horse-Stealers and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... make a fortune; a fair competence would satisfy him, a sufficiency. The thought of no longer being obliged to hold an inquest on every sixpence; of bidding farewell forever to this life of pinching and screwing; of dwelling decently instead of pigging it in a cramped and jerry-built semi-detached; of enjoying once more some of life's brightnesses—sport, for instance, of which he was passionately fond; of the means to wander, when disposed, through earth's fairest places—these ...
— The Sign of the Spider • Bertram Mitford
... loitered on this scene before he replied. At length, screwing up one eye, and with a suggestive smile, he answered: "Sure, it's all a matter of time, to the selfishest woman. 'Tis not the same with women as with men; you see, they don't get younger—that's a point. But"—he gave a meaning glance at the priest—"but perhaps she's not going to wait for ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... this obsession. Here it is the case of the women of a certain town who, in order to prevent their children from playing in a dangerous swamp close by, have taught them that there are "wee Popes" in it. There it is a case of man picked up, maimed and all but unconscious after an accident, screwing up his lips to utter one last "To Hell with the Pope!" before he dies. I remember listening in Court to the examination of an old Orangeman who had been called as a witness to the peaceable disposition of a friend of his. "What sort of man," ...
— The Open Secret of Ireland • T. M. Kettle
... so horrible to cross the room close to that black figure—as she would have to do—that Barbara lingered a moment, screwing up her courage. It was hard, certainly, to walk slowly across, for she thought she should not run, feeling all the time as if two hands would catch hold of her in the darkness. She was very glad to creep in beside her aunt, and at first could not do anything but lie and listen to that ...
— Barbara in Brittany • E. A. Gillie
... path next the woods and stand waiting under the willow which Elnora would pass on her return. It was for that meeting he had made the trip. He got down on the ground, tore up the car, worked, asked for help, and kept Philip busy screwing bolts and applying the oil can. All the time Henderson kept an eye on Edith and Elnora under the willow. But he took pains to lay the work he asked Philip to do where that scene would be out of his sight. When Elnora came around the corner with the pitcher, ...
— A Girl Of The Limberlost • Gene Stratton Porter
... slave of the fair sex, were they but young and fair. At the age of 70, his lordship fancied himself an Adonis, notwithstanding his qualms and his rheumatism. He required a great deal of "brushing, oiling, screwing, and winding up before he appeared in public," but when fully made up, was game for the part of "lover, rake, or fine gentleman." Lord Ogleby made his bow to Fanny Sterling, and promised to make her a countess; but the ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... Peg!" he cried bravely, screwing up his face in his endeavor not to make an outcry, ...
— The Girl Aviators' Sky Cruise • Margaret Burnham
... hang upon his speech, which dealt with badly fitted gas-plugs, waste-pipes out of repair, little tricks for driving picture-nails into walls, and the sins of the charwoman or the housemaids. In the lack of better things the small gossip of a servant'' hall becomes immensely interesting, and the screwing of a washer on a tap an event to ...
— The Light That Failed • Rudyard Kipling
... so much more comfortable," protested lazy Jack, slowly screwing himself into a more erect position, while Katherine straightened ...
— Mr. Pat's Little Girl - A Story of the Arden Foresters • Mary F. Leonard
... incredible and quite disastrous; and yet at the same time had he not, in one unvisited corner of his mind, always foreknown it? Suddenly he was distressed, discouraged, disillusioned about the whole of life. He thought that Everard Lucas, screwing up a compass, was strangely unmoved. But ...
— The Roll-Call • Arnold Bennett
... procession that filed down the garden walk a few minutes later. First came Berthe, in her black dress and white cap, holding a lamp high above her head, and screwing her forehead into a mass of wrinkles as she peered out into the surrounding darkness. After her came madame, holding up her dress and stepping daintily along in her high-heeled little slippers. Joyce brought up the rear, stumbling along in the darkness of ...
— The Gate of the Giant Scissors • Annie Fellows Johnston
... anger, when it burst, would be quite incoherent with force. There was really something of hatred in his look as he gazed at the youngster, his mouth a little open, his hand holding his trembling pipe just away from his mouth, which had forgotten it. The old sailor bent forward, screwing his eyes at this young man as though trying to believe it ...
— Waiting for Daylight • Henry Major Tomlinson
... polishing his glass, holding it up to the light, and then screwing it into his eye; "strikes me, he wasn't overanxious to have that dish ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath
... ready for sea. The immense and ponderous masses which constitute the elements of the mighty structure are hoisted slowly on board and let down into their places. Multitudes of men are incessantly employed for many weeks in arranging the limbs and members of the monster, and in screwing and bolting every thing into its place. Still nothing can be tried. The machinery is too ponderous and massive to be put in action by any power less than that of the mighty mover on which its ultimate performance is to depend; and this mover has not ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... strips of rattan and with coarse fibres from the leaf-stem of some of the palms and ferns is applied to a great variety of purposes, and largely takes the place of our nailing and screwing and riveting. It is carried out extremely neatly and commonly has a decorative effect. This effect is in some cases enhanced by combining blackened threads with those of the natural pale yellow colour; and the finer varieties of ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... pieces and mix in it a little common salt,—never fill the rubber bags more than half full; expel the air as much as possible by pressing before screwing on the top. Always place a layer of lint, cotton or thin cloth between the skin and the bag. The extreme cold is not only painful but liable to irritate the skin, and may cause frost-bites. Its effect should be watched carefully. Sometimes the weight causes discomfort. ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... my blessed infant,' she retorted, tapping her nose again, screwing up her face, and twinkling her eyes like an imp of supernatural intelligence. 'Never YOU mind! You'd like to know whether I stop her hair from falling off, or dye it, or touch up her complexion, or improve her eyebrows, wouldn't you? ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... and dance, there would be no need of schoolmasters—no need of learning to write and read—no parsons—and (by your worship's pardon) no magistrates. The whole world is a big fiddle—the strings are tuned—Fortune plays upon them; but some one is wanted to be constantly screwing up the strings; and this is a job for the parson and magistrate. There's nothing but turning and screwing, and turning and scraping, and ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... him, glanced straight into his eyes and began to laugh with his quiet, neighing voice, screwing his face ...
— The Comedienne • Wladyslaw Reymont
... with his silver spectacles pushed up to the top of his head, his long nose buried in a musty volume, a cup of untasted coffee at his elbow, absorbed in study. The small room was filled with books, old and new, and smelt of them. As Taquisara entered, the old priest looked up, screwing his lids together in the attempt to recognize his visitor without using his spectacles. He took him for the syndic of Muro, a respectable countryman of fifty years, come to consult with him about ...
— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford
... fool sentimentality? If I insisted on my view, what would happen? The people who had followed me so far—and their number was thousands and their quality, measured by any heart and soul standard, more human than any of those whom Rogers was thumb-screwing—as well as I myself, would be surely ruined. If I went on, at least I could care for those I had brought along with me. I looked at the complication fairly and squarely, weighed my duty with such powers of judgment as I possessed, ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson
... of operative fixation rarely needs consideration; it occasionally happens, however, that oblique fractures, such as one mentioned on p. 166, are met with, in which screwing or wiring of the bone ends is advisable. What has been said above as to fractures, accompanied by loss of continuity, applies equally to cases of severe wedge-fracture, ...
— Surgical Experiences in South Africa, 1899-1900 • George Henry Makins
... WISE. Extortion is a screwing from men more than by the law of God or men is right; and it is committed sometimes by them in office, about fees, rewards, and the like:[53] but it is most commonly committed by men of trade, who without all conscience, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... put in a pale-eyed blonde, who sat near the door, "'t seems but yestiddy I was here with Alsia yonder." She nodded her head towards a girl of five who was screwing herself round in her chair and trying to peep ...
— The Delectable Duchy • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... power of the saints, put padlocks on their doors. Very curious affairs these padlocks are. They have been copied from the Tartars, or rather from the Chinese. The key is a screw: by taking the screw out, the padlock shuts; by screwing it in, it opens. As the shrines which claim the poor Russians' devotion exist in every direction,—indeed, they cannot walk twenty yards without seeing them,—while they run along on their daily avocations they are continually bowing and crossing themselves. ...
— Fred Markham in Russia - The Boy Travellers in the Land of the Czar • W. H. G. Kingston
... fellow," said Will Scarlet, in his soft, gentle voice, "I owe thee somewhat that I would pay forthwith." Then Wat, the Tinker, came forward and stood in front of Will Scarlet, screwing up his face and shutting his eyes tightly, as though he already felt his ears ringing with the buffet. Will Scarlet rolled up his sleeve, and, standing on tiptoe to give the greater swing to his arm, he struck with might and main. "WHOOF!" came his palm against the Tinker's head, ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... Guy, shouting down from the top of a tall step-ladder, where he was busy screwing into place the freshly cleaned oil-lamps whose radiance was to be depended upon to illumine the ancient interior of the North Estabrook church. He addressed his eldest brother, Oliver, who, in his newness to the situation and his consequent lack of sympathy with the occasion, was proving ...
— On Christmas Day In The Evening • Grace Louise Smith Richmond
... boiler-seams got into them and made them raw. What a time it was! It wasn't long before I was as dirty as the rest of them. I forgot all about time or food or sleep; just fetched and carried as I was told. Once the Second, who was screwing the holes we drilled, asked me if I had been to sea before. I said 'No,' and both of them said 'Oh Lord!' I can't blame them now. I've said it myself since, when I've found a new ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... the forefinger extended and separated; then raise the hand upward and give it a half turn, as if screwing something. (Dunbar.) ...
— Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples And Deaf-Mutes • Garrick Mallery
... beautiful vicissitude. Were it not that sheer sleeping and soporific passages, circumlocutions, repetitions, touches even of pure doting jargon so often intervene.... A wild tone pervades the whole utterance of the man, like its key-note and regulator; now screwing itself aloft as into the Song of Spirits, or else the shrill mockery of fiends; now sinking in cadences, not without melodious heartiness, though sometimes abrupt enough, into the common pitch, when we hear it only ...
— Essays AEsthetical • George Calvert
... white feather. She went, knowing that she would meet Lord Fawn, and she did wear the diamonds. It was the first time that they had been round her neck since the occasion in respect to which Sir Florian had placed them in her hands, and it had not been without much screwing up of her courage that she had resolved to appear on this occasion with the much-talked-of ornament upon her person. It was now something over a fortnight since she had parted with Lord Fawn at Fawn Court; and, although they were still presumed to be engaged to marry each other, and were ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... thwart and pulled out a light three-pronged hook and fitted it to a jointed pole, screwing the two sections together so that it made one long pole of about twenty-four feet in length. He took the water glass and rowed the boat until it ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... and very short hair. The man was tall and meagre, with a receding forehead and a sandy complexion that should have been freckled, but was not. He had a trick of half-closing his eyes when he looked at anything, not screwing them up as seamen do, but appearing rather to drop a film over them like the inner eyelid of a bird. The woman's eyes resembled a hare's, being brown and big, and set far back, so that she seemed at times to be looking right behind her. She wore a faded look, from ...
— Noughts and Crosses • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... mean me, let me tell you what you are," said Lord Robert, screwing up his eyeglass. "You"—shaking his head right and left—"you are a man who takes delicately nurtured ladies out of sheltered homes and sends them into holes and hovels in search of abandoned women and their misbegotten children! Why"—turning to Drake-"what do you think has happened? ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... now expostulate a little with our country landlords, who by unmeasurable screwing and racking their tenants all over the kingdom, have already reduced the miserable people to a worse condition than the peasants in France, or the vassals in Germany and Poland; so that the whole species of what we call substantial farmers, ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... line, or through the river, or surrender. Breckinridge's line was in plain sight, not a half mile away, in the open and moving up in splendid order. So far as I am informed, Custer was the only man in the command who knew that there was a ford and that we were making for it. The rest were screwing their courage up to the task of breaking through. I never have ceased to admire the nerve exhibited by Captain Brittain, when I told him it looked as if that was what we would have to do. He was an excellent officer and belonged ...
— Personal Recollections of a Cavalryman - With Custer's Michigan Cavalry Brigade in the Civil War • J. H. (James Harvey) Kidd
... suddenly put his left arm round the robber's waist, raised him in the air, then screwing him round his right arm, flung him over ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai
... all you might be thinking it is! Ever since I'm back I've been screwing up my courage—but 'tis the boldest and brazenest thing my like would ever be daring to ask the likes of you!" She had never heard him talk so like a stage Irishman before; she had never known him so moved. "Whiles I'm thinking you'll say me 'yes,' and whiles ...
— Jane Journeys On • Ruth Comfort Mitchell
... had instinctively judged best that they should know the worst at once, and she let them have the full brunt of the drawing-room, while she was screwing her courage up to come down and see them. She was afterwards—months afterwards—able to report to Corey that when she entered the room his father was sitting with his hat on his knees, a little tilted away from the Emancipation group, ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... eye on Lorraine, not on Stanislaus, from the first. For many centuries, especially for these last two,—ever since that Siege of Metz, which we once saw, under Kaiser Karl V. and Albert Alcibiades,—France has been wrenching and screwing at this Lorraine, wriggling it off bit by bit; till now, as we perceived on Lyttelton junior of Hagley's visit, Lorraine seems all lying unscrewed; and France, by any good opportunity, could stick it in her pocket. Such opportunity ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. IX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... jollification to-morrow, it being his birthday. Along the rigging were white trowsers, check shirts, and all the other paraphernalia of a sailor's wardrobe, hung up to swing to the wind, and dry; and, as Jerome sat on the windlass, scraping and screwing his fiddle by way of tuning, I could plainly be made to understand that Friday, the 21st of May, was not intended to be passed over with the indifference of any ordinary day,—at least, not on board ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross
... Isaac in Dutch. A long conversation followed in that language, during which Flett asked me for my viking's stone. The old Jew took the talisman in his long fingers. He regarded it as though he were familiar with its structure, twisting it round and screwing the thin band of gold that encircled it. Then a very wonderful thing happened. He gave the stone a few taps upon the table and the metal ring fell off. The stone dropped open in two pieces like a shell, and in the heart of it appeared a bright ...
— The Pilots of Pomona • Robert Leighton
... shelves on end in their order and start by screwing on the back slats on both ends first, then screw on the two front slats. Turn the stand down and put on the two back slats. Attach the two front slats on the top shelf first. Then bore the places for the remaining ...
— Mission Furniture - How to Make It, Part 3 • H. H. Windsor
... beautiful daughter. Holy Father! what a beauty!" Here the Jew tried his utmost to express beauty by extending his hands, screwing up his eyes, and twisting his mouth to one side as though ...
— Taras Bulba and Other Tales • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... may be a fixture, beaded or puttied in on top, the whole of the bottom unscrewing from the drawer frame. This latter is very well for a collection when fully made up and complete, but if required for an incomplete collection, the risk and annoyance of unscrewing and screwing up, to constantly remove or insert ...
— Practical Taxidermy • Montagu Browne
... as it came out that the gold was gone, Captain Vincent pitched into me. He knew then what I was screwing up that board for. It wasn't any use to deny it to him after what he had seen. I said I would give it back to the old man, and tell him I had taken it to keep it from being lost in the fire. Dock said it wan't worth while to do that; the old man had lost it, ...
— Freaks of Fortune - or, Half Round the World • Oliver Optic
... know too much," said Otoyo, making what she called a "scare face" by wrinkling her nose and screwing up her mouth. ...
— Molly Brown's Senior Days • Nell Speed
... white-topped, out of the snow and spume. They ranged high above her taffrail curling horribly, but one did not want to look at them. The one man on deck had a line about him, and he looked ahead, watching her screwing round with hove-up bows as she climbed the seas. If he'd let her fall off or claw up, the next one would have made an end of her. He was knee deep half the time in icy brine, and his hands had split and opened with the frost, but the sweat dripped from him as he clung to the jarring wheel. One ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss
... She painted away, screwing her eyes almost shut and getting very close to her picture. He had never thought her so plain; she was letting her mouth hang open. He wondered why she was so charming; but when she stepped back rhythmically, tilting her pretty head this way and that, he saw why: it was her unfailing ...
— The Daughter of the Storage - And Other Things in Prose and Verse • William Dean Howells
... listening to the ticking of the clock. A stair creaked, and a squeaky mouse scurried noisily through the wall. The darkness was oppressive, and after lying for some time screwing up his courage, he took the box of matches, and striking one, went downstairs for ...
— Lady of the Barge and Others, Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs
... fastens it to the pin as well as the screw—see here, Jack,' and she showed me the catch, 'that couldn't have come undone if it was fastened when I put it on. And I know gran clicked it, as well as screwing the head in.' ...
— The Girls and I - A Veracious History • Mary Louisa Stewart Molesworth
... street-number over and over, so as to make sure of remembering it; and then, screwing up my courage, walked hurriedly up the street, trying to ignore the glances which were cast at me by occasional pedestrians. I happened to think of a large dairy lunch-room on Fourteenth Street where I had several times gone for coffee and rolls, and where ...
— The Long Day - The Story of a New York Working Girl As Told by Herself • Dorothy Richardson
... dress, even her stays, laid out, and tarnished finery, to be purchased by the lowest of the low. There was a full-length picture of her when she was young and happy; another, beautiful, by Opie or Lawrence, standing screwing up a harp with one hand, and playing with her little ...
— The Life and Letters of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... to date in the crab's progress we are making. Taking these observations with the thermometer between 22 deg. Fahr. and 40 deg. Fahr. below zero (-30 deg. C. to -40 deg. C.) is a very mixed pleasure. Standing still on deck working with these fine instruments, and screwing in metal screws with one's bare fingers, is not altogether agreeable. It often happens that they must slap their arms about and tramp hard up and down the deck. They are received with shouts of laughter when they reappear in the ...
— Farthest North - Being the Record of a Voyage of Exploration of the Ship 'Fram' 1893-1896 • Fridtjof Nansen
... him—for these scoundrels all know how to find one another—L500, too much for any of these bumpkins constables, no, no, I must have it—there is danger though—I must think over it—that voice was queer, where could it come from—could any one be in the presses?' After screwing up his courage to the task, he opened them fearfully one by one; there was nothing there but the old papers before mentioned. He stooped and stood leaning against the mantelpiece, over which was the Earl's picture—then puzzled, but determined on his course of action, ...
— Edward Barnett; a Neglected Child of South Carolina, Who Rose to Be a Peer of Great Britain,—and the Stormy Life of His Grandfather, Captain Williams • Tobias Aconite
... of injector very commonly used is Giffard's (Fig. 16). Steam is allowed to enter by screwing up the valve V. As it rushes through the nozzle of the cone A it takes up water and projects it into the "mixing cone" B, which can be raised or lowered by the pinion D (worked by the hand-wheel wheel shown) so as to regulate the amount ...
— How it Works • Archibald Williams
... distant intervals on the cloth; and the knives and forks look as if they had done duty at every public dinner in London since the accession of George the First. The musicians are scraping and grating and screwing tremendously—playing no notes but notes of preparation; and several gentlemen are gliding along the sides of the tables, looking into plate after plate with frantic eagerness, the expression of their countenances growing more and more dismal as ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... "I'm miserable. I'll explain. I'll tell you. Just sit down again. It would be awfully kind. You see, I've been expecting a friend. It was all-important I should see him to-day, because there were things to be said. I've been awake half the night screwing up my courage to saying them. And then he never turned up. I got nerves waiting hour after hour—anybody would, waiting like that. And I began to imagine every kind of ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet
... coach in which they travelled rolled up. He was a tall, thinnish man, with, dishevelled hair and a thin hawk nose, dressed in an old military coat not buttoned up. He was smoking a long pipe and screwing up his eyes to keep the sun out ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... and knocking of her heart, the eyelids screwing themselves tight, the jerking of her nerves at every sound: at the two harsh rattling screams of the curtain rings along the pole, at the light click of the switches. Only the small green-shaded lamp still burning on Richard's writing table in ...
— Mary Olivier: A Life • May Sinclair
... an Oxford student, with a long rent-roll in prospective, who was screwing himself against the wall, not to be in the way of the waltzers, "I thought you had given ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... screwing around on the piano-stool, and helping herself to just one. But feeling the warmth of Lloyd's cordial tone, urging her to take more, she thawed into smiling friendliness, and took several. "They are delicious!" she exclaimed. "You got them at the cake shop ...
— The Little Colonel's Hero • Annie Fellows Johnston
... finished product that people need in their lives, it's a sort of plain, everyday service, isn't it? And to do this work as economically as it can be managed, taking as low a price as you can get along with instead of screwing as high a price as possible out of the people who have to have it, what's the matter with that, as an interesting problem in ingenuity? I tell you, Mr. Welles, you ought to talk to my wife about this. It's as much her idea as mine. We worked it out ...
— The Brimming Cup • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... difficulty tided over, and with so good a face that few in Marbridge had any idea that it existed. Certainly none knew of the pinching and screwing and retrenching which went on indoors at No. 27. One or two tradesmen could have told of long accounts unpaid, and some relations living at a distance were troubled by appeals for help, a form of begging which, at this date of ...
— The Good Comrade • Una L. Silberrad
... information with avidity, and then turned his attention to the front of the engine, to which several lengths of hose, each forty feet long, had been attached. Baxmore and Corney were at the extreme end, screwing on the "branch" or nozzle by which the stream of water is directed, and Dale was tumbling a half-drunk and riotous navvy head-over-heels into the crowd, in order to convince him that his services to pump were not wanted—a sufficient number having been procured. A couple of ...
— Fighting the Flames • R.M. Ballantyne
... "All right," said Abey, screwing the guard tightly on his pin. "I'll take him on. After he's seen the Flatiron and the head waiter at the Hotel Astor and heard the phonograph play 'Under the Old Apple Tree' it'll be half past ten, and Mr. Texas will be ready to roll up in his blanket. I've got a supper engagement at ...
— The Trimmed Lamp and Others • O Henry
... it alone a little—it won't run away! I want to tell you something about myself, if I could flatter myself you'd take any interest in it." He had thrust the raised point of his cane into the low wall of the terrace, and he leaned on the knob, screwing the other end gently round ...
— The Reverberator • Henry James
... the waitress and watched her later bringing dishes to a purple-faced fat man at an adjoining table. The fat man was futilely endeavoring to tell secrets to the waitress by contorting his features and screwing up his eyes. He reminded Rachel of Brander, only Brander told secrets without trying. She finished and hurried out. She would be hungry later, but it didn't matter. Erik would ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... to this. It was a disappointed whistle; but he soon cheered up. "I thought I could have lent a hand in screwing old Buxton up about the settlements; but I see it's not come to that yet. Still I'll go and see the old gentleman. I'm a bit of a favorite of his, and I doubt I ...
— The Moorland Cottage • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... though we might easily have filled them with specimens of the desert house-fly which swarm at every well! By sawing off the ends of these lids we had two useful boxes, with neither top nor bottom, and by screwing them on to a framework of wood we manufactured a most useful caisson, 2 feet deep by 1 1/2 long and 1 foot wide. By forcing this into the sand in the well and digging out the sand contained in it, and then patiently ...
— Spinifex and Sand - Five Years' Pioneering and Exploration in Western Australia • David W Carnegie
... eyes search the ground far below him for mice or little birds. Then, when he sees something, his body suddenly seems to be made of lead and he drops like a stone on his prey. A hawk can climb the sky by leaning with outspread wings against the breeze and cork-screwing up in a ...
— What Shall We Do Now?: Five Hundred Games and Pastimes • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... calcine some fire-clay by a red heat and pound it,—about a pound,—and send it to me, I shall try to make you a mould or two in Henning's manner to cast this and the sulphur acid iron in. I have made a screwing tool for wood that seems to answer; also one of a one-tenth diameter for marble, which does very well." In another note, Watt says: "I find my drill readily makes 2400 turns per minute, even with the large drill you sent last; if I bear lightly, a three-quarter ferril would run about 3000, and ...
— Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles
... Wing, screwing in his monocle. "I'd like a second whisky and soda! I suppose there's none here. I hate to see a man ...
— Guns of the Gods • Talbot Mundy
... come; all day Stephen had been screwing up his courage for the task he had to do; of course it could not be done when his master and he were in the shop together, for there they were liable at any moment to be interrupted. At dinner-time they separated; for they took the meal ...
— Words of Cheer for the Tempted, the Toiling, and the Sorrowing • T. S. Arthur
... the Universe) rather in dumps to-night. Been a burglar at family mansion in Regent's Park; the Firm at dinner; SONS standing a little meal for ANTONY; burglar took opportunity of entering by bedroom window, first observing precaution of screwing up doors, and other entrances and exits, so that he might pursue his vocation with that certainty of non-disturbance upon which all well-bred burglars insist. Loot considerable, Providence blessing the burglar with tea-pots and spoons to ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, April 29, 1893 • Various
... become a climbing, grasping, lifting, handling organ. The fore-limb has become a free hand, and everyone who knows monkeys at all is aware of the zest with which they use their tool. They enjoy pulling things to pieces—a kind of dissection—or screwing the handle off a brush and ...
— The Outline of Science, Vol. 1 (of 4) - A Plain Story Simply Told • J. Arthur Thomson
... in no wise alarmed, or even disturbed by our approach. When we came very close to any of them, they would survey us with an air half angry, and half inquisitive, stretching out their long necks; and screwing their heads from side to side, so as to obtain a view of us first with one eye, and then with the other; this seeming to be considered indispensable to a complete and satisfactory understanding of our character ...
— The Island Home • Richard Archer
... Fourth were straggling down the passage on the way to their classroom, when they heard a scuffle and the clatter of falling books. Grundy had seized Jack Vance by the collar from behind, and was screwing his knuckle into his ...
— The Triple Alliance • Harold Avery
... I did not wait long for an opportunity of letting the whole of them ken my mind, and that, whenever I chose, I could make them wheel to the right about. So it chanced, as we were playing, that I was in prime luck, first rooking the one and syne the other, and I saw them twisting and screwing their mouths about as if they were chewing bitter aloes. Finding that they were on the point of being beaten roop and stoop, they all three rose up from the chairs, crying with one voice, that I was a cheat.—An elder of Maister Wiggie's ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - tailor in Dalkeith • D. M. Moir
... "There's only one thing more I can think of," she declared, screwing up her mouth and her eyes. "But I sha'n't ask you that—it's too silly. If I imagined for a moment that you could be thinking ...
— With the Procession • Henry B. Fuller
... opening door he turned and stared at the apparition which confronted him. Mary had closed the door and stood with her back to it, screwing up her courage for the last stage of ...
— Mary Minds Her Business • George Weston
... whispered the other. "There 's a big lake up in the hills, and they 've piped the water down here. It 's got a force like a cannon, and that fellow—I don't know whether it is Herndon or not—is screwing on the hose connection. I bet your ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish
... of the proceedings they were asked to play, and after replacing a broken string, and a vast deal of screwing and tightening, they gave 'a new Spanish composition, for three voices and three guitars,' and secured an encore, thus completely overwhelming their rivals. In the account of the French Watering-Place (R.P.) we read about a guitar on the pier, 'to which a boy or woman sings without ...
— Charles Dickens and Music • James T. Lightwood
... candle. To see the star with? No; but to adjust the instrument to see the star with. It was the star that was going to take the photograph; it was, also, the astronomer. For a long time he worked in the dimness, screwing tubes and polishing lenses and adjusting reflectors, and only after much labor the finely focused instrument was brought to bear. Then he blew out the light, and left the start to do its work upon the ...
— Addresses • Henry Drummond
... made gratifying progress in screwing together the "Lady Nyassa." He had the zealous co-operation of three as fine steady workmen as ever handled tools; and, as they were noble specimens of English sailors, we would fain mention the names of men who are an honour to the British ...
— A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries • David Livingstone
... seen a pantomime?" she asked of my father one morning, looking at me the while with a whimsical screwing ...
— Paul Kelver • Jerome Klapka, AKA Jerome K. Jerome
... sets of cutters for the manufacture of shells, as well as twist drills, reamers, milling cutters, gear cutters, screwing dies, taps and lathe tools. Some of this work is of high accuracy, and a set of solid screwing dies has the particular interest that almost all the operations are carried out by women after they have been in the shop for a fortnight. The general tool-room work included an exhibit of seventy-one ...
— Women and War Work • Helen Fraser
... answer to his shout, then a third and a fourth. Slowly and steadily the crowd grew, the turmoil increased. A muzhik in a white apron wearing a conspicuous emblem[7] made his way through the crowd and, screwing up his mouth, cried like ...
— The Created Legend • Feodor Sologub
... drawin' it rather fine, ain't it?" said the Bloater, screwing up one eyebrow and turning towards Little Jim; but that small youth was so touched with the poor girl's sorrow and so attracted by her countenance, that he had quite forgotten his patron for the moment. Going towards her, he laid his dirty ...
— Life in the Red Brigade - London Fire Brigade • R.M. Ballantyne
... least equal force to most of the six-wheeled engines hitherto constructed, as in those engines the engineer has the power of putting nearly all the weight upon the driving wheels; and if the rail be wet or greasy, there is a great temptation to increase the bite of those wheels by screwing them down more firmly upon the rails. A greater strain is thus thrown upon the rail than can exist in the case of any equally heavy four-wheeled engine; and the engine is made very unsafe, as a pitching motion will inevitably be induced at high speeds, when an engine is thus poised upon ...
— A Catechism of the Steam Engine • John Bourne
... was unscrewing the screws in the lid of the coffin, and scarcely had he begun the task when he realized that what he had heard from the balcony was the screwing of these same screws. There were twelve, and some of them were difficult to start, but in due course he had removed them all, and they stood in a row on their heads on the mantelpiece. He listened yet again. No sound. He had only to push the lid of the coffin to the left or to the right, ...
— Hugo - A Fantasia on Modern Themes • Arnold Bennett
... never be just twisted together and then bound with tape to form a joint. Twisted wires sometimes break and sometimes come loose; then an arc forms, and the house catches fire. Good wiring always means soldering every joint and screwing the ends of the wires tightly into the switches or ...
— Common Science • Carleton W. Washburne
... Sturk was screwing his lips sternly together, and the lines of his gruff haggard face were quivering, and a sullen tear or two started down from his ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... said the thrust-block, whose business it is to take the push of the screw; for if a screw had nothing to hold it back it would crawl right into the engine-room. (It is the holding back of the screwing action that gives the drive to a ship.) "I know I do my work deep down and out of sight, but I warn you I expect justice. All I ask for is bare justice. Why can't you push steadily and evenly, instead of whizzing like a whirligig, and making ...
— The Day's Work, Volume 1 • Rudyard Kipling
... Just as she was screwing the long coral and pearl ear-rings with rather painful energy on to the unfortunate young man's ears, the servant, with a slight expression of terror that could not ...
— The Limit • Ada Leverson
... with the patterns, is fastened by the four machine screws, the small tapped holes for which are shown in the corners. In fact, in changing patterns, the process consists of simply removing these four machine screws, taking up the pattern plate and screwing to the vibrator frame the new pattern plate. The vibrator frame itself is secured to the machine structure by the four larger bolts, the holes for which are shown in the inner corners. These bolts are, as shown in Fig. 7, surrounded by thick bushings. These bushings are elastic to such a degree ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 1157, March 5, 1898 • Various
... pocket three pieces of steel, each about the size of a lead pencil, and began screwing them together, end for end. The instrument produced was a foot in length and looked like a screwdriver. As a matter of burglarious fact it was a jimmy of fineness and finish. It had been the property of a gentlemanly "flat-worker," who ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... though she spoke cheerfully and contentedly, I could see they were precarious. I had paid more than was due; other lodgers fell into an opposite error, and forgot to pay Janet at all. Then, Janet being ignorant of all indirect modes of screwing money out of her lodgers, others in the same line of life, who were sharper than the poor, simple Highland woman, were enabled to let their apartments cheaper in appearance, though the inmates usually found them twice as ...
— Chronicles of the Canongate • Sir Walter Scott
... is no evading the heavier part of these miseries. You avoid the moment of suffering, and escape the effort of screwing up your courage for one of these moments, but not the jar to the whole system. I found the effect of having taken the ether bad for me. I seemed to taste it all the time, and neuralgic pain continued; this lasted three days. For the evening of the third, ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... interrupted me? 'there are people like me who make good managers! You see,' he went on, screwing his head on one side and sucking his pipe assiduously, 'looking at me, I dare say you think I'm not much... but you, see, I must confess, I've had a very middling education; I wasn't well off. I beg your pardon; I'm an open man, and ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Volume II • Ivan Turgenev
... the house, I passed the open window, and glanced in, as was natural. 'Twas an old-fashioned bedstead, and there was David, red as a rose, screwing up the cord, while Mary Ellen, fair as a lily, was hammering away at the wooden peg, while the old lady stood by, ...
— Atlantic Monthly,Volume 14, No. 82, August, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... should answer it. How could he refuse her dear constancy and affection, yet how could he accept it? He had no hope of marrying her, he reasoned that it would be better for her should he even repulse her rudely. It would be like screwing the rack for his own body to do that, but he declared to himself that he ought. "She'll never marry at all, if she waits for you; it'll hinder her looking at somebody else; she'll be an old maid, she'll be all alone in the world, with no ...
— Jerome, A Poor Man - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... do,' observed Nenila Makarievna, stroking her cheek, and she went out after her husband. Masha leaned back in her chair, dropped her head on her bosom, interlaced her fingers, and looked long out of window, screwing up her eyes... A slight flush passed over her fresh cheeks; with a sigh she drew herself up, was setting to work again, but dropped her needle, leaned her face on her hand, and biting the tips of her nails, fell to dreaming... then glanced at her own ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... whole morning, a type-writing machine, and a screw-driver before me I could penetrate the mysteries of that useful mechanism. I shall not endeavor to describe the delightful sensations of that hour of screwing and unscrewing; they surpass the powers of my pen. Suffice it to say that I took the whole apparatus apart, cleaned it well, oiled every joint, and then put it together again. I do not suppose a seven-year-old boy could have derived more satisfaction ...
— The Enchanted Typewriter • John Kendrick Bangs
... house in a perpetual uproar where it is kept— when alarmed, or hungry, or excited by envy, it screams piteously; it is always, however, making some noise or other, often screwing up its mouth and uttering a succession of loud notes resembling a whistle. My little pet, when loose, used to run after me, supporting itself for some distance on its hind legs, without, however, having been taught to do it. He offended ...
— The Naturalist on the River Amazons • Henry Walter Bates
... to Leo in Bohemian. He frowned and wrinkled up his face. He seemed to be trying to pout, but his attempt only brought out dimples in unusual places. After twisting and screwing the keys, he played some Bohemian airs, without the organ to hold him back, and that went better. The boy was so restless that I had not had a chance to look at his face before. My first impression was right; he really was faun-like. He had n't much head behind his ears, and his ...
— My Antonia • Willa Sibert Cather
... stimulated by his scene with Semenitch, Tchelkache felt at peace with all the world. The future promised him substantial gain without great outlay of energy or skill on his part. He was sure that neither the one nor the other would fail him; screwing up his eyes, he thought of the next day's merry-making when, his work accomplished, he should have a roll of bills in his pocket. Then his thoughts reverted to his friend Michka, who would have been of so much use to him that night, if he had not broken his leg. Tchelkache swore inwardly ...
— Twenty-six and One and Other Stories • Maksim Gorky
... or two you'll be shooting up and down it like a bird. I used to do so myself. I got into the way of keeping a shoulder foremost, and screwing up as if I was a blob of air! Old age does make fools ...
— Donal Grant • George MacDonald
... for his next meeting. He had decided he must make a percentage in other ways. He schemed in all known ways. He would accept the ten pounds—but really, did ever you hear of anything so ridiculous in your life, ten pounds!—dirty old screw, dirty, screwing old woman! He would accept the ten pounds; but he ...
— The Lost Girl • D. H. Lawrence
... a peculiar screwing thrust of his left shoulder, the commonest trick among fighting-dogs in the northland, but one for which old Sourdough seemed totally unprepared, since he made no apparent preparation to withstand it, and as an inevitable consequence was rolled clean over on his back ...
— Jan - A Dog and a Romance • A. J. Dawson
... pretender, was Lavender; and the manner in which he is said to have proceeded was by first rubbing the foot over, for a considerable time, with handsful of oil, and then twisting the limb forcibly round, and screwing it up in a wooden machine. That the boy might not lose ground in his education during this interval, he received lessons in Latin from a respectable schoolmaster, Mr. Rogers, who read parts of Virgil and Cicero with him, and represents his proficiency to have been, for ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore
... were now in a fair way to wipe off the national reproach of poverty, and expressing my satisfaction at the happy effects of the union, so conspicuous in the improvement of their agriculture, commerce, manufactures, and manners — The lieutenant, screwing up his features into a look of dissent and disgust, commented on my remarks to this effect — 'Those who reproach a nation for its poverty, when it is not owing to the profligacy or vice of the people, deserve no answer. The Lacedaemonians were poorer ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... Englishman unbuttoned his overcoat and produced what is technically called a 'pocket pistol.' It was a flat flask of generous proportions, encased in leather, fitting into a silver drinking cup below, and with a stopper of the same screwing on the top. At any rate, however questionable its contents might be, its appearance ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 2, August, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... fear. So saying, she screwed up her lips, and taking her work, sat for about five minutes as still as a mouse. She then looked up, smiled and nodded at her mother, as much as to say, "See how well I can hold my tongue," still screwing her lips very tight for fear she should speak. Soon, however, she began to feel a great inclination to say something; and was glad to recollect that if she could but think of anything either useful or necessary, she might ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 3 (of 12) - Classic Tales And Old-Fashioned Stories • Various
... awry;—for I must mention That he had riveted his attention Upon his wonderful invention, Twisting his tongue as he twisted the strings, And working his face as he worked the wings, 25 And with every turn of gimlet and screw Turning and screwing his mouth round too, Till his nose seemed bent To catch the scent, Around some corner, of new-baked pies, And his wrinkled cheeks and squinting eyes 5 Grew puckered into a queer grimace, That made him look very droll in the ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell
... Screwing up his mobile face into a strange contortion, Spurge emitted from his puckered lips a queer cry—a cry as of some trapped animal—so shrill and ...
— Scarhaven Keep • J. S. Fletcher
... so reduce the range became imperative, and the steam-pressure in the trawlers' boilers was raised to bursting point by the simple expedient of screwing down the safety valve. For some minutes it looked as though the effort would be successful, and then the range slowly increased again and "short" after "short" was registered by ...
— Submarine Warfare of To-day • Charles W. Domville-Fife
... and down from their wings and bodies. The mercury had to be carefully re-filtered before work could proceed. Then, what was worse, when both your hands were occupied—one holding the sextant, the other gently screwing the vernier—hundreds of mosquitoes, taking advantage of your helpless condition, buzzed round and settled on your nose, ears, neck, eyelids and forehead, stinging you for all they were worth. Swarms of bees—a dwarf kind, with body in yellow and black stripes; fortunately ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... be done, and waited for the morning before she sent for Considine or the doctor. In the afternoon when Gabrielle and Considine visited him Jocelyn was almost good-humoured, laughing sardonically and screwing up one of his bird-like eyes while, from the other, tears escaped. He passed from laughter to tears quite easily. It was very horrible to see one side of his childish grey-whiskered face puckered up with crying and the ...
— The Tragic Bride • Francis Brett Young
... not as is they had contracted with the Devil for leave to sin, but that the Devil had contracted with them, that they should sin so and so, up to such a Degree, and that without giving him the Trouble of daily Solicitation, private Management, and artful screwing up their Passions, their Affections and their most retir'd Faculties, as he was ...
— The History of the Devil - As Well Ancient as Modern: In Two Parts • Daniel Defoe
... hour after supper, screwing up his courage to the point of bearding the Colonel in his den. He fumbled the door-bell at last, ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon
... room. And at lunch I'm let in with the family, if the visitors don't mind. They most always do, but they're too polite to say so. Besides," says he, smiling most condescending, "visitors are always afraid of me. It's because I'm so ugly," says he. "I suppose," says he, screwing up his wrinkles and speaking very slow and impressive, "I suppose I'm the ugliest bull-dog in America," and as he seemed to be so pleased to think hisself so, I said, "Yes, sir, you certainly are the ugliest ever I see," at which he nodded his ...
— Ranson's Folly • Richard Harding Davis
... you back much, any how, as kicking's generally best to be considered on. You see old Bradly is one of those sanctimonious, long-faced hypocrites who put on a religious suit every Sabbath day morning, and with a good deal of screwing, manage to keep it on till after sermon in the afternoon; and as I was a Universalist, he allers picked me out as a subject for religious conversation—and the darned hypocrite would talk about heaven, and hell, and the devil—the ...
— The Book of Anecdotes and Budget of Fun; • Various
... got into a boat and rowed, pulling silently, close up to the keels of the enemy; and gradually, by screwing in an auger, he bored the planks (a device practiced by Hadding and also by Frode), nearest to the water, and soon made good his return, the oar-beat being scarce audible. Now he bore himself so warily, that not ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... creaking, a tallow candle was burning in the room on the floor, my mother was there, terribly upset, but not oblivious of the proprieties, nor of her own dignity. I flung myself on my father's bosom, and hugged him, faltering: 'Papa, papa...' He lay motionless, screwing up his eyes in a strange way. I looked into his face—an unendurable horror caught my breath; I shrieked with terror, like a roughly captured bird—they picked me up and carried me away. Only the day before, as though ...
— The Diary of a Superfluous Man and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... felt himself growing pale with rage, and with the effort of screwing up his brain to make it clever enough to think of some way of being even with those boys. Anthea and Jane were as angry as the boys, but it made them want to cry. Yet it was Anthea ...
— The Phoenix and the Carpet • E. Nesbit
... and disorganised foe. Englishmen were quick to recognise the virtue of the man who solemnly sent the death of a dog to be recorded in the archives of the War Office; quick to appreciate the peril of his position; and I do not think I am screwing my string too tight when I say that the safety of Baden-Powell from that moment became a personal matter to thousands of Englishmen all the world over. Miss Baden-Powell at this time was travelling in Scotland, and at some out-of-the-way station she and her boxes detrained. ...
— The Story of Baden-Powell - 'The Wolf That Never Sleeps' • Harold Begbie
... chart-house to procure a telescope. Catching Joey under his left arm, he climbed the short ladder leading to the spar deck, and pulled it up after him, the bolts having been already removed to permit of that being done. Walker was screwing tight the door of the engine-room, in order to safeguard the fireman in attendance on the donkey-boiler. Now that the screw-driving was actually in operation, it very unpleasantly reminded Courtenay of the fastening of a coffin lid. Neither Walker nor the man inside could guess ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... inquired the officer, screwing up his eyes; and when Pavel silently nodded his head, he announced, twirling ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky
... variety of grotesque ways. He drew up his legs alternately, as if he were dancing on hot plates; he slapped his pockets, grinned, clenched his fists, ground his teeth, and bit his lips till he made the blood come. At last he sidled up to me, "She has been peeping and screwing those eyes of her's into this shop for something. It's all up with both of us, unless you can buy ...
— Japhet, In Search Of A Father • Frederick Marryat
... fourteen-penny leg, (This shorter was than that, and not so big), He had; and they, when meeting at his knees, An angle formed of ninety-eight degrees. Nature, in scheming how his back to vary, A hint had taken from the dromedary: His eyes an inward, screwing vision threw, Striving each other through ...
— Poems (1828) • Thomas Gent
... and push them up in after her. Her head was then on a level with Anna-Felicitas's berth, and she could see how Anna-Felicitas, having got her legs again, didn't attempt to do anything with them in the way of orderly arrangement beneath the blankets, but lay huddled in an irregular heap, screwing her eyes up very tight and stuffing one of her pigtails into her mouth, and evidently struggling with what appeared to be an attack of ...
— Christopher and Columbus • Countess Elizabeth Von Arnim
... Charmian, slightly screwing up her rather Japanese-looking eyes. "I cannot believe that anything really original in soul, really intense, could emanate from the British peerage. ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens
... I am correspondingly elated by the belief that it really is a success. No doubt the unnecessary explanations will have been taken out, and the flatness of the last act fetched up. At some points I could have done wonders to it, in the way of screwing it up sharply and picturesquely, if I could have rehearsed it. Your account of the first night interested me immensely, but I was afraid to open the letter until Dolby rushed in with ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 2 (of 3), 1857-1870 • Charles Dickens
... rescuer to be esteemed with grateful and friendly feeling, or as the cause of the loss of a dear friend, perhaps a lover. I felt very sure I would be able to tell at our first meeting in which light I was held, and, screwing up all my courage, I made a bold dash for the ...
— The Rose of Old St. Louis • Mary Dillon |
