"Spry" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "I was in Witless Bay for two holy baptisms, a marriage an' a wake, an' I just took the notion to step over an' see ye all in Chance Along. Pax vobiscum, all of ye! My children, ye look grand an' hearty. How is Mother Nolan, the dear old body? Spry as ever, ye say? Praise ...
— The Harbor Master • Theodore Goodridge Roberts
... a spry old lady for her age. If you don't believe it just try to catch her. But spry as she is, she isn't as spry as she used to be. No, Sir, Granny Fox isn't as spry as she used to be. The truth is, Granny is getting old. She never would admit it, and Reddy never had realized it until ...
— Old Granny Fox • Thornton W. Burgess
... was just as well for me that Lucia could not talk English. She might have used it on me, and already the left ear was talked off by Irma. Miss Cross stood for just so much conversation, according to her mood. Even if she were feeling very spry, our sixth-floor talk could become only so general and lively before Miss Cross would call: "Girls! girls! not so much noise!" If it were late in the afternoon that would quiet us for the day—no one had enough energy to start ...
— Working With the Working Woman • Cornelia Stratton Parker
... look very tired. It would be still harder for an elephant to be engaged to a cricket. I don't reckon the elephant's love would fit the cricket or that they'd ever be able to agree on what they'd talk about. It's some that way with Abe and Ann. She is small and spry; he is slow and high. She'd need a ladder to get up to his face, and I just tell you it ain't purty when ye get there. She ain't got ...
— A Man for the Ages - A Story of the Builders of Democracy • Irving Bacheller
... the air of it, but at present he thinks lying in bed the only safe course. Do thank dear Aunty next time you write to her for her goodness, and tell her that in my present state I should make her seem quite spry and active. A thousand thanks for the Pall Mall. I do not neglect one word of what you say; but I need hardly say that I ...
— Juliana Horatia Ewing And Her Books • Horatia K. F. Eden
... as you were," she continued; "you're getting on in years, and your step's a bit shaky, and your hairs are turning white. You wants your comforts, father—course you do. Why, this room—it was shameful when I come in, and look at it now!—it's a bit spry, ain't it now?" ...
— A Girl of the People • L. T. Meade
... Chirpy asked Mr. Cricket Frog, when he came back to the duck-pond the following day and found that spry little gentleman waiting for him on ...
— The Tale of Chirpy Cricket • Arthur Scott Bailey
... dancing about Frank, as spry as a schoolboy and poking him playfully in the ribs. ...
— The Boys of Bellwood School • Frank V. Webster
... children by her two husbands, both deceased, and lives with her youngest daughter in Beaumont. Their one-room, unpainted house is one of a dozen unprepossessing structures bordering an alleyway leading off Pine Street. Rosa, a spry little figure, crowned with short, snow-white pigtails extending in various directions, spends most of her time tending her small flowerbeds and vegetable garden. She is talkative and her memory seems ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves. - Texas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... lark, brisk as a bee; lively, animated, vivacious; alive, alive and kicking; frisky, spirited, stirring. nimble, nimble as a squirrel; agile; light-footed, nimble-footed; featly[obs3], tripping. quick, prompt, yare[obs3], instant, ready, alert, spry, sharp, smart; fast &c. (swift) 274; quick as a lamplighter, expeditious; awake, broad awake; go-ahead, live wide-awake &c. (intelligent) 498[U.S.]. forward, eager, strenuous, zealous, enterprising, in earnest; resolute &c. 604. industrious, assiduous, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... scornfully. "I say harnt! Old Mrs. Price, though spry ter the las', war so proud o' her age an' her ailments that she wouldn't hev nobody see her walk a step, or stand on her feet, fur nuthin'. Her darter-in-law tole me ez the only way ter find out how nimble she really be war ter box one o' her gran'chill'n, an' then she'd ...
— Down the Ravine • Charles Egbert Craddock (real name: Murfree, Mary Noailles)
... Mr. Harry's tame squirrel out in one of the barns that teases me considerably. He knows that I can't chase him, now that my legs are so stiff with rheumatism, and he takes delight in showing me how spry he can be, darting around me and whisking his tail almost in my face, and trying to get me to run after him, so that he can laugh at me. I don't think that he is a very thoughtful squirrel, but I try not to ...
— Beautiful Joe - An Autobiography of a Dog • by Marshall Saunders
... the hills in a snug tepee with her gran'ma. They were jest two squaws by themselves, an old one, and a young one. And they hadn't no brave to help 'em, nor nothin'. The young squaw was jest like any of you. Jest a neat, spry little gal, pretty as ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... shoes pinch," replied Judge Lynch, "you'll very soon have ease; I'll give you satisfaction, squire, in any way you please; What are your weapons?—knife or gun?—at both I'm pretty spry!"; "Oh! 'tarnal death, you're spry, you are?" quoth Silas; "so ...
— The Bon Gaultier Ballads • William Edmonstoune Aytoun
... called the latter "Little Prig;" Bun replied, "You are doubtless very big; But all sorts of things and weather Must be taken in together, To make up a year And a sphere. And I think it no disgrace To occupy my place. If I'm not so large as you, You are not so small as I, And not half so spry. ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 4 (of 4) • Various
... I live here days and sleep here nights. But if you want to take a look at the property before it gets a wetting you'll have to be pretty spry." ...
— Blindfolded • Earle Ashley Walcott
... my nets by the foamin' sea, Them little bare feet trot there with me, And a shrill little voice I love'll say: "Dran'pa, spin me a yarn ter-day." And I know when my dory comes ter land, There's a spry little form somewheres on hand; And the very fust sound my ears'll meet Is the welcomin' run ...
— Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse • Joseph C. Lincoln
... comin' to you one of these days, Miss, and that's what I was wantin' to speak to ye about. I understand, of course, that when you get there you'll be wantin' younger blood to serve ye. My feet ain't so spry as they once was, and my old hands blunder sometimes, in spite of what my head bids 'em do. So I wanted to tell ye—that of course I shouldn't ...
— Miss Billy's Decision • Eleanor H. Porter
... were unusually spry that afternoon. They kept starting up all about us, and dashing off down the draw as if they were playing a game of some kind. But the little buzzing things that lived in the grass were all dead—all but one. While we were lying there against the warm bank, a little insect ...
— My Antonia • Willa Sibert Cather
... you'll hev to rattle On them kittle-drums o' yourn,— 'Taint a knowin' kind o' cattle Thet is ketched with mouldy corn; Put in stiff, you fifer feller, Let folks see how spry you be,— Guess you'll toot till you are yeller 'Fore you git ahold ...
— Four Famous American Writers: Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, • Sherwin Cody
... "'Twouldn't be such an awful job to lift the door from its hinges, and if a body was right spry he could climb in at the window after he'd prised it open and the things could be handed out. Besides we've got all the morning's milk and there'll be the night's milk and to-morrow's milk, so I don't see that we shan't get along first-rate. There is more ...
— A Dear Little Girl's Thanksgiving Holidays • Amy E. Blanchard
... his head, "I hope mas'r'll 'scuse us tryin' dat ar road. Don't think I feel spry enough for dat ar, noway!" and ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 453 - Volume 18, New Series, September 4, 1852 • Various
... zoo o' Monday we got drough Our work betimes, an ax'd a vew Young vo'k vrom Stowe an' Coom, an' zome Vrom uncle's down at Grange, to come. An' they so spry, wi' merry smiles, Did beaet the path an' leaep the stiles, Wi' two or dree young chaps bezide, To meet an' keep up Easter tide: Vor we'd a-zaid avore, we'd git Zome friends to come, an' have a bit O' fun wi' me, an' Jeaene, an' ...
— Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect • William Barnes
... he said, in a voice shrill with age, "another year. Time to shingle old man Crabbe's roof again. I'm spry yet." And resting a lean finger alongside his nose, he gave sound to a laugh like ...
— Autumn • Robert Nathan
... is some sea-moss which I was taking to an old woman who lives a little further down the road. She makes some stuff which she calls farina out of it, and grieves bitterly that she is no longer young and spry enough to gather it for herself along the shore. My basket is full of this moss, and if we could wet it in the brook down yonder, we might sponge off the things with it, and then dry them with big leaves, backed up by those newspapers which ...
— Flint - His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes • Maud Wilder Goodwin
... be mighty spry, then," said the woodsman, lurching to his feet, muscles swelling, and nostrils spreading like a sleuth-hound's. "If you want caribou, you've got to take 'em while they're around. Old hunters have a saying: 'They're ...
— Camp and Trail - A Story of the Maine Woods • Isabel Hornibrook
... the trouble! I can't forget the habits of seventy years. I wish I could make-believe I was as young and spry ...
— The Blue Birds' Winter Nest • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... thoughtless careless little beast. One day he went to sleep with his beautiful long tail hanging straight out behind him. Along came Mistress Puss carrying a sharp knife, and with one blow she cut off Mr. Rabbit's tail. Mistress Puss was very spry and she had the tail nearly sewed on to her own body before Mr. Rabbit saw ...
— Fairy Tales from Brazil - How and Why Tales from Brazilian Folk-Lore • Elsie Spicer Eells
... old and snowy haired, but as fresh as a daisy and as spry as a cricket. His cheeks were as ruddy as Spitzenberg apples and his only wrinkles were the laughter wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. And such eyes! They were big and clear, and so bright that Bob could only look at them a moment and then turn away. It was ...
— Sure Pop and the Safety Scouts • Roy Rutherford Bailey
... is a pretty considerable smart horse," said the stranger, as he came beside me, and apparently reined in, to prevent his horse passing me; "there is not, I reckon, so spry ...
— The Clockmaker • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... spry, Caleb! Your gloves now—I shall need my own"—and a pair of stalwart knitted mits were forthwith drawn over my passive hands, in which my ...
— Miriam Monfort - A Novel • Catherine A. Warfield
... the dulcet instrument We favour, still the lilt will stop; And with a gorgeous chalice blent Oft lurks the tiny poisoned drop. I'm not so spry myself to-night; I'll try a dose of arrowroot. You'll own that Indigestion's quite A ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 103, September 3, 1892 • Various
... round to folks, then?" said Mrs. Salter. "The houses are pretty scattering in these parts; he'd be a spry man if he ...
— Diana • Susan Warner
... see ye! She's growed a bit. Come right along into the house — we'll have something for breakfast by and by, I expect. I didn't know you was here till five minutes ago — I was late out myself — ain't as spry as I used to be; ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner
... seemed to be real spry until it got out of reach, and then it got to going slow as the slikery covering wore off, and by the time it had worked into his trousers leg, it was going very slow, though it remained cold to the last, and he hailed the arrival of that oyster ...
— Peck's Compendium of Fun • George W. Peck
... be a sight-seer that morning. When he entered Buckingham Palace Road, the strains of martial music banished the gaunt specter called into being by the red cotton banner. A policeman, more cheerful and spry than his comrades who marshaled the procession shuffling towards Westminster, strode to the center of the busy crossing, and cast an alert eye on the converging lines of traffic. Another section of the ever-ready London crowd lined ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy
... inoppressive; active, nimble, deft, fleet, swift, spry; spongy, porous, well-leavened; incompact, loose, porous; gossamery, sleazy, flimsy, thin, unsubstantial; volatile, unsteady, mercurial, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... and that little woman in the corner, with two tears rolling down her cheeks, may bring her white dress and my work-box and thimble, and put two irons on the stove, and my word for it you shall both be ready by three o'clock, spry and span, ...
— Ester Ried • Pansy (aka. Isabella M. Alden)
... Boreland," he said at last. "But we'd better be spry about it, for it'll be Davy Jones' locker for us if we get caught in ...
— Where the Sun Swings North • Barrett Willoughby
... a few blocks," she announced. "Mebbe it'll do me good. I ain't ben feelin' any too spry these last ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... three or four stories of my own. I now take the liberty of laying these before the ingenuous reader. If he says they are dull, let me tell him (i.) that he has no perception of humour, and (ii.) that occasional dulness is the inalienable privilege of every free-born Briton. Many a spry wight thinks it his duty to be continuously funny and monotonously merry. Let a quiet and demure dulness be the foil of your side-splitting sallies. Learn to keep the peace, yea for hours at a time. If you are in a mixed company, ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... to introduce her," said Zhmuhin, "is the mother of my young cubs. Come, Lyubov Osipovna," he said, addressing her, "you must be spry, mother, and get something for our guest. Let us ...
— The Horse-Stealers and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... Mr. Silas Peckham, "Miss Darley, she's pootty much took up with the school. She's an industris young woman,—yis, she is industris,—but perhaps she a'n't quite so spry a worker as some. Maybe, considerin' she's paid for her time, she isn't fur out o' the way in occoopyin' herself evenin's,—that is, if so be she a'n't smart enough to finish up all her work in the daytime. Edoocation is the great business of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 31, May, 1860 • Various
... diamonds and things he has stolen from fools who hadn't revolvers, or runs away. I cut a slit in my trousers behind, and sewed in a pocket, and practised lugging the revolver out in a jiffy, and getting a bead on an imaginary brigand. I was pretty spry at it, and knew I should be all right. And it was just that revolver which saved me, as you ...
— Adventures in Many Lands • Various
... a good deal of it has been moved to the windows of the north choir aisle, between the transept and the Chapel of the Martyrdom, which are of great beauty, and should be examined carefully. In the transept itself are windows in memory of Dean Stanley, Dr. Spry, ...
— The Cathedral Church of Canterbury [2nd ed.]. • Hartley Withers
... of ninety who were spry enough, even in my bit of experience," said Spargo. "I know one—now—my own grandfather. Well, the best of thanks, Crowfoot, and I'll tell you all ...
— The Middle Temple Murder • J.S. Fletcher
... to eighty. He'd been retired a long time back, and his only duties now were little odd jobs that were easy enough, even for an old man. Not that there was anything feeble about old Blejjo; he still looked and acted spry enough. ...
— The Destroyers • Gordon Randall Garrett
... Spry, the puppy dog, probably carried the smoking-cap to the orchard; but all that is known with certainty is that Mr. St. Clair, the evening before, then wearing the cap, reclined upon several chairs with his head out of the window, gazing at the moon, and there fell asleep, and that, as on account ...
— Harper's Young People, February 3, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... went giggin' at night, us most allus fotched back a heap of fishes and frogs. Dere was allus plenty of fishes and rabbits. Our good old hound dog was jus' 'bout as good at trailin' rabbits in de daytime as he was at treein' 'possums at night. I was young and spry, and it didn't seem to make no diff'unce what I et dem days. Big gyardens was scattered over de place whar-some-ever Marster happened to pick out a good gyarden spot. Dem gyardens all b'longed to our Marster, but he fed us all us ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - Volume II. Arkansas Narratives. Part I • Work Projects Administration
... Maori, resided. Laming was an Irish-Protestant who had great influence with his tribe, which was numerous and warlike. He was admired by the natives for his strength and courage. He was six feet three inches in height, as nimble and spry as a cat, and as long-winded as a coyote. His father-in-law was a famous warrior named Lizard Skin. His religion was that of the Church of England, and he persuaded his tribe to profess it. He told them that the Protestant God was stronger than the Catholic God worshipped by his fellow countryman, ...
— The Book of the Bush • George Dunderdale
... from his earliest boyhood; who at fourteen had been present in four pitched battles with the Danes, and who, while yet scarce twelve years old, had charged the Danish line at the head of his guards and shot down the stout Danish colonel, who could not resist the spry young warrior. His mother was a sweet-faced Danish princess, a loving and gentle lady, who scarce ever heard a kind word from her stern-faced husband, and whose whole life was bound up in her ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... But, spry as I am for one of my settled habits and sedate character, I found myself passed by Mr. Gryce; and when I would have accelerated my steps, he darted forward quite like a boy and, without a word of explanation or any acknowledgment of the mutual ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... But she could attend faithfully to household affairs, and also do something as a private member to lead sinners to Jesus, even though miles away on the dark mountain; for she was an expert rider, very spry and strong, and only thirty years of age, and had a fleet, easy horse that could climb those slopes and fly across those table-lands and be back ...
— Elizabeth: The Disinherited Daugheter • E. Ben Ez-er
... faith, spight, wreathe, wrath, broth, froth, breath, sooth, worth, light, wight, and the like, whose primitives are either entirely obsolete, or seldom occur. Perhaps they are derived from fey or foy, spry, wry, wreak, brew, ...
— A Grammar of the English Tongue • Samuel Johnson
... gossip that's running ahead of my ken in this city just now, Calvin!" The mayor frowned, his eyes fixed on the departing car. His demeanor hinted that his thoughts were wholly absorbed by the persons in that car. "I hope you're spry enough to catch it. Go find out for me, will you, what the blue ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day
... get quit of this confounded Babel yet—and you must want somebody badly. So I send Rupert down. He'll do everything you want, better in fact than I could, for he is young and spry, and as good a boy as lives. He will see to everything, and you can get off as soon as you like. I think he had better go along all the way; his mother wit is worth a dozen stupid couriers, even though he don't ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner
... ain't no more than a child by the side of the chief. And don't you think this affair is going to be a circus. I tell you it is going to be a hard job. There ain't a dozen white men as have been over that country, and we shall want to be pretty spry if we are to bring back our scalps. It is a powerful rough country. There are peaks there, lots of them, ten thousand feet high, and some of them two or three thousand above that. There are rivers, torrents, and defiles. I don't say there will be much chance ...
— In The Heart Of The Rockies • G. A. Henty
... it will be a cholera-year, and we shall not want any), the squashes (small loss), and the melons (which never ripen). The best way to deal with the striped bug is to sit down by the hills, and patiently watch for him. If you are spry, you can annoy him. This, however, takes time. It takes all day and part of the night. For he flieth in the darkness, and wasteth at noonday. If you get up before the dew is off the plants,—it goes off very early,—you can sprinkle ...
— Humorous Masterpieces from American Literature • Various
... subaltern, when telling his story to his colonel afterwards, "never did I see so spry a bit of work as I did when I had said my little say. The Duke was ten men rolled into one, sir. Orders here, there, and everywhere; fellows sent darting about like hares. In a few minutes—minutes! ...
— With Marlborough to Malplaquet • Herbert Strang and Richard Stead
... pint about which I ain't sure. Though you've got the feet of a man, yit from what I gather yer heart an' yer head have eagle's wings, which'll make ye impatient to foller an old feller like me, who ain't as spry as he once was, an' whose jints are ...
— Glen of the High North • H. A. Cody
... be done to the death, what then? If you battled the best you could. If you played your part in the world of men, Why, the Critic will call it good. Death comes with a crawl or comes with a pounce, And whether he's slow or spry, It isn't the fact that you're dead that counts, But only—how ...
— Poems with Power to Strengthen the Soul • Various
... chipper and spry Indian Half-breed, thinks she is about 100 years old. It is remarkable that one so old should possess so much energy and animation. She is tall and spare, with wrinkled face, bright eyes, a kindly expression, and she wears her iron grey hair ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Georgia Narratives, Part 3 • Works Projects Administration
... Only see how spry my little one is at her jumpin'! "Ketch me!" she shouts, in her fun,—"if you want me, foller and ketch me!" Every minute she turns and jumps ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, April, 1862 • Various
... the sixteenth year of her age, Natively quick and spry As all young people be, When God commands them down to dust, How quick they drop ...
— Quaint Epitaphs • Various
... "guesses" and she "calculates," she wears all sorts o' collars, Her yellow hair is not without suspicion of a dye; Her "Pappa" is a dull old man who turned pork into dollars. But everyone admits that she's indubitably spry. ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., September 20, 1890 • Various
... ma'am, but I'm tol'able spry. I got to the door and into the front room before Phrony did; and when she see me at the bureau she gave one awful yell and fell down in some kind of fit. I took the money. The old woman was kind of clawin' the air over her, and sayin' 'Dust and ashes! ...
— The Wooing of Calvin Parks • Laura E. Richards
... at least three of these dummies will have something to do with the development of Cowperwood's story, they may be briefly described. Edward Strobik, the chief of them, and the one most useful to Mollenhauer, in a minor way, was a very spry person of about thirty-five at this time—lean and somewhat forceful, with black hair, black eyes, and an inordinately large black mustache. He was dapper, inclined to noticeable clothing—a pair of striped trousers, ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... sharply. "It isn't piloting this time. You can't steer the launch much while it's fast to the big boat. Best you can do is to fend off and then you're likely to get caught, and when you do get caught and fifteen tons comes down on you at ten miles an hour, somebody has got to be spry." ...
— Dick in the Everglades • A. W. Dimock
... father is out at the gate: Be spry as a cricket; he don't like to wait! Here's the firkin o' butter, as yellow as gold— And the eggs, in this basket—ten dozen all told. Tell father be sure and remember the tea— And the spice and the yard o' green gingham for me; And the sugar for baking:—and ask ...
— The Poets and Poetry of Cecil County, Maryland • Various
... appeared in their pond one day and explained that he intended to be in the neighborhood at least a week. In the first place, the Beavers, as a whole, were a busy, cheerful family, who did not like disagreeable folk for company. And in the second place, they were spry workers; and they had little use for anybody as slow as Timothy Turtle, who never did ...
— The Tale of Timothy Turtle • Arthur Scott Bailey
... Age begins a-stealin' Thoo yo' back an' knees, W'en yo' bones an' jints lose der limber feelin', An' am stiff'nin' by degrees; Now der's jes one way to feel young and spry, W'en you heah dem banjos soun' Git a great big swig o' de ole corn juice, An' w'en ...
— Fifty years & Other Poems • James Weldon Johnson
... left the Bay State; Then it wuz "Mister Sawin, sir, you're midd'lin well now, be ye? Step up an' take a nipper, sir; I'm dreffle glad to see ye;" But now it's, "Ware's my eppylet? Here, Sawin, step an' fetch it! An' mind your eye, be thund'rin spry, or damn ye, you shall ketch it!" Wal, ez the Doctor sez, some pork will bile so, but by mighty, Ef I hed some on 'em to hum, I'd give 'em linkumvity, I'd play the rogue's march on their hides an' other music follerin'—— ...
— Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor - Volume I • Various
... steps spry, parson. I'm agoin' to see that you're shadowed wherever you go. You needn't think you can get shy on the Bible again. It ...
— A Voice in the Wilderness • Grace Livingston Hill
... Jenny Hitchcock, as Dan broke off short, and the mistress of the house walked in. "Ellen," she whispered, "don't you want to go downstairs and see when the folks are coming up to help us? And tell the doctor he must be spry, for we ain't agoing to get through in ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... a feeling that this is going to lead to trouble," she said once more. Rusty Wren said, "Nonsense!" He was overjoyed at the prospect of having a spry young helper. And he hurried out to tell Mr. Chippy's son that he might start ...
— The Tale of Rusty Wren • Arthur Scott Bailey
... little scrub-oak tree and a big granite bowlder. They'll give you shelter to cross the ridge into a deep ravine that leads here where I am. You'll be out of sight all the way up once you hit the ravine. I'd—I'd worm along pretty spry if I was you, going down as far as the scrub oak—say, about as swift as a rattlesnake strikes—and pray any little prayers you happen to remember. And say, Pringle, before you go ... I'm rather obliged to you for coming up here; risking taking cold and ...
— The Desire of the Moth; and The Come On • Eugene Manlove Rhodes
... Smoke encountered a man carrying a heavy sled-load of firewood. He was a little man, clean-looking and spry, who walked briskly despite the load. ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... the Pyrenees, and the Caucasus. On inaccessible cliffs and rocky crags these graceful mountaineers make their home, and except when disturbed by the approach of man, lead a peaceful and harmless life. The chamois resembles the wild goat of the Alps, but is more elastic and spry. It is especially distinguished from it by the absence of beard, and by its black glistening horns, which are curved ...
— Harper's Young People, March 23, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... not free from danger. Great sea-serpents or sharks sometimes make it hot for them, but they are watchful, spry, and being "Folks," with power to think and plan, can generally look out for ...
— Lord Dolphin • Harriet A. Cheever
... she continued, evidently reassured; "your palm is moist and cool, and your pulse is regular. Well, you look spry, anyhow. I shouldn't wonder if you made up your mind to have ...
— A Romance of Two Worlds • Marie Corelli
... ed'ju-kate 4 4 2 4 faTH'ur fa'THur heft weight stoop porch stent task helve handle muss disorder dump unload scup swing shay gig or chaise cutter one-horse sleigh staddle sapling foxy reddish suple spry or supple ...
— English Grammar in Familiar Lectures • Samuel Kirkham
... breathlessly and ran to the kitchen door. A woman of more than middle age but, as said herself, "still mighty spry," approached ...
— Janice Day, The Young Homemaker • Helen Beecher Long
... your noodles that the boss don't know nothing. He gets there mighty spry sometimes. He's had too much of things lately to keep his eyes shut. We got to work pretty slick, ...
— The Return of Blue Pete • Luke Allan
... boun' he ain't much mixed up wi' 'em. He's another cut. Oh, they ain't a-foolin' me this season of the year," he continued, as Teague Poteet shook his head doubtfully; "he ain't mustered out'n my mind yit, not by a dad-blamed sight. I'm jest a-tellin' of you; he looks spry, an' he ain't no sneak—I'll swar ...
— Mingo - And Other Sketches in Black and White • Joel Chandler Harris
... hen, raised the goslings with the little chickens, never lost one, picked them and made a new pair of pillows too fine for any one less important than a bishop, or a judge, or Dr. Fenner to sleep on. Then she began saving for a featherbed. And still the goose didn't act as spry or feel as good as the gander. He stuck up his head, screamed, spread his wings and waved them, and the butts looked so big and hard, I was not right certain whether it would be safe to ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter
... mate said; "I reckon you are about as spry for a green hand as any I have come across; I had my eye on you, and you'll do. You go on like that, and you will make a first-rate ...
— Captain Bayley's Heir: - A Tale of the Gold Fields of California • G. A. Henty
... Sam is, though he does knock me round sometimes, when I ain't spry. The big feller shoves me back, you see; and I gets cold, and can't sing out loud; so I don't sell my papers, and has to work 'em ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott
... how he hangs on, don't it? Eighty-seven last birthday, an' spry as a man o' fifty up to—" He broke off to devote his attention to a couple of strangers farther down the tree-lined street: two men who approached slowly on the plank sidewalk, pausing every now and then to peer inquiringly at the front doors of ...
— Anderson Crow, Detective • George Barr McCutcheon
... couldn't climb up there, nor a boy either! It would take a pretty spry squirrel—wouldn't ...
— Dotty Dimple Out West • Sophie May
... stood a formidable array of pint pots, with the contents of which the men in blue had been refreshing themselves. On a packing-case in the middle of the room sat Short, his billycock hat set far back on his long, greasy hair, smoking a clay pipe with imperturbable calm; whilst little M'Dermott, spry as ever, watched the proceedings, pulling faces at the policemen behind their backs, and "kidding" them with extraordinary tales as to the fearful explosive qualities of certain ginger-beer bottles ...
— A Girl Among the Anarchists • Isabel Meredith
... Massachusetts patina. What if a number of these savages were grafted on Oxford? How would they alter the tone? We shall see. It will be an interesting struggle. Shall we hear of six- shooters in the High?—of hominy and flannel cake for breakfast?—will undergrads look 'spry?'—will they 'voice' public opinion? . . . I forbear: my American vocabulary is limited. Outre mer, outres moeurs, as Mr. Walkley might say in some guarded allusion to Paul Bourget. . . . I shall be sorry to see poker ...
— Masques & Phases • Robert Ross
... out the cattle, boys," advised Old Billee, as he spurred along with the youngest rider. For though this veteran more than doubled the years of the boy ranchers, he was almost as "spry" as any of them. "Cut out the cattle, and we'll look after ...
— The Boy Ranchers at Spur Creek - or Fighting the Sheep Herders • Willard F. Baker
... you'll deem quite absurd— His needle a space in the wall thrust the third, By the Rhine, wondrous Rhine; And then all so spry, he leapt through the eye Of that thin cambric needle—nay, think you I'd lie About wine—not ...
— Songs and Other Verse • Eugene Field
... result was an odd blend of classes and individuals worthy, it may be, of the new democratic era, but unprecedented. It was welcomed as of good augury, for instance, that in the stately Hotel Majestic, where the spokesmen of the British Empire had their residence, monocled diplomatists mingled with spry typewriters, smart amanuenses, and even with bright-eyed chambermaids at the evening dances.[1] The British Premier himself occasionally witnessed the cheering spectacle with manifest pleasure. Self-made statesmen, scions of fallen dynasties, ex-premiers, and ministers, who formerly ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... boy, who had sat on the ground staring at the new-comers, 'go tell your mother to be spry.' The little fellow went accordingly, by the side door through which she had disappeared a few minutes previously; and the Irish servant, planting himself on the vacated spot with his toes to the fire comfortably, commenced to erect of the ...
— Cedar Creek - From the Shanty to the Settlement • Elizabeth Hely Walshe
... are plenty of us about. You won't find the order more flourishing anywhere in the States than right here in Vermissa Valley. But we could do with some lads like you. I can't understand a spry man of the union finding no work to do ...
— The Valley of Fear • Arthur Conan Doyle
... meals is not quite so good as they commonly be, to pick a quarrel with the one that is trying to serve them so as that they shall be satisfied. But you've all been good and kind to me. I suppose I'm not quite so spry and quick-sighted as I was a dozen years ago, when my boarder wrote that first book so many have asked me about. But—now I'm going to stop taking boarders. I don't believe you'll think much about what I did n't do,—because I couldn't,—but remember that ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... spoke his short queue would be jerked back over his shoulder and he received a dozen slaps from his companions, all of whom were waiting for just such an opportunity. This is the object of the game—to catch a boy with his queue down his back. Some of the boys, more spry than others, would move away to a distance, and then as though all unconsciously, allow their queue to hang down the back in its natural position, depending upon their fleetness or their agility in getting out of the way or bringing the queue around ...
— The Chinese Boy and Girl • Isaac Taylor Headland
... such a chap," said Mr. Seabury. "Before we came down here he was as spry as I could wish, but now he does just as the Mexicans do. He sleeps every chance he gets. But come on in. I know you must be tired ...
— The Motor Boys on the Pacific • Clarence Young
... the custom of the country, of the bush at all events. We have no time for courting, scarcely any opportunity for it. We propose first—marry first if we can—and do the courting afterwards. We have to be spry about these things if we ever intend to get wedded at all. It is the result of competition. A great many men are hungering and yearning for wives, and there are very few girls for them to choose among. So ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay
... think we should never ha come to this," gasped the trembling man as he prepared to obey this mandate. "Hi opes has you won't lay it hup against me, sir, if Hi do as Hi'm bid: for if Hi don't jump spry the creeters will kill me, 'deed they ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... before the Bahnhof at 7.10, and it behooved the man of the party to be very spry indeed. He got their unlimited baggage on to a hand-truck, paid the cabman, and hustled the whole ...
— A Woman's Will • Anne Warner
... a finer spot just below us," he said—"a creek that is like no other that I have ever met with in the neighborhood. It is formed by the Alabama—is as deep in some places, and so narrow, at times, that a spry lad can easily ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms
... dumpling, and ever so fat, In running and climbing he's spry as a cat, And if the long ladder should happen to break, And he should fall down, what a crash it ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... the Fencibles joined the mob and terrified the farmers, who were ignorant of the actual condition of the pikes, into selling their corn at something less than famine prices. [Footnote: Admiralty Records 1. 579—Capt. Spry, 14 April 1801.] Guns hoary with age, requisitioned from country churchyards and village greens where they had rusted, some of them, ever since the days of Drake and Raleigh, were dragged forth and ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... didn't own it—which won't be long after we've slid—the sale won't be valid, and it 'll all go back to the estate. These yer orphans 'll git their house back agin, and that's enough for THEM; they're young and spry, and k'n easy earn a livin'. THEY ain't a-goin to suffer. Why, jest think—there's thous'n's and thous'n's that ain't nigh so well off. Bless you, THEY ain't ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... Tention! Form as before. Now then, prisoners, up with you and trot along spry. (The soldiers ...
— Androcles and the Lion • George Bernard Shaw
... there's nothing better for my trouble than tender young clover-heads," he replied. "So I think I ought to go.... What I came home for is this: We want some spry young fellow to come along with us and be a sentinel. And I'm going to take Billy. He's old enough now to make himself of ...
— The Tale of Billy Woodchuck • Arthur Scott Bailey
... "You're feelin' pretty spry now, but you'll be as meek as a baby calf in a little while. In this section a bridegroom is treated worse than ...
— The Round-up - A Romance of Arizona novelized from Edmund Day's melodrama • John Murray and Marion Mills Miller
... to be ninety, John, and as spry an old gentleman as a body'd wish to see. I don't uphold no man for committing murder, but I do consider the sheriff should have waited on Baldy to get mo' reasonable, like he'd done in time if they'd just let him alone—but no, sir, he reckoned the ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester
... pained surprise. "Does you mean I couldn'? Why, ain' you 'shamed of yohse'f talkin' dat a-way to ole Zack! I could a-tol' you, spry's yoh please, but it warn't good ...
— Sunlight Patch • Credo Fitch Harris
... along o' Cap'n Sammy," Tumm resumed, "on the swilin' v'yage in the spring o' the Year o' the Westerly Gales. I mind it well: I've cause. The Royal Bloodhound: a stout an' well-found craft. An' a spry an' likely crew: Sam Small never lacked the pick o' the swilin'-boys when it come t' fittin' out for the ice in the spring o' the year. He'd get his load o' fat with the cleverest skippers of un all; an' the wily skippers o' the fleet ...
— Harbor Tales Down North - With an Appreciation by Wilfred T. Grenfell, M.D. • Norman Duncan
... the same. We do not mind giving our time and our money, Or facing March blasts, or the floods of July; But till nettles bear grapes, Sir, or wasps yield us honey, You won't get snubbed men to pay up and look spry. ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, April 11, 1891 • Various
... know, for it chanced that mention was made of it this very day I am describing. Pons was all of sixty years. He was mostly toothless, and, despite a pronounced limp that compelled him to go slippity-hop, he was very alert and spry in all his movements. Also, he was impudently familiar. This was because he had been in my house sixty years. He had been my father's servant before I could toddle, and after my father's death (Pons and I talked ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... own father and mother were killed when I was eight years old, and the people that murdered them tried to kill me too, but I was a spry little tike and give them the slip. It was a bad country, and I like to have died, only there was a band of Navajos out trading ponies, and one morning, after I'd been alone all night, they picked me up ...
— The Lions of the Lord - A Tale of the Old West • Harry Leon Wilson
... being ashamed of myself I shouldnt have time for anything else all my life. I say: I feel very fit and spry. Lets all go down and meet the Grand Cham. [He goes to the hatstand and takes ...
— Misalliance • George Bernard Shaw
... oh!" under her breath, and, taking out her handkerchief, wiped the face and lips of the man in the cot, who was lying there with his uniform still on him. I suppose he had got it because he was a bad case,—the cot, I mean,—and certainly he was far from spry. ...
— Love, The Fiddler • Lloyd Osbourne
... and plates on the table, under Miss Hepsy's directions. A glad smile crept to her eyes at sight of Tom; it seemed ages since he had gone out. She looked timidly at her uncle as he shook hands with her, remarking she was a pale-faced thing, and needed work and exercise to make her spry. Then the company sat down, and Tom, if Lucy did not, did ample justice to Miss Hepsy's cookery. It was an unsociable, uncomfortable meal. Aunt and uncle ate, as they did everything else, as ...
— Thankful Rest • Annie S. Swan
... lazy, but he was not so spry as he was ten years ago when he was fresh from playing full-back on our scrub team. For a number of years he had been tramping around outdoors all day and had been inclined to play full front on ...
— Cupid's Middleman • Edward B. Lent
... there, by our hostess. That big black hat is hers. She's underneath it." Lucy saw a spry, black-haired youngish woman, very vivacious but what she herself called "good." James would have said, "Smart." Not at all like her brother, she thought, and said so. "She's not such a scoundrel," Urquhart admitted, "but she takes a line of her own. Her ...
— Love and Lucy • Maurice Henry Hewlett
... were about to start trouble, for already had the one they knew to be Si Kedge gained his feet, as he seemed a little more spry than his ...
— The Boy Scouts in the Maine Woods - The New Test for the Silver Fox Patrol • Herbert Carter
... day mendin' dog harness, when I hears th' dogs fightin', and I takes a look out th' windy, and there I sees that wolf fightin' wi' th' dogs, and right handy t' th' house. I just takes my rifle down spry as I can, and goes out. When th' dogs sees me open th' door they runs away and leaves th' wolf apart from un, and I ups and knocks he over wi' a bullet, sir. I gets he fair in th' head first shot I takes, and there be ...
— The Story of Grenfell of the Labrador - A Boy's Life of Wilfred T. Grenfell • Dillon Wallace
... out of the dock Fresh and spry as a fighting-cock, Feathered with sails and spurred with steam, Heading out of ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... by with their nets, and when they drew them in, the fish that had swallowed Tom was one of the haul. Being a very fine fish it was sent to the Court kitchen, where, when the fish was opened, out popped Tom on the dresser, as spry as spry, to the astonishment of the cook and the scullions! Never had such a mite of a man been seen, while his quips and pranks kept the whole buttery in roars of laughter. What is more, he soon became ...
— English Fairy Tales • Flora Annie Steel
... when they first appear in spring, before they have laid their eggs. This may keep the insect in check for a year or two when it first makes its appearance, as the butterflies are comparatively slow fliers, and may be caught without much difficulty by a spry boy, especially in the morning when the air ...
— The Cauliflower • A. A. Crozier
... "You saw how spry a creature he is, and if he should happen to drop down upon us from the branch of a tree, those sharp claws of his would play the ...
— The Hunters of the Ozark • Edward S. Ellis
... his anticipations were correct. Next morning Mazeroux came to the little flat in the Rue de Rivoli looking very spry. ...
— The Teeth of the Tiger • Maurice Leblanc
... own capabilities as a dancer. He rose and began to caper nimbly, executing a series of steps that were singularly swift, spry, and unexpected,—a good deal on the grasshopper's method. His tattered black hat bobbed up and down on his tow head; his brown jeans trousers, so loose on his lean legs, flapped about hilariously; his bare heels flew out right and left; ...
— The Young Mountaineers - Short Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... he wanted. But he was a dreadful uneven creetur in his talk, and I've heerd a smart young man that's one of my boarders say, he believed he had a lid to the top of his head, and took his brains out and left 'em up-stairs sometimes when he come down in the mornin'.—About his ways, he was spry and quick and impatient, and, except in a good company,—he used to say,—where he could get away at any minute, he didn't like to set still very long to once, but wanted to be off walkin', or rowin' round in one of them queer boats of his, and he was the solitariest ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II., November, 1858., No. XIII. • Various
... see they ain't swimmin' so spry, an' I allow they're gittin' some tired. Ther last time over ter our side o' ther river they come slow, an' I picks out ther kind o' pork I likes best, an' ez they land I nails what I want an' slits thar throats, an' I hev my ...
— Ted Strong's Motor Car • Edward C. Taylor
... of Mr. Godfrey, and having murdered him, his wife, and children, they took all the arms he had in it, set fire to the house, and then proceeded towards Jacksonsburgh. In their way they plundered and burnt every house, among which were those of Sacheveral, Nash, and Spry, killing every white person they found in them, and compelling the negroes to join them. Governor Bull returning to Charlestown from the southward, met them, and, observing them armed, quickly rode out of their ...
— An Historical Account Of The Rise And Progress Of The Colonies Of South Carolina And Georgia, Volume 2 • Alexander Hewatt
... old wommen keeps the penut stand but shes got a litel gurl and the gurl gives you most for 5 sents don't let the old wommen wate on you but just ask the prise and then sa sis give us 5 sents worth shes awful spry wen you git the penuts just come out of the big dore of the deepoe and keep strait down the rode til you come to our house you can tel it by the 4 cats if they arnt under the barn but you can ask somebody ware farther lives his name is Mister Gillander but these ...
— Punchinello, Vol. II. No. 38, Saturday, December 17, 1870. • Various
... you into your gown, mistress, I shall soon have the dinner spread and all in order. I be used to such work, and I'm considered spry upon my feet. ...
— Six Plays • Florence Henrietta Darwin
... won't have so long to wait now, even if I is feeling pretty spry and got good use of the feets and hands. Ninety-eight years brings a heap of wear and some of these days the old body'll need a long time rest and then I'll join her ...
— Slave Narratives, Oklahoma - A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From - Interviews with Former Slaves • Various
... then the flannels away and trot out the old linen duster, Pack the bob-sled in the barn, and bring forth the baseball and racket, For the spry Spring is on deck, performing her roseate breakdown Unto the tune of the van that rattles ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV. (of X.) • Various
... spry after your journey. Glad to see you. We'll become good neighbours, I guess," was his familiar but not surly salutation. Mr Ashton took it in good part. "Thank you, my friend, we have come along very well," he ...
— The Log House by the Lake - A Tale of Canada • William H. G. Kingston
... though you be done to the death, what then? If you battled the best you could, If you played your part in the world of men, Why The Critic will call it good. Death comes with a crawl, or comes with a pounce, And whether he's slow, or spry, It isn't the fact that you're dead that counts, ...
— Standard Selections • Various
... up to it. Of these one was the lieutenant of marines. He formed an exception to the general character won by that noble corp—for a braver and more gallant set of men are nowhere to be found. Lieutenant Spry was not a favourite either with his superiors or with those below him. The midshipmen especially disliked him, and he seemed to have a decided ...
— The Three Midshipmen • W.H.G. Kingston
... he, "ah! young sir, my 'air's gray, an' I'm not so spry as I was—nobody wants a man as old as I be, and, seeing as you've got the 'oss, you ain't got no call to make game o' me, young sir. ...
— The Amateur Gentleman • Jeffery Farnol et al
... was much too spry for Mary or Aunt Helen. He darted around back of them, and caught Bumper by the tail—and you know a rabbit's tail is the smallest part of him—and began pulling it. Bumper let out a squeal, and pulled the other way with all ...
— Bumper, The White Rabbit • George Ethelbert Walsh
... for his crumbs. . . . He is not at all pretty, like the Australian or European robin, but a little sober black and grey bird, with long legs, and a heavy paunch and big head; like a Quaker, grave, but cheerful and spry withal." [This is the Robin of ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris
... about whether I shall go. I am the most incurably lazy devil that ever stood in shoe leather—that is, when the fit is on me, for I can be spry enough ...
— A Study In Scarlet • Arthur Conan Doyle
... your guesses hits the mark, Tubby," he was informed. "The inn-keeper said one man told him that, while the bridge was wrecked, a few of the steel beams still hung in place, so that any one who was fairly spry might manage to make his way over from one side to the other. A number had done it, including the man who ...
— The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields • Lieut. Howard Payson
... drinking tea or knitting socks. They're dancing jigs and eating pink peppermints and ice cream! Their eyes are like stars, and Mother's cheeks are like a girl's; and if you think I'm going to offer those spry young things a brown neckerchief and a pair of bed-slippers ...
— Across the Years • Eleanor H. Porter
... nose. When I went a-whalin' on the Star of the Sea we had a first mate who could man-handle anybody, but even he would have had to use a belayin' pin to stamp his trade-mark in that shape. Now, the question is—could it have been this here Mr. Curtis? It reely is a pity I was so—so spry on ...
— One Wonderful Night - A Romance of New York • Louis Tracy
... explained, viewing his friend through a fog of thick, blue smoke, "I want that ye should take my girl! Once Janet is here, she'll be mighty spry 'bout gettin' in t' somethin'. I don't want her t' take t' washin' or servin' strangers, 'less she wants t', but when 'sperience an' money is floatin' loose, my girl ought t' ...
— Janet of the Dunes • Harriet T. Comstock
... we do remember things that ain't of no account; but I remember, as plainly as if it were yesterday morning, just how everything looked that night, when the teams came up, one by one, and we went to work spry to get to rights before ...
— Men, Women, and Ghosts • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... crossed her prutty head, I'll explain it to her clear enough—give me five minutes' chin with her——You all been complainin' it was so gol darn dull. Well, here's some excitement: a weddin' on the spry." He pulled his hand from his pocket and showed the dice in its palm. "This shack ain't big enough to hold the four of us men, not just at present," he said meaningly. "Three has got to get out ...
— The Huntress • Hulbert Footner
... corner they were spry, springing along the streets with their hands locked. It was not hard to find one's way about in Richmond then, and the tavern was not far from the open square. They came upon the tent, the smoky tin torch, the crowd of ...
— Old Caravan Days • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... neighbours and short with his wife. For, up in the apple-tree over his nest, There dwelt a fat spider who gave him no rest: A spider so fat, so abnormally stout That he seemed hardly fitted to waddle about. But his eyes were so sharp, and his legs were so spry, That he could not be caught; and 'twas ...
— The Glugs of Gosh • C. J. Dennis
... and spry, And brimming with lots of fight; She married a little man five feet high, And he died ...
— Cap and Gown - A Treasury of College Verse • Selected by Frederic Knowles |
