"Alligator" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... preacher wuz in de river fixin' ter baptize a man. Eve'ybody wuz singin' ole time 'ligion. A 'oman sung, "I don' lak dat thing 'hind you." Bout dat time de pahson en de udder man se'd an alligator. De parson sezs, "No-By-God I Don't Either." He turned de man loose en dey ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Tennessee Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... jauntiest of creatures, she's the daintiest of misses, With her pretty patent leathers or her alligator ties, With her eyes inviting glances and her lips inviting kisses, As she wanders by the ocean or strolls under ...
— The Kingdom of Love - and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... in this respect Charlevoix is not so credulous as Padre Ruiz de Montoya and the older writers, he yet repeats the story of the bird that cleans the alligator's teeth, the magic virtues of the tapir's nails, and many others. See Charlevoix, vol. i., bk. i., p. 27, Paris, 1756. [The story of the bird that cleans the teeth of alligators is very nearly true — ...
— A Vanished Arcadia, • R. B. Cunninghame Graham
... Drummond. They stopped at the Exchange Hotel and made known the fact. The polite manager, Eddie S. Riddick, Esq., soon saw Capt. Busby, and his gondola was chartered to carry the party to the Lake. Mr. Riddick made every preparation necessary for them, but one of the parties heard that an alligator was on exhibition near the hotel, and thinking that it was brought from the Lake, at once provided himself with a rifle and a large quantity of fixed ammunition. All were then ready and they left for ...
— The Dismal Swamp and Lake Drummond, Early recollections - Vivid portrayal of Amusing Scenes • Robert Arnold
... members of the Silver Fox Patrol an opportunity to enjoy another outing, this time while the North, where their home town lay, was swathed in snow and ice. The title of this next book will be "The Boy Scouts Down in Dixie; or, The Strange Secrets of Alligator Swamp." And the reader of this volume may rest assured that the adventure's befalling Thad and his jolly mates, Allan, Giraffe, Bumpus, Davy, Smithy, Step Hen and the Southern boy, Bob White, will afford them as rich a treat in the new story ...
— The, Boy Scouts on Sturgeon Island - or Marooned Among the Game-fish Poachers • Herbert Carter
... waist, and open at the sides, through which the wide Mexican drawers were plainly visible; a broad, brimmed, low-crowned hat, of Spanish manufacture, with a band of silver bullion, covered his head, and boots of alligator hide, heavily spurred, ...
— The Young Trail Hunters • Samuel Woodworth Cozzens
... copper, set in powerful presses, stamped upon them various patterns or impressions. The designs engraved on the dies were imitations of the texture of every known sort of fancy leather. There was alligator, lizard skin, pigskin, snakeskin and sealskin; even grained leather was copied. So perfect was the likeness that it seemed impossible to tell the embossed and artificially made material ...
— The Story of Leather • Sara Ware Bassett
... Penrod, "I will first call your at-tain-shon to our genuine South American dog, part alligator!" He pointed to the dachshund, and added, in his ordinary tone, "That's him." Straightway reassuming the character of showman, he bellowed: "NEXT, you see Duke, the genuine, full-blooded Indian dog from the far Western Plains and Rocky Mountains. NEXT, the trained Michigan rats, ...
— Penrod • Booth Tarkington
... very few years, during which he became expert in climbing, swimming, loading the rifle, and using the spear. He was bold enough to attack the raccoon and otter, and was not afraid even of the alligator; few of his age were more hardy, or could bear an equal degree of fatigue. His kind protector, who adopted him as his own child, took him over to England in the year 1840. But I have given you a long account. May Nikkanochee become as celebrated for virtue and piety as his ancestors ...
— History, Manners, and Customs of the North American Indians • George Mogridge
... before tennis. I first collected ferns under a crag in a deep glen. Mere amassing soon gave way to discrimination, which led to picking out a favorite fern. This was chosen, I now realize, with a woeful lack of fine feeling. I called it "The Alligator" from its fancied resemblance to my brother's alligator-skin traveling-bag. But admiration of this fern brought a dawning consciousness that certain natural objects were preferable to others. This led, in years, to an enthusiasm for collecting ...
— The Joyful Heart • Robert Haven Schauffler
... versions of this lexicon derived 'baz' as a Stanford corruption of {bar}. However, Pete Samson (compiler of the {TMRC} lexicon) reports it was already current when he joined TMRC in 1958. He says "It came from "Pogo". Albert the Alligator, when vexed or outraged, would shout 'Bazz Fazz!' or 'Rowrbazzle!' The club layout was said to model the (mythical) New England counties of Rowrfolk and Bassex ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... of Kupang Bay, which is called Babao. Late in the night they returned, and told me that they saw great tracks of buffaloes there, but none of the buffaloes themselves; neither did they find any fresh water. They also saw some green-turtle in the sea and one alligator. ...
— A Continuation of a Voyage to New Holland • William Dampier
... journalists at Washington, and was always asking questions. He was especially interested in the trial of Herbert, a California Congressman, who had shot dead at a hotel table a waiter who had not promptly served him, and he appeared to study old Major Lane, a "hunter from Kentucky," "half horse and half alligator," but gentlemanly in his manners, and partial to rye-whisky, ruffled shirts, gold-headed canes, and draw-poker. The Major had fought—so he said—under Jackson at New Orleans, under Houston at San Jacinto, ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... addressed herself to him with a pretty exclusion; and, pausing to explain her indifference to food, she left the selection of everything but the salad to Lee; she had, she admitted, a preference for alligator pears cut into small cubes with a French dressing. That disposed ...
— Cytherea • Joseph Hergesheimer
... this lovely land? Whip the wretch with rattlesnakes! Memphis indeed!—as if Memphis with its monolithic statues needed commemoration on the banks of the Mississippi! A new Osiris—a new Sphinx, "half horse, half alligator, with a sprinkling of the snapping turtle." At every forking of the roads, whenever I inquired my way, in my ears rang those classic homonyms, till my soul was sick of sounds. "Swampville" was euphony, and "Mud Creek" soft music in comparison! Beyond Dresden, ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... tan or white. Thick skinned. She didn't even see that I was telling her so to her face. Wonder what brought her here this hour with her creche. It's just a fad. If they got up a charity to make alligator bait of the black babies so's to sell the alligator skins to buy pants with texts on them for the Hottentots it'd be all the same to her. Something to gad about with. I wish I'd kept that ten ...
— The Ghost Girl • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... an alligator Come up to the air from the mud, Staring blindly under the full glare of noon? Have you seen the stabled horses at night Tremble and start back at the sight of a lantern? Have you ever walked in darkness When an unknown door was open before you And you stood, ...
— Spoon River Anthology • Edgar Lee Masters
... joyful news, carried the knight and the Lindwurm in triumph into the city of Bruenn, where they have ever since treasured up the memento of their former tyrant. The animal, or reptile, thus preserved, is undoubtedly of the crocodile or alligator species, although I regret it was not in my power to examine it more particularly, evening having set in when I saw it in the arched passage leading to the town-hall of the city where it has been suspended. I fear also that any ...
— Notes and Queries, Issue No. 61, December 28, 1850 • Various
... he added smiling, "are you know in some degree a separate race. They are scarcely looked upon as appertaining to the great American family. Half horse, half alligator, as they are pleased to term themselves, their roving mode of life and wild pursuits, are little removed from those of the native Indian, who scarcely inspires more curiosity among the civilized portion of the Union, than ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... parlor bore but little likeness to a cave of mystery. There were no shaded lights, no stuffed alligator, no Indian draperies, no black cat. On a table, in the centre, under a heavy and hideous chandelier with bronze gas jets, was a green velvet cushion. On this nestled an innocent ball of crystal. Beside ...
— Vera - The Medium • Richard Harding Davis
... the bay was a nunatak, which from its shape at once received the name of the Alligator. In front, apparently fifteen miles off, was another nunatak, the Hippo, and four definite outcrops—Delay Point and Avalanche Rocks—could be seen along the mainland. The sight of this bare rock was very pleasing, as we had begun to think we were going ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... the art of standing began with birds. Frogs sit, and, as far as I know, every reptile, be it lizard, crocodile, alligator, or tortoise, lays its body on the ground when not actually carrying it. And these have each four fat legs. Contrast the flamingo, which, having only two, and those like willow wands, tucks up one of them and sleeps poised high on the other, ...
— Concerning Animals and Other Matters • E.H. Aitken, (AKA Edward Hamilton)
... when—don't be afraid—a Catamaran caught me! If you haven't fainted (bless those pretty eyes of your's, my Emmy!) read on; and you will find that this alarming sort of animal is neither an albatross nor an alligator, but simply—a life-boat with a Triton in the stern. Yes, God's messenger of life to me and happiness to you, my girl, came in the shape of a kindly, chattering, blue-skinned, human creature, who dragged ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... a big alligator acomin' surgin' and heavin' down the river, tryin' to drink up all the wather; or ilse it's that bully old Comfort swimmin' along, wid a bone in her teeth," declared Jimmie, after he had had a turn with ...
— Motor Boat Boys Mississippi Cruise - or, The Dash for Dixie • Louis Arundel
... Fountains Abbey the other day. Look here, sir; angels' heads putting their tongues out, rolled up in cabbage leaves, with a dragon on each side riding on a broomstick, and the devil looking on from the mouth of an alligator, sir.[32] Odd, I think; interesting. Then the corners may be turned by octagonal towers, like the center one in Kenilworth Castle; with Gothic doors, portcullis, and all, quite perfect; with cross slits for arrows, battlements ...
— The Poetry of Architecture • John Ruskin
... like the camel, ship of the desert, distilling grapes into potheen in his hump. Nine tenths of them all could be caged or trained, nothing beyond the art of man barring the bees. Whale with a harpoon hairpin, alligator tickle the small of his back and he sees the joke, chalk a circle for a rooster, tiger my eagle eye. These timely reflections anent the brutes of the field occupied his mind somewhat distracted from Stephen's words while the ship of the street ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... and his sub-chiefs, Jumper and Alligator, Osceola learned the details of that day's action. About two hundred warriors had taken their station in the outskirts of the swamp to await the coming of Major Dade and his one hundred and ten soldiers. They sent out scouts who brought them exact information concerning ...
— Four American Indians - King Philip, Pontiac, Tecumseh, Osceola • Edson L. Whitney
... flavour is found in great abundance in the woods about the mouth of the river, and, for aught I know, in every part of the country. You perceive that I am constantly discovering new luxuries for my table. Not having been able to kill a crocodile (alligator), I have offered a reward for one, which I mean to eat, dressed in soup, fricassees, and steaks. Oh! how you long to ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... sir," he concluded, "I should have been a supper for an alligator to-night if you hadn't stuck to me. Those murdering rogues would have beaten me under easy enough, even if I hadn't been drowned before giving them the trouble. I've got to ...
— Jack Haydon's Quest • John Finnemore
... to do with this case?" I asked. "I got insured in the Wabash Mutual Internecine company against accident, and here I 've had an accident! Ivy poison is as severe an accident as can happen to any animal, except, perhaps, an alligator or a rhinoceros, and I think I 'm ...
— The House - An Episode in the Lives of Reuben Baker, Astronomer, and of His Wife, Alice • Eugene Field
... boatmen who professionally propelled the keels and flats of the Ohio, they were a class unto themselves—"half horse, half alligator," a contemporary styled them. Rough fellows, much given to fighting, and drunkenness, and ribaldry, with a genius for coarse drollery and stinging repartee. The river towns suffered sadly at the hands of this lawless, dissolute element. Each ...
— Afloat on the Ohio - An Historical Pilgrimage of a Thousand Miles in a Skiff, from Redstone to Cairo • Reuben Gold Thwaites
... of the curious lizard found in our Western Territories and in Mexico, and variously known as the "Montana alligator," "the Gila monster," and "the Mexican heloderma," is becoming ...
— Scientific American Supplement, Vol. XV., No. 388, June 9, 1883 • Various
... of the wonderful things that were sent. Two collars made of gold and precious stones. Two birds made of green feathers, with feet, beaks, and eyes of gold, and in the same piece with them animals of gold resembling snails. A large alligator's head of gold. Two birds made of thread and feather-work, having the quills of their wings and tails, their feet, eyes and the ends of their beaks of gold, standing upon two reeds covered with gold, which are raised on balls of feather-work ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang
... alone speaks his august master's language, a tongue not to be easily translated; in fact, perfectly proof against all prying outsiders. The one way to hoodwink old Fraser is to humbug him about the great work on Thibet. That is the one soft spot in the hide of this old alligator. We have gone carefully over the reports of your secret agent at St. Heliers. Make us square with him, Captain, let him have your orders to aid us, and he can get us first hooked on to this Yankee Professor Alaric Hobbs! We will jolly him a bit, and so, get an interview with old Fraser, and then ...
— A Fascinating Traitor • Richard Henry Savage
... shallow river, Where the panther walks to and fro on a limb overhead, where the buck turns furiously at the hunter, Where the rattlesnake suns his flabby length on a rock, where the otter is feeding on fish, Where the alligator in his tough pimples sleeps by the bayou, Where the black bear is searching for roots or honey, where the beaver pats the mud with his paddle-shaped tall; Over the growing sugar, over the yellow-flower'd cotton plant, over the rice in its ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman
... fumbling at the hasps of his alligator bag which stood by, opening it out and stooping to insert ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst
... could realise what it was, there was another movement just beyond, and this time he made out plainly enough the gaping mouth, prominent eyes, and rugged back of a great alligator, followed by its waving tail, as it dived down from a cluster of tree-roots out ...
— Nic Revel - A White Slave's Adventures in Alligator Land • George Manville Fenn
... 'em yarroman like 'it Hinchinbrook; my word, plenty of alligator sit down along of water. He been parter ...
— Australian Search Party • Charles Henry Eden
... on the jam and was clawing out the butt of a log with a rude sort of boat-hook. It slid forward slowly as an alligator moves, three or four others followed it, and the green water spouted through the gaps they had made. Then the villagers howled and shouted and scrambled across the logs, pulling and pushing the obstinate timber, and the red head of Namgay Doola was chief among them all. The logs swayed and ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling
... the largest and strangest lizard they ever saw. It was nearly two feet long, with a perfectly round body, a broad, flat head, short legs and a short, blunt tail. It was a chunky little animal, all covered with a rough skin like an alligator and dotted with square warts. It seemed very tame and followed Mary into the tent where she made a warm nest for it in the corner near her bunk. It was very fond of being petted and would lie and rub its head against Mary's hand. When Father returned at night he was much pleased with the strange ...
— Little Tales of The Desert • Ethel Twycross Foster
... nearly an Indian himself. His hair is black as a savage's, and if he goes a few months longer without washing, he will have the war-paint all over his face. That one standing beside him, with a nose like a hickory knot and with feet like flat-boats, calls himself 'half horse, half alligator, tipped with a wild-cat and touched with a painter.' The rest are about the same, so that I have a good mind to march right into the Indian country on a campaign against the whole set that have been in this business—the whole set that have been ...
— Oonomoo the Huron • Edward S. Ellis
... Clock occupies a position on a shelf near by, and all southern visitors greet the Alligator as a familiar friend, as all of us joyfully ...
— Cave Regions of the Ozarks and Black Hills • Luella Agnes Owen
... as a hole in the ground, And weasels are wavy and sleek; And no alligator could ever be straighter Than lizards that live in a creek, But a Camel's all lumpy And bumpy and humpy— Any shape ...
— The Best Nonsense Verses • Various
... rowers of Ulysses, M. Salverte, a recent compiler on the marvellous, is tempted to regard as an overgrown polypus magnified by the optical power of poetry, though we are disposed to give the credit to an alligator, or its mate, a crocodile; and this occurrence is not so fictitiously represented, as it is supposed ...
— Thaumaturgia • An Oxonian
... lizard was on the outside of a pane of glass, with a candle on the inside. There is, I believe, no class of living creatures in which the gradations can be traced with such minuteness and regularity as in this; where, from the small animal just described, to the huge alligator or crocodile, a chain may be traced containing almost innumerable links, of which the remotest have a striking resemblance to each other, and seem, at first view, to ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden
... harmonising well with a pair of flowing yellow nankeen trousers, and a pink waistcoat, from the bosom of which, amidst a large bunch of the splendid flowers of the magnolia, protruded part of a young alligator, which seemed more anxious to glide through the muddy waters of a swamp than to spend its life swinging to and fro amongst folds of the finest lawn. The gentleman held in one hand a cage full of ...
— John James Audubon • John Burroughs
... all about it. Secret no longer. Dr. MORTIMER GRANVILLE has told the Times how it's done. Consider it great shame. Takes the bread, so t' speak, out of one's mouth." Here the Sage gave a lurch and seated himself accidentally on a stuffed alligator. Seeing that his host was about to indulge in an untimely nap, PETER thought the moment had arrived to urge him to reveal his wonderful secret. "I implore you to tell me how you have managed to live for so many years when all your ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 101, September 26, 1891 • Various
... impenetrable body, and not the soft substance of which all the marine inhabitants that he had heard of were made, such as whales, sharks, walruses, and the like. If anything, it more resembled a tortoise or an alligator. A hollow sound was emitted when it was struck, and it appeared to be made of cast-iron ...
— The Wizard of the Sea - A Trip Under the Ocean • Roy Rockwood
... gallantry and candour go hand in hand. A legend of the envious East represents that a Chicago young man travelling in Louisiana wrote to his sweetheart: "DEAR MAMIE,—I have shot an alligator. When I have shot another, I will send you a pair of slippers." The implication is, to the best of my knowledge and belief, a base and baseless calumny. New York itself does not present a higher average ...
— America To-day, Observations and Reflections • William Archer
... and Shawneetown, whilst "gliding merrily down the Ohio" in a keel-boat, "navigated by eight or ten of those half-horse and half-alligator gentry commonly called Ohio boatmen," Judge Hall was lulled to sweet sleep, as the rowers were "tugging at the oar," timing ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13, No. 374 • Various
... then I tried the Hoosier States, where they are 'half horse and half alligator;' his figure was somewhat in the backwoodsman style. But none ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol IV, Issue VI, December 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... expressive gesture, scornful and abrupt, with which she neglected them might have been terribly wounding to a young man more sensitive than Dayson. But Dayson, in his self-sufficient, good-natured mediocrity, had the hide of an alligator. He even judged her movement quite natural, for he was a flunkey born. Hilda gazed at her master with anxiety as he deposited his black walking-stick in the corner behind the door and loosed his white muffler and ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... wagon, a light "prairie schooner" drawn by two stout horses, and driven by an old French Canadian. I wear a sombrero, silk neckerchief, fringed buckskin shirt, sealskin chaparajos or riding-trousers; alligator-hide boots; and with my pearl-hilted revolver and beautifully finished Winchester rifle, I shall ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn
... an Alligator.] There is a Creature here called Kobbera guion, resembling an Alligator. The biggest may be five or six foot long, speckled black and white. He lives most upon the Land but will take the water and dive under it: hath a long ...
— An Historical Relation Of The Island Ceylon In The East Indies • Robert Knox
... what had been in this one,—an alligator, maybe, or a snake. He's very fond of snakes. He says some of them are so useful. I try to be charitable, Fairy, and I believe I would give even Satan credit for any good there was in him,—but it is too much to ask me to be fond of a man ...
— Prudence of the Parsonage • Ethel Hueston
... have detached to the island of Malta 3,250 tonnage of transports not required for the services of this island; and I have given directions to Captain Bowen, of his Majesty's troop-ship Alligator, to remain in Mahon harbour ten days from the time of the embarkation, and then proceed for Malta, and follow the orders of ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez. Vol II • Sir John Ross
... adventurous and energetic spirit of their leader, remonstrated with him and proposed to return to their companions; but, disregarding them, he pressed on in his new enterprise. In wading a small stream, one of the men was carried off by an alligator, and a day or so after, another was bitten and killed by a rattle-snake. Terror seized upon his men, and all their persuasions proving fruitless, they determined to assassinate him and return. They did so, only to find the colony dispersed and nowhere to be found. After many hazardous adventures ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... double-breasted, broad-collared flannel shirt, tucked in at the waist in snugly-fitting breeches of Indian-tanned buckskin, while Sioux leggings encased his legs from knee to ankle, and his feet were shod substantially in alligator-skin. Mexican spurs were at his heels; a broad leather belt bristling with cartridges, and supporting knife and revolver, hung at his waist; a red silk handkerchief was loosely knotted at his throat, and soft brown ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... M. Larsoneur, advocate, member of the bar at Lisieux, and archaeologist, would probably supply them with information about it. He had written a history of Port-en-Bessin, in which the discovery of an alligator ...
— Bouvard and Pecuchet - A Tragi-comic Novel of Bourgeois Life • Gustave Flaubert
... light in his bedroom, Northwood examined the wallet. It was made of alligator skin, clasped with a gold signet that bore the initial M. The first pocket was empty; the second yielded an object that sent a warm flush ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science February 1930 • Various
... whom we cautiously inquired as to the route and towns, and by the assistance of our map and the stars, got along very well indeed, until we came to the Suwanee River. We had intended to cross this at Columbus or Alligator. When within six miles of the river we stopped at some negro huts to get some food. The lady who owned the negros was a widow, who was born and raised in Massachusetts. Her husband had died before the war began. An old negro woman told her mistress that we were at the quarters, and ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... Chinese who was once sailing in a canoe, either upon the river Pasig, or that of St. Mateo, suddenly perceived an alligator making for his frail bark, which it immediately capsized. On his finding himself thus plunged in the water, the unfortunate Chinese whose only prospect was that of making a meal for the ferocious animal, invoked the aid of St. ...
— Adventures in the Philippine Islands • Paul P. de La Gironiere
... dimly discernible; not articles of furniture, for these are few, but things appertaining to the craft in which Shebotha is supposed to have skill—demonology. There are the bones and skins of monkeys, with those of snakes, lizards, and other reptiles; teeth of the alligator and jaguar; the proboscis-like snouts of the tapir and tamanoir, or great ant-bear, with a variety of other like oddities, furnished by the indigenous creatures of the Chaco in every department of the zoological world—birds, quadrupeds, ...
— Gaspar the Gaucho - A Story of the Gran Chaco • Mayne Reid
... the Everglades is a true story. All that imagination had to do with it was to find names for the boys and arrange a sequence of events. Other characters, white and Indian, appear under names similar to, or identical with their own. Any old alligator hunter, familiar with the swamps and the Ten Thousand Islands, can follow the course of the explorers from the text of the story. It would be possible for two fearless boys, imbued with a love of Nature and the wilderness, to ...
— Dick in the Everglades • A. W. Dimock
... condolence. I am sorry for both of us, George, that we can't sit there under the trees and eat out of a basket and have spiders and ants in things and not mind it. Here we are in the land of Smithfield hams and spoon-bread and we ate canned lobster for lunch, and alligator pear salad." ...
— The Trumpeter Swan • Temple Bailey
... bel mango?" Her basket of mangoes certainly weighs as much as herself.... "a qui l bel avocat?," The alligator-pear—cuts and tastes like beautiful green cheese... "a qui l escargot?" Call her, if you like snails.... "Ca qui l titiri?" Minuscule fish, of which a thousand would scarcely fill a tea-cup;—one ...
— Two Years in the French West Indies • Lafcadio Hearn
... Within ten years the alligator has become an important factor to the artistic manufacturer. The hide, by a new process, is tanned to an agreeable softness and used in innumerable ways. The most costly bags and trunks are made from it; pocket-books, card-cases, dining-room chairs are covered ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 362, December 9, 1882 • Various
... of "Hamlet"—three Acts of "Hamlet"!—the first question started with 'G.tt. p..cha' 'Al..g.tor' and invited the candidate to fill in the missing letters correctly. Now I was morally certain that the words 'gutta-percha' and 'alligator' did not occur in the first three Acts of "Hamlet"; but having carefully re-read them I invited this examining body to explain itself. The answer I got was that, to understand Shakespeare, a student ...
— On the Art of Writing - Lectures delivered in the University of Cambridge 1913-1914 • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... rules of taste and propriety in conduct—and taste is often as strong to determine conduct as principle —as it is to make its literature acceptable to the other. If in the land of the sun and the jasmine and the alligator and the fig, the literature of New England seems passionless and timid in face of the ruling emotions of life, ought we not to thank Heaven for the diversity of temperament as well as of climate which ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... art lover, nor the Paris of the lover of history, nor yet again the Paris of the worth-while Parisians —but the Paris which the casual male visitor samples, is the most overrated thing on earth, I reckon—except alligator-pear salad —and the most costly. Its system of conduct is predicated, based, organized and manipulated on the principle that a foreigner with plenty of money and no soul will be along pretty soon. Hence by day and ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... agent of this society, Stockton sailed for the west coast of Africa in command of an armed schooner called the "Alligator;" and when he arrived at his destination, he took upon himself nearly all the difficult work of selecting territory suitable for the purposes desired, of buying land from the savage natives, of making them ...
— Stories of New Jersey • Frank Richard Stockton
... brush and roll the log; Hard pillow, but a soldier's head That's half the time in brake and bog Must never think of softer bed. The owl is hooting to the night, The cooter crawling o'er the bank, And in that pond the flashing light Tells where the alligator sank. ...
— Southern Literature From 1579-1895 • Louise Manly
... Victoria. The lady had a face like a thunder-cloud, and a form that, if whitewashed, would have outsold the "Greek Slave." She was built on springs, and "floated in the dance" like a feather in a high wind. Cato's mouth was like an alligator's, but when it opened, it issued notes that would draw the specie even in this time of general suspension. As we approached he was singing a song, but he paused on perceiving us, when the Colonel, tossing a handful of coin among them, called out, "Go on, boys; let the gentleman have some music; ...
— Among the Pines - or, South in Secession Time • James R. Gilmore
... April evening was damp with a hesitant rain. On the table, near the lamp, was a silver vase with three yellow tulips in it, and Cecil, wandering about, came upon a double photograph frame, back of the vase, that made her gasp. She picked it up and stared at it. Between the alligator edgings, facing each other obliquely, but with the greatest amity, were Mr. Thomas Denby in the fashion of ten years before, very handsome, very well-groomed, with the startled expression which any definite withdrawal from his potational pursuits ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... began advances to make it my property. For the full demijohn he would have parted with the tiki that had been his grandfather's, but I had no fancy for it. One can buy in Paris purses of human skin for not much more than one of alligator hide. ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... throwing himself back in his chair choked with ecstasy. Another was feasting with a graver air; he seemed to be swallowing a bit of Paradise, and criticising its flavor. This was too much for mortality—my appetite fastened upon me like an alligator. I darted from the spot; and only a few yards further discerned a house with rather an elegant exterior, and with some ham in the window that looked perfectly sublime. There was no time for consideration—to hesitate was to perish. ...
— A Budget of Christmas Tales by Charles Dickens and Others • Various
... Shore skirted by rocks; timber noble, and the forest clear of brushwood, enabling us to penetrate with ease as far as caution permitted. Traces of wild beasts numerous and recent, but none discovered. Fresh-water streams coloured as yesterday, and the trail of an alligator from one of them to the sea. This dark forest, where the trees shoot up straight and tall, and are succeeded by generation after generation varying in stature, but struggling upward, strikes the imagination with pictures ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various
... to actual measurement, the very biggest ichthyosaurian skeleton ever unearthed does not exceed twenty-five feet from snout to tail. Now, this is an extremely decent size for a reptile, as reptiles go; for the crocodile and alligator, the two biggest existing lizards, seldom attain an extreme length of sixteen feet. But there are other reptiles now living that easily beat the ichthyosaurus, such, for example, as the larger pythons or rock-snakes, which not infrequently reach to thirty feet, and ...
— Falling in Love - With Other Essays on More Exact Branches of Science • Grant Allen
... many alligators in these Louisiana waters and some very fierce snapping turtles. He had heard the negroes say that alligators were particularly fond of boys, and that snapping turtles never let go till it thundered. He had no wish to furnish supper for an alligator and there were no signs of a thunder storm. Hence he advanced with great prudence. When he had nearly reached the centre Horatio called ...
— The Arkansaw Bear - A Tale of Fanciful Adventure • Albert Bigelow Paine
... fashin.' And he turned to, and at it agin, as hard as he could lay on. I believe in my soul he would have nearly killed me, if it hadn't a been for a great big nigger wench he had, called Rose. My! what a slashin' large woman, that was; half horse, half alligator, with a cross of the mammoth in her. She wore a man's hat and jacket, and her petticoat had stuff enough in it to make the mainsail of a boat. Her foot was as long and as flat as a snow shoe, and her hands looked as shapeless and as hard as two large sponges ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... shouting and laughing of the operators and onlookers she heard piercing screams, as strong arms plied the alligator hide, and one by one the girls came running into her, bleeding and quivering in the agony of pain. By and by the opiate did its work and ...
— Mary Slessor of Calabar: Pioneer Missionary • W. P. Livingstone
... two small heads of lettuce; four medium sized tomatoes; one alligator pear. Place lettuce leaves on plate with two or three slices of tomatoes. Cover with rings of alligator pear cut very ...
— Stevenson Memorial Cook Book • Various
... looking round as if to find an object to decide him where to begin—"do you see that body floating down the river with the crow perched upon it, and that black thing flush with the water's edge which nears it so fast—that's the head of an alligator; he is in ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat
... of it, is not to be dreamt of; and our residence, as far as I can learn, is to be a half-furnished house in the midst of rice-swamps, where our habitual company will be our slaves, and our occasional visitors an alligator or two from ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... got a fish! I've got a fish!" he cried, as he lifted up the pole. Up out of the water with a sizzling rush flew the string and the sweet cracker bait, and the next minute out leaped the big, savage alligator that ...
— Uncle Wiggily's Adventures • Howard R. Garis
... extraordinary array of bottles—green bottles that lurked under the bed, red, blue and white bottles that climbed the walls and crowded the mantelpiece, tops of bottles that peered out of half-opened boxes, all ticketed and mustered in regiments. From the ceiling a baby alligator swung on a wire, blinking at them horribly with shining glass eyes; a stuffed owl sat in one corner; while opposite, a muskrat peered into a crow's nest. The closet and all available floor space were heaped high with paper ...
— The Varmint • Owen Johnson
... waitin', my Anita; In the Plaza, in the Square; Where the little fenced-in fountain Throws its water in the air; Where the old pet alligator stays, And winks his knowin' eye, And says, "Patience, Senorita," He'll be with you by ...
— Rhymes of the Rookies • W. E. Christian
... where Oongnairwah and Guinarey were stationed with their net. Presently little Deereeree, the wagtail, and Burreenjin, the peewee, who were on the bank sitting on a stump, called out, "Look out, we saw the back of an alligator in the water." The diver and eagle hawk called back, "Go away, then. The wind blows from you towards him. Go back ...
— Australian Legendary Tales - Folklore of the Noongahburrahs as told to the Piccaninnies • K. Langloh Parker
... Ports and harbors: Alligator Pond, Discovery Bay, Kingston, Montego Bay, Ocho Rios, Port Antonio, Rocky Point, Port ...
— The 2003 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... three, because I was on the edge of a swamp and there was a big alligator with his mouth wide open, ready to swaller me the minute ...
— The Hilltop Boys on Lost Island • Cyril Burleigh
... carved, and inlaid with bits of crystal, porcelain, mother-of-pearl, and jade, is richly enamelled and gilt. The stem, which rises ten or eleven feet from the bows, represents the nagha mustakha sapta, the seven-headed serpent or alligator. A phrasat, or elevated throne (also termed p'hra-the-nang), occupies the centre, supported by four pillars. The extraordinary beauty of the inlaying of shells, mother-of-pearl, crystal, and precious stones of every color, ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens
... catching a full supply of fish, some of which were cooked on the spot, brother Ed., in wandering about, captured a young alligator, and led it along to where sister Lu was seated, saying: "I've brought you a new pet, Lu." She adopted the little monster at once, and it was carried home, and turned loose in the ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, September 1878, No. 11 • Various
... distended jaws for the swimmer. The saint, of course, orders the beast back just at the moment when all seemed over, and is instantly obeyed. The characteristics of the monster could not be more closely identical with those of the crocodile or alligator, had the incident been narrated ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... standing, or to be enabled thereby to contract marriage with natives. Their intercessor and patron is Saint Nicholas, since the time, it is said, that a Chinaman, having fallen into the Pasig River, was in danger of being eaten by an alligator, and saved himself by praying to that saint, who caused the monster to turn into stone. The legendary stone is still to be seen near the left ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... disease. Happily, he had had a very good week indeed with his rents. He trotted about all day on Mondays and on Tuesday mornings, gathering his rents, and on Tuesday afternoons he usually experienced the assuaged content of an alligator after the weekly meal. Otherwise there was no knowing what might not have been the disastrous consequences of Helen's barefaced robbery and of her unscrupulous, unrepentant defence of that robbery. For days and ...
— Helen with the High Hand (2nd ed.) • Arnold Bennett
... was head mistress of the Diocesan School at Amherst near Rangoon, and her pupils were bathing in the sea when one of them was bitten in the leg by a shark or alligator. Alarmed by this terrible shock she lost her balance and was being carried away by the tide when her sister and the head mistress both went to the rescue. Miss Grace Darling had succeeded in getting hold of her when she too was bitten and disappeared under the water. The sister behind ...
— Beneath the Banner • F. J. Cross
... the Crocodile of the African, and the Alligator of the North American rivers, as enormous lizards; though they are now placed in a class by themselves, on account of their horny covering, which is so strong that it is almost impossible to pierce through it, and so smooth ...
— Twilight And Dawn • Caroline Pridham
... to powder the shillings or use them whole—I would have thought an alligator's or shark's tooth would scarcely require ...
— Some Everyday Folk and Dawn • Miles Franklin
... the Watson one boy child! Bye-o-baby go sleepy! What a big alligator Coming to catch this ...
— Slave Narratives Vol. XIV. South Carolina, Part 1 • Various
... No, he hadn't seen all of the world; it was bigger than they'd think. But he had played "gentleman's poker" with club dudes in London, he had hunted with niggers and potted many strange things from an alligator to a cow elephant, he had seen ...
— The Short Cut • Jackson Gregory
... few feet above it. I could not help having a fear that in those places there often lurked the fearful python; while some dark pools over which we crawled might, I thought it more than possible, harbour a hermit alligator ...
— In the Eastern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... dexterously mixing a salad of alligator pears. "Ah Foo, open some of those ports and let in the coal-dust. Have ...
— The Honorable Percival • Alice Hegan Rice
... jaguar's paw, it is able to remove the double armour of the creature, and to scrape out the flesh with the greatest neatness. It will even pursue the turtle into the water when not very deep. It also digs up its eggs; and, together with the alligator, the heron, and the gallinazo vulture, captures large numbers of the little ...
— The Young Llanero - A Story of War and Wild Life in Venezuela • W.H.G. Kingston
... and georgette and alligator pears; and Hosea Brewster was in the habit of dropping around to the Elks' Club, up above Schirmer's furniture store on Elm Street, at about five in the afternoon on his way home from the cold-storage plant. The Brewster place was honeycombed with sleeping porches and ...
— Half Portions • Edna Ferber
... surrounding forests. The rude warriors were filled with sentiments of awe. Not a bark dimpled the waters. No living thing was to be seen but the wild tenants of the wilderness, the unwieldy boa, and the loathsome alligator basking on the borders of the stream. The trees towering in wide-spread magnificence towards the heavens, the river rolling on in its rocky bed as it had rolled for ages, the solitude and silence of the scene, broken only by the hoarse fall of waters, or the faint rustling ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... thoughts of desperate men! I do remember an apothecary,— And hereabouts he dwells,—which late I noted In tatter'd weeds, with overwhelming brows, Culling of simples; meagre were his looks, Sharp misery had worn him to the bones; And in his needy shop a tortoise hung, An alligator stuff'd, and other skins Of ill-shaped fishes; and about his shelves A beggarly account of empty boxes, Green earthen pots, bladders, and musty seeds, Remnants of packthread, and old cakes of roses, Were thinly scatter'd, to ...
— Romeo and Juliet • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... notes of accordion and fiddle, the evening would pass in rude and harmless jollity, unless too many tin cups or gourds of fiery liquor excited the always ready pugnacity of the men. They were ready to brag of their valor, and to put their boasts to the test. They were "half horse, half alligator," according to their own favorite expression, equally prepared with knife or pistol, fist, or the trained thumb that gouged out an antagonist's eye, unless he speedily called for mercy. "I'm a Salt River roarer!" bawled one in the presence ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot
... alligator swung from the ceiling, and the lighting of the room was effected by means of two or three swinging lamps, that burnt dimly blue, and made the place look sepulchral enough to satisfy the most morbid cravings for ...
— Jack Harkaway and his son's Escape From the Brigand's of Greece • Bracebridge Hemyng
... Indians of the Pampas Who would dine upon their grampas, From every beast and vermin That to think of sets us squirmin', From every snake that tries on The traveller his p'ison, From every pest of Natur', Likewise the alligator, And from two things left behind him,— (Be sure they'll try to find him,) The tax-bill and assessor,— Heaven keep the great Professor May he find, with his apostles, That the land is full of fossils, That the waters swarm with fishes Shaped according to his wishes, That every pool ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... calico gown, reaching to the ankles, and her hair, instead of hanging long and straight down her back, as is customary with Indian women, was twisted into a knot, and held together on the crown of the head by an elegant comb. A pair of gold ear-rings, bracelets of the same metal, and half-boots of alligator's skin and scarlet cloth, completed her graceful exterior. From her girdle was suspended a pocket knife of considerable length, and in her hand she carried an empty basket. Her step could be called neither walking nor running; it was an odd ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... Kentucky jean trousers, boots, straw hats, two shirts, and jean hunting shirts—all thin, to be sure, but warm and comfortable enough for a day's hunt. We trudged about until noon, firing but once, and then at an alligator in a bayou, whose coat of mail laughed to scorn our puny bullets, and, barely flirting his horny tail in contempt, he slid from his perch back into the greasy and turbid stream. Seating ourselves upon a dead cotton-wood, we made a slight repast upon some ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley
... been a tendency in recent years among Retriever breeders to fall into the common error of exaggerating a particular point, and of breeding dogs with a head far too fine and narrow—it is what has been aptly called the alligator head—lacking in brain capacity and power of jaw. A perfect head should be long and clean, but neither weak nor snipy. The eye should be placed just halfway between the occiput and the tip ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton |
